More Updates and Improvements

It’s been another good week around here. It was cold like most of the rest of the country, but our house seems to hold up to the weather pretty well. One of the best things we did was to replace those windows in the park model portion of the place. They were the original windows and didn’t do anything to insulate from heat or cold. We did break down and turn the heat on over the past few days, but it didn’t run a lot. When we replaced the a/c in August, we got one that had a 2.5 ton heat pump with a back up auxiliary heater for when the temps dip below 35 degrees. So that is more than enough to keep us comfortable in the few times that the weather gets like it did the past week.

We were talking a couple days ago about the ceiling fans. The one in the bedroom is starting to go. It had three speeds at one time, but only one speed is working now. And they are really dated, of course. It doesn’t seem like any previous owners of this place (I think there were two) were into doing any kind of updating. Then we remembered we had recently gotten a coupon from Home Depot for 18 month interest free financing, so we decided that must be a sign! There was a minimum amount that had to be purchased to qualify, so we threw in the kitchen lights as well.

We ended up only being able to replace the fan in the kitchen area, as the fans we bought turned out to be too big for the bedroom (which was the one we really needed to

replace in the first place, but we will just have to order a smaller size for the bedroom).

The new one is so much more streamlined. It makes the area look larger! (You can see the old one in the next picture.)

The other big thing I want to do, (but it’s not going to happen until next winter), is to get a slipcover for that couch.

The shutter-like object standing behind the couch is a room divider. The main function for this area is going to be as a guest room when we have company, so we will use the divider to make it into a more private space.

We also got the other cabinet for the kitchen. It is a better height for the microwave and also provides some much needed storage space.

The new lights in the kitchen area…

You can also see my breadmaker in its new spot.

So far I have made one recipe for white bread, and a Cuban wheat bread. Yum. I don’t think we will ever be going back to store bought bread.

I bought a cookbook with 300 bread recipes. I see a lot of new types of bread in our future!

We are getting to the end of what we will be doing as far as improvements for this season. Gotta let the bank account recover for a while!