Come on in!

Welcome to 5431 Nottingham.  Our first house home!  Where Derek and I started.  Where we Derek learned to be incredibly handy.  Where we painted every wall a bright and bold color upon moving in because....we could!  It was ours!

We came home from our wedding to this house.
Lita joined our family here.
We brought Cole home to this house.

Many memories.

Lots of work.

Tons of love.

We have to bid her adieu.  We have outgrown her.  We must move on...Cole is growing and we need to think about his best interest; school, community, safety.  And, we just need more space.

We hope that she will hold lots of memories and love for the next family who resides in her.

While we are still here, take a look.  We've worked really hard and touched every nook and cranny to make it work for us.  Here, just see....

We have to give most credit to Ed for the front.  He did the landscaping.  We love it.  Derek put a new porch on the spring  before Cole arrived.  The old porch was a concrete slab combined with some brick.  It just didn't make sense.  Derek and Ed spent Memorial weekend of 2007 with a jackhammer.  After getting permits, seeking consult from neighbors and friends, and making plans - Derek set to work.  I think the finished product is perfect for this house.


Here's Cole's room.

This room served as an office before Cole came along.  It was deep pumpkin orange.  Served us well.  However, didn't seem to make any photos!
Then it evolved into a nursery where Cole lay sometimes and stored his toys slept.

 On Cole's second birthday, we transformed his room to hold his big boy bed and growing collection of toys!

He's proud to show it off.


Here's our bedroom.  It was not equipped with a closet when we purchased the house.  Ed built one in for us as our wedding gift, all in a few days that we traveled to Florida for final wedding planning.

Yeah, we made the bed like this all the time....has nothing to do with showing the house.



This is the hallway between the kitchen and bedroom.  It is where I highlighted our family history in black & white snapshots.  (and I did NOT get this idea from watching Tori (Spelling) & Dean's reality TV show)  :)
This is where the closet for the "master" bedroom was originally.  It took up a lot of hall space and was just strange.  We demo'd it very early on.

The bathroom was a huge labor of love on Derek's behalf.  It was one of the last big projects in the house.  And it was by far the biggest.  It was originally 'Pepto Pink' and had walls built out in odd places.  While I went on a college visit with Jamie, Sheri, and Maxine (and the little baby bump that was Cole in the making) Derek and Ed demo'd and rebuilt this....

They have some stories to tell about that.  I'll leave those alone!  ;)
While Derek finished up plumbing over the course of a few weeks (with the help of Spencer!) we showered in the basement...in the middle of the basement.
The tub was from under the Stahlhuth's porch.  We had it refinished and purchased all of the hardware to match.

The living room.  Yes, we live here.  It's comfortable and lovely. 

The kitchen.  Another big project.  We took it from lots of 'country blue' and oak to this.  The ceiling was a drop, so we added the tin look.  Painted the cabinets.  Added the backsplash.  Updated all of the appliances.  Cooked a lot of good food.

Lets go downstairs....

...or to the man-cave, whatever you prefer to call it.

Here's the office area.

...there is storage around the corner too.  Who wants to show all the uglies though!?!  Let me just tell you, Derek did an amazing job of taking a small space and making it work for organizing all of our stuff....and trying to keep it organized despite me!

The neon and light collection.

A tour of the bar area.

The basement was really odd when we moved in.  It had cardboard walls (yes, cardboard) in each corner, making little awkward rooms.  There was some kind of cheapy drywall covering the ceiling, but the pipes and were below the drywall (?).  We gutted it.  Derek and I did the epoxy floor.  Derek built the bar.  We sprayed the ceiling black...and did not tape anything off....so then we cleaned a lot of black paint.  I sewed curtains for the block windows.  Derek collected lights, tin signs, and memorabilia.  Sissy and Gerald gave us lots of great UGA gear, including a flag that flew with them on the car during a wonderful winning season!

We hosted parties down here.  They were fun...lots of fun!

So that wraps up the inside tour.  Want to go out to the back yard?  Cole does (ALWAYS!)!

Not pictured is the garden area.  We did a lot of gardening considering the garden was approximately 3 feet X 6 feet.  We had lot's of tomatoes, peppers, zuchinni, cucumber, and squash each year!  Not bad for city gardeners, huh?!


So, that wraps it up.  We have less than three weeks left as the owner of this house.  We are in the process of packing things up.  On my part, it's a bittersweet process.  I am so sad when I look around, see our life here, and think about leaving.  On the other hand, when we take our things, we will take our memories, our pride in this home, and these photos.  We will have a new place to make new beginnings (and new babies hopefully! ;)).  We are taking our family and our love.  This place will always be where we began though.

...off to pack.

Oh, and - don't worry, amongst all of the touring and reminiscing - we are still having some fun at 5431 Nottingham!