Getting closer!

Before
After
I think it looks so much better now that it is black!!! (Actually the before picture is our garage door, the after picture is our front door...I forgot to take a before first!)

And here is a sneak-peak of our kitchen...more to come later!

Whoo Hoo!

On Monday, I went to a Saving Addiction coupon class...It was 2 hours well spent! I was so excited to go grocery shopping this week after hearing about the deals I could get! I don't really buy many groceries, but I thought there are some things I could pick up for Mike and I (since we'll be needing them pretty soon!) So tonight, armed with a few coupons, I headed to Meijer and got this:

If I had paid the normal store prices for all this, it would have cost me a whopping $44.79!!!

But after the sale prices, my coupons, and CATS, my grand total was just $15.15!!!

So, here is a run-down of some of the deals I got today!

Best Life Margarine= FREE!

Smart Ones= 30 cents each!

Scrubbing Bubbles Toilet Cleaners= ($3.62+$3.85=$7.47 sale price)-($3.82 from BOGO coupon)- ($1.00 store coupon)/2 items=$1.33 each!!! BUT WAIT! Then, I got a $2 CAT back for buying 2 Scrubbing Bubbles items, so I basically paid 33 cents each!

I am so excited about these deals and can't wait to build my pantry!

It's about time!!!! (But well worth the wait!)

After a looooonnnnnggggg time of waiting...Ovidiu is here!!!! Ovi is engaged to my best friend, Alecia. They met 7 years ago when Alecia went on a mission trip to Romania. After many years of trying and waiting, Ovi was able to get a fiance visa and he and Alecia are getting married in November!

See him waving?

They just can't stop smiling!


Alecia's parents also went to Romania to "get" Ovidiu

This was his first time meeting Alecia's extended family

I'm so glad Ovi is here!!!

Completely painted!

I really feel accomplished now! Our whole house is painted!!! And yes, in this picture, I really was painting, not just posing! All of our walls needed a second coat, so I had Mike take a picture of me finishing the last section of this wall!

Mike and Brett ripped out the sink so I could paint behind it!

We have flooring!!!

We finally have flooring in our bathrooms! Last weekend, my friend Brenda's parents came and helped Mike lay tile and grout. It was hard work, but they had fun and it looks great!

Mike learned how to use the saw and cut the tiles

Mary laying the tile after Mike cut it

Mike putting in the grout

Yay! The grout is in! After this picture was taken, it had to dry a bit so that we could scrape off the excess grout. After that, we had to clean off the tiles. This Saturday I will seal the grout and then it will officially be done!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In exactly 1 month from today...I will be a married woman!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chicago

Last Friday, Mike and I drove to Chicago for pizza. Yes, all the way just for pizza. The whole point was to rent a cool car (supposedly a cool car...we ended up with an Impala...oh well) and just enjoy the drive. We had a good time, just talking with no distractions, and enjoying each other's company as well as a day off of work from both our jobs and the house!

This is a bench right outside the restaurant, I thought it was really neat!

And this is the restaurant we went to. We went to the Lou Malnati's in Lawndale. Whenever our youth group would go to Chicago for our mission projects, we would always get pizza at Malnati's on Saturday night. Here is a quote from the website describing the uniqueness of this particular restaurant: "Carrying on Lou's vision of providing great food at reasonable prices, Lou Malnati's has grown to include 21 family-owned Chicagoland pizzerias. In recent years the Malnatis have felt blessed by their success and wanted to do something to give back to the community. In the fall of 1995 the Malnati's opened a restaurant on the West side of Chicago in an effort to help rejuvenate a neighborhood that has not had much success in recovering from the riots of 1967 that ravaged the area. Lou Malnati's Lawndale Pizzeria is unique in that all profits will be given back to the community to benefit children's educational and recreational programs."

Notice anything different about the sign below the green light? ;)

There was a traffic cop directing the traffic, specifically the pedestrians...we don't see them around little ol' Allendale!

If we weren't so full from delicious pizza, we probably would have stopped to get food from some of the many street vendors! We saw people with ice-cream, popcorn, hotdogs...all kinds of stuff! There was even someone walking down the median before the highway selling cold drinks!

All in all, it was a fun trip, and great to just get away for the day!

Unity 2010

Mike and I went to Unity this year for the first time together. It was a great night with some really good bands. We went specifically to see Thousand Foot Krutch (one of our favorites), but we really enjoyed the other bands there as well!

The pictures aren't the greatest, because we sat quite far from the stage, but we had a good view of the screens!

The lead singer from TFK

Lead singer from Fireflight

I have never seen the sun set like this before, it was incredible!!!

Kitchen and more

It took a lot of hard work and muscle, but Mike was finally able to get all the counters and cabinets out of the kitchen. The original plan was to take them out and then put some in our garage, but they needed to be ripped apart to come out, so now we are left with a pile of wood in our garage! You can see how strange the kitchen looks without any structures in it now! We did run into 1 issue: we removed the backsplash from the wall and discovered a nasty mess of hardened glue (the brown stuff on the walls). We tried goof-off, sanding it...nothing worked, so Mike and his Dad came up with a final resort...

...cutting out the section of drywall and replacing it! This was an issue that had to be taken care of since we only have a 4 inch backsplash with our new kitchen, and of course we couldn't leave the walls looking like the did!

This was my project for the day...painting the bathroom vanity and drawers. I decided that we needed some brightness in our bathroom, so I thought I would paint all the brown wood white. I still have 1 more coat to go, but I'm loving how it turned out!

Mike and Dan started this project a while ago and it should be completed soon! The subfloor in our bathroom was black with mold and mildew. They ripped it all out and are in the process of replacing the subfloor. Within a few weeks, we should have tile in!

This room has been painted for a while, but I just wasn't happy with it. The previous owners had done a horrible job with painting, so unless I covered up all their mistakes by making my paint job look bad, we could still see pink, purple, and yellow paint on the trim and ceiling. A friend of ours, Sue, came and painted the ceiling, which made a huge difference. She then suggested painting the trim on the walls the same color as the walls. I told her to go for it, so she and Mike's mom did the first coat. I think it turned out great!!!

We have a month before we want to be able to start moving things in, and I think we're going to make it! We had a few set-backs with our carpet and wood installation, but I think we have that mostly cleared up and we should be making big progress soon!