House Update!!

We are making progress on our house!! YAY!!
The past few weeks have been rain free - good for house building, bad for everyone else, so a lot has been done!

Here are pictures from the framing of the foundation.

We went out a few days later and they had done the plumbing and electrical!

I woke up super early on our first cold morning and watched the concrete get poured!! I could barley sleep the night before, I was so excited! Today our property went from a lot to a home! And it is so wonderful to say home now! It makes it so much more real!!

On our way out of town to Colorado before Thanksgiving we stopped to see the dried foundation! Michael had not seen it yet so he was very excited! It was so smooth and looked great! We can just picture what our stained concrete will look like!

The morning after we got home from Colorado we could not wait to go see the progress! It was so great to see how much had been done!

We walked into our home on Sunday! We were able to completely walk through each room and know exactly what it will be. Crazy to think we made about 40 different plans and finally decided on 1 and here it is! It is perfect for us!

I really wanted to go out and see the progress tonight, but Kurk Homes surprised me and added pictures of our house from today!! Lucky for Michael since I was bothering him like crazy to go out there tonight!

Tomorrow they start putting in the windows and Monday the roof goes on!! We are so excited for this step in our lives and are so glad we can share it with everyone!

I will do my best keeping everyone updated!

Oh Hey November!!

So maybe I fell out of the blogging world for the past few months, but I am hoping back in! 

Our house update!

The last time I blogged was the end of June and a lot has happened since then. 

Let me start off by saying this was a blessing! We were going to be closing on our original lot on Monday morning and this was Thursday night. About a week and half after my last post, Magnolia got about 20 inches of rain in 24 hours!! We decided to go out to the lot to see how the water ran off and to just see what the neighborhood would be like with all this rain. (After seeing Cypress go underwater we had to see what was in store for us) When we got there, we were devastated to say the least. The entire lot was underwater, like water up to mid calf! A FISH SWAM BY ME!! 

A few tears later and a yummy Mexican dinner we were begging to get out of this! And since this post goes on, we got out! We thank God for this as we would have been sick if we had started building and then got a rain like that and our house be underwater!! 

We found a new lot in the same neighborhood, but in a different section. It is bigger, WAY more trees, and a few houses down from the greatest park the dogs have ever seen! We have met our neighbors and they are very nice and super helpful already!

We cleared only the house site and driveway about 2 weeks ago and then got another good rain. But this time, the lot didn't hold any water and NO FISH luckily!! We brought in dirt for the pad and we are setting forms for the foundation today. Next week the concrete will be poured and this process officially starts!! YAY!

Since we only cleared the pad site and driveway, we have a jungle to get through ourselves! Michael has a friend who will be helping him underbrush the front and back yard. Thank goodness! The past two weekends we have spent cutting trees down, chopping wood, cutting vines out of trees, you name it and we are doing it! Thank you so much to his parents because we could not do it without them!! And I now know Michael's dad is a boss at the chainsaw!

The dogs love their yard. I call it a jungle, but I know soon it will be a great yard! They try to be helpful by pulling on vines that are at their level. Such great little helpers!

We took a break and went to the park and it was perfect! We had been sad about leaving Lake Bryan behind, but I know this will end up being great for them! Sadly I can not run out there, but the dogs can and that is a huge plus for us!

I will keep updating as things happen :]

I am so glad all of you can follow us in this fun process!!

Bye Bye June!

Already a month into Houston living and it has flown by! 

What have we been up to:

Michael started his job! And he LOVES it!! It is exactly what he was hoping for and looking for with his first job. He spends about 75% of his time in the field and 25% in the office or writing. A perfect balance for him. Sadly it is summer in Texas, so it is beyond hot, but as October comes around this will become an even better job. The only big change for Michael is now he loves the weekends and all he wants to do is relax and veg since all week he is going and going. Just wait till we have the house and then he will never have veg time haha!

Coney 2012! Samson had a hot spot on his back right leg that wouldn't go away. It started as a bite and turned into an open sore. It was so sad and we could not get him to stop licking so as a last resort we turned to the cone. We tried bandaids but he and Bella would take them off, we tried these yucky tasting strips that we were told would work and he took those off with no issues, so our last idea was the cone. He hated every second of wearing it and would run into everything, but we are happy to say that he is all better!!!

Bella is the Queen! We are living with Michael’s parents as the house is being built so there are 4 labs which is beyond crazy!!! But Bella – she is nuts! She loves having all this room to play, all her friends in one place ready to play, and endless amounts of water in the pond to drink. Bella plays from about 6:30am to 9:30pm everyday and then literally passes out! I am not talking about sleeping, I am talking about she can not even open her eyes, she is that tired and it is wonderful!

We are under contract on the house!!! YAY!! We signed our contract last week! After about 20 floor plan changes and exterior changes we settled on a plan and are moving on! We now spend our evenings looking at appliances, colors for the exterior of the house, paint colors for the inside of the house, about a trillion other things that go into a custom home, and I am now getting to think of the Pinterest ideas I want to add to the house! Hopefully within the next 6 weeks we will start the actual building!!!! We have a lot of things that have to happen first, but I can not wait for the clearing of the lot to begin (just where the house is going-we are keeping as many trees as we can) which will start the actual building process.

Michael’s parents bought a house in Colorado!!!! YES!!! We are very excited! His parents left today to spend 2 weeks enjoying the new house and the beautiful weather! Michael and I can not wait to get up there in the winter and enjoy this new slice of heaven!

Aquariums. No exclamation point as this is not my thing. The boys LOVE them though! Michael has a fresh water tank and Andy has a salt water tank at the house. They are downstairs in the kitchen/kitchen eating area so we all get to enjoy them when we want. I will say I like Andy’s aquarium. The colorful coral and pretty fish are really neat but SO MUCH WORK! Andy had these adorable clown fish, but they didn't make it :[ his coral though is doing great and is multiplying! 

Meet Pearl! A good friend of Michael’s parents got a new lab puppy and brought her over to play! She reminds us so much of Bella! She has a spunky personality and doesn't back away from anything! She stepped in the water bowl and the fun began!

Bella and her favorite thing, FOOD! Michael found a deal online with the dog food and when it was delivered this is what she did with it. 

Our month of July is going to be BUSY!! My birthday is the 7^th, Michael’s birthday is the 14^th, Michael’s mom’s birthday is the 22^nd, Michael is going to Salt Lake City for 3 days the next week, we are going to Port Aransas with friends the weekend he gets back, and then the following weekend is August! WOW this summer is flying by!

All good things come to an end..

Last week ended the Lake Bryan era for our sweet pups! Both dogs absolutely LOVE this place and could walk themselves the few miles there and back by memory if they one day decided to just take themselves there. (Luckily this never happened and never would as both dogs do not run away and just stick the our yard) When we would turn left onto Sandy Point Road they would start to go crazy in the back seat and the craziness got more intense the closer we got. I know soon I am going to miss the excitement they had, but now I have to find some place new for them to love like they did the lake. I just have no idea how/where I will find such a place.

I thought I would share some of my favorites from the MANY trips we have taken to lake Bryan.

And here are some from our last day, poor pups had no idea it was going to be their last time :[

These two sweeties LOVE Lake Bryan and I hope we can find another place in the Magnolia area that they can love just as much!

Here are some other lake posts and pictures here, here, and here.

Sorry about the picture over load!