First weekend

Moving day wasn't as brutal as I had expected but it was long. Im so
thankful we hired movers because it took 4 guys 6 hours plus to finish
the move.

Sunday morning we went back to the old place to spackle and clean and
Mike's dad and his wife came to help us settle in. Ann helped me scrub
the bathroom (and thank goodness she did, I don't think I've ever
encountered such years of dirt in a place before) and Chip helped Mike
install new locks on the door.

We have made some inroads into the zillions of boxes and laid the
apartment out in the way we planned. It's a trial layout to see if we
like it and slightly different from the Grays upstairs

Mike bought a charcoal grill and we made burgers Sunday night which was
nice. Im having some space issues as it is a bit of a downgrade to move
from my lovely walk-in closet to a rail and some drawers but that's in
discussion still...

The kitchen is also kind of a downgrade as it is smaller and darker than
my old kitchen. But once we move the washer/dryer I will be able to
reclaim the space as a pantry (and eventually both floors will move the
kitchen altogether). So as everyone as advised, it's a never ending
process and I have to work on everything one thing at a time.

We've made an appointment with a recommended General Contractor who's
gonna walk around and give us some ideas of prices of moving the kitchen
& moving the washer/dryer and whatever ideas we have in our heads. It
will be useful for us as we can then decide how much we could do on our
own to save some money and how much we actually can do with our (low)
skill level.

I think the first project for us is the washer/dryer move. In the mean
time, we might try stripping the paint around the window sills & lintels
to see if we can reclaim some of the natural wood. Right now it has
years and years of paint and it's so ugly. I have already begun weeding
the front yard (as per Ann's advice) and it already looks a ton better!

--iris--