Well, we stayed strong and on track in November (and actually ran the fastest race to date). That race was liberating for me…I thought…”Am I finally getting “faster”? Could I actually beat, no crush, my previous 1/2 marathon time?”
(Side note: I say, “faster” because, well, I am not fast at all, but it’s not about my minute per mile for me, really).

Well, for some reason all that excitement slowly faded and I struggled to find the motivation (and sometimes the time) to go out there and log those miles that I so desperately needed.

I thought that signing up for the ING Georgia Half Marathon would give me the push and motivation that I needed, but it didn’t. When I would run I would have horrible calf tightness (during and after runs) and some other aches and pains. This was another added excuse to why I shouldn’t run….because it hurt. Deep down I knew I hurt because I would not run for a week or two and then all the sudden go out and run 5 miles. I was starting to have all those “beginner” aches and pains that I hadn’t experienced in so long.

I also blamed the lack of running on the cold weather, shorter days (I run at night) and for Nate not wanting to run. Yes, I actually blamed my husband…mostly in my head, but sometimes to his face…for my lacking of running. I once told him, “You spoiled me by running with me so much that now I hate running alone” (which is partly true – I hate running alone now) but I can still go out there by myself.

Oh, and then there’s the house thing. I don’t even know what to say about that. It’s true, we spent every free second we had from March 1 – March 15, working on the house, but really? That’s only 2 weeks.

*Sigh* long story short, a few weeks ago, Nate and I went out for a 10 mile run. It was brutal (why I thought it would be ‘easy’ when I knew I wasn’t prepared, I’ll never know) and it hurt. It depressed me. I looked at Nate and said, “There is no way that we can run a successful 1/2 in 3 weeks.” I knew we just weren’t ready, but the thought of dropping out of the race killed me. A part of me just wanted to run it, ready or not, but good thing Nate’s smart and put a kibosh on that.

The 1/2 would have been this coming Sunday, March 21st. As, I write this I am trying to think of that last time I went for a run…and well, I think it was the day of the brutal 10 miler.

I am trying not to get down on myself, but I am so frustrated. It was around this time last year that I started to run…and I loved it. What happened? Where did my motivation go? With all this said, I am thinking about signing up and running the Nashville 1/2 marathon at the end of April. I need a boost, something to get me back out there, but the thought of not being prepared or running a slower time than my 1st half (which we were super prepared for) haunts me.

Any thoughts? What would you do? I need some love…

Whew! What a long, exhausting (but fun/satisfying) weekend! The days all started to blend together, so the order of things may be a bit fuzzy, but you’ll get the general idea!

Wednesday: My parents arrived in Nashville late Wednesday night (around 11pm) and we pretty much came home hung out for a few and then went to bed.

Thursday: I (Jenn) had to work all day on Thursday, but Nate had the day off, so he and my parents headed over to the house a started working on the kitchen. They did so much on Thursday during the day. The got almost all the prep work done (priming, trimming, etc) and I am pretty sure they even started painting the walls and trim their new color.

I came over after work and helped paint, etc. and then we left the house around 8:30pm and had dinner. After that, we came home to watch LOST (since we missed the episode on Tuesday) and I ended up falling asleep right at the beginning…so I still need to catch up on the show!

Friday: We started the morning with a text from the guy who re-finished our hardwood floors saying that due to the rain and humidity over night (Thursday night) the 1st coat of poly wasn’t dry yet and that they hadn’t started the 2nd coat yet because of that. Thank goodness the rain ended up clearing and he was able to apply the 2nd coat of poly on Friday morning. It didn’t end up hindering our move – like we thought (thank goodness)!

I think the floors turned out great and we love the color! Here’s a picture of the floors (taken on the iphone, so excuse the quality) pre-move in…

We headed to the house that morning and continued our work on the kitchen. *Sigh* somewhere in the time frame (I can’t remember if it was Thursday night or Friday) we (meaning my Mom and Nate) decided the kitchen would look better with the random short “island” removed. Of course, we all thought it would be easy and it would be super quick and an easy fix (which it was for the most part), but you always underestimate how long things are going to take!

Honestly, Friday is a blur…all I remember is painting, painting, and oh yeah, painting some more!

Saturday: Time to hang the kitchen cabinet doors back up…or was that on Friday? (Hmm…I seriously cannot remember)! Ha! Anway’s, now we know why people get paid the “big bucks” to do kitchens. It is not easy people. The cabinets aren’t the nicest to begin with and I tried to number them when I took them down, but the numbers ended up getting painted over somehow…so we had to pretty much guess where each cabinet door fit. Not. Easy.

Oh, and then there with the hinges. Yeah…we went to Home Depot 3 times in an hour time frame. Ha! We could not find the right hinges and we almost had to use some really ugly ones, but luckily Nate and my Dad made it work! Ha! Most of the cabinets shut fairly easily!

While the men we doing the cabinets my Mom and I were at Home Depot buying other random “crap” (bead board or wainscoting for the “island” area, molding, trim, etc). How we got stuck going to Home Depot I will never understand. I now loathe that store! Never want to go back for a loooong time!

We were pleasantly surprised on Saturday afternoon when our friends, Ryan & Cari Hines, offered to come over and come help us with the house (once again). They are so helpful and such hard workers! Love them! Ryan helped my Dad and Nate finish putting the hardware on the cabinet doors and then they finished the island.

My Mom worked hard on cleaning everything in the kitchen (and many other places…thank you, Mom) while my Dad continued to help the guys, paint, and clean (thanks Dad)! Cari and I headed over to the apartment and packed up a lot of the kitchen stuff and then brought it back over to the house to unload.

(P.S. I loved seeing Cari and Ryan’s face when they saw the almost done/freshly painted kitchen! It makes my heart so happy that people who have seen the kitchen (before) in person and now after are so impressed with the change. If I remember correctly, they said “It doesn’t even look like the same kitchen!” That response seriously makes all the long hours, hard work and stress so worth it. I am glad other people can see the change that we do. It makes us feel much better that we aren’t crazy for making the changes that we did and like we are moving in the right direction!)

Here’s a picture we took of the kitchen right before we left on Saturday night…it’s just a little preview and was again, taken on my iphone. We can’t wait to share more (and better) pictures with you!

Sunday: Moving Day! What is there to say? We moved. It actually went pretty fast and was relatively painless. Again, we were so thankful to have help of friends and family (lots of Discount Tire guys – and their pick-ups, my brother, Mom, and Dad)!

Monday (today): We are all moved out of our apartment! At the house, we are having the cable for TV hooked up (yay) and a electrician is putting up the pendant lights above our sink a couple recessed lights in the kitchen (we seriously have no light in the area by the cabinets) and switching out a couple fixtures for us. I can’t wait to see what it looks like!! Yay! Here is a pic (yep, iphone again) of the light fixtures we are using in the kitchen…

After this, I am done spending money for now….seriously.

Please pray for us…that God would protect us, our home and everything in it, our finances/jobs (I swear I have never worried so much about one of us losing our jobs until we bought a house…stupid, I know, clearly I am not completely trusting the Lord) and our marriage. We can’t wait to make this house a home…our home…

Shout Out: Nate and I cannot thank my Mom and Dad enough for all the help they provided over the past 4 days! The kitchen would have been nowhere near finished without their help, hard work and ideas. Thank you for enduring the achy knees, neck pain, hand pain, short tempers, etc. to help us. We know you don’t have to help, so we really appreciate that you did! THANK YOU, we love you!!!

Well, there are a couple of reasons for this…

First, even though there are a lot of windows in the kitchen it can seem “dark” and we were worried that painting the cabinets dark would then make it feel even darker. So, we debated doing a lighter shade of green and that was okay, but we didn’t really love it.

Second, I was afraid that in 5-10 years, or whenever we end up selling the house, that the grey/green cabinets would look as outdated as the “current” ones…

(Yes, people, this was the color of the cabinets when we bought the house). It is just hard to choose a color that won’t go out of style, ya know? Maybe the color of the cabinets was cool when they painted them that lovely lime green color (maybe?? I am trying to give the previous owners the benefit of the doubt).

You never know, maybe down the road we’ll buy new cabinets and what color we pick to paint the cabinets won’t really matter, but maybe we won’t replace them? You just never know. With that said…I thought going the “classic” route couldn’t hurt, especially after I saw these kitchens…

Today is my last day of work – for the week! My parents flew into Nashville late last night and while I’m at work today they (including Nate) are suppose to be working on the kitchen. Praise Jesus. I am so thankful for their willingness to come and help us move/paint/etc.

The floors were in the process of getting stained last night when I left so I am excited to go over today and see what they look like. We chose “dark walnut” as the color. Hopefully they are beautiful! The next few days are going to be crazy and we’ll be without internet next week (at the house) because we forgot to set it up! Oops! So, it may be a little while before I get new pictures up! Be patient!

“We Can Do It!” that is my motto right now. I have to admit it…this whole home “renovation” thing is sucking the life out of me (and I know it is Nate too). At first it was fun, but now it has become straight up exhausting. We only have the kitchen left and I feel like we should be cruising through it, but instead it feels like it is taking forever. We did get over to the house tonight and got the 1st coat of paint on the cabinets and I just happened to take some pictures…for all of you! Enjoy!

kitchen

kitchen without flash. all trim still needs primed and painted white and walls need painted…but we’re getting there!

The floors are being stained tomorrow! So exciting! Hopefully my next picture update will be of furnished and finished rooms! Can’t wait.

We really want to remove the laminate “backsplash” that is there currently and we can pry it off pretty easily, but it does show where the glue was (but there is no damage to the wall at all). Does anyone know how we can go about removing the glue? At first we were thinking we could just sand it down and paint it the wall color, but I don’t think that is going to work.

Do any of you know if we can use adhesive remover on the wall?? Thoughts?

P.S. Can you see where we removed the kitchen cabinets above the sink? The wall and ceiling needs some TLC, but man, it makes a huge difference having them removed. We LOVE IT. Now we just need to add a couple pendant lights there!

Here is the work in progess…yikes!

…And friends are friends forever
If the Lord’s the Lord of them
And a friend will not say never
‘Cause the welcome will not end
Though it’s hard to let you go
In the Father’s hands we know
That a lifetime’s not too long to live as friends…

Not really, but for some reason the chorus of the song is stuck in my head this morning. Not. Cool. It probably doesn’t help that from where I sit, in my little cubicle, I can see a huge cardboard cut out of his album cover of “Healing Rain.”

Nate and I have a sectional (this is it)…

…and we were planning on putting it along the big picture window and then placing the TV on the opposite wall. Well, come to find out, the floor vent is right where we wanted the couch to go. So, what do we do?

Pull it away from the vent? We thought about that, but I don’t think there will be enough room. The room is around 12 feet wide and our couch (the chaise part extends around 8ft) so if you pull it a foot away from the wall then you will only have 3 feet to walk around the couch. Is that enough? Can you move floor vents? I need suggestions people…HELP!

If you move to couch to the opposite wall, then where do you put the TV? Not in front of the windows? So where? Such a bummer…

Alright lovelies…we’ll try and keep you updated as we go! Pray that we get everything done soon! Everything has been primed, but the kitchen cabinets…ugh!

**One more thing! I need your thoughts on our bedroom paint color…see pictures below:

What color do you like better?