Along with the good, comes the bad...

Still no offers on our old house yet, but thankfully after a painfully slow July with the holidays and no one house hunting, our showings have increased, so hopefully soon...

 

Until then, we are immensely enjoying our new pad, but as we all know, everything can't be perfect...

 

With our big backyard comes some new animal friends, namely, Gartner snakes and rats.  We've seen a whole host of rats - that, or it's just the same few running around.  No worries though.  As soon as we find the rat trap in one of the dozens of garage boxes, they'll be bird food :)

 

I don't mind the rats though.  They're kind of cute.

I do, however, greatly mind these slithering things...

I really, REALLY detest snakes, so I guess I will just have to become their friend soon since we've already seen four (or the same couple) in the last few weeks. 

 

Today, the girls decided to catch one and play with it.

They even had the gall to ask if they could keep it!

I definitely think NOT :)

 

 

In other news, our new couches arrived today.  I am still laughing at the delivery guys reaction when he saw where the sectional was to go in the basement.

 

"Uh, ma'am? That isn't going to happen."

 

They left them in the basement room with the French doors leading out to the backyard. 

We may need to do some more demolition to get it into the family room. 

If the previous owners knew what we were up to in this house, they might not have sold it to us!



Summer Fun

 

 Here is a smattering of some of the fun things we have been up to this summer.  It has occurred to me that my pictures are sadly lacking - I keep forgetting to take out my camera. 

 

The older girls made homemade watercolor paints. 

Amazingly, they worked really well.

 

 

Then I went camping with a bunch of gals in my ward. 

 

 

 

Many of these same lovely gals threw me a surprise goodbye party too a week later (though I still see them all the time since I don't live very far away, but still...I'm not in the same neighborhood anymore, so it has been a tad hard adjusting)

 

For the fourth of July, we spent the afternoon finding some new couches to replace our 16-year old ones, and then enjoyed a BBQ in the evening with friends, where we served up our lovely "dirt" dessert. 

We enjoyed a Rimington family reunion with LOTS of fun water games. 

 

We went camping up to Lava Hot Springs with some friends.

 



The girls found a fun cave near our campsite. 

 



 

 They even improvised on some baseball. 

 

 

 We then spent most of Saturday rafting.  It was a blast!

 

Even Megan enjoyed the fun. 

 

John made whistles for the kids out of sticks (much to our listening pleasure)

 

 

And we enjoyed relaxing away from all the stress of moving and selling a house.

 Camping is just not camping without some good Dutch Oven cooking :)

 

 

Last week we celebrated Alicia's birthday at Cherry Hill waterpark with Aunt Marian and her kids, and then we made these fun panda cupcakes. 

 

 Uh, photo bomb...Let's try this again:

 

One of my Meldrum cousins from Arkansas even stopped by for a visit :)

 



Good times, good times, indeed. 

I'm glad we still have another month left of summer. 

We still have some lake trips to enjoy and another camping trip before the summer is out. 

 

New Digs

We are finally getting back on our feet again having moved into our new place last week.  I have had many requests for pictures, so here goes...don't mind all of the boxes and moving paraphernalia...amidst swimming lessons, a weekend camping trip, and story deadlines, unpacking is going at a snails pace, but at least we have the essentials out, which meant I could make cookies yesterday and feel right at home :)

 

 

Here's the entryway. 

 

 

If you are wondering what the heck that demolition is, whilst moving in the piano and discovering it didn't make the corner into the den/office from the hallway, we made a second entrance with the help of John's brothers:

 

 We'll soon be able to have the piano moved in.  Don't worry, John does beautiful work and plans to put a nice glass door in.

Here is the angle from the original door.  You can see this is where our desk/computer will be, which makes for a nice quiet place for me to write up my stories, instead of the kids continually on top of me like at the last house.  Kitty corner to this room is our master suite, and another full-bathroom.

 

 Here is the kitchen.  I absolutely adore it. 

 

 

Just off the dining room is the living room area.  We've ordered new couches for the living and family room, but they haven't arrived yet. 

Under this area is a huge family room we just need to paint and put in carpet.  On the other side of the basement under our master bedroom and office is the laundry room and another couple of bedrooms that will be Kimberly's room and then a room we will turn into a craft/project/sitting room (see below) that walks out into the backyard - again, just waiting for some paint and flooring.

 

This is one of the cute bedrooms upstairs - they each have dormer windows - so fun. 

Poor Kimberly and Alicia are dying having to share a bedroom, but thankfully, it's just temporary.  As you can see, they haven't tidied up their room this morning. 

 

...and I've saved the best for last...our beautiful backyard with nary a view of other neighbors, though they are all really nice - they'll all come over to meet us - we feel loved already! That is a trampoline hidden amongst the trees.

 

Our backyard reaches all the way back (.5 acres worth) to property owned by UDOT where there is another acre of trees/woodlands before hitting Highway 89.  We've been told that deer frequent our yards often.  I've already seen the pet mice that live in our front and backyards running around, and eek - a couple of snakes - not my favorite thing in the world. 

 Now we get to keep tackling the boxes, including the extra-deep garage that is filled to the hilt with our stuff.  Can we say, Good Times?

 

 In all seriousness, we love this house already, and we've only been in it a week.  It felt like home the moment we walked in, and the feeling hasn't changed.  The kids are getting settled in, and we are looking forward to some new adventures.