4 weeks until closing!

Another Saturday trip to the house with Sasha this weekend and a lot more was completed in the house! We have our cabinets in (kitchen and bathrooms), all interior doors were on, paneling above the fireplace, outside shutters, and they started the railings! Enjoy the pictures...

In an effort to really hype ourselves up to move, Dave and I managed to take full advantage of the JCPenney home sale this weekend and got several window coverings and pieces of art work for 50-60% off! We even got a call from the fraud group at our credit card company wondering if we were shopping in JCPenney...guess it's good we're being watched, but we thought it was rather funny! So, once we move all our stuff inside, we'll now have artwork and blinds to hang to make the place look more homey!

5 weeks...

Dave, Sasha and I went on Saturday to see progress. Yes, we took Sasha, she gets to enjoy the excitement of her new digs too!! There was a lot more done that we expected for this week. All the ceramic tile was done, painting was completed, our railings and cabinets were all in the garage ready to be installed, our driveway was poured, exterior brick and siding finished, deck completed, and light fixtures were in! Can we move in yet? Here are some pics for you to enjoy!

We have a niece!!

Rowan Carlyle Ashmore was born on Saturday (Sweetest Day!) around 3a.m.!! Congratulations to Lesley & Robin on their little girl. We hope to see pictures of the newest addition to the Hickman family today and Dave and I plan to visit PA to meet our new niece early next year.

The countdown continues...6 weeks to go!

Not too many more exciting pictures, besides this one of the full brick work done on the front of the house. We went in and all the drywall was taped-up and still needed a bit of sanding to be done before painting. I did get a call this morning saying that the first coat of paint will be going on tomorrow, so hopefully next weekend there will be some exciting interior photos we can take.

Not too much else exciting for us this weekend, I was sick with a cold starting from about Thursday night, so I kind of laid around the apartment. Dave actually helped a friend put drywall in his garage, so he got some practice for our garage in the future. (I did get out of the apartment for a little bit to visit the boys at work, I was going crazy in the place all by myself with only a fuzzy channel 7 to watch on tv!)

7 Weeks and counting!!

Before we get into the house update, let's talk for a minute about the apartment living. Not only are Dave and I sharing a 700 sq. foot apartment with a dog and a snake..I discovered mouse droppings yesterday afternoon when I decided to start some laundry! Now, normally I'd be on the phone in a split second with the leasing office, but due to our decision to 'hide' the fact that we have a dog, we are on our own to deal with these things (I guess this is our payment for saving the $600 dog deposit fee). Not only did I find droppings on the floor in the laundry room, but I found them on our counter this morning (and I know that I wiped off all counters yesterday)! My husband being the clever man he is, offered to allow Merlin, our pet boa, loose in the apartment to be our 'mouse trap', but I think I'll opt for keeping her in the cage and buying the traps to catch the rodent(s). So, we are sitting at 7 weeks left in this place and then we're on to the house!

We drove out Sunday morning to see the house progress and boy, they got a ton done this past week! Almost the entire outside is done, just a small amount of siding left and about half the brick work to finish up. On the inside, the entire place was drywalled! The pictures tell the story, so here it is. (We are only making one trip a week out there now - on the weekends so we can get the key and go in...for those of you that were used to the twice a week update with pictures). Enjoy!!

Urbana visit

Dave and I drove down to Urbana Friday night and got there around 10p.m. Boy, traffic was still nuts at 7:15 when we left town! We dropped Sasha off at Dave's parents with her prescription food and 2 bottles of pills in hand to get her back feeling better and headed out. Because we got to the Grandparent's house so late on Friday, we visited for about an hour and then crashed for the night. Saturday morning we got up and ate a marvelous breakfast...you have to love a good home cooked breakfast! (cinnamon rolls, bacon, egg casserole, fruit, orange juice) Mmmm! After breakfast, we headed out to the Homecoming football festivities. We had great seats for the game, only 12 rows from the field on the 30-yard line! It was a great 1st half for the Illini, but they lost ground in the 2nd half and ended up losing by 2 points literally in the last second of the game, when Indiana scored a field goal. I was pretty bummed that they didn't win because it really looked hopeful most of the game. Here are a few pictures from the game (notice I packed blue and orange for us to fit in like college kids)

After the football game we visited more with the Grandparents and then we headed out to see my brother. Imagine this, we offer to take a college student to dinner wherever he wants and where do you think he wanted to eat....Pizza Hut! I was quite surprised at the choice due to all the stories I had heard to date about free pizza at different events around campus. The answer I got to this question was that he wanted some 'good pizza'. Okay, I love my brother and all, but aparently Pizza Hut doesn't agree with my stomach anymore, and so I will be suggesting a different restaurant for future visits. After taking him out to eat, we took him grocery shopping at Wal-Mart and he definitely stocked up on snacks for the dorm room. Finally, we helped him carry his groceries up to his dorm room, met some of his friends on the floor and then headed back to Downers Grove to pick up Sasha and go home.

Update

Sorry for those that look forward to the picture updates, I have none today. Dave and I went by the house last night after working out, but it's amazing that it's pitch black now by 7 p.m. So, we put the brights on, on my car and checked it out the best we could. The brick was mostly done on the garage and the drywall was almost complete inside. We were able to sneak inside again and stumble around in the dark to see the drywall, because they left one of the garage doors cracked open. We plan to go back on Sunday during the day and take pictures because they'll give us a key to get in and look around!

On a family note, poor Sasha is suffering this week. She got a urinary infection and unfortunately the medicine she's taking to get better makes her 'sick' in other ways. So, Dave and I are getting a small taste of what is means to have a kid, because she's waking us up once or twice a night to be let outside. I guess we are thankful she wakes us up, but I just feel so bad and want to make her better. I'm trying a new vet today hopefully (one that's closer to where we live now) to see if they can help us. Of course this all happens the week when we plan to go out of town. So, thankfully I have the greatest in-laws and they are offering to still take care of Sasha while we're out of town, but we're probably cutting the trip short so we're not completely inconveniencing them! We'll be at the Illini Homecoming Football game Saturday and visiting Dave's grandparents and my brother at school. So, hopefully we'll have a few pics besides the house to blog next week.