The last time I posted, we were in the middle of our house hunting process, and while at the time it seemed like we were looking forever, it was actually only a serious hunt for a little under a month.

To some people who look at houses for months before finding one, that seems laughable (or makes you want to smack me), but I had been wanting to buy something for several months before and I let it get to me more than I should have. Sometimes patience isn't my strongest suit!

Anyway, we had been looking for several weeks, and we opted to use an mls search and Zillow ourselves and call up listing agents for showings instead of working with a real estate agent. And the housing market in our area is super competitive and expensive right now for buyers, and it seemed like half of the valley was also looking to buy in our price range! So I felt like I was on the computer constantly, and we were driving around scoping out houses whenever we got the chance.

If a house even remotely decent came on the market, it was snatched up within days, and sometimes only one! We put in an offer on a house that we saw on the day it listed, and we were one of 11, and we didn't get it. And Dane didn't actually get to see it in person, he had to trust me and his dad when we told him it was a good deal!

After several weeks of this, I woke up one morning to find this tiny little house that I knew would need tons of work (but in our budget, that was pretty much everything), but this one had acreage. Dane has always wanted to live outside of town, with some property where we could have some space and raise some animals. Everything was just so expensive though, we had decided we would probably have to flip at least one more house in town to be able to afford it. So when this house came up, the price was too good, and I knew there was a chance it would need too much work, like most of the rural properties we had looked at (and it did, but more on that later).

I almost scared Dane away from it when I told him about it, because I said it looked so bad, ha! But We went ahead and scheduled a showing with the listing agent for that same day. And it was like a frenzy! It's on a semi-busy-ish road, and I saw so many people slow down, stop and take the phone number of the agent, and someone even stopped after our showing to tell us he was submitting an offer that night! (I think he was trying to scare us off).

But we loved the potential of the place. It had a large shop and another outbuilding for an office/guest house. It had just the right amount of property. The house was the right size, and it just hit almost everything on our list. So we immediately went to Dane's parents' house to talk to them about it, and his dad and I came back and looked at it again the next morning. We made an offer the day after it listed on the market, and even though it had two pending offers already, the owners accepted ours that night!




We almost couldn't believe it, and it was so exciting! We said after selling our last house that we would love to find something that needed more work if it meant we could stay in it and not have to flip again, but we didn't think we would actually be able to do it so soon. So now we are living in a 5th wheel trailer on the property and remodeling our house that we will hopefully be staying in for many, many years to come!

Since this has ended up being so much more wordy than I intended, I'll go ahead and stop there, but I'll be back soon with more progress pictures. And there are a lot, because things got very intense very fast, and plans had to change accordingly. We knew going in that since the original part of the house was built in the 40s, with an addition in the 60s, that there would be a lot of potential problems, and lucky us, we found almost every one in the book! What was supposed to be your run of the mill, total gut job, turned into quite a bit more, but we still feel really good about choosing it. And for Dane to not regret it after all of the work he's done so far, I know we really found something special :) I mean, just look at this view!


Thanks for stopping by, and I promise I'll be back soon to finish bringing you up to date on where we're at in the process, and maybe even some inspiration for what we're planning on doing! Happy Wednesday!

You guys! This is a very exciting week :) (even though I've been down with a nasty cold!)

So, I realized today that I haven't shared some exciting news that happened a few weeks ago...


Meet little Lemon, the newest little member of the family!

She's a miniature schnoodle, and as sweet as can be. I have been on the look out for a puppy for a while now, and she was a bit of an early Christmas present for me! When I went to look at her litter, I had a different puppy picked out, but when I saw her, my heart literally just melted!


She has been such a fun little addition to the family, and she pretty much steals the heart of everyone she meets!


I named her Lemon, after Liz Lemon from 30 Rock, but mostly I call her Little Lemon, Baby Lemon, Little Bean, or Little Lemon Bean. She seems to tolerate the ridiculous nick-names pretty well I think ;)

Another exciting thing around here lately is that the shop getting a huge boost! I registered my business name with the state, got a P.O. box, got accepted to sell at a very cool local Christmas market (more on that later) and I have a ton of new products that will be launching in the near future! :) :) :)

I will have Christmas cards, updated versions of some of my old favorite greeting cards, and some brand new products that I can't wait to share with you all! Christmas cards should be up by the end of the month, with the rest to follow soon!


Here's some of the other things my afternoons (and mornings, and evenings) have consisted of.

Reading- Lots of articles on puppy care tips and grooming tips! I don't think I've ever done so much research on an animal before!

Drinking- Coffee, coffee, coffee. But also, I've been doing better with drinking water :) I also had my first peppermint mocha of the season! I'm definitely more of a peppermint mocha kinda girl, than a psl one ;)

Listening- To the Ultimate Christmas Playlist on Spotify! It really helps get the juices flowing for Christmas card designs!

Loving- Cinnamon-Vanilla popcorn, my own recipe! Also, this China Glaze nail polish in Ravishing Darling that I bought at Sally Beauty Supply, and this perfect fall sweater from Maurices!

This last weekend was a very productive one, in terms of hand lettering practice anyway.

I was feeling a little burnt or something with all of my shop stuff (Christmas cards!!) so I decided to shift focus and work on some personal projects instead!

My grandparents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary on Saturday (!) but they didn't want a party.We did a family reunion last summer to celebrate, but my mom thought it would be nice to send out an announcement to those family and a few friends who didn't make it.

I was pretty excited to do it, and I'm glad that I did! I ended up smoothing out some wrinkles I was having with printing and quality, and I was super happy with the result!




Since it's the gold anniversary, I gold embossed the 50 on all of the announcements, and I thought it turned out super cute!

I do have a confession to make though. The dates? Those aren't my handwriting! I got most of the way through the editing process before realizing that I hadn't done those yet.....so in the interest of saving time, I used a hand written font instead. Kind of cheating, but it is still hand lettered, just not by me. (Don't worry though, it was licensed for personal use!)

The calligraphy, the 50, and the laurel leaves are all mine though. The front had what you see here, as well as a picture of my grandparents from last summer. Then the back was a black and white photo of them on their wedding day! I won't be showing those though, because they don't really want their photos all over the internet.

Then, I drew up a quick invitation for my little sister's birthday party! She put me in charge of planning (and oh man am I having fun with that!) and so I decided to do something fun and informal for her to pass out to friends.





I have always liked the look of this kind of lettering, where everything is filling a set space, and all of the word shapes play off of each other. I never tried it before, because it seemed too daunting, but I'm glad I gave it a shot! I really liked the result, and so did she! I only kept one for myself, but I actually printed it in three different colors, fitting in the party's theme.

I may go ahead and share her party here down the road, if it turns out as good as I'm picturing! And maybe even if it doesn't.

Now that I had a solid weekend, and I'm feeling a little refreshed from some new projects, it's back to those Christmas cards! I'm really feeling the time ticking for those, so I should have some things listed for sale in the next couple days.

Happy Monday everyone, here's to a great start to our work week! Thanks for stopping by!