NEW HOME OWNERS

With the weather suddenly turning cold, I have limited the kids time outside in the backyard. I feel that with the changing of the temperature from warm, very warm to suddenly cold will wreck havoc on my kids health. Anyway, my kids have a lot of toys and activities to occupy them inside the house. I wonder how the weather is in Minnesota? Just recently a friend of mine from high school just bought their very first house. She and her husband are now proud homeowners of a 3 bedroom house. If we only lived in the same state i would already be in a tizzy looking any cheap housewarming gift ideas. What would the perfect house warming gift be? If it were up to be I'd probably give them a nice picture frame of my family so they can hang them up among the many photos of their friends.I am so happy and excited for them. Will have to ask her to take more pictures of the new house. I wish I could see her and her sister in Minnesota. That will have to be added to my list of people to see...

CRACK

Oh snap it cracked! That is a picture of our kitchen counter. I don't know how it happened and when it happened but its not good. Our kitchen counter is still new. I only noticed the crack when I was using the crock pot. Maybe it cracked when the crock pot was placed not to gently on the counter? Nobody seems to know. It seems like I was the only one who noticed the crack. Of course as soon as I saw it I had to tell my husband so he could call the company we bought it from. First he has to find out the warranty of the kitchen counter. Hopefully something can be done. As for now you can't even tell where the crack is, but I know and it will bother me until it is fixed or replaced.

BASEMENT CLEANUP

After almost 4 years we have finally cleaned up our basement. Ralph had to ask for his nephew A.J.'s help as he still can't lift up heavy object. We spent the whole afternoon in the basement whilst my MIL watched over the kids. The first couple of hours was spent breaking down boxes that we accumulated for quite some time. We also had to weed out a lot of stuff, separate which was junk and which ones are still good. We also had to organize a bit to make the basement less cluttered. I didn't think we were going to be able to do it in just half a day but we did it. Now the front on our house has a mountain of garbage with lots and lots of broken down boxes. The garbage collectors are not going to be happy with us, lol. Some may probably think that we are moving out,lol.

Now that the basement is decently organized and clean we can start visualizing what it would be like to have it finished. That is really one of the few projects that Ralph and I would like to start. It would not only add value to the house but it opens up a new space for the kids and for when we have visitors.. We are aiming to start with the basement in another 2-3 years.

NOTHING LIKE CLEAN

There is nothing better than relaxing on my newly vacuumed love seat. With a dog around and kids my baby gets covered with so many dog hair and just about anything. I love my couch and my love seat and I try to take good cake of them. Our new couch is a much better improvement from our old couch that got so tattered from cat scratching on it. It was a good timing that we got our new couch after my MIL cat Smokey passed away. He was the one who puts holes on our old couch. The one thing that I do not like about having a microfiber couch is the shock that you get every time you get up to open a door. I am literally scared of opening doors now coz I don't like getting shocked. My husband thinks its funny that I put my elbow on the door first before I would open it so that the shock will be on my elbow and not my hand. If I am watching T. V. I avoid opening the door by making my daughter open it for me,lol.. On April my baby couch is turning a year old. Let's hope that our red couch will last the onslaught of kids in the house.

PLAYROOM

One of our projects for 2011 is to buy some affordable and elegant light fixtures. The home lighting in our house is not bad but it needs an upgrade so it will look more modern. And not only that, the living room/playroom has no light fixtures at all. We are currently using a lamp that serves as a light in the playroom. I feel like our house needs more lights and fixtures. I don't know how Ralph could have missed not telling the Realtor about it before he got the house. Not only does the living room/playroom need light fixtures it also needs a fresh coat of paint. We painted the house last spring but we didn't not include it seeing that the playroom will only be temporary. I would really love to paint the playroom bright colors for the kids. We will have to see come Spring and see what we can afford to do in the house.

GETTING USED TO EACH OTHER

Guest post written by Ken Barley

My wife and I are newlyweds, and itÕs been a whole new experience since we started living together. Having to share the same space everyday has its pleasant momentsÉ but it also has its challenges, ha! We get along really well, but weÕre definitely still fine-tuning a few things. I am a pretty messy guy, and she is a pretty neat girl, so we bang heads there a lot. I feel like sheÕs often frustrated because I donÕt clean in a very timely fashion, and when I get home from work, cleaning is the last thing I usually think about. IÕm trying to work on my habits so that we can both live easily.

One thing we both agree on is that our new home needs a little work in general. We are going to have to make it a team project to get our new little home in pristine condition. I think that I am going to look at sites like http://www.HomeProImprovement.com because I honestly have no idea what IÕm doing when it comes to repairs. We have a lot to work on together, but, the operative keyword there is TOGETHER!

NO REST FOR THE WEARY

I am finally done with decorating the house. I am a little frustrated though with some of the hanging stuff on the wall. They seem to stick and stay in place but the next day they are on the floor. I am so tired of fixing it so I think I'll forgo that this year. I have already put the wreath on the door and added a few decorations to it to make it pop. Now that I have it in place on the door I seem to be having difficulty closing and sometimes opening the lock. It happened twice that I could not open the lock right away, I had to struggle for the bit. When I mentioned this to Ralph he doesn't seem to think it is the wreath but the door handle and the lock itself. He said we will be needing new handlesets for the front door and other door that leads to the deck. Maybe its the cold weather that's making it stick. I will try and spray the lock with a little oil to grease it up. I have a lot of cleaning up and organizing to do after all the boxes and containers are returned in the basement. Oh well, a mother's work is never done.

CLEAN MESS

Men are slobs, they really are. For some reason don't understand why such simple things cannot be done right away. My MIL reads a lot of magazines and tells me that most wife complain about what slobs their husbands are. I know my husband works so hard to provide for us and affords me the chance to be a stay at home mom but I need cooperation. Our bedroom is a wreak, a wreak I tell you. Soda cans all over the headboard, candy wrappers on the floor, paper plates on the night stand, shoes everywhere and the bathroom calls for an emergency. I have been sleeping in our kids room so basically my husband is responsible for all the mess. I have cleaned up so many times and he keeps promising to clean his room on his days off but he never does. So we have come up with an agreement that he will keep his room at least decent and I clean the bathroom. I think I got the short end of the stick though, lol. Cleaning his bathroom takes a lot of arm power, and a whole bunch of cleaner. The tub is the part that I really hate cleaning with all the soap scum. It doesn't help at all that our bathroom faucet are so close to the wall that you barely have space to clean the soap scum in between. How I wish we could remodel the master bathroom and the first thing to go would be the faucet. I would get a modern bathroom faucet that has a minimalistic look to it. Some thing like our kitchen faucet that doesn't have a lot of those knobs and what ever. I just want a bathroom fixture that is easy to clean and maintain. The tiles are also horrendous and needs to be replaced.

To cut the long story short, I am like a master when it comes to cleaning my husbands bathroom. Credit also goes to my husband because he does try his hardest to maintain the cleanliness of his bathroom on his own but the soap scums just won't let him. Maybe I'll buy him one of those automatic spraying things that goes in the shower and cleans after you get out of it. But one day, I will teach him to get on his hands and knees again and do his own bathroom,lol..

IT HAS BEGUN

Fall is almost here, lurking its golden head around the corner. Our neighbor's tree has started to loose its leaves. Her tree is always the first one to go in the fall. I have also noticed birds starting to migrate. My neighbor loves the fall with the changing of the foliage from green to yellowish to golden red and then to brown. She also loves the breezed that comes with fall and loves to hear the crunching of the leaves under her feet. I know my kids will love to play in it and so would our dog. And speaking of our dog he has been going nuts barking every time our doorbell rings. Maybe its a good idea to change look into door chimes. It is just so annoying hearing him bark constantly every time he hears the doorbell..Maybe if its a different chime he will stop since he is not used to a new sound. That will be among the many projects Ralph and I will be tackling in the coming months. Hopefully we will have a mild winter like the Farmer's Almanac predicted.

REPEATED CYCLE

As a housewife one of your many duties is keeping up with the household chores. I know a lot of people think that being a stay at home mom is easy peezy, not! Don't get me wrong, I am very thankful that my husband has given me the luxury of not having to work and earn money. I do my part in our marriage and its to keep everything together. Lately I have been lagging behind on my house work. Cleaning up over and over again, dusting, laundry,vacuuming,tidying up,washing dishes the cycle just repeats over and over again. The inside of our house needs more decoration, little knick-knacks here and there. I need entertainment centers for the family room and the playroom, more picture frames, shelves,stair runners and window treatments. That is going to be my project for this year, to try and make our house more homey and lived in. Its a good thing I'll be seeing my mom soon so she can give me great tips on how to decorate my house without breaking the bank.

DECK,DRINKS AND CHILLING OUT

Its already Spring, time to break out all the outdoor cushions that we stored in the basement for the winter. The other week the weather was just perfect with temperature hovering in the 70's. When the weather is nice we usually spend almost all of our time outside watching the kids play. We had a deck built in our backyard a year and a half ago. It was the perfect place to lay out the new inflatable pool I got for the kids. We have a swimming pool but the liner needs to be replaced and I just got the small pool so the kids can play in it. The inflatable pool didn't last that long though coz our dog bit into the side of the swimming pool and just chewed on it. This summer it's going to be so nice just sitting on the deck watching my kids play on the swing set while I sip a cold drink under the shade of the umbrella and just chill out.

MY PICK IS RED

We are finally done painting the inside of our house. We started off painting last weeks with the dining room and since we still had a lot of pain left over we decided to paint the bathroom. The kitchen, dining room and downstairs bathroom is painted in ALOE VERA color. Its actually a nice, soft and bright color. We were doing such a good job painting so we tackled painting the rest of the house. I really didn't want to do it but we have to. Ralph will be having his back surgery to remove his cyst on Friday that is tomorrow. After his surgery he won't be able to do much at all. His best friend will be the bed and I will be his servant until he can get up and out of the bed without help. Mind you painting is not an easy task but its not that hard either. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to paint the inside of your house, all you need is common sense, lots of tape, wet rag and a steady hand.

Last night was the last day of painting the inside of our house. We did the hallways, the stairs and also the family room. What is left is the formal living room/ playroom of the girls. We will have to do that last in the autumn season. We celebrated our success by going out to our favorite Chinese restaurant. Afterward I cajoled Ralph into taking all of us to the furniture place so I could show my MIL the couch we got. I never thought Ralph and I were going to agree so quick on a couch but if we hadn't we would still be looking for the right design furniture for our family room. The couch we picked is a sofa recliner with cup holders in between seats. I just fell in love with the red microfiber couch. I can't wait until it will be delivered to our house and I will finally be rid of the horrible couch we have had for the last 3 years.

WHITE IS BRIGHT

We got buried in more than a foot of snow once again. Like most people we have not really had the chance to dig ourselves from the first snow storm then we got hit again by another one. I remembered one Meteorologist said that the second storm was like adding insult to injury. Thank God that we don't have any problem that comes with a lot of snow. I have not really cleaned the house and most specially washed the floor since its all going to get wet and dirty again. My thinking was, wash the floors when all the snow has melted. Yeah right, I don't know how long its going to be before all this snow melts and we will be back to normal. What gets me now is the freezing cold when you go outside and the glaring whiteness of the surrounding. With the stark whiteness outside we get more lights which is good but also bad at the same time. Looking outside gives me headaches and wish that we had put up blinds in the playroom. Its the only part in the house except the kitchen that doesn't have it. I should just let the curtains down but the kids enjoy looking outside at the snow and it also saves on light.

BREATHING CLEAN AIR

Winter is the time where parents are on high alert when it comes to cold, fever, cough and so many more. I not only dread the winter but I worry if my kids are going to get sick. My youngest is only 26 months old and when she gets sick I worry so much. The first time she got a bad cold was when she was less than 3 months old. She was so stuffed up and had such a hard time breathing. Our Pediatrician encouraged us to get a cold mist humidifier to help with her breathing. Not only did we buy one but Ralph got two, one for each kids room. The only problem I have with the humidifier is changing the filters constantly. Speaking of filters, we have to look into putting an air filter in our house. It's important that our kids breath clean air specially inside the house. That is on our to do list to improve the living condition in our home. Having a good air filter helps with the allergens in the air. Now where was I? Back to the humidifier, I go to tell Ralph to buy a filter when he goes out to buy the salt tomorrow. There is going to be snowstorm starting tomorrow so preparations are in order.

OUR VERY OWN

Part of the American dream is having a house you can call your own. When I got here the house had already been bought, the transfer was done but the packing was not over yet. Both Ralph and I are lucky enough to have a house that in a few years time will really be ours. I have always wondered though what manufactured home are like inside. My husband said its no different from our house and they are built to last. Homes like that are built to meet the standards of Department of House and Urban Development. Therefore those houses are safe, durable and they do look very homey.