Collecting furniture

We slept in this morning till about 9am… Marc feels bad about sleep-ins whereas I sleep in on weekends completely guilt free! So after our sleep in this morning, we had to run a few errands. That took us to about midday and we didn’t have anything else to do. Normally what would happen is that we would chill out on the couch infront of the tv… But today we decided to get active again.

So we drove the five minutes to the river and power walked along it! It was such a beautiful day out that we just had to be outside. The photo above shows a very murky river and that’s because it rained non-stop over the last few days. We quite regularly, in good weather, walk along the river. The usual route that we take is a good 4 to 5km so it’s pretty good exercise.

After our power walk, we went to a nursery nearby to checkout a few plants I wanted to get but more importantly the nursery has the most amazing homeware/furniture shop that I absolutely love. I wanted to do a little window shopping. As soon as we stepped in, I fell in love with just about every piece of furniture and home decor they had!

My eyes immediately fell onto this most beautiful hutch… Extremely rustic and country-like… Just my style. What was even better was that it was on sale! I wanted to leave the shop with it right there and then… But I wouldn’t have a place to store it! I love furniture shopping for the new house we plan on buying later this year… But it’s just so hard to find somewhere to store them! Our existing home is a tad too small to house more furniture…

I swear I’m considering becoming a ‘furniture collector’! Some people like to collect stamps… Or collect art… I like to collect furniture! Only good, quality pieces that is. I so want to open a shop like Tori Spelling’s Inventori… I think that would be a dream come true for me!

In the mean time I’ve just got to start my collection in a relatively small manner and find a place to store them. I didn’t leave the nursery with that hutch but my lord I’ve been thinking about it all day. I may go back for a second peek at it… I’m sure I’ll be able to find space in our spare room… Somehow…

I want to renovate!

I came home to these last week… Pretty :) Marc and I got into an argument and we were both extremely frustrated with one another. The next day he got me a bunch of flowers. Why is it that he is so damn freaking good at saying ‘sorry’? And I’m not? I am making such a conscious effort to be the one that apologises first… Not because he always does but because I need to learn to get off my high horse sometimes. I don’t know if it comes with being a Leo – too much pride – but my heart melts and l feel guilty to no end that in 90% of our bickering or arguments, he is the first to make peace. Bless his good, good heart.

Anyway! The point to this post is… Remember the house that we were extremely interested in a few weeks ago? It went to auction last weekend and it was passed in. It didn’t sell! Which means no one made a bid! Hmm, maybe we should’ve put an offer in… Maybe we would’ve had a new house to play with now. Maybe!

I’m just itching to renovate… I already know what my next kitchen is going to look like. I can’t wait to have a house big enough to entertain more than six people at any one time. I told Marc that our next house is where we’re going to have people over to celebrate our birthdays. At the moment, we have always celebrated our birthdays out and about, mostly at restaurants.

I just hope when we’re ready, there will be a perfect home for us… Somewhere out there.

House update

I am having one of those sleepless nights again… So I thought I’d post something. Speaking of sleepless nights, I have been getting ‘little’ sleep lately! I’ve always considered myself to be a good sleeper, always making sure I get at least 8 hours each night. I normally cannot function with anything less than 7 hours. Heh! Unfortunately off late, I’ve been struggling to fall asleep and when I do I sleep really well but because I end up falling asleep late, I only manage about 6 hours. Some nights less! I know it’s bad because I wake up feeling horrible and feeling like I could just sleep forever. It’s partially to do with the wedding and also partially to do with our recent house hunt!

Update on the house hunt – we have decided to not buy the house! Bottom line is, we just don’t feel comfortable committing ourselves with a new house without having sold our existing house. We just don’t want to be forced to sell our house at a price we’re not happy with just because we’ve committed ourselves to another house. Not a wise thing at this moment I don’t think. So, for now we are pushing the house-hunting to the back burner, only for a little while till the wedding has come and gone. That way we can get the wedding out of the way and fully focus on selling our home at the price we want and buying a home at the price we want! Win and win!

I’m also a little relieved that I now don’t have an extra cause of stress on my already full and stressful plate! My manager at work is going away for a few weeks and he has given me the opportunity to take over and be in charge while he’s gone. Great opportunity and challenge but I will still have my own job to do, so I’m a little worried about juggling it all without having to ‘live’ at the office or falling over from stress! I just have to keep reminding myself that this is what I want! Which it is… I practically bolted at the chance of taking over when he brought it up at our meeting last week. Hehe.

Well, I’m off to try this sleep thing again… Like I said, I don’t function well with little sleep. God help me when I have a baby one day!

Plain crazy

Believe it or not, we spent most of last weekend looking at potential houses. How did we get here?! We were only going to sell up and buy a new home after our wedding!

I’m only supposed to be able to handle one overwhelming event at a time… Right? Apparently not. It all started when I casually browsed a real estate website for potential houses sometime last week. Not a big deal since we’ve been keeping our eye on the property market for awhile now just to try and gauge what the market’s doing and what kind of properties are being put up for sale.

Then I spotted one. In our neighbourhood! At a super, super low price. I knew not to get my hopes up because if the price is abnormally low when it shouldn’t be… There’s got to be a catch! And there was… The house needs a ton of work. A lot more work than what we’re prepared to do. I was actually quite put off by the actual house when we went to see it on the weekend at the open inspection. Not a good sign hey? I tend to get emotionally attached to potential properties which is really the number one no-no in real estate purchasing but bottom line is I do. But I do also have a very logical side to me so if it’s not going to be a smart purchase or if it’s not a fit to us at this moment personally and financially, it’s just as easy for me to detach myself emotionally.

We then went to look at another house. And this one? I LOVE. As soon as I stepped through the front gate onto the uneven driveway, I loved it. As I walked closer I felt nervous. I was scared of loving it too much. I was scared because there were quite a number of people looking at the house and quite possibly wanting to buy a house. A house that I felt I could feel myself getting so attached to. I was scared of loving it too much and then not be successful in getting it. It’s going to auction in a few weeks! Truth be told, I hate auctions!

We both love the house but we’ll just have to wait and see how things pan out. The asking price is very reasonable, that is, if it doesn’t get hiked up through the auction. I’ve been spotting quite number of bargains in the property market at the moment which is really the main reason why we’re even considering making our purchase before the wedding! Seize a good opportunity when you see one, right?

Im trying to keep myself from thinking about house-hunting too much because there’s still a ton to do for the wedding. I’m just not quite sure how we’re going to buy a house, put our existing home up for sale and plan the rest of the wedding over the next 3 – 4 months… It all seems impossible but I know in my heart that it is possible and if it’s the right thing to do, we’ll be able to do it and get through it!

Stay tuned…

Crazy with a capital C

Would it be CRAZY if we bought a house this week? Just wondering.

A Lebanese dinner

It is a dream of mine to some day live in a house that has a mudroom. I’m not being overly ambitious am I? The majority of houses in Australia don’t have mudrooms… I suppose, we’ve never really had the need for a mudroom, because it never snows and it’s not like it takes us fifteen minutes to rug up before heading out into the winter cold. Our winters aren’t cold enough to warrant a mudroom at home. But I want one anyway. I would love to have a little, cozy room where I can just blitz through on my way into the house… and I can throw my scarf and jacket onto the giant hooks and kick off my wet shoes from the yucky rain and mud… and not worry about the rest of the house looking untidy from the mess. I’d just love a mudroom, is all.

I’m glad it’s nearly Friday. Had an amazing dinner with the awesome bunch tonight at Dunyazad. My first Lebanese dinner experience, ever! It was so delicious! I’m not a big fan of dips… but their hommus, baba ghannouj and tabouleh were the yummiest dips I’ve ever had… I have a newfound perspective on Lebanese food… not that I really had any perspective on it before as I’d never had it before tonight. Definitely somewhere I’d go again…

Another work day to go before the weekend hits… the girlies and I are off to watch Sex & the City 2 this Saturday night… yummy Vietnamese dinner and a night of Sex & the City 2… perfect! I’m beyond excited.

Have a superb Friday tomorrow!