Meet Our New Kitchen

I promise not to spend long with opening pleasantries, but it is podcast day, you know, so here's your weekly dose of Shafferland chatter...in which we celebrate the FINAL SALE of our Marion home and let you peek in on Mommapalooza 3.0! So...enjoy!

 Click here to listen.

NOW.

You've been asking and asking to see pictures of our new place, and I've held off, because I wanted the rooms to be {mostly} complete before we shared. I know that with the two of us, no room is ever TOTALLY complete, but I believe we have hit the stage where we can call it done enough for pictures!

This post might be a bit longer than some other room introductions I share with you, because we did the most work in this room. In many ways, this kitchen is a recreation of the kitchen in our old home. We overhauled that kitchen just a few months after we got married, and there were so many things about it that we dearly loved, so we transferred them to the new home. But it was still completely different, because the layouts of the two kitchens are nothing alike. Our old kitchen, as you can see in the link above, was a galley style kitchen, and it didn't have abundant light. It was also at the opposite end of the house from our living area. Our new kitchen is a big square with room for a small table, and now it's also an open concept to the living area. It was not when we bought it!

So these are the two pictures I took the night we first walked in as owners of this house. {And now I wish I would have taken just a few more!}

I loved the floors {which I believe they had redone not long ago}. I loved the big feel of it after sixteen years of a galley kitchen. I loved the wonderful, natural light from the windows. I loved the microwave over the stove. I loved that it had a pantry! This, I felt, was a kitchen we could love and use so well.

I am not a wallpaper girl, so I wasn't crazy about the wallpaper backsplash. And Ryan said that wall above the sink had to go entirely. You can probably see there that it goes up and stops just about the same place the TV {which is also gone now, by the way} ends. It didn't go clear to the ceiling, but it went definitely high enough that you couldn't be in the kitchen and interact with anyone in the living room.

He wanted that wall down on the double. I asked {only because I wanted to be able to just move in and settle without a lot of drama} to live with it a year or so and then see if we really wanted it down. Ryan asked {ever so lovingly} to take it down immediately, and I could tell it was really important to him, so I said okay.

He. Was. So. Right. That thing made a RIDICULOUS mess, and I cannot imagine, now, dealing with it while living in a furnished house. Plus, the house is just a million times better with it down. How glad am I that he fought for that one!?

So here are a few pictures of the room in progress. {The wall, by the way, came down LESS than 24 hours after the pictures above were taken. Many thanks to our friend Troy for helping with demo and for coming back every single day for a week to mud/sand/fix the wall areas damaged by the demo.}

They took down the cabinets and saved them all. Some were put back in the kitchen later, although in different spots from where they'd been before, and the rest were eventually hung in the garage to hold overflow items that didn't fit in the kitchen itself. 

 Wall's comin' down!

 And when I arrived later that night, this was the mess I walked into. LOL! But look how lovely it is to see into the next room!

 Scraping that wallpaper. I seriously thought it was going to win the war.

My friend Amber came to help me scrape wallpaper. At that point, she was my sanity.

Troy came back over and over to work on the repairs.

When he was done mudding and sanding, I was cleared to paint the room. The entire house was a neutral tan when we moved in, and while I liked that color, I wanted more than just that color. We so loved the autumn fog color of our old kitchen that we brought it right into this one! {And for the record, I did wash that shirt in between pictures...}

Our friend Shawn came over one night and helped Ryan reinstall cabinets! THANK YOU, SHAWN!

I've mentioned a time or two about the stone wall feature we did - on the OTHER side of the wall. But halfway through, Ryan decided he wanted it for backsplash, too. So he worked ridiculously hard to get that installed, and it looks stunning. {For the record, I tried to talk him out of it, mostly because of the time factor for installation. I even Pinterested other, faster alternatives. But he wanted the stone, and he was the one installing it. And I'm so glad now that he did!

 We also ordered a two foot wide black countertop to place over the spot where the wall came down. There are no pictures of its installation because we ended up doing it ourselves, and it was HEAVY. No time to set timers and run and pose. Just get the thing UP THERE. But it looks so good, and the rope lighting he added really gave it an extra lovely touch.

So that was the work phase!

And now...the after photos to match the before ones:

And in case you struggle with comparisons without seeing side by side, here you go. {Click to enlarge if you need to.}

A quick recap from these pictures. We left the floors alone. We took down the curtains they left and put up our own - which were actually the same curtains we had at our old house. They "just happened" to perfectly work at this new house! Ryan raised the light after hitting his head on it for the 437th time. {Spoiler alert: we are actually looking for a new light for over the table. One a little more "Shaffery."} Ryan and Troy knocked down half the wall to open up the space. I scraped off all the wallpaper in the backsplash area and Ryan installed the AirStone wall in its place. We replaced the hardware with an updated, brushed nickel look. Ryan added rope lighting under the newly installed bar-height counter top and under the cabinets. Ryan and Shawn reinstalled some of the cabinets that had been taken down. I painted the entire room a light blue color from Lowe's called Autumn Fog. And then we put in all our coffee decor.

Almost all our decorations are repeats from the old house. I think we added two new ones, and that's it. {And one of those was a gift!}

You can see here the contrast between the regular counter tops and the new black one we purchased for the bar height counter. We were unable to find an exact match to what existed {since it's older and has cycled out} so we decided to contrast instead, and I really like it. Thanks, Amber, for helping us make a decision on that when you were here!

My pottery mixing bowls...a hand-me-down from Lynne when I worked at the station. I love those things!

I think Miss Mixy looks extra regal next to her new stone wall home. :)

Our one new piece of art! A gift from Lindsay Sherbondy at Lindsay Letters when I visited her storefront, called Letters on Main, as part of our trip to Wisconsin. I love this so much. It's so us!

One of only two new pieces we purchased for this house {so far, anyway}. We feared our nice big dining room table would cramp up this space way too much, and we had sold my old, square kitchen table. That was okay though, because it was tall, and I didn't want tall furniture blocking this amazing window. So on Valentine's Day {after our offer on this house had already been accepted}, we went to a big store in Indianapolis called Weekends Only, and we found this table. It's perfect. It's little, there are no chair backs popping up to block the view, it makes a great island for extra prep if needed, and it has scads of character. We love it so much.

And our favorite part: the coffee bar. This is the closest thing to a coffee shop we have. We love our open shelving to house all our mugs, and we have allllllll our coffee stuff here. Keurig, regular coffee pot, French press, pour over, all of it. :) And we were able to squeeze in my buffet that used to be my grandma's! :)

So I realize this has been a very long post, and I do apologize, but I wanted you feel like you were actually over visiting us! Hope you love our kitchen as much as we do. Ryan especially worked SO HARD on this room to transform it into the vision in his mind. He did a great job! Thanks to all our many helpers who pitched in on this room! {HUGE shout out to Sandee for cleaning the parts that freaked me out!}

Mommapalooza 3.0

We had a busy but wonderful Mother's Day yesterday!

I was invited back to speak at Chapel Pike Wesleyan to speak at their Mother's Day breakfast, which was a joy! I used to attend there, and it's always good to go back and see my friends! Ryan went with me - I just so dearly love it when he can go with me!

 After I spoke, we went home to get ready for the Mommapalooza.

I don't know if you remember this from last year {WHY would you?} but we had issues with the dinner rolls we bought for the day. No matter how long we baked them, they were still doughy and gross {in my opinion}. So this year we had rolls we bought from a fundraiser. Texas Roadhouse rolls. We got them out before church so they could thaw, and when we came home...this. WHAT!? Are we just cursed in the rolls department?

{For the record, when we baked them the ones that look normal were super doughy, and the ones that look like a pizza crust were pretty decent.

We planned to have Mommapalooza outside on our back porch, but it was COLD in Indiana yesterday, so we moved the party inside. Ryan and I would have been the only two comfortable being outside, so we just scooted the furniture around and put the tables in our living room. Worked great!

I also love my flowers we got so the vase on the counter wouldn't be empty. HA!

 I'm a nerd.

 Our photo booth!!

A quick {and rare} photo with the closest thing to a kiddo I have. :)

{Yeah she's not hugging me. She's definitely pushing away.}

Sneaking more fruit.

My sister, Lori, wasn't there, but here are the Freelan girls present!

And the whole Mommapalooza crew!

This was, for the record, our first big hosting in our new house, and we loved it. Loved having our family over and introducing them to our new home!

 Julie and me with Mom and our Aunt B!

Housewarming gifts from my parents!

Ryan and 2 of his siblings, along with his mom!

With our moms. We are so thankful for them. I'd say both of us got a little extra blessed with good moms and good moms-in-law!

 With my love...who made this whole hosting in our new home a delight. Thank you, Ryan, for working so hard to get our landscaping ready! Thanks for helping me with the food, and best of all, cleaning up ALL of it!

The Shafferland Shuffle

Before I recap what may have been the BIGGEST WEEK EVER IN SHAFFERLAND, I want to pause to wish a happy Mother's Day to my mother, my mother-in-law, and my step-mother-in-law. I'm very grateful for each of these ladies that are moms to me. I'm also grateful for all the moms who have adopted me in and loved me as though I belonged to them!

* Last Sunday, Ryan and I were exhausted, but we had coffee duty at church, so we got up early and reported in to start brewing! After we came home from church, we fell into bed and slept HARD for almost three hours. We felt so much better after that! I had fun playing with my new chalkboard-on-a-door and then we began the first of the goodbyes for the week. We met up with our friends who bought the Bekah-mobile and said our fond farewell to my car from the last thirteen years! 

* Monday night we said our final goodbyes to the house in Marion. We made one last trip over to mow the yard and walk through, have our good meltdown, have our last dance, and lock the door behind us for the last time. It ended up being much more emotional than I expected it to be, but it felt fitting, somehow, for this to be the way we spent our 41st monthiversary!

* Tuesday, some of Ryan's work buddies came over to help him hang cabinets in the garage. These were extra cabinets we took out of the kitchen when we tore down the wall. We hated to get rid of them, and I needed some more storage, so we hung them out there! YAY! We also picked out the first round of our flowers for this year, which was such fun. And we even got to rest a bit and watch a TV show. {Funny how that now feels like a luxury.}

* Wednesday was our BIG, BIG DAY!!! We officially closed on our Marion house...and Braeya turned ten! It was a lot to celebrate! We loved being able to officially sign the house over to its new owner, to celebrate with him, and to have a little party for our girl to celebrate her advancement into double digits!! PRAISE THE LORD for the huge answer to prayer in selling our house!

* Thursday evening, I traveled to another town to attend a meeting for a retreat I'm speaking at later this year, and on the way home, the sunset was so beautiful! I loved that! Meanwhile, Ryan decided our yard is not best suited for a push mower {YAY!!!!} and a friend of his had a riding mower to sell, so he went to pick it up for a test run!

* Friday I worked to plant flowers, and I especially loved this old red wagon full of flowers. The wagon was mine when I was a kid! I made long lists of stuff that needed to be done before Mother's Day, and then I helped plant more flowers while Ryan reconstructed the pedestal stones we brought from our old house!

* Yesterday Ryan worked hard to finish the landscaping, including putting in our fire pit, and I worked hard inside to get all the food ready for Mommapalooza! LOTS of cooking! We took a break in the evening, to attend our niece's birthday party, and then we went back home and got back to work. WHEW! What a crazy busy week! :)

The Saturday Six

One.

Source

I purposely choose not to do political talk on this blog, and in truth, I'm not a big political talker in my everyday life either. {So that works out nicely!} But this past week, as every single commercial was about politics and I had grown weary of all the mud-slinging and the arguing, I turned to Ryan and said, "I'm so tired. Call me when Andrew Shepherd is running." He said, "Who?" I said, "You know...My name is Andrew Shepherd and I AM the President." He cracked right up. For not being a politically minded person, I will say that The American President is one of my favorite movies of all time.

Two.

I confess when I first heard this song {Ryan introduced me to it} I didn't like it. But he loved it and played it so much that it has become one of my very favorites. Powerful words and more than that...true words.

Three.

I did another play-on-words present for some of the folks who helped us throughout the moving process. {I still have some of you to thank...you're not forgotten!} Ryan and I went to the donut shop in Marion that we discovered after we moved away. It's called Poppy's Xtreme Donuts, so my sign for the people we treated said "We are x-tremely thankful! Donut know what we would have done without you." Then we drove around and surprised them with donut deliveries! It was much fun. ;)

Four.

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Yes. Yes. Yes. These words about being hard on yourself when you try to do it all and you can't...because you really can't.   

Five. 

Source

Just a PSA for you: MOTHER'S DAY IS TOMORROW!!!!!!!!!!!! If you forgot, I'm here to remind you! And if you're looking for one more recipe {or the entire menu} that keeps the food on the healthier side, check out this list from Dashing Dish!

Six.

Source

I learned a lot of author names in my four years of working for Mid-Morning. One that I remember, because Lynne loved talking with her, was Sharon Jaynes. Even though I'd not read her books myself, I remembered that I enjoyed hearing her on the air, so when I saw she had a brand new book coming out, I asked for it immediately. And. I. Am. So. Glad. I. Did.

This brand new release, called Take Hold of the Faith You Long For, is a book that I'm sure is helpful for any believer, but I think it has a special place for those who have been believers for a while. People like me. People who know the Bible, have read the accounts, heard the sermons, "get the stuff," and yet need a genuinely fresh salve smoothed over their soul.

That's the danger, isn't it? You spend your life walking with the Lord and somehow you get spiritual callouses. Places of the heart that begin to harden over and you don't even notice it...until you do. And then you're not sure how to soften it again. How to hear fresh truths in familiar places. How to unlearn teachings that maybe you didn't learn correctly in the first place. How to heal wounds you might not even know you had until someone tosses some spiritual salt into them.

Then you pick up Sharon's book and devour it because it speaks to your soul in a way you've not experienced for some time. Sharon blends stories from her own life with accounts from Scripture and through the weaving of the two, she shows how we've learned to absorb the Lord into our lives...to a point. And then we stop. We don't push through to grab hold of the true fullness He offers. We miss out on blessings because we stop too early. We settle for, as my friend calls it, "fire insurance" salvation rather than gulping in a full and abundant life.

I've been a believer for over thirty years now, saved as a little kid, and my parents gave me a fabulous foundation in the Lord. {And I'm grateful for it.} But this book pushed fresh air into my spiritual lungs. I truly learned as I read. I saw things in ways I hadn't before, and I'm grateful.

From learning more about what forgiveness does {and does NOT} mean, to learning how to kick shame to the curb, to finding the fresh courage to boldly march forward and claim what God has ALREADY ORDAINED for my life, this book helped me see familiar things in new and needed ways.

I'm so grateful Lynne interviewed Sharon so I could know her name and know I could trust her words. And I'm grateful she wrote these words. A blessing to my week, for sure. Thanks, Sharon! And thanks, Baker Books, for giving a printed place to such truths and for sending a copy my way in exchange for a review!
 

It's Kind of Been a Big Week

I feel like this week brought closure to all the big stuff we had lurking out there. And it all came so fast, I had a hard time journaling about it and grasping it quickly enough! But I wanted to round out this week with some recaps of the other big stuff that took place!

First up - we downsized by one car. I am not sure that it's necessary for anyone to have an actual fleet of vehicles, but we did.

When we got married, I had my little Bekah-mobile, Ryan had his asphyxiator truck that he used for hauling stuff, and we had what we named "the good car" - which was a newer vehicle he'd purchased before we started dating.

For a while, he drove the good car back and forth to work, but we could see that was going to QUICKLY pile on the miles, and we wanted to make that car last for as long as we could. The asphyxiator wasn't a great option for commuting {if you heard the podcast, you'll remember the story about the windshield flying up...} so he bought a little work car. A little Neon. Yes. We had four cars and two drivers. RIDICULOUS.

Well, the Neon died a couple of summers ago, so he sold it, and then he sold the apshyxiator too {YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!} and replaced those two with a an older-but-reliable truck that he could use for hauling stuff AND driving back and forth to work. And there was no immediate danger of dying from breathing while in it, so BONUS! And so we were back to three cars.

We decided that if NEITHER of us had a daily commute, there really would not be a need to continue owning a vehicle fleet, so we had in mind to put my car up for sale once we moved.

Some friends of ours, who have a college-aged daughter, needed a little car for her to get around, and we mentioned in passing that ours would be available soon-ish. They contacted us, said they were interested, and so it was that we cleaned up the Bekah-mobile, gave him a good washing, changed his oil, and sent him on his merry way!

 They asked us if we were sad to let him go, and we weren't. I have so many fond memories in this car. So many funny stories. But they're happily scrapbooked and he'll always be preserved in my mind as my 13 year chauffeur, so I'm good. I'm happy he went to a good home, where he'll be loved and cared for!

Then, you know, we sold our house.

And then in celebration of things NOT SOLD, we have our Miss Braeya Jo Jo. She managed to get a proper birthday celebration in spite of all the house-selling-fun we had going on at the time!

Ten years old. Early morning.

It's the best time to have deep conversations.

When you're working with a slightly-skittish cat, you get family portraits when you can, even if the humans in said photos do not have time to find proper posture or smooth their clothing.

Being ten can be so exhausting.

But then you get toys and all is well.

So we've celebrated well and often in the last few days. And now? Can I have a nap please??