We are making progress!

So Blake and I moved into our house a little over a year ago. We closed on the house the first Friday of school last year so needless to say, the progress has been slow going. I anticipated working on it more in the summer but then I decided to take 9 hours of grad school so again, not much got done. Now that I am in my 4th year of teaching, I have been able to manage my time a BIT better and am finding more time get our house the way we want it.

Our two big projects are our study  and our lawn. When we moved in, the study became the "catch all" for all the stuff we did not know where to put. Over the last year, it also became the room we shoved everything into whenever anyone would come over. :)

When we first moved in.

This is what it turned into by the end of the summer :(

Today, Blake worked really hard and we can finally see the floor!!! A lot of the papers and stuff were put into boxes that were put into the closet, but I can go through those later (maybe next summer).

YAY!

Way to go Blake!

You do NOT want to see inside the closet ;)

Our yard has also been a big problem. We try to keep up with it but it is expensive to buy all the equipment and we have been slowly but surely acquiring them. I know we could hire a landscaper but we are really trying hard to avoid that and honestly, I don't mind working on the yard, I just wish I had more time.:)

One of the biggest problems is that Blake bought a "cheap" (not really that cheap though) edger and our yard is too big for it. Our HOA keeps sending us letters about our yard so Saturday (in an effort to avoid working) I went outside to work on the weeds. Our neighbor stopped by and offered to loan us his edger. We got talking and it turns out his daughter needs some help with school work so he offered to edge our lawn if I would work with his daughter. DONE! After 3 plus hours and 4 wasp stings, our front yard started looking decent. It still needs a LOT more work since I'm not really a fan of what the previous owners did with the landscaping, I'm working on taking out there stuff and figuring out what I want. 

Current status of the front yard. Blah!!

Well, I guess I should get back to my grad paper. I am taking Children's Literature and Literacy this semesters from one of my favorite undergrad profs. Our first assignment is to write a reading autobiography which is actually somewhat fun. It was interesting hearing from my parents about my early reading experiences. Apparently, when I started reading in Kindergarten, I expected my brother (who was 3 at the time) to be able to read also. I used to get mad at him for not reading and accused him of lying when he said he couldn't read. Anyone who knows me shouldn't be shocked by this revelation. :)