crazy week

last weekend we took a trip to the wv mountains with our charlottesville friends. it was exactly what we needed....time with them and time to relax. the standing requirement when we hang out with these folks is that you wear pants with an elastic waistband. how awesome is that! the weather was foggy and rainy, but we didn't care. it was fantastic! robin has tons of beautiful pictures over in her little slice of blogland...check it out.... Robin's Song (i really need to get a camera...beside the fact that she's a professional....her pictures are amazing. my ipod is not going to cut it for much longer)

photo courtesy of Robin's Song

when we returned home sunday, we started preparing for frankenstorm, which was originally predicted to dump inches of rain on us. brian spent the afternoon (in the rain) on our new roof fixing missing shingles....

inches of rain eventually turned in to about a foot of snow in buckhannon! other than monday, brian has had the whole week off.  he has spent every day chauffeuring me around working on the house. almost all of the carpet has been torn up. today, he is starting the process of sanding the floors. tomorrow we will start staining and sealing our beautiful (hopefully) hardwoods!

trip

even though we have 4 million things to be doing, we planned a trip a long time ago for this weekend.

so rather than work, or worry about our jobs and the house, or run around like crazy people, we are meeting some of our favorite charlottesville folks at a cabin in the middle of us....which is literally the middle of nowhere. 

can't wait to see (most of) these fine folks....

hello hardwood

the first time we walked through the house, we both commented on how horrible the carpet was. and not jut ugly....dirty and gross. we knew it needed to come up, so the realtor let us rip up a corner in a closet to see if there was hardwood underneath.  from what we could tell, there was. but in some places, it seemed like the boards were really far apart.  we just weren't sure if they would be in good enough shape to use (and we didn't have the money budgeted for new floors).

the first thing we did last night was start ripping up carpet. we started in the bedroom (not a great "before"... we got ahead of ourselves and just started ripping!).....

after about an hour, brian had the carpet, padding, and tack strips ripped up, and my mom and i were finishing ripping out the millions of staples that were holding the padding down. and HELLO HARDWOOD!!! this room is in pretty good condition...some discoloration here and there.

my brother arrived to help out, so we moved to the living room....

the living room is almost done...just a few staples here and there. this room will definitely need to be refinished because of stains and a stripped finish in many places. but it is pretty amazing how much it has transformed the room already. i can't WAIT to paint in there (the dark blue trim is terrible!).

and in the meantime, boo was helping us clean all of the corners with her face...

homeowners

we are officially homeowners! is it normal to have the feeling of "what have we done" right after signing all of the paperwork? HA

we went to the house last night to make a huge to-do list. by item 1789, we decided to prioritize....ripping up carpet and the laminate bathroom flooring...in order for it to be livable (and not totally gross)! my brother helped and took our inaugural picture with the house (sorry it's blurry)....

examining this picture more closely made me laugh.  here are all of the things i saw...

we have LOTS of work to do! more pictures (and, hopefully, home improvement success stories) to come!!!

nightmare

i had a nightmare last night that someone stole our cards and drained our bank accounts....only to discover that our accounts were drained the morning of closing!

yep, didn't sleep well last night. but, it's finally here. 

we are planning to go to the house right after we close to start making a huge to-do list. in all reality, i may just sit in the middle of the floor and have a nice long cry. it will be a happy cry though..maybe with a little exhaustion mixed it....but happy.

that yard is going to look so much better without the "for sale" sign in it (and after lots of yardwork!)...

the weekend

brian's family had tickets to the wvu game on saturday, so they got to hang out with us at the mcquaid homestead before they left.

our nieces were particularly excited to play with boo. apparently they don't come to see uncle b and aunt jo jo anymore...just boo ;-) haha....i completely understand!

mimi is a regular dog whisperer...and boo knocked maddie (the baby) down a couple times, but all maddie did was giggle while saying "no boo"!

aunt jen got the girls ready with flying wv tattoos... (doesn't aunt jen's hair look awesome...she used wen shampoo...i'm going to have to try it!!)

holy cow...these girls are gorgeous...and love west virginia!!!

...and we got an awesome family picture in the yard with the beautiful leaves! too bad the game sucked.

my home among the hills

today is the kickoff of homecoming weekend at wv wesleyan college. one of my favorite things about wesleyan is homecoming convocation. students and alumni attend, sororities and fraternities dress up, faculty enter the chapel in their academic regalia, and the concert chorale opens up the festivities with "my home among the hills".  every time i heard the chorale sing this as a student, i got a little teary. hearing it today, for the first time as a faculty member, will likely be no different.

check it out....it is incredible!