Finally!!!

We're homeowners again! Hooray! Yesterday, we closed on our house in Queensbury, and to celebrate we "camped out" at the new house. We had a delicious dinner of Taco Bell, then the plan was for us to do some essential cleaning after the kids went to bed. Problem #1: kids never really went to bed.

However, we did get a lot of good cleaning done, and while we did, we realized a few things. One is that the refrigerator that stayed with the house is actually pretty nice, definitely nicer than the one we left behind in Flagstaff. Another is that the cabinetry in the kitchen is actually really nice! It's all solid cherry, and I must admit it grew on me in a hurry last night. The previous owners got nice stuff when they updated the kitchen. In 1993. We'll still do some kitchen remodeling, but our previous plan of gutting it is out the window, now. We will re-use almost all the cabinetry. The last thing we learned is that the matching cabinetry in the laundry room / mud room has a pantry cabinet that has a surprising amount of storage in it. Score! We thought we were going to be doing a whole new kitchen, and it is quickly turning into a much smaller project.

The second picture is of the family room, a room that we have taken to calling "the golf room" for the stylish carpet. Those crosses in the carpet pattern are in fact golf clubs. Burgundy and forest green were never done better than this. In 1993. Obviously, we'll be doing a little updating of this room; we're undecided about how to update the fireplace, but white-painted brick certainly isn't going to be the long-term solution. The three-season porch was cold early Saturday morning, but beautiful. The geothermal heat system kept the rest of the house quite comfortable over the night. Of course, colder nights will come, but I'm really curious to see how it works out. Apparently it was good enough to keep the house comfortable for two 60-year-olds, and we do have four extra furnaces running around the house at any given time. One thing that we'll get to do plenty of is yardwork. I may have wasted my time this afternoon raking the front yard, since all the trees still have most of their leaves. We did meet some of our neighbors, though. The neighbors north of us came over, and they have a daughter Ian's age. The neighbors to the south of us came over, and the husband has apparently been helping the previous owners with upkeep of this place for a few years, so right now he knows more about the house than we do. And the neighbors across the street came and gave a big plate of pastries. Tasty!

We spent the better part of yesterday and today loading up the van and car at the townhouse, then driving over and unloading at the house. The basement of the townhouse, once packed, doesn't have much left now. The remaining items, however, won't fit in our cars. Next weekend, we'll end up renting a U-Haul and getting the rest of our junk. But in the meantime, we're exhausted and we'll enjoy a day of rest tomorrow.