Walls!

We have the dry wall in place! A view from the street-side entrance looking in. A nice, wide hallway, no? Through the french doors will be our front porch with a water view!

Lee's offered to make us a mantle out of some cherry wood from a fallen tree from Scott's parent's house. How cool is that? A bit of the Northern Neck in our living room.

Ah. Yard.

This is our street-side yard being (literally) unearthed for storm water drainage--a very messy affair, namely with precipitation.

Which has been making a certain carmudgeonous neighbor even more carmudgeonly. I'll attempt to nab a pic of her, she's been tirelessly giving the builders an earful daily. She likes to amble over with her little dog and demand to see permits and make threats. And Scott had the luxury of making her acquaintance yesterday.

To counter than unpleasantry, Aunt Mary (not really my aunt, but a family friend & dear neighbor for decades) welcomed us with some of her famous baked treats.

Even the Fresh Prince of Bay Ridge is settling in. Her stray days on the city streets seem far behind. OK, I need to stop posting pictures of our cat.

White shingles

Almost makes painting seem easy!

Ho ho!

7 days till Christmas and we are successfully moved out! Well, just about. Today I'll nab the last boxes from the rowhouse and bring them back... here.... this cottage is exploding with all our stuff! Seems a shame to pay for storage (again) when we have all this room, just 2 doors down! I'm hopeful that soon we can drop some off over there.

Anyway, we're getting settled in for the winter here...the house is really cozy. A small kitchen, adorable living room, decent sized bedroom and a nice office for Scott. Oh, and a front porch that is packed 85% with boxes. I'm taking a few days off to sort through them.

Turns out, Scott and I are both pyromaniacs. Well, not really, but we have had a fire going every night since we moved in. So nice!

Dowtown

Relieved to know we wont be homeless, we went downtown for lunch and some Christmas shopping. It was so pretty!

Cottage!

Understanding the real estate market, Scott and I hurried to get our Baltimore rowhouse on the market-- we were told the typical turnaround time is 90 days. So, we followed all the instructions, "staged" the heck out of our house and it paid off! Someone has put a contract on our house for nearly all of our asking price. Yay! Great news!

The odd news is that they want to move in 2 weeks. Right before Christmas. Ulk! I spent nearly all of last weekend on Craigs List and looking at temporary sublets. Nothing great. At all.

My dad suggested we rent down near our house. Great idea! We are really very weary of the city.We completely lucked out...2 houses down from our house-to-be is this ADORABLE cottage for rent. It is tiny, but just fine for us. The owners are good friends with Noel & Nicola, so they let us rent it for a great price, and with a perfectly flexible time frame, no lease signing, nothing! How perfect is that? Look how precious this will be! It has a fireplace. Assuming all goes well with our pending contract here, we ought to be moving in 2 weeks. It has a fireplace and a great herb garden.

Siding

I'm floored at the difference the siding has made. WOW! I'm thrilled. And my green & white obsession is finally becoming a reality! The scalloped singles on the top will be painted white. And the roof on the porch will be dark green tin, as well as the small bit of roofing separating the second and third stories.

A shot of the side of the house...those windows in the middle are casement window above the kitchen sink-- which will be a neat farmhouse sink.

Thed front door will be painted dark green. Pretty!