One Month In...

I am so excited that I can take photos in front of my house again now that our PM replaced our two dead trees by the front door.  They don't warranty landscaping so we knew it might be a long shot getting the trees replaced, we hoped for the really really dead one because it was dead before we closed.  Anyway the second our PM came by for our post settlement follow up on Monday morning our adorable 4 year asked him for a new tree.  Who could resist her request? Haha. It was too funny, I couldn't believe she ran right up and asked him. Wonder if we would have had the same luck as her if we were the ones who asked?   😉

 Anyway, came home this morning from being away a couple hours, to our two front trees being replaced. What a nice surprise!

 In other news we worked for an hour or so Saturday afternoon, putting all the littles to work as well 😄 and we finally got all the boxes and furniture out of the garage and can park both of our cars in the garage.  We love it.


Tonight, my sweet husband, after working a full day, going with me to pick up my van from the mechanic (dead alternator), and then going to a tire store to attempt to have my tire plugged (dumb construction site screws!!! Makes me mad I go around picking them up out of the roads in an effort to save everyone's tires and I end up with one in my very expensive tire... ugh.) Anyway, it couldn't be plugged, and we had to order a new tire since they didn't have the size we needed... but he came home from doing all that and still managed to muster up the energy to hang my new curtain rods and curtains in the family room.  Love that man!

As you can see we are slowly... very slowly... pulling together our family room.  Still waiting on that couch to be delivered. Think it'll be after the holiday now. Bummer.

 But we are loving it coming together. I am not a decorator but I wish I was. Its fun for me but hard to know if certain patterns and colors will work together.

Sunday night I wrote a blog post but kept it as a draft because I thought I would contact Ryan Homes first and let them try to fix our problem before venting publicly.  So glad that I did that because they fixed our problem right away.  We hadn't heard from our PM once since pre settlement and we were over 30 days.  We heard our new neighbors were about to have a 10 day post settlement follow up and that felt wrong to us that we hadn't even heard from him, and our things pre settlement never were fixed.  Anyways, I emailed our SR and was probably over dramatic but I have been extra emotional lately... he emailed back first thing in the morning, then we got a phone call from our PM and he scheduled to come over that morning to do our post settlement follow up. 

Turned out there was a mix up btw two PMs we had, an old one and a new one and each thought the other was handling our follow ups and actually that meant no one was. And since we didn't have any contact information for our PM we had no way to let him know we were being forgotten. 

Anyway, its all fixed now.  Next Thursday we are scheduled to have our issues addressed, which include scratches in hardwood floors, wall touch ups on drywall and paint, a new window, vinyl in kids bath, shutter and garage door. 

We received our survey in an email and will be filling it out as soon as our things are all fixed.  Can't believe its been a month in our house here.  :) 

Home Depot Price Matching

Okay, I may be slow, and I have heard of price matching before but haven't ever tried it out before and definitely not AFTER the purchase either but today I gave it a try.  I am a bargain shopper (sometimes even to a fault), we don't ever make big purchases or go on vacations (married 12.5 years still not even a honeymoon-lol.), and I always shop around for the best price on the things I do buy.  Yes I even shop at multiple grocery stores to make sure I get the best deal on food as well.  My bargain shopping is also why we still do not have a couch in our family room nearly a month after moving in-- because after falling in love with a really nice sectional (nicer than any piece of furniture we've ever owned) at the local furniture store I looked for it online and found it for nearly a thousand dollars cheaper through an online retailer... they are taking their sweet time delivering it and everyday we get a little more anxious to receive it but definitely worth the savings in our opinion.

 Anyway, I really shouldn't make a habit of checking prices of things I've already bought since it drives me crazy if I find a better deal after the fact but in this case it managed to work out in our favor.  I noticed Home Depot's Red, White and Blue sale had started and just out of curiosity wanted to see if they had a better deal on my washer and dryer at their Memorial day sale or their 4th of July sale-- I fully expected the Memorial day sale to be the best price and I was just going to go on my way being happy with my good deal... ummm nope! They now had my washer and dryer set for over $80 cheaper (total plus taxes).  

After being disappointed about it but really knowing there was nothing to do about it, we had needed a washer and dryer right away and it would have been super inconvenient to have not been able to do laundry this month waiting around for the 4th of july sale... so I really decided it was okay because it was something we needed.

 Then I had the thought about price matching and price adjustments.  A quick google search told me home depot did 14 days.  We were definitely out of the 14 days but I thought it couldn't hurt to ask on their convenient little chat feature on their website.  The rep there told me they do price matching and will refund money within 30 days of the purchase. The rep was super helpful and got our refund all worked out, sent me a confirmation email with the receipt for the over $80 going back on our card! I can't tell you how much this made my day!!! (I was so excited I joked we should go to Olive Garden to celebrate the extra money coming back to us... instead I boiled a box of pasta and a package of hot dogs and we had hot dogs and pasta salad as planned ;) )

We have been frequenting Home Depot since we moved in, bought the washer and dryer, a lawn mower (3 times actually, there is a story for another day), and all our ceiling fans , plus little things like hose, sprinkler, grout sealer, hardwood floor cleaner, drywall anchors, etc... they are the closest home improvement store to our house but they also have the best prices (or you can believe me I would drive further if the deals were better somewhere else). Anyway, we have been shopping there quite a bit and we keep having very positive experiences with pricing, selection, and customer service-- so I just wanted to share our experience and also give others a heads up about the awesome price matching policy they have! Also, if you are still in the market for appliances their Red, White and Blue sale seems to be one of their bigger sales of the year for sure so definitely check it out! :)

One week in...

One week in our new Ryan Home and you aren't getting rid of me so easily.  It makes me sad when people stop blogging after their build is over, or even just part way through their build bcuz I love reading those blogs so much (seriously if I could make a career out of it I would)-- I don't know if anyone cares to continue to read this blog but I plan on continually updating it as we go along anyway.  I have been a family blogger since 2007 and kind of stopped once facebook and instagram came into play bcuz sharing there was so much quicker-- anyway I don't think fb or instagram care to see my house updates so I will channel all my house excitement into my blog posts. :) 

Today marked one full week actually waking up in our house (though I suppose it technically wasn't since we went and slept in MD on Memorial Day so the kids could go to school one last day).  Anyway, it was our first Sunday attending our new church and it was exciting to meet all the new people.  After dinner tonight we walked the neighborhood with some ice cream sandwiches for a treat, as you can see some evidence of that in this photo we took afterwards.  (First family selfie on our new front porch btw ;) )

 On our walk I snapped this photo of the back of our house.  If you look closely you can see where my husband gave up on mowing that crazy steep hill!

 Sorry, these photos are so random, this is how my children watch a show right now while we have no family room furniture.  Hopefully Ryan Homes will be able to come fix our drywall issue before we get the family room furnished and decorated, then at least something good will come out of having no couch for a few weeks.

This photo I took and texted to my landscaping managment major brother and asked of this poor sad tree will "come back". He basically laughed and told me its dead. He said it either didn't get enough water or was planted poorly by the landscaper, or it was just a bad tree from the nursery.  Either way it isn't coming back.  We know its not a water issue since it rained for 3 straight weeks before we moved in-- Ryan Homes made us sign a paper saying they don't warranty landscaping, which makes sense but seeing as this tree was dead before we closed I am hoping they will replace it for us. That is one of my questions for our PM.

Thursday was my husbands first day back to work after taking over a week off to move-- my goal for that day was to finish unpacking the kitchen and have the island cleared off and clean! Totally accomplished my goal minutes before he arrived home.  (I also mowed the front yard, did laundry, and gave my aunt and uncle a tour of the house that day too).  Anyway, really love my pretty kitchen, it totally motivates me to keep it as clean as possible (with 4 littles running around... seriously makes us re consider our decision to buy a nice home while we still raising children. Lol.)

I took this photo when an old family friend asked where my laundry room was... but I am posting this to help illustrate this scary moment we had yesterday afternoon... my 4 year old decided it would be a good idea to climb along that railing from the stairs side in. Meaning when she made it all the way over to the corner and looked down she was over 10 feet off the ground. Thankfully, she was fine and managed to get back on safe ground quickly and it certainly scared her enough that we hope she won't ever do that again!

 Wednesday our washer and dryer were finally delivered (after a missed delivery Saturday morning, Wednesday afternoon was the soonest they had). Laundry is my favorite chore in the world to do. I love everything about it, is that weird? Anyway, its been extra fun with my new machines... only down side I have found now with these large, high efficiency machines is I have less loads to do, which means less time doing laundry. Bummer.  But I'll survive.  Hopefully its going to help cut down on costs too bcuz holy cow the bills have already started rolling in... one week in!!

Tuesday night when we got back from our two day trip to MD we found that our PM had pulled up the dead sod and replaced it with new. So happy about that!

 One more photo, from the day we moved in. The kids enjoyed popsicles on the front porch, that our sweet neighbor brought over. (You can clearly see that sad tree was already dead when we got here.)

Anyway, thats our first week in the house, randomly and backwards.  Other things that happened this week were my new nephew Emerson was born on wednesday in MD and I went down to meet him.  Friday we drove down again for an orthodontist appt and to say goodbye to my sister and her two babies who moved to California later that afternoon. Its been a busy busy week.  Hoping this week will be a little slower paced and I hope to stay home lots and get more unpacked.  Also on the agenda is sorting out some utility bill issues, and getting our pool passes so my littles can swim!!! :)