This has definitely been our summer project! We closed on our first rental house July 6th (YEAH!) and got to work pretty quick on cleaning it up. I felt bad for the kids because we spent a lot of time here instead of doing fun summer stuff, but the investment will be worth it to them down the road and they had fun running around and playing in an empty house! Brooklyn really started walking and getting into everything right before we got the house, which made doing things a little difficult and it took us longer. Travis gets credit for doing so much hard work outside in our Texas summer heat! Cleaning up trees, building retaining walls and planters, ripping out overgrown bushes, cutting out tree stumps and power washing. It looks so much cleaner than before. The previous owner wasn't tidy, to say the least, and I spent my time inside, scrubbing, cleaning and painting. We steam cleaned carpets and had tenant locks installed. I love the floor plan of this house and I love the way it looks cleaned up! Of course, I have so many ideas on things I'd love for us to do in the future, but Travis keeps reminding me that we are trying to make money and not spend money. HaHa! We had it listed for rent on July 24 and within 24 hours, we had our first tenants! It was a huge bonus because they weren't planning to move in until the end of August, even though they paid for all of August, which allowed us time to do some extras, like paint and retaining walls. Here's wishing us good luck in this rental biz!! :-)
Before-
After-
Before-
After-
Dining room-
Kitchen-
Living Room-
Master and bath-
2nd bedroom-
2nd bathroom-
laundry room-
Backyard Before-
Backyard After-
Travis removed the two stumpy trees and trimmed up the palm tree in the corner. He power washed the porch and we cleaned up any junk lying around.
Brooklyn is 14 months old. Our summer days have been a mix of busy and lazy, but the time is flying by. Brooklyn is definitely turning into a busy toddler! She's on the move constantly. Walking, trying to run, and climbing on everything. She is much more steady walking now and doesn't fall down that much. She finally warmed up to the idea of shoes and actually wants to put them on. She will run and grab her shoes from the basket and sit on the staircase, waiting for me to come put them on. She also has some thing about socks. She loves them!! She likes picking them out and tries to put them on, but can't even get one toe in. :-) She completely shocked me the other day when she climbed off the bed from her nap and opened the bedroom door and came into the living room. I haven't seen her open any other doors since, but she is tall enough to be able to reach the handle?! Crazy! She had a bottom left tooth come through July 17, so that makes four total on the bottom. She's still enjoying all the same foods: eggs, lunchmeat, broccoli, mac-n-cheese, pasta, strawberries and bananas. We really don't switch things up that much. She started saying: "no, no, no" and she shakes her little finger at you when she says it. She says: hot ('ot'), dog ('dogga'), moon ('moo'), bath ('baa') and points to all the birds and airplanes that she hears. She started saying and playing peek-a-boo. It's precious! Video below. :-)
Where do I even begin with this post? A little time and a little healing has passed, but it still breaks my heart to think that my grandma is no longer with us. Mamma lost her battle to lung cancer and became our angel on April 11th, just 10 days shy of her 66th birthday. I was pretty open about her battle with breast cancer two years ago, but I was a lot more quiet about her battle with lung cancer. In fact, some people assumed that the breast cancer had returned and that's what she passed from. The truth is, when I received the call last June from my mom telling me that she had lung cancer, I knew that would take her from me. I knew that I was going to lose the person that I've been closest to my entire life. I didn't know when, but I knew it was happening. It's the hardest I've ever been slapped in the face with reality. It's the worst I've ever felt and I couldn't share that with many people.
Everyone knows that my grandma and I didn't share a typical grandma/granddaughter relationship. I came into the world when she was only 30 years old and in many ways, she took on more of the mom role because my mom was so young. Mamma gets credit for naming me Krista Karlene and our bond was strong from the start. When I was young, she was the one person that I wanted when something wasn't going right or when I didn't feel well. The one person that would make things better. I always looked up to her and I can still remember getting into little arguments with my dad over silly stuff, like me saying that she made more money than he did, even though she didn't. I just always thought she was the smartest and best at everything. She was successful, hard-working and independent. I wanted to be just like her!! And as I got older, she was still the person that I wanted by my side... whether that was car shopping, seeing an orthopedic surgeon for my scoliosis or tagging along to get information at Universities that I considered... she was there for anything important that was happening in my life. We truly became great friends. We shared several interests and spent time antique shopping and decorating. She introduced me to my love for Fenton art glass and Thomas Kinkaid. We took vacations together (not because I had to, but because I saved up money and wanted to). We went to concerts together (Garth Brooks, Celine Dion and Cher). We loved The Lord of the Dance and saw a live show for Mother's Day one year. We just did things that great friends do because they enjoy each others company.
My family lived with my grandparents on a few different occasions when I was growing up, but I moved in with her by myself when I was 20, after my grandparents separated. Being roommates for 2 1/2 years was such a great experience. We watched way too many Lifetime movies and ate way too much vanilla ice cream. I have always cherished that time when it was just us. Travis and I met during this timeframe. It's funny to remember their first meeting. Mamma could be a tough cookie when it came to my dating life and I was pretty nervous about introducing Travis to her (because he was 5 years older than me!). We went out for dinner and by the time I got to the restaurant, I had broken out in 13 huge stress-induced fever blisters! I'm not sure what I was so worried about because she loved Travis and grew to love him more over the next 14 years. The feeling was mutual and I loved that when Travis and I would daydream, our plans often included her. When we looked at houses that we could spend forever in, we always made sure there was a spot to build my grandma's cozy cottage in the backyard. She and I were going to be a package deal down the road and Travis was always supportive of that.
Family was everything to my grandma. That's what she lived for. Our joys, accomplishments and adventures were her joys, accomplishments and adventures. I can't help but feel guilty now because she put so much energy into us and not herself. She didn't spend a lot of time outside of her home or family, but that's how she preferred it. She loved my babies like they were her own. She was over the moon excited about her first great-grandchild and even watched Tyler as a newborn when I went back to the office for a couple of months. She went to doctor appointments with me and asked just as many questions as I did. She rushed to my house with my mom when I was in labor with Kinley and even though it wasn't a rush to head to the hospital, I can still remember her being so impatient and pushing us out the door. She was ready to meet her first great-granddaughter! And she was just as excited about us adding Brooklyn to the family. One of the hardest things about not having her here is knowing that my kids will miss out on such a special relationship.
I was with her the day before she passed and sat with her and an amazing Chaplain in her bedroom. We prayed for her and loved on her. It's really something when you sit and reflect on life in those final moments. Even though I know she knew, I am thankful that I was able to tell her how proud I was of her, how much respect I had for her and how much love I shared for her. Losing the person that you hold in the highest regard and trust with everything isn't something that you move on from. I know that I will have to move forward, but I also know that this incredible void will remain. There are many things that will make me smile and remind me of her- when I chew only half a piece of gum, see Hazelnut chocolate truffles, smell Chloe Narcisse perfume, eat homemade vanilla ice cream, see a hummingbird or owl, plant a pretty flower, paint my nails, fix a good Sunday breakfast or think of badminton. And there are still things that I can look forward to because of her. I asked Mamma if there was anything that she still wanted to do just a couple of months before she passed. She assured me that she was happy with the life that she lived and was satisfied, but that she really did want to take a train ride along the East coast some day. Sadly, she didn't get to do that, but I sure hope that I can do that one day in her honor. I definitely have a lot of amazing memories to carry me through.
I absolutely know that my grandma is in a happy place. She's as beautiful as ever. She's watching over us, just as she always has and she's proud. I didn't plan the details of my grandma's service, but in hindsight, I really wish that I did. I would have chosen to play one of her favorite songs.... I'll Fly Away by Alison Krauss. I can see her and hear her singing this and not only does that make me smile, but the lyrics of this song brings me a sense of comfort and peace.
(Copy and paste song link: https://youtu.be/1BPoMIQHwpo)
I'm going to miss this face more than words can express....
Tyler took swim lessons and I can't even believe it, but he's swimming! This kid hated getting his face wet in the bath tub and now he's diving for toys for hours! He was the one that said he wanted to take swim lessons because he didn't want to wear a life jacket at the pool. I was pretty skeptical after the first lesson because he hated it, but by the middle of the second lesson, it started clicking and he loved it! He was swimming the pool length at the end and I felt comfortable letting him play with friends. I'm pretty sure that we'll do another round of lessons next summer so that he can advance his skills and get Kinley going as well.
