Paco's Photo Shoot...My Favorites. :)

Because, you know, it's all about me. hehehe. Just kidding!!! It's all about little Paco. What does Paco translate to anyway? little bean? :)



I adore this one...super sweetness. Am totally putting it on the ellusive website...




You look so posh and Seattle in this one. I love it!


I'm totally using this one on my website...someday!


Hey, Paco! Can you hear me?


Maybe you're ticklish?


Oh, wait, I guess just Danelle can feel that! heheheh, I'm so funny!

www.brookwhitney.com

I love you guys!! Thank you for letting me take your pics. Hope we can do it again when I'm home and when Danelle is really showing! Congrats!!!

Finally!! House pictures!

WARNING: Massive post!!
Ok, first off you should know that I lost ALL of the "in progress" pictures that show how much we demolished,tore down and shipped out (7 loads to the dump that Kathy and I made...I can't remember how many tons...a lot!). Consequently, it looks like we just took out the carpets and painted...but we didn't!!! :)

Closing Day! :) Happy first time homeowners...


On our first night Jerome came over to help us with our first project...taking down the rickety fence just outside of the living room...

Before...


During...

Still very enthusiastic...but need to take a picture of "after" will do and will repost...


Among our accomplishments:
*Tore out all existing built in storage closets

Below is a sample of the built-ins and "wood" paneling:



*Scrapped off all the popcorn off the ceiling (lost those pics)

*Completely demolished the bathroom down to the studs and subfloor. Even put in all new pipes. EVERYTHING is new...and I learned to tile!!
You have to love the black plastic tile! Before...


*Took down all the fake wood paneling in the main part of the house...discovered that it was covering up several barely covered former windows (you couldn't tell from the outside). So we tore out those walls to the studs b/c there was no insulation...re-insultated, re-wired, drywalled and textured (5 external walls).

*primed all walls, painted ceiling (repaired sagging ceiling)

*Tore out carpet

*Re-wired 3/4 of the house

*Added closet organizer THANKS MOM!

*repaired/painted side fence

It looks so good after dad's handi-work...


*Re-roofed side shed (all by ourselves!) see what bad shape it was in? just to the left (it was leaking badly and not functional). We also tore down the green lean-to in the foreground.


You can see the roofing felt Dave laid down and the facia board I measured(!) and painted...


Me measuring the guide lines for the 3-tab shingles...



The finished product...not bad if I do say so myself!


*Repaired/rebuilt side shed In progress...almost done (yay Dave!)

Did we do all this by ourselves?! Heck no!!! We were SOOOO blessed by our family and the help that everyone gave. We had work crews, cleaning crews, building crews and support crews. I think most all of you played some role in it. And for that WE THANK YOU!!!!!


Don't even ask what we have left to do!!! :)

I wish I had all the pictures I took when the family was here. It was amazing to see everyone pitch in like they did. Dave and I can't even begin to express our gratitude. There is so much more that wasn't even mentioned in this email.

I'll post more before and afters soon. I hope to be better about doing this in stages so it's not all or nothing. At least you have some idea of what we've been up to! :) I'll probably even re-visit some of the topics here for a little more detail and to give credit where credit is due.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who has supported us through this major undertaking! We love you and couldn't have done it without you!!!!

Craziness!!

Just a quick post to apologize for how delinquent I've been with posting. But I think I've seen all of you periodically throughout these last 3 months so most of you have some idea about what's going on. Working like mad on the house. I will have pics up sometime next week (hopefully!!). We've made tons of progress, although most everyone still points out how much work we have left to do! LOL Well, if we weren't traveling every weekend or filling it with photoshoots or plans to take over the world (insert evil laugh here...I'll explain in a minute) then maybe we'd have more time to work on our place. Still, it's livable, less smelly, and ours! :)

Below is a picture of Mary's arms after spending an hour sanding drywall...let me tell you, we now know the value of feathering!!!




This is a (poor) picture of our living room the very day we moved in...Mom and I got to work unpacking the kitchen and Dave executed his vision for the living room. It has since met with several coats of paint, but you get the idea...


Plans to take over the world...
Most of you know that my beloved boss Sandy has given her notice and will be leaving BHB to move to Colorado. To say the least it puts a kink in things! I have been approached by several shareholders who would like me to make a bid for Sandy's Director position. That is what I've basically been consumed with for the last two weeks. You should also know that this comes at our busiest time of year! I'll keep you updated if there's anything to announce.

Other news:
Our car officially died three weeks ago! Talk about craziness! Since we only have one car it was rather traumatic. We spent all week looking for a new car. Thank God for Auntie Penny and Ken!!! Each night they would come to our house, we'd drive them back to theirs and head out to look at cars, then we'd come back to thier place and they would finally drop us off after a long night. In the end we went for another Saturn. It's a pretty cute wagon that we are really excited about.



And since I know that all of you would rather read a post that has pictures...