Sunday, March 20, 2016

Springing into 2016!

It's has admittedly been quite a while since we blogged; it's been a whirlwind of visitors, out of town trips, long nights at work and I'm-never-leaving-the-couch type hibernation since the New Year. But now that Spring is 'springing', we are feeling energized and motivated to start making this house a home. 

First and foremost BIG shoutout to our friends and family who provided us with gift cards, furniture, decorations, candles, etc. to help us get settled in. We were truly spoiled this past holiday season and our home is better for it! 

Ok, now here we go!!


Kitchen and dining right after the new year:


Kitchen and dining now: 

"What is the purpose of those shelves?", you may be wondering to yourself. To which I reply, "An herb garden of course!".

 I am in the process of starting some seedlings so we can have herbs indoors year round. We will also transplant a few sprouts to the balcony planters that will be revealed to you at a later time. So far, we have dill, thyme, rosemary, lavender, two types of basil, chamomile, cilantro, oregano  and calendula. 


We have even started using a kitchen compost to put our kitchen scraps to good use. 


We're experiencing a bit of a cold snap right now, but soon this organic material will line our outdoor planters and provide a nutrient boost. Three cheers for urban gardening 🎉

Next up we have the living room. We are so thankful a family friend was able to make us an ottoman table that matches our floors. We love the contrast! 


We've been prepping the dining/kitchen balcony space for Spring and investing in fun outdoor things. Arthurs latest toy is his new grill! 


We have been grilling. up. a. STORM. I even made Arthur grill up pizza yesterday in 35 degree rain. Not sorry! 

                    Grilled avocado 

                       Grilled bananas 

            Arthur's first grilled filet! 

            Grilled pizza! Life changing.

I've also added a bamboo reed privacy screen so our view is not the house behind us. 



The fourth floor/ terrace room is a work in progress. We still need another 1-2 bookshelves and Arthur and I keep going back and forth on putting another TV up here or leaving it as a technology free space (you can guess which camp I'm in haha). For now, it's a great space to work out and/or read a book!


Which leads us tooooo....

The Terrace! Thanks to a Sams Club error we were able to score this AMAZING furniture from my mom & dad. We sat up here on Christmas and it was so peaceful. We'll be making major updates to this space over summer, so stay tuned! 


Next up we have the Master (heavily influenced by the one and only IKEA). Arthur surprised me with the vanity table for my birthday, and even installed fancy dressing room lights along the sides. IKEA (and Arthur) are the best! 


The guest Master has come along and is actually our old (incredibly comfy!) bed. We installed our old living room tv on here across from the bed for lazy viewing ☺️.


Now back downstairs ...
This entryway was a labor of love that took Mom & I HOURS to complete. Don't ask us why, we have no idea. 

Our most recently completed project was organizing the garage. It was a disaster, and we wanted space to put a fridge and one day an outdoor mudroom. Arthurs workbench fits perfectly next to our Costco overflow shelf 😋. 



Our biggest project has been......entertaining (to say the least). We are working on creating a white board and batten accent wall in the laundry room, surrounded by the other 3 gray walls. 

This was the laundry room when we were first in the dreaming phase...


Then we moved on to the actual doing...





 After we put the boards up we filled the sides and sanded everything down. We've been struggling with some corners  and with some of the corner filler we used. It's taken us TWO. WHOLE. MONTHS to get to the point of priming. Coat one turned out better than we anticipated! 



We still have another coat or two of primer to do before we get to the white paint. Then the gray walls will come along! Slowly (very) but surely! Hopefully it doesn't take us another month and a half to finish this part haha. 

On a leisurely note we have taken some time to explore the local parks and attractions. Now that we are Marylanders for good, we think it important to be aware of everything this state has to offer! We've gone on runs and hikes through local parks that are only 5-10 minutes away.... 




...to the Chesapeake only 35 mins away...




All and all, we love it here. We love our home and we love our accessibility to downtown DC, downtown Annapolis, local parks and beachfronts. We are going to try and post on here bi-monthly to give family and friends updates on how things are transforming over the summer. 

Until then, peace, love, and -as our wifi network says- "Namaste!" from the Goldins.