A Brand New Home

As I write this, I'm lying on my bed, under the covers - because the new house is officially freezing. While in the last couple weeks at the apartment, we've had to turn on the heat for the first couple hours in the morning, it's nothing compared to the chill that has taken over our entire home. I mean, that's partially due to the fact that I had all the windows open in order to air out the place. But moving on from complaining! We're in our house! Even though possession date was on Tuesday, we didn't actually move in until yesterday, so today will be our first full day of living here.

As I mentioned before in my post on packing, Derek and I have never done a full on move before. For the most part, when we've moved, we've been able to fit all our stuff into one vehicle. We had no idea what were were in for. We started the process yesterday around 3:30 or 4:00, and we weren't finished until after 11:00 (and by finished, I mean finished for the day, because we still need to go back to the apartment to collect the few small things that are still cluttering up the place, and then we need to clean it) when we moved the washer and dryer from the apartment to our new house's basement.

But even with the sore backs and arms, the tired groggy outlook on life, the random boxes EVERYWHERE the funny smell of a house that hasn't been lived in for months, and the prospect of cleaning the apartment, we are so, so excited about being here. Last night, around 10:00, Derek told me how seeing all our things coming into the house made it so much more real for him. Even though he'd been lifting heavy boxes and pieces of furniture for six hours, it didn't matter because we were moving into our HOME. I'm not sure that words can really describe how happy we are to be starting this part of our life together, and how blessed we feel that only four months into being married, we're able to be starting this stage.

The house is full of quirks and odd little things, but even though I'm intimidated by the work that lies ahead of us (as we truly make this our home), I'm excited by the challenge - and the fact that Derek and I will be creating it ("it" being our life? Our home? Our family? Maybe all three and more) together.

It's so crazy to think that only three years ago, Derek and I had no idea that each other even existed, and now we're married and we've bought our first house - a place where we'll be able to grow together, to have family and friends stay in, to have parties and play games, and someday bring our children home to. Oh goodness, I'm getting all sentimental and my eyes are tearing up. Go me.

I have so many crazy ideas for this place (including, but not limited to: removing the stucco on the living room and master bedroom ceilings, replacing all the windows with ones that'll keep the heat in, doing complete bathroom and kitchen reno's - which will hopefully involve knocking out the wall between the kitchen and living room - giving the whole house a new colour scheme, installing hardwood floors? Please? - Derek isn't quite on board with that yet). Like I said before, I'm so excited to see what will become of our new home. A part of me is sad about leaving the apartment where Lana, Vickie and I built and strengthened the friendships that are with us today. A year and a half of living there meant hundreds of memories that I will always cherish, but I'm ready for the new adventure of marriage and house.

So, because I've bored you all to death with words, here are a few pictures of the new place. Keep in mind that we've hardly unpacked - except for the kitchen, which I got to work on right away - and that I'm using a cell phone camera (still! *sadface), but these should give a pretty good idea of where we're living.

Master bedroom:

Future Office (complete with all of Lana's stuff that we're storing for her, since we figured it would be easier to put it in there than to cart it upstairs):

 Bathroom (the pink tub is showing off since we didn't have a shower curtain up when I took the photo):

 Current living room (and hopefully future dining room?):

 Kitchen and Dining room (the only mostly unpacked rooms in the house):

 Stairs to upstairs...

 ...and upstairs hallway:

 Future spare bedroom #1:

Future spare bedroom #2:

 Stairway to the basement:

Future living room(?) - the pictures don't show how ginormous it is, but it's huge:

 Future working area (those are the old washer and dryer that came with the house, but we already have our own, so if you know someone who needs a washer and dryer, let us know):

Basement pantry:

And finally, laundry/utility room:

And there she is: our beautiful new home, just waiting for some lovin'. Hope you all enjoyed the photos. Maybe once we're unpacked completely, we'll do a video tour!