Our (soon-to-be) new house

The week before Thanksgiving, the family and I drove out to California to drop the kids off to stay with Scott's little sister Katie while Scott, Duncan and I flew up to Washington to go house hunting. For four days straight we spent eight or more hours in the car driving from house to house to house narrowing down our preliminary list of 30+ houses. The very last house we went to see was one that we had actually already kicked off our prelim list because it was more expensive than we were looking for. But once we went inside, we were sold!

I  thought we would find a place with a nice big yard, a fixer-upper with lots of room for our family of boys. What we found was a huge house with a smaller yard in a teeny tiny city. It is a newly built house that was the last of the subdivision and the builder wanted to get it off his books before the end of the year.

 Right now we have a contract on it, and should be able to move in to it in the middle of January.

 

That little patch of grass of the right side is seriously ALL the grass in the front yard. The house to the right is a funny little flag lot, so there is only a sliver of barked area between our house and their driveway. I told Scott that one of the kids' new punishments could be to go mow the front lawn with a pair of scissors!

And this is my kitchen that I absolutely love! Granite counter tops. A cupboard microwave and counter top gas stove. Deep double sinks and oil polished bronze fixtures. A bar area and a double oven!! Stainless steel dishwasher and hardwood floors. Tile back splash areas and decorative lighting. A large pantry and TONS of cabinet space! We need to get a fridge, but everything else is ready to go in it! Isn't it beautiful?

And this might look a bit boring, but this is the master walk-in closet! I have missed having a walk-in! We don't have dressers for our clothes, and one regular sized closet has been really hard to juggle with two grown adults' wardrobes!

 And this is going to be our new school room. Teagan isn't going to have to share her room with four desks and three bookcases anymore! This is a really large bonus room, and I am so excited to have a dedicated school room!

This is the master bath. It has a soaker tub, a tiles shower, a separate 'water closet' in the bathroom itself, and a double vanity. I like how they put the 'relax' sign up next to the window as you look into the neighbor's window! Because that is just what you want to see as you are completely naked and getting into a tub! First thing to buy once we get in: blinds for the bathroom!

Next is a picture of the entry way from the front door. There is hardwood floor in the entry way, kitchen, and hallways downstairs.

This is a picture of the formal dining room. I don't like that there is carpet in it, and we are planning on leaving it there for a little while, but we will eventually hardwood that area as well. Light colored carpet and kids in the dining room are just not going to be a good match!

Downstairs there are two sitting rooms. This is the one with the gas fireplace that will be our sitting room with the piano in it, and the other one has glass doors and will become the tv room with the entrainment center a couch.

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Not pictured are the three kids bedrooms upstairs and the master bedroom, and the laundry room upstairs - no more laundry closet in the dining room for us! And it is upstairs...how intelligent is that! I love the idea of not having to drag baskets up and down the stairs to do laundry! Teagan will have her own room and the two older boys will share a room and the two little boys will have their own room.

It is a HUGE house, and a small lot, but the back is a decent size and is fully fenced in already and ready for a trampoline and lots of kids! We decided that since it is so often rainy up there, that a larger house and smaller yard would still allow the kids wiggle room without having to be out in the rain. It is large enough for us to have 4 teenage boys living in it a few years down the road!

There are also a lot of other kids in the neighborhood that are our kids ages. We scoped it out a few times and there were always kids out and about and having fun. And the house is on the neck of a cul-de-sac, so the traffic is minimal.

It seems like it is going to be a great house for us, and we are excited to move in next month. Emmy already calls it his new house when he sees pictures of it!