#moving Archives - Erin's Middle Niche

Weekend wrap up

This weekend was a good mix of being productive, fun and relaxing. We were going to kick off the weekend with a football game but it was cold and rainy at game time so we opted to stay home and play Qwirkle. We play once a day, and I haven’t beat Brandon yet. I have tied and been close, but not a win yet.

Qwirkle is not a game for Natalie so we played a round of jenga first. Our table is the worst surface for that game. It’s wiggly and the girls are constantly leaning on it. Normally we play on the floor and quickly learned that would be site for all future jenga games. Natalie is surprisingly good at jenga. And that really annoys Morgan.

Saturday started off with me moving the girls desks around in their rooms. And cleaning up. Now, they both need a rug to play on and warm up the rooms. And maybe muffle the THUMP of them getting out of bed. While I was up there, Brandon worked on scraping and painting the porch.

That night we ate at Harley K’s (I always want to call it Harley Quinn’s) for some Philippino food. I was extra adventurous and got the pork stewed in pigs blood. It was good, but I like the pancit better. What was really amazing was the fresh rolls they brought us out to try. They were not as sweet as Hawaiian rolls but close and just delicious. They make them to order so we agreed they would be perfect for thanksgiving. Then we made a quick trip to Princeton for pumpkins.

Since the guys were combining on Sunday, we had my mom come down for pumpkin carving and lunch. We even fit in a game of Qwirkle.

We roasted the pumpkin seeds because Morgan insisted she liked them. She might have ate 5, but Natalie ate a small bowl. I tried both a salty and a sweet kind, but the sweet kind got a little crisp. I should have been watching them closer since it was brown sugar. I think the salty would still have been better. They were really yummy.

Morgan liked the scraping technique for hers. We eventually put it in a closet so she could see how much she needed to scrap for the light to shine through. These pumpkins were really thick this year.

Natalie wanted a scary pumpkin so this is her design. It took a bit to finalize the plans but it turned out really good.

Then we went for a little walk in the timber and checked out the deer stand. It’s really getting pretty back there now. We finished that walk with some hedge apple bowling in the corn field.

We plan on planting some pumpkins next year by a shed. I’m rethinking that plan after Natalie spotted a snake going into the tall grass there. We were walking up to the house and made a couple trips back and forth and the snake was out every time to sun himself. He would slither back in the grass and wait for us to leave before coming back out. I am not a fan of snakes. This was a small, harmless one, but I still didn’t like it.

Next weekend is a trip to Macomb for WIU’s homecoming and more packing. I made good start in the basement last time we were there so I’m hoping to wrap that up and move on to the kitchen. Moving is a pain but moving in chunks is really hard. I want my stuff in both places for when we are there. Eventually, everything will get to Wyanet and will will make due with paper plates and takeout in Macomb when we go there to work on THAT house. Some day we will just have one house to work on. 😁

Moving: Part 1 of ???

We were able to move the girls’ clothes, some toys, dressers, Morgan’s mattress and box spring, and Natalie’s bed along with a few other things up to the new place last Sunday.

I think it took about an hour to get things loaded in my dad’s truck and then add the other mattress.

It went pretty smoothly except we forgot the mattress to Natalie’s bed until we had the other mattress and box spring already strapped down on my car. It was a relatively easy add though those things kept me from going my usual speed. 😉

Unloading was pretty easy too. The hardest part was reassembling Morgan’s old/Natalie’s new bed. It’s the IKEA Hemnes Daybed which is great for the storage. Brandon assembled it the first time and was surprised it went smoothly after hearing the horror stories of IKEA instructions. This time, we were tired and ready to be done so it took a bit longer than it probably should have. I was in charge of the instructions and didn’t know there were no words in IKEA instructions. It took me a hot minute to figure out the instructions, but I managed and the bed hasn’t collapsed yet.

She’s done better than I thought she would sleeping in a new bed in a new room at a new house upstairs away from mom and dad.

Brandon headed back to Macomb for three more weeks of work, but he will be back for long weekends. He will bring a few things along with him each time, but the majority of the rest of things will be moved once the floors downstairs get done.

The girls and I wanted to squeeze in some fun before school started on Wednesday. We checked out some local parks and the Hennepin Canal trail. I love to ride bikes and walk the trail. The girls like the “waterfalls” and throwing walnuts and rocks into the water.

I feel like this is one of the last ones you can actually drive over. Brandon and I took a wedding photo on one of the old bridges a few locks down and it had not been open to cars for years.

Morgan started school on Wednesday. Natalie will start a bit later because the program needed more documentation to start her in the program. Morgan was a bit nervous but I was sure she would have a great first day. She is so outgoing and makes friends everywhere she goes. She did love her first day and every day since, so that does make moving easier for her.

Natalie is very excited to start her preschool, mainly because there is a bunny in her room. Natalie’s comment was “it’s too big to for Clarence to kill.” I’m hoping she will start in the next few days since she asks every day to go to preschool.

So we will keep on getting things settled here and working on little projects. I’ll keep you up-to-date on those as they happen. We are trying to mix in some fun along with work since we are more “moved” now than we have been.

The New Place

I mentioned in the first blog that we have some big changes coming up and that’s all due to us moving into my grandparents house. It’s a great opportunity for us to live in the country which is something both of us want. Natalie seems to be fully onboard with the idea, but Morgan is more hesitant because she realizes she will be moving away from her friends and school. She has a definite pattern of liking it when we are up there and working, but once we get back to Macomb, she says she wants to stay there. I get it completely. And I am hoping once we are up there and she meets some friends, which she is a total extrovert so she won’t have any issues with that, she will be just fine with the move.

The house does need some work. My grandparents really didn’t do much in the area of updating. The flooring has been the same since I was born and I’m 42. My first goal was to get the main living area painted so we could pull up the carpet. It only took a few hours of being in the house before I was affected by the dust. Then it took me a couple of days to recover once I was out and away from all the dust.

We’ve already done quite a bit and I’ll continue to document that all here, but here is list of things we have done and need to do (and this is an incomplete list.)

Empty the house (it was FULL)
Fix cracks in plaster (upstairs and down)
Fill in all the nail holes (my grandma loved to hang pictures)
Paint the entire interior
Pull up carpet
Remodel bath (reconfigure)
Remodel kitchen (mostly cosmetic)
Rework the entry way
Get electrical checked
Buy new couch
Landscape
Refinish all the floors
Clear out the wasps (they seem to like all the windows)
Refurbish the windows
Outside play area for girls

Like I said above, there’s way more that we will have and want to do, but this is what we are focused on right now. There’s other “fun” stuff like adding some beehives and making the extremely large front lawn into a prairie, but those will wait until some of the other things are done. Structurally the house is great, so it just needs some attention to make it more efficient for us. Brandon and I are planning to do a lot of the work ourselves since it’s things we can do, but other things like the electrical and bath remodel will probably require an expert.

Obviously, there is much more to come with house updates!