this is our house!

we will have owned our house for 1 month as of tomorrow. we have been so busy this past month that I haven't had time to post some pictures of it!

we are homeowners! (moving day)

we closed on our house august 1, 2013. we signed the papers & it was a done deal! it was awesome because we had to get out of work early that day & just decided to spend the rest of the afternoon shopping for house stuff (like new door locks).

the days leading up to our move in day, which was saturday (so people from church could come help) we cleaned the house up & got it ready to put all of junk in it. the house was an absolute mess before the bank came in & did $21,000 of renovations to the house. it was pretty beautiful by the time we looked at it for the first time! there is still much to do & to take care of but we have really been enjoying it all.

one huge surprise that happened that friday night was when we were shopping at menards. I was just walking down one of the aisles when my sisters, danica & danielle, ran up to me! what the what?! my mom & sisters came & surprised with a quick visit for the weekend! it was so awesome & such a blessing to have my mom here to help me unpack & get some of the basic things set up & put away in the house. my grandpa & cousin Joshua came too!

move in day went by quickly! so many people came to help from the st. peters ward & we are so grateful! we did it all so quickly that people from the weldon spring ward didn't even need to come. austin & I were up late the night before & had to wake up pretty early the next day. we picked up the u-haul & picked up some donuts at donut king for all those kind people who came to help us move! let me just tell ya, donut king is SO GOOD! it is especially delicious when you get them early in the morning when they are still warm....mmmmm.....

our front yard trees

I LOVE our bay window!

dining area, all new laminate floors & fresh paint job

all new kitchen cabinets & appliances!

 

our AWESOME backyard!! huge selling point

the deck

creepy fireplace in the basement

midget door aka harry potter's room

its a split level! front door

master bath counter

 hallway

 garage

 checking out our boundary survey done by the company I work for - Cardinal Surveying!

 closing day!

 picking up the u-haul!

 getting ready to load it up at our apartment complex

 setting up our new microwave!

 had to replace the fridge that was already there with this nice scratch & dent frigidaire!

 danica being awesome in our new house on moving day

 my baby sister danielle!

 our table with some beautiful flowers from my mom!

 austin replacing the shower door (because it was nasty) with some nice new ones!

living room

 our couch

 new flowers! thanks glynn!

 we've got a dumb tree in our front yard that is shedding like crazy!

this is what has fallen in less than a week

our deck covered in leaves

painting the top trim in our living room & kitchen (it was an ugly brown before)

 our new vanity in the hallway bathroom! austin tiled the floor beneath it, resealed the toilet & installed the vanity. he is basically amazing :)

 painting the banister

we are sure proud of everything that we (mostly austin) have done to this house this past month. we cannot wait to feel settled in when the major projects are out of the way & cannot wait to start our family right here. our new ward is great & we've met lots of nice families! we love the location of our house & are having so much fun buying stuff & doing projects to make our house truly a home.

btw, totally sliced my hand open with a utility knife last week & got stitches so I have been pretty worthless in doing much that require 2 hands. can't wait to get the stitches out so I can take care of the household chores more easily which austin takes care of the manly projects!

celebrating year one!

Austin & I have now officially been married for 1 year as of August 10th! it has been the best year of my life & I am so looking forward to many many many more to come. we have been incredibly blessed this first year of marriage. we've also hit some pretty big milestones along the way!

here's a quick recap:

• got married (duh!)

• honeymooned in yachats, oregon (absolutely beautiful & so relaxing!)

• moved away from parents (well, my parents. we moved in with austin's family for a few months) 

• took online classes & got my associate's degree

• went on an awesome camping trip to see mt rainier

• got my first car! (honda cr-v & I am in LOVE with it)

• austin started his career! (after job hunting while living in washington, austin finally got an offer from 2 companies & he chose to work for Boeing here in St. Louis)

Austin's first day of work (leaving from our hotel)

• we moved to st. louis (halfway across the country from all of our family :( sad, but also grateful to have this experience growing up & learning on our own)

moving out of our room in washington

• got our first apartment here in st. louis (which we loved but so glad to get out of there since we think there was mold getting us sick)

 first night in our apartment in st. louis

• endured a midwest winter

• I got a job within a month of living in st. louis working for a land surveying company (Cardinal Surveying)

my desk at work

 at an event with my boss

• austin & I got callings as Primary teachers (& scout leader/activity days leader)

• went to our first cardinals game with austin's co-worker Glynn

• went to nauvoo to see the pageant & attend a session at the temple

• started hunting for a house! (so fun to look at houses)

• celebrated austin's 25th birthday

• bought our very first house!! (best way to celebrate a year of marriage) 

& here we are. in our first house & boy have things been busy! having a house is a lot of work but it will definitely be worth it so we can call this place home.

more about our new house in the next post :) now onto celebrating our first anniversary. we started off the day sleeping in, of course (it was saturday & we take full advantage of the weekends!) we were so busy the weeks ahead that we didn't plan anything too extravagant (& since we just laid down a bunch of money to buy this house!). we've been fixing up a lot of stuff around the house the week of & to top it off, I got super sick. probably from all the stress of moving. we had some delicious breakfast & got ready for the day. we had a few errands to run like looking for vanity tops to replace the gross ones that are in our house now, but then we spent the rest of the day enjoying ourselves.

we went to this delicious cupcake place for lunch. it was our anniversary & we can choose to have cupcakes for lunch if we want! jilly's cupcakes are apparently pretty famous. they won cupcake wars on the food network. I can see why because these cupcakes we so delicious! they were ginormous & so rich. austin got a reese's chunkage & I got a turtle caramel cheesecake.

after stuffing ourselves with these delicious cupcakes, we headed down to forest park to explore. forest park is pretty awesome. its got lots of museums, a golf course, beautiful grounds to walk around, a little lake & the st. louis zoo (which is free). we walked around for a bit by the pretty lake with a view of the museum of art.

 after cooling off in the museum of art & looking around at some exhibits, we decided to find the boathouse & rent a paddleboat to take it around the lake's little river.

we loved chillin out by the big fountains that misted us with cool & refreshing water. paddle boating was a lot of work & it was so extremely hot. austin didn't enjoy it as much because his legs didn't have enough room.

we went home & relaxed after being out in the sun for so long. then we got ready to go out to dinner at our favorite restaurant here in in st. charles by the riverfront. Little Hills! we love that most seating is outside & when it is cold at night, they light up the fire pits & it gives a nice ambiance to the dining setting.

we called earlier that day & asked if it would be possible to make a special dish that they don't currently have on their menu but did earlier that year.

they were able to make it for us!! wondering what this heavenly dish is?? it is butternut squash ravoli with a brie cheese cream sauce with mushrooms, asparagus & red peppers. it is AMAZING!

they didn't give us much in each plate so they fixed our bill & apologized. we went elsewhere for dessert...we can't resist those s'mores blizzards at DQ!

we had a really great time celebrating our first year of marriage. we reflected upon all of the blessings we have been given this past year & we know our decision to be sealed together for time & all eternity in the temple was the best thing we could have ever done. those covenants we made that August day a year ago have blessed us tenfold. we've enjoyed our time here in Missouri so far & we can't even believe we have a house now! I am so glad I get to spend eternity with my best friend. we've been able to share all of these wonderful memories together & we can't wait for what this next year will bring for us :)