Fort Campbell Flip, Week 1 Update

A lot has happened in the short time since we closed on the house but most of it isn't very exciting. We are now mold free, and the house is all but empty. The doorway between the living room and kitchen has been widened, creating a much more open feeling in what was a very closed off space. Many minor plumbing issues have been corrected as well as the new water line installed for the fridge to be moved, not photo worthy but a very important step. All the flooring has been purchased as well as all new light fixtures and fans. I scored some incredible 6" dark walnut laminate planks for $1/sq ft, which is a huge savings from the $1.60- $1.80 I had seen everywhere else. The carpet will also be $1/sq ft. Have you looked at laminate lately? That junky plastic roll out sheet flooring? Well- it has come a long way since I last saw it new. It's crazy nice! I am only using it in the basement laundry room but it is very nice stuff!

The almost empty kitchen- Cabinets and appliances will be in next week. 

This was a regular sized door that closed, it feels much better now!

New roof! These guys removed two old layers of roofing, replaced three sheets of rotted plywood and re-roofed the whole house in about 7 hours. Roofers are amazing. And I LOVE the change!

When I left this afternoon the contractors were about to pressure wash everything from sidewalks to gutters, some damaged wood panelling was coming down in the kitchen, and they were planning to begin painting, though I doubt that happened today. The carport was being removed, but we hit our first bump in the road there. It should have been an easy removal, but the previous owners poured the new concrete parking pad around the existing carport, meaning that removing the bottom support rail will leave a 20' long 2" wide hole in the pad. I'll have to have someone patch the concrete, which was not an expected expense. But we didn't find any rotted joists in the ceiling, so we should still be on budget. 

So- while the progress doesn't make for a very exciting blog post, things are moving smoothly and for the most part on time. The contractor goes on vacation on the 15th and the plan is for everything to be complete by then. Fingers crossed! 

Do you have questions or want me to elaborate on something? I'd be happy to answer, just let me know.

Return of the Mom

It has been over a year since I posted, and we've had several big life changes since then. My latest adventures are drawing quite a bit of attention and I have had several requests for a blog documenting the details for your entertainment. So... I'm back!

Quick update for anyone who doesn't know.. which is who?? I'm not sure. But- for the sake of the blog world, here it is. We live in Tennessee now, thanks to the Army, and could not be happier. We purchased our second home in Adams, another fixer-upper, but the 2.7 acres and stunning hill country views stole our hearts so the house could have been a shack for all we cared. Since we moved in I've done some painting and totally renovated the kitchen, but most of my time has been spent outside. I also got my real estate license and added three hens and two pekin ducks to the family.

The ducks are George and Jemima PuddleDuck and the hens
are Birdie (brown Araucana), Buttercup (Black/white Araucana), and Raven (Black Silver-laced Wyandotte).




Since we sold our first home for a decent profit I've wanted to do it again. We considered flipping the house we are living in, because it does have the right profit margin, but we just love it too much to let it go. So last week, we closed on our first nothing but investment property. I am blessed to have an incredible husband and in-laws who trust me with their money. I looked at more houses than I can count before we closed on this one. Most were wrong for various reasons, one I lost to a bidding war, another I lost to agent errors on the listing side and a stubborn property manager. By the time we had this one under contract I was so jaded I honestly didn't think we would get it- but we did!

She isn't pretty right now. Actually- she's really rough. 1780 sqft, 3 bed/1.5 bath, a full finished basement and a two car garage. But the kitchen and basement are full of mold and the roof is it horrible condition. I see what a house could be when I walk through, and this little lady is a gem. I paid $61,500 and hope to put it back on the market in late June for $129,900. Since I am a Realtor now I only have to count on 6% closing costs, plus the $~20k we are investing to renovate it. If everything goes smoothly we should have a very nice profit at the end and a beautifully renovated happy little house. We closed last Friday, and the mold crew came in Saturday to start demolition and remediation. I ordered cabinets, countertops, and appliances Friday afternoon.

The carport will go, and the second garage will be converted back into a functional garage.

Fresh carpet, primed and painted panelling, and serious mold removal should leave a great bonus room.

This doesn't look terrible, but closer inspection shows water

damage and mold throughout.

That's a lot of mold. But for the age of the house it will be an amazing laundry area!

The house will get a new roof, new paint and flooring, all new cabinets and appliances, new fixtures, and landscaping. This is my quick ipad sketch of what I expect it to look like when we are finished.  I should have pictures with the new roof tomorrow!

     

Until next time.

When I grow up.

I have a problem. One that has plagued me since about my sophomore year in high school and is one of the major reasons I still do not have a degree despite having enough credits for more than 2 full bachelors. I find passion in almost every aspect of life.

The summer before my senior year I applied for a summer program at an art college in Atlanta, largely to be near my boyfriend who would be spending his summer there. The choices were obscure and didn't suit my interests so I semi-randomly opted for the animation program. As it turned out- I was pretty good at it and the six weeks there won me a scholarship. I fell in love and could imagine nothing better than devoting my life to cartoons- and my dream quickly became Pixar.

Things happened, my art school closed, and I changed schools and majors and eventually quit completely out of frustration.

Then I baked my first pie. It was pumpkin. And it was to die for. Within a matter of months I built a repertoire of wonderful pies, an idea for an all pie restaurant, and a business plan.  I had an investor and a website and was literally days from signing on the building that would be converted into PIE (a late night pie and martini bar). And then my investor backed out and my pie dreams died as quickly as they had been born. Although, someone else has since opened a restaurant in the same area the specializes in exactly the same thing.

My next love was education. I went back to school and yet another place and could think of nothing better than teaching elementary school children. And after a couple of semesters another series of events stopped that also- specifically marrying my army husband and moving to a new state.

Now I am a stay at home mom (by choice) and find myself seized by waves of old aspirations and new ones at least weekly. This week I have seriously considered selling Mary Kay (??) and lusted over a letter from the editor in my lastest edition of Martha. I think I would love working for a magazine- especially Real Simple or Martha. The glossy pages and heavenly weight of each issue fill me with something I cannot begin to explain- something that makes me feel like I belong within them. But other things give me the very same feeling.  Last year my husband and I renovated and sold our first home, and now I pine for the sad soul of every abandoned house I pass. And there have been many more, some long lived and some fleeting, but they all invoke an overwhelming love in the depths of my soul.

I feel like most people try a number of things and eventually find one that moves them and stick with it. But I am different. Broken somehow. Doomed to spend a lifetime trying to decide which wonderful thing I should spend my life doing. For the time being I am quite content to spend my days with my little daughter, but there will come a time when she is in school and my hours are quiet. And what then? What then, my friends??

Beach!

Every fourth of July my husbands family rents a condo at the beach for all of us. It used to be Destin, but since we moved to NC, Destin is about a twelve hour drive for us so the trip has been moved to Myrtle Beach. Last year I sat under the tent watching the ocean, feeling extremely self conscious of my (not actually very visible) baby belly, and daydreaming about the baby that would be just old enough to sit up and play in the sand the next time we were there. This year that baby WAS just old enough to sit up and play in the sand, and she completely changed the dynamic of the trip. It was different, and wonderful. And she loved it. Pictures tomorrow!

I was worried about her being uncomfortable with sand all over her- and I read in Real Simple (my favorite magazine of all time, maybe second to Martha) that baby powder makes sand fall off your skin. But pouring and rubbing just wasn't working. So, M and I came up with the idea to make a fabric pouch to fill with powder. Turns out, someone else did too, because there is an entire website devoted to powder pouches. But I made my own, and they worked perfectly!!

Just a rectangular piece of fabric, a piece of Velcro, a little stitching, and POOF! Super great washable, reusable, sand removing powder pouch!

I liked it so much I made one for my mother in law!

I was able to let the baby play in the sand and water, dry her off, and put her in clean clothes (without sand stuck everywhere) all without leaving the beach. Otherwise I would have had to keep her on the blanket until just before we were ready to leave so that she wouldn't have to be all sandy. In case you don't know, sand on a baby anywhere very quickly leads to sand in eyes and lots of crying. But it works great for everyone else too. Keep it in a ziploc bag and leave it in your beach bag until you need it!

Fresh from the Garden

Well, not my garden, because the last time Hubs and I tried to make a garden I killed every single thing. I don't know how, because I watered and fertilized and everything else I thought would make for a wonderful abundance of fresh veggies, but it was an epic failure. The tomatoes looked like knarly heirlooms (they were BetterBoy- a variety my Nana swears by) and were completely hard and inedible. I had no idea both the broccoli and lettuce were ready for harvest, so I let them get way overgrown, and thus inedible. Cabbage Loopers ate my brussel sprouts and beans. And that was that. Waste of a lot of time an effort and I got nothing.

BUT, yesterday I stopped by a friends house and was gifted with a bag of zucchini, sweet banana peppers, and green tomatoes. Her garden is magnificent. So big and healthy that you have to move giant branches around and hunt for the huge produce. I was amazed, and confused and jealous too. I gave my plants tons of space and tons of support in a fancy raised bed and got terrible results. Her garden is pretty natural- in the ground and growing all over itself and the ground, and absolutely thriving! Now I know.

Anyway, between her amazing veggies and the sandwich loaves I got from the super awesome Sunbeam Outlet (which you can read about here if you missed out), our dinner tonight was almost free! And miiiighty delish!

We had Zucchini Parmesan Subs.  Might not sound so great, but it was. Even my vegetable-hating, meat loving hubs liked them. Sorry the picture quality is absolutely terrible! It was taken to send to my friend as a thank you- but then I ate mine and realized it was wonderful enough to blog about!

So- recipe..sort of. I made it up as I went so it will be lacking in precise measurements. But it's the sort of thing that is up to your tastes anyway.

Cut three zucchini in nice sized strips and toss in a hot skillet with a little oil. You want them to be big enough to feel sort of meaty in the sandwich. I added two small banana peppers, seeded and diced, as well as a little garlic powder, onion powder, and a (very small) dash of cayenne. (Onion powder rocks, btw. I hate chopping onions) When the zucchini starts to get soft, add a tiny can of tomato paste (or pasta sauce if you happen to have a jar open) and some hot sauce. We use Texas Pete, because while I don't really like spicy food, I loooove the flavor it adds and the slight kick if you add just the right amount. You don't want the mixture to be super saucy, just coated well. When it's all coated and the zucchini are the texture you like, scoop a hefty amount into split mini loaves and top with shredded cheese. I used both chedder for sharpness and mozzarella for...because I like it. :)   Wrap them individually in foil and bake at 350 for about 15 minutes. The foil wrapper keeps the bread from crisping up too much and makes for really great gooey hot sub. Yum Yum.


Don't cut your loaves all the way through- you want to fill them like a taco shell and keep them open side up to keep everything from falling out. It makes the whole process much easier. Don't cook the zucchini too long. You want them not quite crunchy, but if you over do it they turn to mush and you will have bread full of mush. No good.

Tomato paste is greatly under appreciated I think- I never use a whole can at once so I keep it in a baby food jar in the fridge and find myself tossing a spoonful into all kinds of things. The same with onion powder. Onions add wonderful flavor to almost everything, but chopping them sucks, and so does remembering to use them before they go bad. So- keep a jar of onion powder around for the times when you just don't feel like crying.

Enjoy loves- We sure did!!

Thrift shops for Bread!?

I live in Hope Mills, a small offshoot of our main town (Fayetteville), and any time I need something from Lowes or Home Depot, which is usually a couple of times a week, I have to drive the 6 miles down Hope Mills Rd into the real city. I have been doing this for nearly a year now, and I finally decided to stop in some of the little shops I've been passing by for so long. Most of them were a bust. One little thrift store was actually closed down, though the open sigh still flashed invitingly in the window. Another was full of clothes and Diaper cakes??, which is not what I am interested in at all. The cutesy antique shops were full of new furniture at a "discounted price" which was not discounted at all.  But bread outlet- oh the bread outlet.

Do you raid the rack of half priced clearance bakery items at Walmart like a starving child? I do. My husband eats a bagel for breakfast every morning, takes three sub type sandwiches and two regular sandwiches to work every day, and has to have rolls/biscuits/breadsticks with his dinner- so we go through a LOT of bread. And bread is EXPENSIVE. This place, The Sunbeam Outet, recollects the bread expiring that day from the grocery stores and sells it for $1 or 2/$1. All kinds of bread- bagels, rolls, the fancy sliced kind, buns. Everything. They also sell all those little prepackaged snacks for super cheap, but since everything I eat sticks to me like glue since Lovebug was born and Hubs hates sugar, I have to skip that isle. In addition to everything being so cheap already, they give you a free loaf if you spend $5, a 10% discount if you have a military ID, and $5 worth of free bread every time you fill up your punch card-which fills up quickly!

I left that store with all this for only $7 and felt a little guilty as I skipped out the door.  That it two packs of Natures Own bagels, two packs of Cobblestone Mill loaves, two packs of dinner rolls, a huge pack of brown loaves, AND a loaf of Cobblestone Mill sourdough sliced bread. All of it technically expired that day, but who cares? It all seems as fresh as can be to me. And my deep freeze has no problem storing it all for me until we need it.  I cannot believe the money I have been wasting buying all of this at the grocery store for the past year when I could have been saving so much at the Outlet!

A bonus, if you have children who like to feed ducks, or farm animals that like to eat bread, they sell big bags of yesterdays bread for dirt cheap. I have an aunt that gets truck loads of what didn't sell for $1 to feed to the cows- I guess cows like bread.

The best part? These are all over the country. Now that I have been in one I remember seeing them everywhere I have ever lived. What a discovery! What wonderful things have you found hiding right under your nose?

I'm baaaaaaaack!!

Hello again Friends- I'm back! Very sorry for the absence, but now I am here to stay, like it or not. :)

Recently I found, or rather, was shown by my wonderful friend who's daughter was born the very same day as mine, an amazing thing. Pinterest. If you have not yet been seduced by Pinterest, you should immediately go and take a look. And by immediately I mean just as soon as you are finished reading my wonderful ramblings. Check out my boards while you're there- I rather like them.

On a more creative note, I just finished an awesome project that I think you all just might love, and I didn't even steal it from Pinterest! I have always kept a mini dry erase board on my fridge for grocery lists, jotting down phone numbers, or whatever else I might need to remember. But- since we have remodeled the kitchen and it is looking oh so classy, my notes are looking kind of trashy (not that my house full of baby toys does not). I pondered glueing the board to the inside of the cabinet door- nope, painting the inside of the cabinet door with chalk board paint- nope (we'll be selling the house soon and the brand new cabinets need to stay brand new, plus I hate chalk), and then had an epiphany. Contact paper.

My first thought was painting chalk board paint over contact paper on the inside of the cabinet, but then I remembered that contact paper, as well as anything else non porous, works as a dry erase board. White would look sort of trashy too, but black. Perfect. So- check this out!

Plain Cabinet

 Awesome Cabinet!

Now I can have my great list-making note-jotting board, even better than I had before, and keep it out of site! Though this one is so cool that I almost want to leave the door open. I'm betting you're wondering where in the world I found such awesome bright colored markers that would write on black? Expo makes them for black erase boards and they are wonderful- though slightly expensive. I think I paid $7 for the set shown below. So worth it though.

So, go grab some contact paper and markers and make yourselves a board! I used the leather textured stuff from Home Depot because I was in too much of a hurry to find the smooth high gloss kind, but it worked just fine, and looks very nice. The markers only fully erase with a wet paper towel on the textured paper, but I have no problem with that since I thought I was going to have to use wet erase markers in the first place. The roll is huge, and if you wanted you could cover every cabinet in your house and probably still have some left over. The markers I got at Staples, though Walmart or Target may have them too. 

What awesome projects have you done lately?