And now, 9 months later...

Ok, FINALLY, I can post the after pictures. You cannot even imagine how much I have waited for this moment. It was a really long haul and felt like an eternity, but we have weathered the storm and have been rewarded with a beautiful new home. Have a look...

This is the kitchen. One of my favorite rooms - I LOVE my kitchen and lovemaking all kinds of nummy delights in here. Everyone is welcome!!!

This is a picture ofthe master bedroom. Weactually just hung our pictures this last weekend and assembled and put in a small armchair for the corner to the right of this shot and it looks fabulous!!

This is the loft looking to the right. We boviously need to add a few books to theentertainment center, but right now we are just enjoying kicking it to the fullsound of the Bose home theatre system and watching the glorious detail of the hi-def TV - 46 inches of flatscreen love baby!!

This is the loft looking left. We actually hung another picture ot theleft above the railing. It really is one of our favorite rooms in the house (asside from the electronics)!

This is the living room. Check out the awesome money tree plant we got in the corner from this little known nursery near us. You can't really see the picture on the wall that well, but we got it at the Art Fair this last summer. It might be a little small for that space, but we love it nonetheless.

This of couse is Katie's room. We are stillworking on getting more of her art hung up in there, but notice the little aquarium next to the bed. That contains her two mice named Ham and Cheese.

A Little History...

Ok, as I set out to do when I first started this blog, I am finally loading some chornology here. These are pitures of the house right after the fire.




This picture is what our bedroom looked like. Note the absence of a roof!


















This is what the loft looked like as you look towards the back of the house. Amazing how much of a mess soggy charred drywall can make.










This is a picture of Katie's bedroom. It makes my stomach leap to see it because if it weren't for John getting all of us up, we might not live to tell the tale.



















This is what theplace looked like from the outside. In a nutshell the entire roof on the front half of the house was burned off. The majority of it landing in our bedroom, bathroom and closet.

99% Complete!!!

We are very pleased toannounce that we are 99% finished with getting things together around the house. Just little odds and ends left to be done like towel racks, painting bathrooms and such, but it islooking fabulous!!! We have posed the pictures below so you can see what the (nearly) finished product looks like. I AM available for interior design work should you be interested! LOL

We're Back and Better that Ever!!!

At long last we are back in our house!!! The place looks great and everything we ordered looks perfect. iam going to post some pictures of before everything arrived then, once the painting and home theatre are all together anddone, I will posxt pictures of the finished product.

What a wild week it has been though, the move day itself was good - we picked up the keys on time the movers were a little early which was great because we got it all finished at a reasonable hour. The utilities, that was a different story - the phone company, AT&T, never showed up and, after telling me to wait around the house between 8:00 am and 8:00 pm on Thursday, told me they would fix it Friday but that I didn't need to be there. Thnafully I was home anyway for furniture delivery and an appointment with woman about the blinds. Yesterday they delivered the master bedroom furniture (it looks fabulous) and the home theater and big TV for the living room. The equipment delivery was a fiasco too because they didn't give them our speakers and they were told we had already picked up our BLue Ray player, which we hadn't. It all turned out great though because we ended up getting a newed Blue Ray player and $100 rebate! They still need to do the spearkers, but that'll be done on Wednesday after work, the painting should befinished by then too, so it'll look more awesome than it does now.

Anyway, enjoy the before pictures, because the after will be amazing!!!


Here is a picture of the kitchen









Here is a picture of the loft








Here is a picture looking into the living room, the kitchen is around the corner.








This is a picture looking out Katie's bedroom window.

Almost There...

Yes, it's true!! I know it's been almost 7 months, but there is finally a light at the end of the long and undulating tunnel. We will finally be moving back into the house on August 28th - how ironic is that, 1 year and 4 months to the day after we bought it! We can hardly wait. We've started packing, scheduled the movers, scheduled two furniture deliveries. Still have a lot left though with finishing packing the kitchen (because there isn't much else to pack) and calling all the utilities, scheduling transfer of service - OY! I was serious last time when I said I didn't want to do this again. Now I am more serious! On the other side of moving, however, will be several bashes to celebrate. More news on that at a future time. Still, we can't wait to have everyone over to help us celebrate. I promise there will be pictures the next time I post! God bless you all and thanks immeasurably for your support!! We could not have made it through without all of you!

No pictures yet, but...

We actually have a roof and all our windows now!!! How exciting , and it is a couple of weeks before I predicted they'd be done - even better!! They are doing all the siding this week and the garage and front doors will probably also be in stalled so we will not longer be able to go inside. Still, it was kind of nice, and a little emotional, going back in there afgter all these months. Feels like de ja vous! We did notice some mildrew on the fire wall between us and our neighbor's house, so wehave to ask about them remediating that - with all the raid we had in the last two weeks it it hardly a surprise. hopefully now that is it closed off it'll dry out and go away...but it never hurts to ask. I promise there will be pictures with the next post. Maybe when we move back in we can get DSL and uploads will be lightnig fast, unlike this dial up stuff! I guess I am spoiled from the speedy service at the office!

Picture(s) - Attempt III (Success!!!)

This was the front of the house - we are the last one on the end with a magnificent view of the trees. The window with the transom was our master bedroom. The window just past it was the garden bath.
















This was the front (corner) of the house - the large windows on the corner were the living room which goes up 2 floors. The windows above the sliding doors was Katie's Room.

Yea, that's right, visual interest...

Ok, now for the pictures - I am still getting the hang of this. Let's start with something simple, like how the house looked when we closed on it (for lack of anything more fascinating). (Keep the comments kind - I am new to this after all).

I have no clue what I am doing...

Wanting to keep up with the Jones's, or in this case the Schoutens's and Naone's, I decided to start my own blog - I am sure it will serve only as my own personal source of amusement rather than anything substantive - but you can't blame me for trying! That being said, I guess we can start with what has to have been arguably the most amazing year, both good and bad! First, we closed on our new home. A week later we got married. Life was blissful and settling in when nearly everything was lost in "the fire" back in January. As if that wasn't hard enough on Katie, she found out her Dad was being stationed in Iraq a month later. After drawn out negotiations with the insurance company (which is my euphamism for hounding them relentlessly to do their jobs) we finally bgan to see a light at the end ofthe tunnel - construction finally beginning last month. Over the ensuing weeks I will start to post all the fabulous and frightening pictures up to the minute. We will also start posting stuff about the exciting goings on in Gilberts, Illinois and in our lives as a family. It can only get better in other words!!! We hope you enjoy.