We've Moved!

Moving Day

The months of April and May have been a blur. April was busy planning for the move, while May was actually moving and unpacking it all. In April, I was packing boxes every free moment I had. Which meant either while both boys were sleeping or while Hayden slept and I had something to occupy Colby. We planned for the movers to come the week after our closing to give us time to move smaller things in our cars. I'd spend a day packing up the car. Then the following day, I'd leave early in the morning and spend the day unloading and unpacking the car.

I made countless car trips like this. Car loaded down and kids strapped in. Pretty sure it's not legal to roll like this.

Hayden was easy to shuffle back and forth but Colby, with his adventuresome, boundless energy and never ending quizzical mind, is more exhausting than the labor of moving. So, I arranged for him to go some extra days to day care during the moving process.

I spent hours arranging the kitchen. The old house had 9 cupboards. Our new house has 16! It is nice to have so much space. Some cupboards currently don't have a thing in them.

Love my new kitchen. It is open to the living room so I can watch the boys and TV.
Lots of storage space too.

Empty cupboard. I'm sure I will eventually fill it but it is nice to have the extra space for now.

I also love my pantry. I like to stock up on sale items at Publix and my new pantry has plenty of shelving space to store it all. It is so easy to take inventory to see what I need for my next shopping trip. I have also loved organizing everything.

Eat-in kitchen area with a view of the pool area.
Have been enjoying my coffee and news paper here in the mornings.

Plenty of space for all the baby gear. The coffee table and end tables are next on our list of things to replace.

The month of May was busy settling in to our new home. The first weekend I barely stopped physically moving except to eat and sleep and to feed Hayden. My mom flew down to visit and help babysit while Jason went to San Diego. While she was here, I was able to run errands and complete a couple projects - painting Hayden's room and the boys' bathroom.

Our first visitor, Bebe, one week after moving in!

There was no end to all the miscellaneous stuff, towards the end, at the old house. I kept making trips over to the old house with both boys, thinking it was my last trip and quickly fill the car up with the random stuff still in cabinets, drawers, closets, shelves, fridge, freezer. I had to work fast before someone exploded - either me or them and with them, the explosion could come out of either end and at any moment.

Once we moved into our new place, with all of our never ending stuff - our house is still a little empty. We've never had a formal living room before - so that room doesn't have anything in it except for the dog's bed.

The empty living room. Colby loves to run circles in here.

We've already been busy buying new stuff for the place. New bar stools for the kitchen bar, new area rug for the family room - our old one was too small but fits nicely in the office. New area rug for the dining room. New washer and dryer for the laundry room...

Home office. Jason can work from home if he needs to. He can just close the double doors.

New Whirlpool front loader washer and dryer and new upright freezer.
Doing laundry is fun in my beautiful laundry room.

We get free cable with our HOA, and it seems every room has a jack, so we've bought a few more TVS. One for Colby's playroom and one for the patio. We also want to get a small one for our master bath - because there's a jack there too! Can't wait to soak in the roman tub and watch movies - yea right, more like I'll enjoy listening to the news while I get ready for work in the mornings.

Colby's (and eventually Hayden's) playroom.
We got him a TV too so we can finally watch something other than Handy Manny,Max and Ruby or Jake and the Neverland Pirates!

Patio with new TV mounted. It streams Pandora -internet radio so we don't need to add outdoor speakers. It's been nice to swim in the late afternoons and cookout while having some background music or news.

Pictures are finally hung! Feeling more and more like home every day.
For the first couple of days, our dog Tucker kept marking his territory on these white columns in the dining room. Now Colby just tries to climb them. Can we not have anything nice?

Front door and entrance way. Need to find an indoor welcome mat. Chandelier needs updating.

The boys rooms are connected by a Jack and Jill bath.

Hayden's room, newly painted and with his letters hung over his crib. Also with new leather shag area rug.
He has yet to spend a night in here since he is still in a bassinet alongside of my bed.
Colby, however, has climbed into the crib several times to take naps. Who am I to argue over where he sleeps!

Another view of Hayden's room. I was able to reuse all of Colby's nursery decor and furniture.
A benefit of having the same sex sibling spaced 3.5 years apart.

Colby's big boy "car" room.
His room doubles as the guest room when we have company, as we passed our Queen bed set onto him. The playroom has an Ikea couch that folds out into a double bed that he camps on when we have visitors.

I was able to reuse Colby's nursery letters in his new room.
I love that his closet has double shelving for seasonal and his next sized clothes.

Our Master Bedroom is more like a Master Suite! If I'm in the master bath I cannot even hear the children. Our old master bedroom was so cramped with our new furniture. Now our King size bed looks a little lost in the vast space.

The curtains are also too short for the 12' high ceilings.

We would like to get a over-sized chair with an ottoman for a sitting area along the window.
Also, maybe an area rug for the bed to break-up the emptiness of the room. Another view of our Master bedroom. Love the tray ceiling!

It's the first thing I see every morning when I wake.

All the neighbors we've met have been very friendly. Can't wait to meet more and get to know everyone better. We've been taking walks to the park/clubhouse each evening. The first time I had to coax Colby into going. I said let's go for a walk and meet the neighbors. The first couple we met along the walk, he embarrasses me by pointing and yelling are they our neighbors?!

We pass this gazebo along our walk through the wooded preserve to the park. Colby has to run inside it every time.

Once we got our electronic cards to the club house, I've enjoyed walking with the kids there and working out at the fitness center. They have a stocked playroom full of toys adjacent to the gym with window dividers. Colby asks every day if we can go to the "playhouse" instead of calling it the clubhouse. He's now my daily workout motivator - plus the mile walk there and back is my warm-up and cool-down.Our tropical "courtyard." Our old house had a huge backyard with a custom built swing set that we sadly had to leave behind. Our new house has a pool that takes up all but a fraction of our backyard.

At least Jason's yard work will not take up a chunk of his weekend.

Colby is enjoying the pool daily. He will be a good swimmer before the end of Summer.

We are loving our new place. We are both closer to our jobs. Jason's work is 6 miles and mine is 8 miles. We are also very close to toll roads, 417 and 408 - which means we can be connected to any part of Orlando in minutes. Waterford, where we do the majority of our errands - Target, Home Depot, Lowes, Kohls, BJs etc., is only 4 miles away. Publix is only 2 miles! Where we used to live, I'd have to methodically plan out my errands making one big trip that would take hours. Now, I can run out several times a day. Downtown is only about 15 minutes and the airport about 10. My gas tank has already noticed a difference - filling up only every 2 weeks instead of one.

This is the home where our boys will grow up. There is plenty of room for them to run around and be boys. Although the cleaning is never ending. Just a matter of time before I have some helpers though. We are not moving again unless they can physically help out next time!

Our new house lit up at night. We wanted one story, with a 3 car garage, and a pool, in a nice neighborhood and found exactly that! It was actually the first house we looked at too.