our new pup prancing in the snow

It’s a good thing that our new pup took to the snow because we’ve gotten a ton of it this winter. Here’s a pic of her prancing in the snow— I was hoping to get a shot of her running through the yard with her nose plowing piles of snow to eat, but she is just too damned fast— so this will have to do.

Filed under: family, life, maine, personal., pics, portland. , dog, pics, puppy

more progress on the house

Despite the rough beginning to our week, when we woke to a house with no heat as a result of our aging boiler igniter and motor,progress on the house is marching on and its beginning to look like a whole new house. The siding on the front of our house is done, replacement windows are in and despite the 4” of new snow last night and the on and off snow/rain all day I came home this afternoon and was greeted with a view of our new metal roof on the addition (2nd pic).Now work is beginning on the inside— tomorrow the studio gets a skylight and the lower roof gets finished. We have just about a month and a half before its all done and I can’t wait!

Filed under: family, kevin + karen townsend, life, maine, personal., pics, portland., thoughts , home, home improvement, life, personal.

before and after

here is our house as it looked in Jan 2006

and here is how it looks now in February 2008

The updates and the addition are still going on despite the 4-5 foot piles of snow and the 12 degree weather. We are loving all the changes so far and just can’t wait for the rest of the work to be done.

Filed under: family, kevin + karen townsend, life, maine, personal., portland., random , home, home improvement, life, personal.

life on the road

It has been a while since I took the time to post or for that matter to write anything. For the last few weeks we have been running around and traveling— and it has been exhausting. Over the last few weeks we spent so much time in the car with 2, 14 hour round trips to NJ and then 30 minutes in the car to go anywhere or do anything while we were there. Every trip back to NJ just reaffirms our decision to move to Portland and reclaim OUR lives.

Filed under: family, maine, personal., portland., thoughts

spring to action

Our weekend disappeared in a wink. One suggestion lead to a multitude of actions that involved the re-arranging an re-thinking of at least three rooms in our house. It all started with a simple idea to move some book shelves out of our studio in order to make some more room. But then, where do the shelves go? After a full Saturday of lifting and moving all is calm again in the house and it feels even more like home. In the studio we gained floor space and a new work wall, Teagan’s room feels like its larger and our guest room looks pulled together for the first time, instead of like a feeling like an orphanage for unwanted and forgotten furniture. We have been in this house for over a year, and while a lot has been done it feels like we are just now putting on those touches and making those tweaks that make a house feel like a home. The added bonus is that we are slimming down with each series of edits and tweaks that we make around the house. We keep ditching and donating any unused or unneeded things, even Teagan has stepped up and filled three, rather large, boxes with her un-played-with toys since we’ve been in Portland.

on a side note:
for the first time in our lives, our weekly recycle pile is larger than our trash pile.

Filed under: family, life, maine, personal., pics, portland., random