Where Does The Time Go?

So it's been months since my last post, 

so much has happened in that time.

We purchased our home end of April, 

we spent two full weeks, night and day, in the demolition

process, then shopping, (the fun part), 

blood, sweat and tears, and that is literal! 

We moved in mid-May and we're still doing some remodeling.

I will have before and afters as soon as life slows down a bit, 

yeah right, whenever that be!

I'm waiting for the flooring guys to show up, someone came by this morning and measured for our new kitchen counter top which will be in by next Tuesday.

So lots and lots happening and I will have updates real soon,

promise!

Our Apartment

After 11 years of owning a home I never thought I'd say,

"welcome to my apartment".

We've been here now four weeks, still waiting to hear if we have the house we put an offer on, and in the meantime, still house hunting.

So we're "settled" in our little one bedroom apartment.

The only thing is,

there's no kitchen!

That is hard for someone like me who loves to cook and bake,

but I get to use the kitchen upstairs.

Not the most convenient but for what we pay for rent here,

we'll make sacrifices.

I'll give you a little tour of our little apartment.

The living room:

(our new sofa, from Broyhill called "Cora" love the arms and the feet.

It's a eight feet long and deep, good for someone like me who's 5'8)

(found these great pictures at Marshall's and the colors match our new

sofa perfectly)

(no place for litter boxes so they're in front of the fireplace, not the best

but it's the place with tile so easy clean up, don't worry, no smells,

I'm too much of a clean freak for that to be allowed)

(great place for my plants, on the other side of the fireplace)

The Dining Area:

(which is in the living room, thank goodness its a large room)

Bathroom:

(my cats have discovered they can open the cabinet so

that's why the string is there...LOL)

(much smaller bathroom than what we're used to)

Bedroom:

(my shoe collection)

If this was going to be our home for several years we would redo some things down here, not sure why the closet isn't a walk-in there is plenty of wasted space that they could of built it out,

and we'd have the owner add a kitchen of course.

But it's a temporary arrangement,

in a really nice area, and we have the view of the lake right outside our doors, very peaceful.

So there you have it, a short tour of our little apartment.

Hopefully soon, you'll get a tour of our new home,

wherever that is!

German Desserts Search

Recipe

For some reason, these past few days I have been craving certain desserts.

I used to work at a Shop that was in an old school built I think in the late 1800's.

The shop owner had everything and anything in that shop, handmade items that were beautiful.

She decided to have a local German lady who owned a bakery in the neighboring town bake her some goodies to sell at the shop.

That was a mistake.....well, dangerous for those of us who worked there.

Way too much temptation.

But she made desserts I never had before and I am searching high and low to find the recipes, but its hard to do when you don't know the proper names.

She made these tortes that would sell out, they were apple, cherry and blueberry.

Words can't describe them.

Then she made cakes, cakes that I've never heard of or had,

one had pears in the middle of the layer, another had a mousse of cappuccino of some sort, another was coconut with a lemon curd filling.

Her cakes, tortes and cookies I think were the best sellers in this shop.

I want to find these recipes and bake these cakes and tortes.

The above photo is similar to what she made,

that was the closest I could find, but the cherry torte is so hard to find.

And the cakes, well, nothing comes near them when I put in a description.

To have a slice right now.......does anyone have any  clue of what I talking about?

That Time of Year...

So

it's that time again,

that time to wish Spring were here.
Flipping through gardening books or magazines.
Looking at websites that sell seeds or plants.
Going to the nurseries that are starting to open to the public
and stroll around for ideas.
Anxious.

To want to dig in the dirt.

To enjoy being outside in the warm sun.

To watch those Spring Flowers push through.

Sadly, this will be my first Spring when I will not be

able to see my hard work pay off.

Will not see my Spring flowers push through the ground.

Someone else will be enjoying that, well, I hope they will.

(this is my favorite Spring flower that bloomed at our home, we have the seeds packed away for my next garden)

So,

we plan on buying another home,

in fact, we have one in mind, but are waiting, waiting,

waiting, and waiting to hear back.

In the meantime,

this house is a blank slate.

The last owners didn't bother to garden.

It will allow me to dream up some plans, to learn

from my mistakes.

I have all kinds of ideas, of course, assuming we may get this house.

(one of several rose bushes we had)

I was checking out some different Cottage Gardens online for inspiration and found some beautiful ones out there.

(Google search)

I'd like to make an entry to the garden like this, an arch with

Wisteria growing over it,

and when you enter, I'd like to have cutting flowers, a vegetable garden and some roses.

Lots of work, fertilizing, tilling, and planting to do, but I enjoy that.

So more Google searching I will be doing, and saving

pictures for inspiration.

Spring is around the corner, if we get this house, I won't get to do any of this until next year, but that's OK, I can be ready

when that time comes.

Moving Forward

Where to start?

It's been so long since my last post,

so much has happend since then.

If you remember we put our home on the market

last year March, it stayed on for

six and a half months with tons of showings,

a few interests, even one that was serious but

couldn't get a loan.

After much frustration we removed our home from the market in October.

Then after a two month break we put the house

on the market end of December,

we thought we'd try to sell it ourselves

this time.

Well, two weeks after putting it back on

it

SOLD!

We couldn't believe it. The buyer loved the house,

drives by our home everyday and

NEVER

saw it for sale until one day he said the sign

jumped out at him and he called

the number.

Well that same day they came over, walked

through and asked us when we

wanted to close.

So, we closed Febuary 27th.

Our home went from this crazy caos and overwhelming

craziness for several weeks then on Monday

it looked like this

It was very hard for me.

I cried for two weeks.

Yes, this is what we wanted to do, it was our choice,

but it was still very hard.

This was our first house, we put a lot blood, sweat and tears

into this home.

Renovated this home, each and every room, we had

a lot of memories here.

But now, we'll make new memories.

We're in Maryland now, renting a small apartment

with our belongings in a storage unit.

We hope to buy a home here now.

But I would like a break for a while, the last six weeks

have been insane

so it'll be nice to just take it easy before starting to

fix up another home.

We made it, we survived the first phase of new

beginnings.