Newlywed Life- Our first place!

A sweet saying that brings so much warmth into the hearts of so many. Home sweet home. A place of comfort, love and rest. A place of many moments, experiences and memories.

One of the many dreams I had going into marriage was one where I finally got my own home sweet home. A place I could not only call my own but make my own, or in this case our own.

After Justin and I got married we moved back into his condo. Fully furnished, unlimited AC and water and more space than we knew what to do with. The condo did more than what we needed. However, after housing boys for the past 4 years, a feminine touch was more than lacking. I did my best to add touches here and there, but no matter what, I always felt as if I was attending a long term sleep over at my husband's place. Words cannot describe how ready I was for August to come and for our lease to start.

* Insert glorious happy music here* The day finally came. MOVING DAY! I have never been more excited in my life... okay, that's not fully true, but I was pretty stoked! We were finally making our place, OUR place!

Now, if I could submit a small short for a Seinfeld episode, our first week in this house would be worthy.

So lets just keep in mind, Justin and I are newly married, but we are also fresh out of (even still in) college. As most young married couples, we are starting off with very minimal amounts of green in our piggy banks. The house we stumbled upon and now call our own, is a small older house; the type of home that embrace a very quaint and simple essence. In my mind, it is the perfect first house for a couple!  

Back to our first week. Me, being the busy body that I am, was determined to be unpacked and have the house decorated by the following week! Note to self: don't be so determined next time. Justin and I were able to get our needed necessities unpacked for our first night and then immediately crawled our exhausted selves into bed. Ah, nothing like a warm cozy bed to crawl into after a full day of moving and unpacking. Except, when the warm cozy bed just makes you uncomfortably hot because the AC isn't blowing cold air. Absolutely the worst.

My whole self just sank because I feared that we would be fighting a few months of hot nights due to our sub-par AC unit. As we started to sweat, I crawled out of bed to check the thermostat to see what was going on. The temperature gauge read 57 degrees. THERE IS NO WAY THAT HOUSE WAS 57 DEGREES! I am naturally just cold all the time, I would have been frozen, the cold definitely bothers me anyways... Elsa. At that point I decided to turn the temperature down so we could sleep and give my dad a call the next morning. Luckily, the temperature gauge was just calibrated a few 20 degrees off, requiring us to do a little math when we change the temperature. Mind stimulation. Always healthy.

The day Justin and I moved in, his sweet family came to help us. It's just a rule of thumb, when parents come to visit, they take you out to dinner. Justin and I were lucky to be treated our first night in our house, giving us a slight delay in using our state of the art kitchen! No worries, we were able to use it our second night when we attempted our first meal in our first house!

Our sweet little house is old, I think I've mentioned that before. With the passing of time usually comes the updating of technology and oh yes, kitchen appliances. Our kitchen is fully equipped with a gas powered oven and stove top, a refrigerator dating hip about 30 years ago and a non existent disposal or powered dish washer. Now, we knew this going into the rental agreement with our house. A simple kitchen, how fun! Or so we thought. The fun lasted about 10 seconds. After Justin turned on the oven, our kitchen transformed into the towering inferno! I swear it was literally 100 degrees in that room! Turns out the hinges on the oven door were a little outdated allowing our oven door to stay open a slight bit.In door sauna? I know you have to be pretty well off to have one of those in your house, we got one for free! ( Pictures below for the full effect!)

After those long and hot summer days, a little bit of rain always does us some good. I think God thought Alabama was too hot, so he sent a monsoon. Rainy days at our house are awesome. Our windows are big and bright, giving us full access to experience the coziest of weather. We also hear a pretty legit pitter patter of rain... unfortunately some of the rain decided to come inside, through our roof. Our first roof leaks! Aww. It is in the moments like this that I am grateful for living in a house with a man. A man who doesn't mind going in the scary attic to scope out the damage. Thankfully, the leak was very small and is easily fixed. Even more thankfully, the house is rental and the fix isn't out of our pockets! whew.

Sitting here, recapping these little stories is definitely and thankfully now bringing a smile to my face. In those specific moments, I remember thinking how I wish we were back at the condo or in some updated apartment. I was so irritated and frustrated, nothing was going how it should. However, I also remember thinking how incredibly blessed we both have been these past years. Justin and I both lived in very updated, very nice places while attending college. Our parents helped us pay for our bills and rent, allowing the burden of reality to sit light while we focused on our studies.

With getting married comes the cold plunge into life and all its responsibilities. These stories are small compared to what they could be and thankfully we are renting the house and the fixes are not our full responsibility. We are only a few weeks into living into our house and already Justin and I share some pretty great memories.

I believe God didn't bless us with this little house because it was deemed as the perfect house for newly weds. I believe God blessed us with this house to teach us and grow us. We now have a greater appreciation for what our parents and grandparents have blessed us with growing up. The quality time we spend together is sweeter and more personal because of the lack of modern amenities. We share memories and moments that we will carry with us from now on.

I have always been told that the first years of marriage are the sweetest, to cherish them. I think God has definitely had his hand in helping us do that very thing.

I love our little house. This little house is our little house, quirks in all. This little house is the one we call our own and have made our own, for now at least.

A few pictures of some of my favorite parts thus far:

God Bless.