In August 2013 I made a very big change & after 10 years working for KMH I stopped working to spend more times with the boys. I loved all my years at KMH. I loved working for so many great people but it was time to start a new chapter of my life.
In September 2013 Dave got a New Job in New Washington Ohio.
The new job is in a little farm town in the middle of nowhere & it was 1hr & 45 minutes away from our current house in Parma Ohio. So we decided to put our house up for Sale & try to move closer to his new job.
Unfortunately, we listed our house at the end of house selling season & by November we decided to take our house off the market & wait until Spring to try sell our house.
Luckily once house selling season started we were able to sell our house in 1 month.
Which is really fast for a really horrible house market.
However, from September 2013 until June 2014 Dave commuted back & forth to work.
It was a very long commute. Their were some very long days.
But, with many, many, many snow days & Dave also getting to sleep at his parents house to help reduce some of the commute we got through the year. Thank goodness for a really bad winter.
We did have 1 Car Accident this past year b/c of the long commute. It wasn't Dave's fault but the Jetta did not survive. Dave survived & that day the boys & I got a glimpse of the long drive Dave takes every day b/c we got to go pick up Dave when the Jetta died. I realized that day that we really need to sell our house but instead we got more snow days. We really loved our snow days & we were probably the only family glad for the really cold snowy winter we had this past year.
Here a few pictures of Dave's car. It was the 1st Car we bought after we were married:
And Here are some pictures of our very 1st House.
5515 Orchard Avenue Parma Ohio.
We really did love Living in Parma Ohio.
And we have some great memories in our 1st Home.
Pictures of our living room. We loved all the hardwood floors & tile throughout the house & the big window off the living room.
Bryant & Hudson's Room. When we 1st moved into the house it was only Bryant & Us.
A Picture of Myles bedroom & the guest room when Myles decides he is "ok" with sharing his room. Yes, during 1 visit Myles told my dad to get out of his bed.
The boys rooms were also once my office but over the years my office got to play musical chairs to many other rooms b/c we needed more bedrooms. These boys spent many hours playing cars, trains, superhero's in these rooms. We loved their bedrooms & the hours of playing.
Pictures of Our upstairs Bedroom. In August 2011 until June 2012 the upstairs bedroom was actually Dave's baby brother Stephen's room. In August 2011 Stephen had just came home from a mission & we needed a babysitter. Luckily, Dave & I convinced Stephen to come live with us & be our babysitter. We suggested to him many of the benefits to staying with us & going to school here. We loved having Stephen live with us & he was such a great help. Bryant & Myles also loved having Uncle Stephen spend many hours playing with them. These boys love their Uncle Stephen. At our past 4th of July party when we arrived out our picnic Myles saw Uncle Stephen & told us all "this party will be way fun b/c Stephen is here".
We lived in our house from February 2009 Until June 2014.
When we 1st moved in it was just 3 of us. When we left we were a family of 6.
Pictures of our basement:
Our basement was one of our favourite living spaces. The boys spent many house building massive train tracks & building fort tunnels with us, with Stephen & with Stephanie. Yes, the boys even got to have Stephanie to help out as a babysitter for a year. Stephanie babysat all 3 boys the year after Stephanie & Stephen got married. We have been so lucky to have Dave's family to help babysit while I worked. The boys also love Stephanie & think she is also "way fun".
Thanks to our basement & our house we also developed a close relationship with our local plumber. While living in our house we learned that our previous owners were very good at refinishing a home but not so great at plumbing.
In our laundry room we had plumbing fixed due to water flooding the laundry room every time we did our laundry. In the upstairs bathroom we had the plumbing fixed in our bathroom due to plumbing issues.
We had a few plumbing items fixed under our kitchen sick.
And Our biggest plumbing problems was actually caused by a huge rainstorm that flooded all the homes in our neighborhood. According to my parents (who were babysitting at the time) water was coming up from our downstairs toilet, shower & sink. Water was everywhere & my dad had to go to the Local Home Depot to buy us a Shop-vac. After that Dave & his brother pulled up all the carpet & baseboards & then Home Depot tiled our floors.
Pictures of our dining room. We actually got the dining room table as a wedding gift from my Grandpa Leo. The table was a little too big for the dining room so whenever we had large family get together's we always moved the table into the living room & swapped the furniture around. It was a great solution to a minor problem.
We had many birthday parties & celebrated many holidays in our 1st home.
And finally, The picture of the sold sign. It was a great day when we officially got our sold sign up on our lawn.
We had many great memories in our 1st home.
We will always think of 5515 Orchard Avenue in Parma Ohio as home.
We are glad we were able to sell our house in a very difficult housing market.
And we are glad to have started a new chapter of our life in Ontario Ohio.
