It's Official. Our House is on the Market!

Our listing went up this morning and we already have someone wanting to see the house this afternoon. Yea!!

Signs For Our House

With our house going on the market tomorrow, we need to let people know about a few things.

We recently had our carpets cleaned, so I made this sign to let people know. I will put it on our front door. I really hope that they pay attention.

Also, since we haven't moved everything out of our garage and basement (but we have it organized and will have everything out this weekend), I made some signs to let people know.

Let me know what you think.

More Out the Door (348-546)

During our pack and move to the storage facility, we were able to go through a lot of our cabinets and basement and found a bunch of things that needed to be freed from our posession.

To ARC**
6 Vases
1 Sweater
1 Mailbox toy
1 Train Toy

An 18 Gallon tub which included the following

• 27 T-Shirts
• 2 Pairs of Sweat Pants
• 1 Pair of Shoes (that I don't even remember buying- nice huh??)
• 1 Robe

40 Items

Brian is taking Friday off work and taking some stuff to the dump and to a recycling facility. These are items that should have been disposed of months, if not years, ago.

• 1 Old Garage Door Opener
• 1 Desktop Computer (without a hard Drive)
• 1 Broken Microwave
• 1 Tree (broken down into countless branches)- Should I count each branch?? How about 50??
• 2 Very, Very, Very Old Ottomans (that Brian was going to repurpose the wood, but we don't want to move again)
• 2 Dead Bushes (they never grew, but have been in our backyard from 3 years)
• A Truckload Full of Junk (branches from fallen trees, firewood, and other yard waste)- I'm counting that as 100

158 Items

198 Items Total

**These are the items that I remember. There are probably at least another 50 things that I don't remember. If I come to the end of the year and are within 50 of removing 2,012 items from the house, I'll count them.

Before & During

There is still some work to be done, but the bulk of it has been completed. Here are some before pictures.

Doesn't this look like a well lived in house? Now look at it.

The major areas have been cleaned, purged and organized. We even had our realtor over to take photos for the listing. We are still on track to have our house on the market by March 1st.

Outside of our Home

Here is the outside of our home. We are selling. Does anyone want to live in SE Aurora??

 

Week #8- The Big MOVE

Tomorrow is when we are taking all of our extra items to a local storage facility so that we can present our house as an open, inviting place instead of the "House of Toys" that it actually is.

I will post before and after pictures of each of our rooms and let you see the difference. I will also post a photo of the storage unit once it's full.

Have a much "funner" weekend that I will!!

Wordless Wednesday- My Sweet Boy

Week #7- Everything (Almost) Done and More Things Out The Door (265-347)

We got almost everything done that I had anticipated this weekend. Here is what was completed from the list.

• Pack wine glasses and mugs
• Pack mudroom chemicals
• Remove bird's nest from back yard light fixture
• Clean out medicine cabinet
• Thin out area under the sink in Master Bathroom
• Move oxygen machine
• Move Sam's portable potty
• Determine area for shoes
• Pack refrigerator magnets

Another thing Brian did (that wasn't on any list) is hose off our newly installed front and back porches. This included spraying out the cobwebs around our front door.

Activities moved to this week.

• Clean refrigerator (gross) and organize shelves- I think this will be Brian's job
• Remove childproof items in kitchen
• Pack vases- Tonight
• Snake our upstairs sink
• Replace burnt out bulbs- Tonight
• Clean light fixtures- Tonight
• Clean the bathtub (again)- Maybe tonight

Some of this stuff might be completed while I'm at work today since Brian has today off from work (President's Day- lucky!!). I'll see when I get home.

Besides packing up items to put into storage while our home is on the market, I was able to find a lot of things that were taking up room in our house that were not going to make the voyage to our new home.

Returned to Oxygen Company
1 Oxygen Machine
1 Oxygen Regulator
2 Oxygen Tanks
1 Oxygen Tank Cart

Items Donated to ARC
2 Jackets
1 Sleeveless Shirt
3 Long Sleve Shirts
2 Pairs of Pants
6 T-Shirts
4 Pairs of Jeans
1 Pair or Shorts
1 Set to Jammies
1 Short Sleve Shirt
2 Outdoor Vests
1 Set of Headphones
1 Sewing Machine
1 Wire Toy
1 Serving Tray
1 Barn Counting Toy
3 Bottles
1 Glass Bowl
1 Kite
1 Pair of Glasses
43 Items of Sam's Clothes

82 Items

New Fireplace

Earlier this month, after speaking with our realtor, we contacted Chimney Sweeps of America and requested that they come out to clean and inspect our fireplace before we put our house on the market.

The came out and looked at our zero clearance fireplace (we found out later) and saw that it did not need cleaned, but there was a crack in the back refractory panel and it needed replaced since it was not safe to use. 

We hated to have to spend more money on a house that we were leaving, but without the document stating that the fireplace was able to be used, it might have become a big deal for the prospective owners, and could break the deal. I tried to see if there was a way of repairing the crack without having to replace the entire panel, but the high temperature mortar couldn't be used on our type of fireplace.

We decided not to risk a problem with any prospective home buyers, so we relented and had the work done on Saturday morning.

Week #7- Update on Everthing Weekend

• Pack wine glasses and mugs- DONE
• Clean refrigerator (gross) and organize shelves- I think this will be Brian's job
• Remove childproof items in kitchen- Tomorrow
• Pack vases- Scheduled for tomorrow morning
• Pack mudroom chemicals- Can't be packed, but organized

 
 
 

• Replace burnt out bulbs- Tomorrow
• Clean light fixtures- Tomorrow
• Remove bird's nest from back yard light fixture- I'm making Brian do it
• Clean out medicine cabinet- Done
• Thin out area under the sink in Master Bathroom- Done
• Clean the bathtub (again)- Scheduled for tomorrow
• Move oxygen machine- DONE-Was picked up today along with extra O2 bottles
• Move Sam's portable potty- DONE
• Determine area for shoes- DONE- Used master bedroom shoe organizer
• Pack refrigerator magnets- DONE

Week #7- More of Everything

This week we have the following planned. Results will be posted early next week. Wish us luck!!

• Thin out the pantry (to look good for potential home buyers)- DONE Monday
• Pack extra glass dishware- DONE Monday
• Pack serving items- DONE Wednesday
• Organize Sam's cups- DONE Tuesday
• Drop off items to Goodwill- DONE Wednesday
• Pack the last of Sam's toys that he can see again when the house is sold- DONE Wednesday
• Move microwave table to Dining Room to hold Sam's diapers- DONE Tuesday
• Pack wine glasses and mugs
• Clean refrigerator (gross) and organize shelves
• Remove childproof items in kitchen
• Pack vases
• Pack mudroom chemicals
• Replace burnt out bulbs
• Clean light fixtrues
• Remove bird's nest from back yard light fixture
• Clean out medicine cabinet
• Thin out area under the sink in Master Bathroom
• Clean the bathtub (again)
• Move oxygen machine (Getting picked up Saturday)
• Move Sam's portable potty
• Determine area for shoes
• Pack refrigerator magnets

Have a great weekend!

Happy Valentine's Day!

My husband is GREAT!!


I'm not one to go overboard or request an extravagant gift for Valentine's Day. Actually, even though I married, I usually try to boycott this Hallmark Holiday, but this year I'm proud to say:


Happy Valentine's Day!!



Why am I so happy?? My wonderful husband gave me a set of beautiful aquamarine (Samuel's birthstone) and diamond earrings.

 
I love them!! Thank you so much gorgeous.

More Week #6- A Little of Everything

We purged and organized everywhere in our house this weekend. There were even some repairs completed.

• Purged and packed wine bottles
• Cleaned out master bedroom closet (including a bin of clothes that will be taken to Goodwill tomorrow)
• Cleaned the master bathtub again (it will probably need one more GOOD cleaning to be ready for potential buyers)
• Put all of the kid's themed movies in a bin together
• Washed and folded all dirty clothes in the house (you can actually see our living room couch now- our dumping ground for clean clothes)
• Removed and recaulked part of the kitchen (the rest will be completed this weekend)
• Grouted the replaced tiles in the kitchen and around the half bath door
• Other small projects

We only have until the end of the month to make our house look AMAZING before it goes on the market. With the storage unit we rented (available to us on the 24th) and Brian's parents watching Sam that last weeked, I think that we can get everything done.

15 Minutes of Fame

My husband's uncle Cliff starred in a 30 second commercial for his dentist office, Mortenson Family Dental- Forest Green branch.  This is recorded on an iPhone, by his son, so the recording isn't perfect. Enjoy!



It will run 23 times a day there for 3 weeks, plus 170 times a day on the cable stations. 

Sam's Daycare Valentine's

I found these Valentine's Day printouts (DINOSAUR and LION) about a month ago, and I'm using them to distribute Valentine's Day items to Sam's Daycare class.

Since he (sort of) belongs to 2 classes, I made sure to make enough for both groups.

They came out so well!!