Tuesday, March 8, 2011

We've moved!

If "A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words," I guess this blog is worth 8,000 words. Here are 8 pictures of our new house.

I know the house looks small, but it actually is very big.
















The main level has a Living Room-Dining Room which I am hoping to convert into one large Dining Room. Since we have a Family Room, I don't think we need a formal Living Room but I do love having a Dining Room where everyone isn't cramped around the table. The challenge is that there is a ceiling beam separating the LR from the DR and we need to disguise the fact that the room was intended to be two separate areas.

In addition, there is a large Kitchen with eating area. The cabinets are so tall that even Howie can't reach the top shelves! You can see the LR/DR through the door.















Here's a view from the Family Room looking into the Sun Room. I love the Sun Room! It makes the house look so bright and cheerful on a sunny day. Too bad we haven't had too many of those lately.















There is also a Master Bedroom and Bath on the main level as well as smaller bedroom and guest bath.

We had two criteria when we decided to look for a new home. One was to be closer to our grandchildren and the second was that the house had to have a basement so that Howie and I could have space for our hobbies. We used to live an hour from our son's house and now we're 15 minutes away so we accomplished that goal. However, finding a home in an over 55-adult community with a basement was a challenge. Most people want to downsize when they get to this point of their lives. Obviously we didn't downsize at all since we bought a house that had a huge, and I mean huge, basement. It's the same size as the main level. Here's a picture of the finished section of the basement. It's 60 feet (that's not a typo) by 16 feet!!! I'm going to have a wall built at the far end to make that area into the studio. It's the area with the largest windows.



















This is the area where the studio will be located.


















Speaking of studios, here's a horrifying picture of what the boxes look like all lined up waiting to be unpacked when the studio is finished. It looks like a warehouse. There are 4 rows of boxes and each row is 3 boxes high. The rows are about 20 feet long. That's 80 feet of junk (translation: valuable art supplies.)
















In addition to the large finished area, there is an partially finished area which Howie is going to have split into two rooms. One will be his man-cave/office and the other will be his workshop. Here's what it looks like currently.















We're not done yet. There is also another large guest bedroom and bath in the basement. It has large windows so it doesn't feel like a basement.
















We have our work cut out for us, but we're up for the challenge. LOL