"A house is built with boards and beams, A home is built with love and dreams."

Well, here's my first post from North Carolina! Don't really know what to say right now but I'm sure I'll ramble on enough for you :) We got here on the 10th (a Saturday)...took two days to drive with a stop in GA at Mark's parents. Then we started to settle into our hotel because the original move in date for our house was March 26th. Sunday we went to church, met a friend of my cousin Crystal's, who was super nice and had us over for dinner. She has a young little granddaughter who had a lot of fun playing with Evelyn so Evelyn now has a friend, which is super great! She's tired of me :)

Anyway...Monday we went into the housing office to ask some q's/let them know we were here now/wanted to see if we could see a model of the house we were moving into (they are brand new houses...got lucky again on that one!). So they said they'd talk to someone else and get back to us on when we could see a house. Then half an hour later they called and said they had our house key, were doing a walk through and could sign/get our keys/move in the next day! SWEET!!!!!! I was so excited.....living in a hotel for two weeks wasn't sounding too fun to me....and just getting it that quick was awesome! We were praying to get into our house earlier but didn't expect that quick!

Anyway...this did mean Mark had to go into work Tuesday to check in and all that, which is kinda the downfall to moving in quicker...we were expecting a longer time before he had to go back to work. luckily he only had to go in for a couple hours, we signed our contract, got our keys and started unloading our moving truck! They gave Mark the rest of the week off, which was great cuz I definitely needed his help, and he went back to work for real on the following Monday. Here's a pic of the outside though!

Evelyn opening the door to our new house for the first time! :)

I really love it...so cute!

Evelyn loves it too :)

We got a lot done though that week...I swear I've been to Lowe's nearly everyday we've been here....lots of projects/house stuff/had to go back cuz I forgot- that type of thing....but right now it's looking really good! Mark was at work all last week with the car so I got a lot down painting-wise and also with my biggest house project so far...redoing an old dresser/nightstand into TV cabinet and side table! We've needed a TV cabinet for a looong time and I saw this pin on Pinterest where this lady redid a dresser into a TV cabinet and I loved it! Finally last Wednesday I found a dresser & nightstand on craigslist for $80, had Mark pick it up and got to work! I pretty much just had to paint it and we inserted some thin boards in the top two drawer spots for a little cubby but it did take three days and quite a few coats of paint! Two primer coats (I didn't want to sand the whole thing so I got this nifty primer so I didn't have to :), a red layer and brown layer for distressing, two yellow layers for the top coat, and then two layers of sealer! Here's some pics I took throughout the process....(I took these with my iphone so sorry if they're not so great :)

Before....

White primer coat...

the red layer....

the brown layer....

yellow layer... :)

distressing it! I used candle wax and wiped in the spots I didn't want shown so they layer above it wouldn't stick...such a great idea and super easy!

The final nightstand/side table! Sorry it's dark....I'll take better pics later...

and the final TV cabinet! It works perfect with our TV and all our stuff....it's hard to see but we put our DVD player/Wii/remotes in the cubby's. 

Anyway...I really liked how it turned out and LOVE it in the living area! We've used make-shift things for pretty much our whole marriage for our TV so it's nice to have it on a real piece of furniture! I love the yellow and the handles (I spray painted them a bit more brown to go with everything better) and I love the little scalllop/curve of the bottom and the little details around the top edge...so fun! I've never done anything like this before so I was a bit worried about doing it but I think it turned out pretty good...

The other main project I worked on this past week was painting! Most of you know I do love to paint so I got on it pretty quick :) Plus I couldn't hang anything up til I painted :) So Mark and I were watching some show on TV one day and Ty Pennington was on and showed this faux-chair rail paint technique so I did it...it's hard to see here (iPhone again...better pics later) but there's three lines of different browns in the middle of the red and yellow sections...I like it but will be happier with it when everything is done and up :) The far left room is the office/craft area...the middle is what you see right when you walk in the front door and the right foremost wall is the living/tv area....I thought that since they were pretty open to each other and have similar coloring in the rugs (pretty much red and golds), I'd do these three area walls the same and make them flow a bit. I also painted one wall in our bedroom (a pretty turquoise-y color to match our bedding) and I'm gonna do something fun on Evelyn's wall this week....just gotta draw it out :)

Entry area...to the left hallway is the kitchen/dining area....the  right hallway has a bathroom and closets then another living area in the back, which I'm using for a play area...and the stairs are off that room.....just FYI :)

Another project we've started is a bit of growing! I've wanted to do an herb garden type thing for awhile and finally got around to it here...so here's the first sprouts we've gotten! We also have a couple planters with some plants/veggies in it so hopefully they go well :) I've never really gardened before!

So glad it's spring btw! Although I didn't experience much of a winter...oh well :)

And I know this post is getting long but I'm going good and don't want to split it and of course I've gotta have some more pics of my girl up! The first Saturady we were here we made a little trip to the beach, which Evelyn was SO excited about! She's been wanting to play at the beach forever and just loooved it. We haven't been back but I look forward to going in the summer! 

She got scared of the tide coming up...she'd run up to the water, see it coming and run back....it was pretty funny 

she loooved digging though!

enjoying some ice cream on the back patio! It's a covered/screened porch area which is SO nice! Definitely gonna enjoy that. 

I know this is random but this girl's feet astounds me sometimes! They are SOOOO long and big!

Evelyn's big project (well mine cuz I put it together :) a new kitchen! She saw me order it online and for days til  it arrived was begging for her "pink" kitchen....so glad when it got here! She LOVES it though! I'm hoping it will keep her entertained for good periods of time at least...

Making some cookies for me! 

Although her favorite toy from the kitchen so far is the phone....ugh, really? :)  I thought this was cute though...she was talking to her Grammy and telling her about her kitchen...soooo cute!

Just a cute pic from this morning before church....

 So there! I'm done....hopefully this will tie you over til the next post... :) Although I've got some fun stuff coming up this week I'll have to blog about...including Mark's promotion! More on that later though... :) Love you all!

oh...and a p.s. on me! :) I'm almost 20 weeks and have been feeling pretty darn great! All the pesky prego symptoms of feeling icky are gone and I'm regularly feeling little man move around, which is sooo great! Just trying to get a Dr. figured out here and I'll hopefully be getting my ultrasound done with them soon! :) Don't have any "belly" pics yet cuz I'm not really showing but I'll post some once I get them...