Progress and Happy Mother's Day

I am moving along with lots of sorting, purging and packing up boxes for the move at the end of this month.  

I am up to my eyeballs with bubble wrap!  Sorting through the things I will take and finding new homes for things I will not be taking.

Sorting and wrapping up my chippy pieces that will be used in the new cottage.

So while I move through the process of sorting and packing.  I wanted to take a moment here on my blog to wish each and everyone of you a wonderful Mother's Day Weekend.

While I was sorting and cleaning out my pantry cabinet I came across a precious Mother's Day gift from my youngest daughter Kimmie.  Kim made this cookie recipe book for me when she was in 1st grade.

On one side of the cookie recipe page was the kids version of how to make the special cookies and on the other side of the page was the mom's recipes!

So cute to see the different interpretation of the recipes.

As I continue through the sorting and packing process,  I get a moment of love when I find things like this recipe book made for me by my daughter so long ago.  Just love finding memories like this to move on to the new cottage.

Have a wonderful rest of the week and have a great mom's day.

Hugs,

Kris

Summer Inspiration

Happy New Week Everyone.

First I want to thank all of you for your sweet and kind comments shared on my last post about losing our sweet Cooper.  He was a sweet boy and we miss him so.  That little guy with his long ears and big droopy eyes will be in our hearts forever!

I thought I would post some of my past flower garden pictures for a little inspiration and uplifting post today.  I am a summer girl and love my time with garden flowers.  I love to water, feed and just get my hands in the dirt.  So relaxing and peaceful for me.  

With us moving at the end of May and construction starting at the new house,  I will probably have limited flowers this season at the new place.  I did order some cute flower boxes for the windows up front on the new cottage.  Hope to do a few beds of flowers out front too.  We will be staying with my daughter for a month or so after we close to get the construction under way of the new garage and basement before we officially move.  So I will be limited on what I can do in the garden this year with being far away to water everyday. 

I will be taking out the lower bushes on the left side under the window to put up the new window boxes.  Then where the bushes are I will be putting in knock out roses and annuals to fill in the beds.  Eventually pavers will make this sidewalk look pretty too.

Here goes some of the past flower garden pics.  Enjoy the inspiration.

I have begun to take down and sell or wrap up  for this next move.  Packing up my favorites  to move on to the next cottage.

Enjoy this new week.  Hope to have upcoming changes to show you on the new cottage as we move forward.

Hugs,
Kris

Sadness

I dreaded the day I would be writing this post on my blog but the day has arrived.  Little Cooper our basset hound lost his battle with cancer today.  He lived a year past when he should have with the aggressive cancer.  With the new cancer medication and lots of love this little guy had a good life for the past year.  

We enjoyed every second with this guy.  He made our hearts grow bigger with every day we could love him and make him part of our family.

This big lug of love on his adoption day a year ago.  We were so excited to get this guy from the rescue and give him a good home.

He actually smiled like this for the whole 6 hour car ride home to his forever home with us.

He was such a happy little guy.

Cooper and I shared the love of white slipcovered furniture lol!  He loved my white chair and made it his own very quickly.

Good bye sweet boy we will miss you.  You rescued us and gave us such love.  May you find peace and love over the Rainbow Bridge.

Thank you to each and everyone of you that shared Cooper's story and always had love and prayers and good wishes for him.  His journey in life was shortened by cancer but his love he gave will fill our hearts for a million years.

Cooper 2009 to 2017

Cottage Update

Hi Everyone.  

Hope your new week is starting out to be a good one.  Just moving along on trying to find senior living for my mom and also working on getting bids etc. on a new garage and basement refinish on the soon to be new cottage.

We have a graduated side walk that goes to the street on this house.  It needs some repair and hopefully maybe even some brick pavers to tie into the cuteness of the brick home.

I had to laugh when we saw all the welcome mats to the front of the house when we came to look at it!!!  I guess they really wanted to welcome us in.
I will be putting up a cute new vintage mailbox for the mailman to put our mail in and also we need a pretty new porch light.  Just little things but it will make a difference.  I see lots of cute flowers adorning the porch.

We will be adding a nice deck and garage off the back of the house.

This is a picture of the back of the yard.  When the trees all fill in it will be so pretty back there and gives lots of privacy.  Not sure what perennials are planted back in the beds yet with things just starting to pop up.   I will be working on that this summer.

The pictures do not do this pretty yard justice.   The buds are just beginning but I can see that when these trees and flowers fill in it will be so pretty.

This is the basement that will be finished off for living space.  This corner will become a storage area.  New walls, new ceilings and lots of new lights will be added.

These steps will be carpeted and finished off.

New bathroom added to this area.  Loved the little hanging monkey that was left there!!!!  I guess he was the tour guide of the basement for us!

This area will become the new family room/ fireman cave and office for Terry.  So lots of work to be done in this area of the basement.  Since the cottage is only 900 sq. feet upstairs we really need this additional 900 sq. feet from the basement for more livable space.

We close on this home at the end of May and then the construction will begin.  I will bring you along on this journey with us.

 The upstairs will need some work too.  Expanding the kitchen will be entirely done by Terry and I.  I have a vision and he has the tools lol!

The basement area will have a contractor do the electrical, walls, rough in plumbing and ceiling work and then Terry and I will do all the finishing touches to the spaces.  Adding trim, doors and bathroom fixtures etc.  So there is a lot of work ahead to get this cottage ready for us to move into.  We will be staying with my daughter for a month while we do a lot of the work.

It is easier to do the construction when you are not living in the house.  Then we can move in after that.

Stay tuned for more news in the coming month.
Hope all of you are doing great.
Enjoying that Spring has Sprung here in Illinois.
Hugs,
Kris

Cottage Found

Hi Everyone.

Hope you all had a wonderful Easter Weekend.

Just wanted to share some news.   We found a beautiful cottage home to buy.  We will be moving into Junk Chic Cottage III at the end of May.

Our home here sold in two weeks and we have been scrambling to find another home for us.

I was very picky about what I wanted in the next home.  I wanted a home with charm and character and one level living.  I wanted it in a great neighborhood with lots of charm.

Not too much to ask for right?!!!  Well.....

All the homes we were looking at went under contract within a day or two of them being listed.

There has not been too much inventory out there and a lot of buyers.  So it is certainly a seller's market.

When houses would come on the market we had scheduled an appointment to look at the home and before we could get in the house went under contract!!!! That is how competitive it has been to find our next place.

  

Here she is an all brick cottage in the heart of Arlington Heights, Il.  She is tiny but oh so cute.
I can see pulling some of the bushes and putting in roses and flower boxes under those cute windows.  Terry is going to tear out the sidewalk that goes  to the street and around the sides of the home and put in pavers.  It will dress up and make this home just pop with curb appeal.

Lots of charm to this brick cottage.  The backyard has lots of mature trees along the back and lots of beautiful flower beds.  I only have the pics from the listing but hope once we move in and get things planted I can show off this beautiful backyard.

We will have to add a garage to the back of the house which there is plenty of space to do that.
It is a must to have a garage in Illinois for the winter months and Terry needs a work space in the garage for all his tools.  That is a priority on this new place.

The home has charm with thick baseboards and freshly painted light blue gray walls throughout.  We will add some beautiful crown molding to each room to give this pretty cottage more charm.

Gorgeous hardwood floors through out that were just refinished.

The kitchen needs new counter tops and sink and all new appliances but the cabinets are fairly new and white!!! Yeah for white cabinets.

The kitchen is very small so the room right next to the kitchen is a dining room and we are going to expand out the kitchen to include this area.  I cannot wait to start those changes to show you in a future post.

This is the dining room right off the kitchen so this will become part of the new kitchen area.  These pics are not the greatest since they are off the MLS.  I will have better before pics when we begin to work on the kitchen.

There are only two bedrooms on the first floor and they are small.  We will make a master bedroom and maybe an office/guest room out of the other.  I will be painting these two rooms to a lighter white/gray color from the light tan they are now.  Just will match my style better.

The home is small but it is just Terry and I and Cooper so it will work nicely.  It has a full partially finished basement that will be made into a family room and laundry room and also an office area for Terry.  We will be putting up walls and doing some electrical and plumbing things down there to finish that into workable livable space.

We are excited to have been able to purchase this home.  It has the cottage feel I love in a home.

I know I will have fun getting this little place made into a home for us.

My mom is doing so much better and is going to be able to live back in senior living once again up by us.  I have been working hard on getting her into senior living up near where we will be living.

My mom is excited to have some of her independence back and will be happy to be living with other seniors and making new friends.  It was hard for her to leave all her sweet friends in Florida.  Hoping she will make new friends and be happy living independently again.  

This was a good move with my mom's health the way it is.  If she needs help we will be near to help her.  She is up near all of her family again and will be able to see us more.  I know she will miss the weather of Florida but she will be gaining her family.

Thanks for all the prayers and good wishes for us.

I have to say I have been so stressed with moving my mom when she was pretty sick and being by her while she was nursed back to health.  On top of this selling and trying to find another home!!! Yikes!!! Now I hope I can get my mom settled in a place soon and then us settled into a new home too!  So much still to do ahead for me.  I really hope to be back to blogging again soon when we get settled into the new cottage.  

It will be fun to share the changes to the new cottage with all of you.

Have a wonderful new week ahead.  Please know that I do not always comment on your blogs with how much I have going on in my life but I do try to visit and see what you are up too.

Hugs,

Kris

Kitchen Cabinets

Happy New Week Everyone.

Things are moving along with the sale of Junk Chic Cottage II.  In negotiations with our buyers  we agreed to put the kitchen cabinets back up for them.  

I loved the open concept of the shelves but it is not everyone's taste and storage was their main priority.  Thankfully we had the shelves still.  Terry had hung them in the garage for storage.

So here is my kitchen the way I had it.

I liked the open feel of the shelves in this galley kitchen.  Not everyone embraces the open concept of shelves.

So back up went the cabinets for the new buyers.  They said they would paint them white so we are thankful with all we have going on they will do that.  They just asked us to rehang them.

My open shelf on the coffee bar side of the kitchen.

They wanted a cabinet put back up.  So we did that for them.  Terry had added crown molding to all the cabinets when we moved in.  I am not sure if they will do that to these cabinets that we rehung.  I think it would look better and make the cabinets look more like the others but it is their choice.

Taking down my shelves and starting the packing process is helping me to detach from this home.

Nothing has come on the market for us but I am staying hopeful we will not be homeless come May when we close on this one!

Have a wonderful week.  Hope to have some news to share on finding the new Junk Chic Cottage III soon.

Hugs,
Kris