friday check-in

Well, we've made it to another weekend, my friends. I never know what to write for the opening sentence and paragraph. Whew, that's over.

Today Brett is taking a half-day so that we can go to multiple home stores and pick out stuff for the new house. We need to pick out countertops, kitchen appliances, a backsplash, bathroom vanity, and about 500 other things that I'm not remembering right now. We will then talk over our selections with our realtor-contractor the beginning of next week, and then he'll write up a proposal. I'm not explaining this well, but basically it has to do with the conventional rehabilitation loan - we need to see if the improvements we plan to do will add value to the home, and how much we can get from that loan to do the improvements.

So Stella will be napping and hanging out at Mom and Dad's while we traipse about in Home Depot, Lowe's, etc. Right now in the new house there's laminate butcher block and rather old cabinets. We would like to replace the fake butcher block with a laminate countertop and just have the cabinets repainted for now. Eventually we would like to replace the cabinets and install granite countertops, but since we may reconfigure the kitchen setup in a few years, it wouldn't be wise to do granite now because we would have to tear it out anyway. My heart was set on granite, but I can see the value of waiting because of the aforementioned reasons. As I hate laminates that try too hard to replicate the look of granite, I would like a solid color with maybe just a touch of a design to it. For example, something like this (not that color, but you get my drift):

For a backsplash, we like subway tiles or glass tiles. We are fans of the herringbone pattern, as shown below, and the offset joint pattern.

I've started pinning ideas on Pinterest for paint colors. I think we are going to go for charcoal and pewter grays and dark gray-blues. When I say gray-blue, I am thinking of Cape Cod houses in dark, stormy blues. I think gray is a nice calming backdrop to add in little pops of fun colors when it comes to accessories. I think the white trim will make everything pop, too. Apparently I like the word pop.

Our closing date is set for June 21st, but the underwriters may need another week, so it might not be until the end of June. We are getting antsy! We are also not looking forward to getting our current place ready and finding renters. Prayers appreciated!

Pregnancy update: I'm 14 weeks. It was fun hearing the baby's heartbeat - 140 bpm. I am not one to read into old wives' tales about heartbeat determining gender. The dr. said it's just 50/50, while ultrasound is 80-90% accurate. Speaking of which, I made my ultrasound appointment for 19 weeks on June 20th. Hopefully baby cooperates, and we can see if we're having a boy or girl. 

In closing, a couple pictures of our almost-two-year old. AHH!

Practicing holding up two fingers for turning two; she likes her new owl shirt so much, that she wanted to wear it two days in a row; she is also into accessorizing, so we cannot be without a necklace and hair clip 

Mom, I know the natural light is so good right now, but I'm tired of smiling.

One more thing: If you leave a comment and select the Anonymous option, will you still type your name somewhere in the body of the comment so I know who it is? While I love guessing, I'm never quite sure who it is. Unless you truly wish to remain anonymous, which is kind of creepy, don't leave your name.