"You're WHAT???"

These were the first words out of my Mom's mouth when I told her 2 weeks ago that we are moving! Again! Poor Mom - she's getting too old. And her address book has no more room for new addresses for us.

So, that's our big news. We're moving from Maryland to Minneapolis! I accepted a new and exciting job offer from my current employer that takes us back to the Twin Cities. Since we lived there for many years (and it's where Joe and I met!), I am excited to be getting back. I think Minneapolis is such a great city with tons of stuff for us to do.

Max has been very contemplative about the thought of moving again. Today he spent some time out on the deck sorting through it all:
On the one hand, he has this great 1-acre area to run around and roll around in.....with alpacas to bark at! On the other hand, being an American Eskimo, the thought of sub-arctic winters and LOTS of snow is also very appealing. Grandma #1 (my Mom) is here on the East coast; Grandma #2 (Joe's Mom) is in Minnesota. So, he thinks.

He's clearly not looking forward to yet another cross-country car trip. The poor boy has been driven from Minneapolis to Phoenix, Phoenix to Maryland, and now from Maryland to Minneapolis. Spike is even more traveled, having gone from Maryland to Minneapolis, Minneapolis to Phoenix, Phoenix to Maryland and now back to Minneapolis.

We had to put the master bedroom/master bathroom remodeling project on the fast track these past few weeks, and have been so busy getting everything else else ready to get the house on the market.

We'll be in Maryland until we get an offer on the house; then we will move. Keep your fingers crossed that it happens sooner rather than later!

And if you want to buy a house, let us know!

Big Difference!

The old carpet & padding was taken up:
New padding was put down:
And in goes the new carpet!
Makes a huge difference. We re-did the entire upper level, including the new master bedroom. It now feels like one room.

I know if I were a potential buyer, I would be pleased! (that's a subtle hint).

We promptly proceeded to go to Lowes and bought six 9' x 12' rolls of plastic to put down until Mom comes and gets the pets this weekend.

Nothing A Little Duct Tape Can't Fix!

Er....I think this will be noticeable.

I hate squeaky floors. So I decided to fix them. Because I haven't done enough demolishing yet.
The good news is by drilling in a few screws, the floors don't squeak anymore!

The better news? We are getting new carpeting installed tomorrow anyways :)

And Lights!

Inspired by the plumber's work yesterday, we got the new mirror, light fixture, shower curtain....what a busy day!
But it is turning out very nice, and we are almost done. Seal the grout and install the trim molding, and we are finished!

Nice as it is turning out, I think this remodel project was a bit more to take on that we expected. It was a TON of work, and nearly every weekend since January has been devoted to some aspect of this.

New carpeting for the entire upper floor, which includes the new master bedroom, will be installed on Tuesday. YAY!

Running Water in the Bathroom!

In a very exciting development on the master bedroom/master bath project, the plumbers were out today and installed the new vanity! Look!!
From the other angle!

Notice (Tree!) that the toilet is out of the bathtub and fully functional! I did that myself yesterday :)

Progress!! Lots more to do to get things ready for The Big Secret Event. Stay tuned!

How Do You Spell FUN??!!

Well, it sure as hell isn't G-R-O-U-T........

More progress this weekend on the master bed/bath project. We grouted the bathroom floors, and are really pleased with how the whole floor turned out!
I think we can put this in the "Jeff is pretty good at this!" column. Unlike drywalling and matching up walls so you can't notice the joints....

We also painted the bathroom and the closet, continuing the color (officially called wooden Spoon) from the bedroom.

We're under a bit more pressure now to get this done - but I'll save the details on that for later.

Meantime, the birdies out front are certainly growing fast!

Bug of the Month

What would Spring be without more fun and exciting bugs? Joe found this guy out front this morning:
What very interesting little legs he has:
And a very cool wingspan:
Only to be outdone by the feather antenna:
Ever seen one of these? I have, years ago in high school on a class biology trip to Virginia. It's a Luna Moth.

Birds, Dogs and Bedroom Updates

A few weeks ago, we noticed a bird flying out of a small tree near the front door every time we went outside. Upon further investigation, we discovered this:
Talk about colorful eggs! So we've been keeping an eye on things, and today someone became a new mommy!
I think there's about 6 of them, and they were really looking forward to some eats! I'll have them all named by the end of the week....

Meantime, we got the first coat of the new bedroom paint up today! Yay! It finally looks like one room:
I'm very pleased with the color. Of course, Joe picked it out. So one more coat and that will be done.

We also finished laying the floor tiles in the bathroom. We rented a manual tile cutter on Friday and cut the 20+ end tiles. We had 2 that needed some special tricky cuts to accommodate the floor vent, so we took them to Home Depot and they cut them for us. $1 a tile - best $2 we ever spent!

We'll grout next weekend, and then we can get the sink and vanity installed!

I think we're making good progress now.

And what's a weekend post without Max? He has this thing about pillows - he likes to either throw them off the bed, or bury himsslf under them. This time, I caught him in the act:

Weekend Warriors

More progress! We put down the subfloor in the new master bath, picked out our tile this morning, and started putting it down:

Now we need to rent a tile cutter to cut the border pieces. Our goal is to finish the tile work by next weekend so we can grout.

And if all goes as planned, our new counter top and vanity will be end by this weekend, and we can get the plumbers out the following week.

Max doing what he likes to do best:He owns the yard, you know. Laying in the grass ranks up there right with rolling in it...

Miss Kitty gets very jealous of the dogs, though, and really has a desire to be an outside kitty on nice days like this:

"Please let me out! I promise not to run away!!"