Home Sweet Home

I have been putting off posting pictures because I wanted to wait until the house was perfect...I soon realized it would never be perfect or finished. So I decided to just put up pictures of what we have and when we update stuff we can add new pictures. There are still some specific things we need, like cabinet storage in our bathrooms above the toilet and other things, but for the most part, we are settled into our first home. 

We started off with a few projects and painting

For a while all we had in our freezer were Otter Pop...I mean a LONG while

We had to install some recessed outlets so we could hang the TV and all the wires went through the wall to behind our entertainment center shelf. I also had to figure out a way to stop our shower caddy from falling off, so I bent out a rectangular bracket and screwed it on. And many already know of the difficulties we had getting our dryer to fit in the closet and the recessed bibs and rearranging the pipes and and cutting drywall and tile everything that went along with that.

Our next project was building our entertainment center to surround our fireplace, putting up the trim and painting the mantle.

No visible wires, HOORAY!

We painted the living room, kitchen, guest bathroom, guest bedroom (that's right, we have space for guests so come visit us!) office and our bedroom. I bought a rug for under our table, put up some floating shelves and other decorations. I also got rid of the horrible closet doors in our bedroom and installed a curtain instead. We are still yet to hang our DVD racks that we made a couple years ago, but I think we are very happy with how everything is coming along. 

Our kitchen, dinning area and living room

Our fireplace. (I've turned into Mom, I have a vase with just sticks in it!)

This frame was made for us by Leanne Heuer (sort of my second Mom, Thanks Leanne!) for our wedding and now holds the key to our first home!

Our "Beachy-ish" bedroom with a "girl station" (term coined by Lee) for me complete with
a purse rack I made to keep all my purses and bags contained

The guest bathroom. The pictures don't really do justice to the color in there;
it's an olive color, like the top of a palm tree... it's really very pretty

Since I got palm trees everywhere, Eldon got a spot for a little bit of baseball. 

This is our office. I am going to add a collage of his old baseball cards and try to find an old jersey to add. The eagle picture was given to him special when he became an Eagle Scout.

And for those who were worried, don't be, Duke has a good sized yard to run around and play in, he's just fine. Next summer our project will be to pour a concrete patio and create a nice spot for a BBQ, another reason to come visit us :) 

Slingball Tournament

Forgot to post this a while ago...
Eldon's boss, Bob, is friends with a man whose mother died of MS. In remembrance of her and to help find a cure, he and his father started a Slingball Tournament on the beach to raise money. Bob invited us to join them this year. It turns out this is a big thing, they had a bracket with about 130 people. It was a double elimination tourney that lasted two days. Bob and his family went along with a few others from Eldon's work.
So slingball is basically what we know as Ladder Ball or Lawn Golf, the game where you have to land the rope with golf balls on the end on one of the rungs worth 3, 2, or 1 point. The only two differences are that one: it is not played in teams, you are playing just one-on-one and the second difference is that behind the bottom rung is another one worth four points. Everything else is the same.
We headed out to the coast on Friday night where we stayed in a nice beach house. The tournament started Saturday morning. I lost my first game and was knocked into the loser's bracket. Eldon, however, won. A while later I played again and barely pulled out a win. Eldon's next game, another win. My next game, I had to play the girlfriend of Dennis, one of Eldon's co-workers that came with us. I was losing pretty bad but was able to catch up and win again. Eldon-another win. My next was my last game, unfortunately. I lost and that was it for me. Eldon, on the other hand, kept moving his way through the bracket not loosing one game. Saturday ended with Eldon in the Semis. The next morning Eldon continued to win and was in the championship. Since it was double elimination, even though Eldon had already beat this guy, he had to do it again. It was close, but the dark horse won the entire tournament. There is a tradition that when the winner takes the podium they bring out his trophy with beer in it. Bob, knowing we don't drink and not wanting Eldon to be uncomfortable, told the guy this. So last year's winner said Eldon could dump the beer on his head. So he did. Great photo opp. He also won a free night stay at the inn on the beach where we were and a free dinner at the steak house there. It was a very fun win for the underdog that no one knew! Very fun weekend all round.