Can I Have a Tookie?: November 2009

I wanted to put in an apology for the shocking and somewhat alarming pictures put up by Josh in the previous post, without sufficient explanations or disclaimers. I just thought I'd put a few things straight and hopefully put some hearts at ease.

Yes, we are buying and moving into the trailer photographed below but obviously not in that condition. At first I too couldn't see past the cat feces and old taco bell remains and the fridge made me want to vomit into the night, but Josh, having a more trained eye for these kinds of things, saw its potential.

We are going to own it for $5,000 which will be paid off in no time and should save us a considerable amount of money for the rest of the time Josh will be going to school here.

Josh and his brothers are carpentry and finish carpentry experts and professionals and I have no doubt in their ability to make this place look clean and beautiful. His brother Nate has been adding on to and refinishing their mom's house and it is gorgeous. Nate and his wife and kid came down this weekend with all the tools we need and a Home Depot card hook-up to help us get the place ready to move into and as I type this they are all over there working hard for the third day in a row. Josh has been dedicatedly cleaning the place for a couple of weeks now.

The first thing Josh did was tear out all of the carpet and padding which was soaked through with cat urine and covered with poop, and we ordered new carpet right away. We also got a new, clean fridge for $75. Our electric company is hauling the old one away and giving us $40 for it. Other new things we're installing right now include:
-front door
-kitchen faucet
-toilet
-light fixtures

We have one of the only trailers in the neighborhood that has a tarred and shingled roof, and it has a new hot water heater. Despite the four unruly little boys and cleanliness negligent previous owners who lived there before us, everything in that place is perfectly functional (luckily). This place has three bedrooms and 1.5 bathrooms (as compared to our current 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment) and probably three times as much closet and cabinet space.

Nate is helping us prime, prep, and paint all of the walls and ceilings which will seal up the rest of the odor that Josh wasn't able to scrub away (and cover up all Sharpie scribblings) and make the place look way better. They also added finish trim and corner molds, nailed everything to place more securely, and caulked the heck out of the whole place to make it really nice and tight. We puttied up all the nail holes (and other holes) everywhere. So we are getting really hooked up with all the free labor and machinery and lots of extra primer, paint, etc. that Nate was willing to share with us.

I'd also like to add that Josh has been an angel of a husband this whole time and is not coercing me into anything. It was just kind of hard for me at first because moving is never fun and I'm always really indecisive and, let's face it, trailer parks are kind of scary and our current apartment is super nice. But it has been really frustrating to throw all of our money away on rent and bills every month, never to be seen again, and not being able to save like we want to. Josh has been spending hours cleaning and prepping the trailer every day to make me happy and so I don't have to inhale cat feces which is really bad for pregnancy, and letting me pick out the wall colors and everything. I'm excited to make curtains for all the rooms and things for the baby room, which Josh is letting me have full reign over. You never saw a more excited father-to-be. I will post more pictures later, I think you will all see a drastic difference.

Anyway, thanks for all of your love and concern and help, we are really grateful to have so many people who love us and support us.

Every once in a while we really get in the mood to see the kids. So last weekend we decided to drive to Oak City for some quality family time. It was quite the party... people there included Marti, Nate and Anna and their five kids, Summer and her three girls, Aaron and Amanda and their baby, Misti and her four kids, and Terrill and Jentry and their baby (who are pretty much like family anyway.)

Marti and Misti and Amanda also just had their birthdays, so happy birthdays to them!

So you'd think we'd have a bunch of pictures of kids wearing halloween costumes and stuff but... it's funny, it seems we mostly just hung out with the babies. Weird, huh? Which means we pretty much only have pictures of babies for this post. Well, hope you enjoy!

Here is cute, cute Cambrie, Aaron and Amanda's offspring. (Aaron is Josh's twin brother... so maybe this is what our little girl will look like? Haha.)