We bought a house! (Part Two)

Josh and I had a rule when we started looking at houses: each of us had veto power. If we were going to enter into this much debt and commit to this large of a purchase, we had to be 100% committed. If either one of us couldn't agree to the house, then we had to let it go as a couple. Let me tell you, I let a lot of houses pass by because Josh pulled the veto card. I was pretty anxious coming home after touring the house that Saturday because I knew I loved it and I knew Josh didn't.

We spent a couple of hours talking over the strong and weak aspects of the house. Josh had quite a few good points that he brought up. I kept stressing that we weren't entering into a commitment necessarily by asking our realtor to make an offer. We could back out after the home inspection. Eventually, that's what persuaded Josh to take the next step--we agreed that if the inspector came up with something majorly wrong with the house, we'd just walk away. Man oh man, I can't tell you how nervous I was about meeting with the home inspector. I knew he had the power to take my house away from me and I literally could not imagine losing it.

While we let our realtor work through some of the initial paperwork and set up the inspection, Josh tried to interest me in other houses. Josh was uncomfortable with the age of the home and tried to show me bigger, newer houses, in similar neighborhoods at comparable prices. Looking at them made me so sad. I even cried at one point while looking at the floor plan of a house built in the 1970s. It just lacked any character. It was one of those dime-a-dozen cookie cutter models that didn't age half so well as it could have. I was heartbroken at the thought of living in a place that could so easily be mistaken for a dozen other houses. At that point, Josh knew we were entering into a commitment that could only be broken by the home inspector.

We had to bring our kids for the inspection, which made it a good deal more complicated, but we made do. On a hot July evening, we met up at the house and went over a checklist of items with the inspector. I was so nervous, I was babbling for the first twenty minutes. It took me about forty minutes to start to relax when I began to realize that there was nothing deal-breaker-ish about what the inspector was discussing. Everything was old and there were a few update issues that needed to be addressed. But the big stuff--the water heater, the furnace, the roof--all of it was sound. The electricity was good. The attic was fine. The crawl space was haunted. (Okay, he didn't actually tell us that, but what crawl space isn't haunted? I've made a vow to never go down there and I intend to keep that promise.)

We left the inspector in a bit of daze, because there was a lot to consider. With his positive report, we were now at the stage of committing to this house or backing out forever. Josh was again uncertain and even I had to evaluate how I really felt and whether this was a wonderful opportunity or a huge mistake. We took a few days and eventually settled on continuing with the forward motion we had started. From there, it was all a waiting game. The bank, the realtor, the home appraisal, the loan, the locked-in interest rate (which, thanks to Brexit, was unusually low!). We got reports from our realtor and we met with our bank and we signed a lot of documents. It was a bit exhilarating and it all seemed to move really, really, slowly when in reality we bought the house in less than a month. Unreal.

By the end of July, we had signed the last documents and received our keys. I was suddenly very, very nervous. Josh and I decided we'd better stay in our apartment for August so we could do some much-needed repairs and renovations before moving all of our stuff in. I asked my sister Sarah, freshly home for the summer from college, to come live with us for the month so she could watch the kids in the evenings while Josh and I went to work on the house. And thus began a very, very busy August for us.

The first thing that needed to be done was refinishing the floors. The floors had all been sanded down so that the orange-ish varnish had been stripped. Josh and I had considered staining the floors but we eventually decided we preferred the natural coloring, so we bought a LOT of polyurethane (after researching how to finish a wood floor) and other tools and got to work. With a water-based polyurethane, you have to let each coat of varnish dry for 24 hours before adding another coat, and you have to put on at least three coats. We started in the nursery, then moved to the master bedroom, the hallway, and the enormous front room (well, it seems a lot bigger when you're mopping it every night). We'd eat dinner at the apartment, kiss our kids goodbye, and leave them with Sarah so we could make our nightly sojourn to the house and work on the floors.

The next step was to hire an electrician and a plumber. The electrician and his team moved one of the light switches from the hallway into the bathroom, added canned lighting in the kitchen, moved the central light to where the dining table would sit, added some outlets, added a light switch to the living room, and a few other odds and ends. The plumber ran a gas line into the kitchen so we could switch our electric stove to a gas stove. He also ran a few water lines so we could have an ice maker in our fridge and a garbage disposal and dishwasher (kitchen came with one electric stove/oven and no refrigerator, dishwasher, garbage disposal, or microwave. That was a sore spot for Josh but I knew I wouldn't want to use someone else's appliances anyway, so I wasn't fazed by that sort of thing). He installed our oven, our dishwasher, our garbage disposal, and he's currently working on running a pipe from the water heater to the attic so the combustion air can be properly ventilated.

Josh and I decided (mostly me, but with Josh's consent) to tear out the old, gross kitchen and put in a new, pretty one. We figured we could get it all done in the month of August and have a working kitchen by September 1st. We really were new at this. So the second Saturday after buying the house, with the hardwood floors still halfway varnished, we had Josh's parents come over and help us tear out the kitchen cabinets and sink and stove and countertops. It was really, really fun. I took a ton of pictures. My dad took a vacation day and came up to help us install a new back door (the old one was apparently an inside door repurposed from a church building) and change out all of the locks for new ones, and add a deadbolt to the side door, and install a new ceiling fan for the living room, and a myriad of other things. Seriously. There was no end to the little things that needed to be done on the house.

Sometimes Josh and I would bring the kids over with a bag of toys and let them run around and play while we worked (not with the polyurethane, but with other things, that was okay). James is very much a homebody and he gets anxious even visiting my parents in Las Vegas. But at the house, he was ecstatic. He loved running around the empty rooms. Scarlet and James both loved climbing into the linen closet and closing the door. They still love finding tiny hiding places in the house, and thanks to all the closets, there's no end to hiding places for them.

Josh and I got to do a lot of really fun things, like select a countertop material and pattern, and select cabinet colors and styles and heights. I was obsessed with research and spent hours and hours looking at examples and measuring things and pricing out options. Josh has a preference for cherry wood, but I was able to steer him toward white cabinets. He wasn't overly keen on my choice of farm sink, but he let me have it. He chose a faucet for the kitchen and I was able to persuade him to lean toward the one I liked. Basically, I showed him what I wanted and then I begged until he let me have it. He barely looked at the appliances I selected before agreeing. It was kind of awesome to have so much autonomy with the kitchen, but I got spoiled. By the time it came to backsplash, I had a perfect sage green glass subway tile all selected and then Josh discovered that he prefers a brighter, more vibrant green. I couldn't process the fact that he had an opinion at first, because he'd been so incredibly lenient with me on every other aspect of the house up to this point. I'd picked out the shelving for the pantry and the little shelves for the laundry room. I'd picked out the curtains and the blinds and the childproof baby gate, and the carpets, and the layout for all of the furniture. I mean, I'd gone wild with power at this point. So it was weird and jarring and a little bit frightening for Josh to adamantly disagree with my choice for backsplash. The problem was I couldn't agree with his choice because it was all wrong. I'd specifically chosen the type of knobs and pulls for the cabinetry and the countertop color and the cabinet color with that particular backsplash in mind and it wouldn't work as well with a different choice. Josh and I still haven't decided on a backsplash, but we're not so concerned. We just barely got running water in the kitchen.

That's right: in the midst of all this demolition in the kitchen and touching up in the other rooms of the house, we had to turn off water and gas in the kitchen and leave it off while we ordered our cabinets and countertops and appliances. I figured it'd take about a week or so for those things to come in. That was true for the appliances and the countertops but the cabinets were a problem. Apparently the company I'd chosen had a great product at a great price, but they had a terrible, terrible supply system. Josh found a lot of negative reviews about their service and disorganization. It started with some damaged items arriving and some of our order being wrong. Then we reordered and got some more incorrect items. This process continued for six weeks or so. We ended up with three or four extra cabinets and more crown molding than we could ever use. We also ended up with the wrong sink base twice and had to wait for the right one for two weeks and it ended up being the wrong one again. At this point, two months had passed by and Josh and I were living off of meals sent to us by Josh's angel of a mother, as well as paper plates and bowls and plastic silverware and a lot of fresh ready-to-eat foods and microwave meals. We couldn't use dishes because we had no running water in the kitchen, and I couldn't bring myself to wash dishes in the bathtub, so we just didn't use our dishes.

After we got the wrong sink base again, Josh put his foot down. He was tired of waiting on the cabinet company to send us the right product, so he and his dad cut into the cabinet and made the hole bigger for the apron sink, and then our plumber made a supporting stand underneath the sink to help bear the weight of the impossibly heavy fireclay sink. Did you know that a farm sink filled with water can weigh up to 300 pounds? Your average cabinet can't support that weight, especially if you have a heavy countertop material like granite or quartz as well. To counteract that weight, our plumber configured this amazing wood and steel table that held the sink up while leaving room for storage under the sink. Incredible. I was still sad to lose the sink cabinet we actually ordered (which is $150 more expensive than a regular sink cabinet), but I understood Josh's frustration. We were sick to death of not having a kitchen. It was time to let go of the perfect kitchen and settle for a functioning one instead.

Shortly after we installed the sink, the countertop people came and measured and installed our gorgeous quartz countertop. Then our plumber installed our faucet, garbage disposal, and dishwasher. That was the last thing we needed to make our kitchen operational. Now we have a fully functioning kitchen and we are so happy to be able to cook again. Josh and I spent a week and a half running the dishwasher and hand washing all our stored dishes and pots and pans and finding places to store all of these things in our cabinets. Now there are only a few boxes left in our bedroom for us to unpack. The rest of the house is set up and lived in and wonderful. Aside from the backsplash and some curtains for the back door, our kitchen is ready to go.

I tell people all the time that I still walk through this house with stars in my eyes. Although the house is small for a house, it is more than double the size of our last apartment, and that means I feel like I live in a mansion. Our neighbors are wonderfully friendly people (in fact, when our power died yesterday due to a loose power line down the street, I spent an hour chatting with my next-door neighbor about it while Scarlet played across the street at her new friend Charlotte's house) (Also, how cute is Charlotte and Scarlet? Her mother and I are determined to make those girls eternal childhood friends.). Our backyard is spacious and beautiful and the kids love those rickety old swings. The tree back there is enormous and provides such beautiful shade in the summer time (Josh spent plenty of time trimming it back this summer and I spent plenty of time dragging the branches to the trash). Our children have their own rooms and they have a great big front room to play in. They love it here and I love it here. There is a neighborhood park across the street (the neighbors call it Hidden Park--how cute is that?) and people walk their dogs at night and everyone is so nice and it feels like the 1950s when I go outside and know my neighbors' names and see their children and pets running around. I love hearing the football games played at Murray High School on Friday nights. It brings me nostalgic feelings from when I was in high school. I read an article that said Murray High is going to bring back their marching band after a 25-year hiatus, and I am anticipating waking up at 6 a.m. to sounds of early morning marching band practice. Just the thought makes me weep with memories and happiness. I love my beautiful, imperfect, so-many-more-projects-to-come house. It's been an amazing journey so far.

Josh helping with the floors.

The kitchen before the demolition. Look at that backsplash. Blah.

Demo day!

New back door.

That was our old back door, Isn't it horrid?

Before we varnished the floors, we had to sweep every night.

Our kitchen

Sweeping up the mortar that fell off when we busted out the old backsplash, which was utterly horrid. They had laid floor tiles and called it backsplash. Thinking about it offends me.

Josh breaking down our old cabinets. So much trash. We had to make a few trips to the dump.

One side of the house didn't have any sort of gate, so we built one. Josh didn't feel safe having the kids in the backyard until it was blocked off from the front.

My dad teaching how to put in a new back door.

James is just behind Scarlet. They loved playing in the house while it was empty.

The first cabinets installed in the kitchen.

Josh's dad assembling the cabinets to put in the kitchen.

One of the broken packages. This is our toe kick wood, totally bent from the shipping.