Our PA Wedding

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Our House!

Occasionally, when I open the door to our house, I remember what it looked like when I first stepped foot in it, and I am so thankful we were able to fix it up like we did! From kid-scribbled walls and bright pink painted rooms, dirty kitchen and bathroom, and no curtains to fresh normal-colored paint, clean places to cook and shower, and handmade-with-Grandma curtains!

Alfredo and I are very content with how our house turned out, but more importantly we are so blessed to have a place to live without spending a penny - umm, I mean a peso. (The apartment belongs to Alfredo's father.) We also were given some furniture from friends who were moving, and we were able to buy cheap couches (although one is not incredibly comfy), cheap kitchen chairs, and a beautiful table made of onyx for a extremely decent price. Who knew onyx is as cheap as nice wood when you have the right connections!? The point is: God has given us so many blessings, both financially and with friends! We love entertaining in our tiny dining space! :)

For the first month or two after moving in, Alfredo kept calling his parents' house his home. I was still calling my parents' home. After living here for three months, it is definitely starting to feel like home - although we still don't have internet or phone contracted. (Living 5 minutes from his parents house kind of lessens the motivation to spend that extra money. :)

In the future, we plan to build a house on a lot of land Alfredo's father bought for his children (again, another huge financially blessing), but for now this is where we live! Enjoy! :)

P.S. Soon to come pictures from the wedding in PA! :)


Oh, and I apologize - they are a little out of order, but you will get the idea. :)

I'm not sure what it is about pink, but the previous tenants apparently were fans... These are the cupboard doors we removed, sanded, filled in the holes, and repainted.

Alfredo working on replacing some sides of the cupboard doors.

 The dirty kitchen - you can't see it, but my mother-in-law had to scrub the stove for a while.

What you can see is the broken lamp and things that were in the cupboard above the stove.

I scrubbed a lot of yellow tape residue off the walls... we also took out that shelf on the wall.

There is not much room to walk in the kitchen now that the fridge is in that corner.

No shelf = more room to walk!

Window tinting peeling off the window in the dining area.

(I tried peeling it off more - didn't work, but now there are lovely curtains covering it.)

First coat of paint in the living room!

I forgot to take a picture before we painted the first coat - can you see the  blue circle on the wall?

That is part of the drawing by the little girl who lived here previously, which continued to the right along this wall and around the corner to the other wall. :) How creative!

Ahh... the bathroom. Dirty and missing tile in the shower. Now, it has the tile, is scrubbed clean, and has a shower curtain! (Anyone want a red bucket? Oh wait... I threw that out!)

Our tiny sink, which is still tiny, and has a faucet which is too close to the back, causing water to go all over and drip to the floor - we have yet to fix that. :)

This is the view of our bedroom, again with one coat of paint.

And this is YOUR guestroom! :) Again... pink. I spent a lot of time filling in holes in the wall.

And the other room, which is now our office/TV room. Half pink? I guess they ran out of paint.

Can you see the yellow tape covering the crack in the window? Love the yellow tape!

Ahhh... and the dining/living room is painted! No more crayon illustrations on the wall.

Painting the outside of the house! Oh yea, this white and purple - pink and purple color theme?

Alfredo working on beautifying our cabinets.

We have yet to finish painting around the door downstairs - it was made bigger after we painted the rest, and it is still on our list of home improvements. :)

And this is our bathroom as of now - well actually as of several weeks ago when I took these pictures. :)

Downside of our bathroom - it's so small that when you sit down on the royal throne, you COULD hit your head on the wall in front of you. (Not that it's ever happened to me...)

This is our office! With our free desk, cheap but comfy couch, and the door that belongs at the entrance to the hall but hasn't (and may not ever) made it there yet. :) Oh, and our beer logo chairs - before we bought chairs we were using plastic chairs and tables. My visiting grandparents were very impressed with our beer furniture. :)

As of today, 12/1/11, this desk is now fully put together and it actually has things on it! :)

Guestroom - no longer pink! It's ready for YOU! Tiny, but yours. :)

Our bedroom, complete with the gifted headboard and nightstands. Too bad there is no space between them and the wall and closet - I guess it's good they don't need to be moved...

Living room/Dining room, including the cheap, not so comfy couch. :)

Mr. Potato Head - heehee

Our onyx table and chairs bought from the carpenter along the road. :)

Oh, and there are some of the curtains Grandma Joyce and I made!

Clean kitchen...

...with all my toys. :)

There you have it - the tour of our house! Oh, the "patio" downstairs is missing... it contains the water tank from which we pump water to the roof (all water runs with gravity! :) and our washing machine.

Hope you enjoyed it - we love it! It's the perfect size for us - and the perfect size to clean. :)

Now there is just one thing left: let me know when you are coming to visit! :)

Something New

The past few months have been full of new things -new plans for the future, new husband, new family, new country, new culture, new friends, new struggles, new passions, new house, new cooking style, new way of washing things in hot water, new daily schedule, new furniture... and now a new blog (among many other new things).

All of this newness makes me appreciate the "old" things even more, and they have left a bigger hole in my heart than I anticipated. Over the past two years as I complicated getting married and moving to Puebla, I did my best to force myself to confront my fears and face reality. I discussed it with God, family, friends, Alfredo (just ask him how many times I soaked his shirt with tears while pouring out my misgivings about my capability to give up everything, move here, and be a successful "Mexican" housewife). Nevertheless, the love that Alfredo and I share and the security I felt from knowing God brought this to be, was enough to convince me that I would make it!

So, here I am - in Puebla - surrounded by new things every day, and loving it! Alfredo and I feel so blessed by our Father God for his care for us in the past year. From passports and visas for his family, being able to spend time together often during the months before the wedding, the opportunity to celebrate our marriage with ALL of our friends and family, family both here in PA that loves us and supports us, the perfect apartment for us at very little cost, free furniture from friends... the list goes on and on. Despite the challenges that sometimes arise from language, culture, or just normal man vs. woman/independent vs. independent personality differences :), we are just loving being married and not being thousands of miles apart, and we are thrilled to see what God is going to bring our way.

And to be able to share what is going on with those of you who can't be with us to witness it... I decided to start this blog! Normally, I am terrible at this kind of thing. I once attempted a blog (when I was studying Spanish here in Puebla 4 years ago - I think I had a total of about 3 posts). So, here's to hoping I will post a little more often than that!

To start off, I am posting pictures of our wedding celebrations under the page "our life in pictures". You may have seen some of them on Facebook, but I decided to post more here for those who are interested in seeing more or for those who don't have Facebook. (For now I am posting just from our wedding in Puebla. Once I have the pictures from the wedding in PA - next week!!!! - I will post them as well.)  

Look for pictures of our house soon! :-D

Much love to all of you from both Alfredo and me!