The crazy thing about living out in the country (even when you are really not that far in the country) is the amazing sunrises! Each and every day we see something new and beautiful. Sometimes it is hard not to share every morning, since each of them are different and amazing, but I can see it getting old sharing every day.
We don’t take it for granted one little bit, this amazing place we call home. Sometimes it is hard to believe this is where we live when not even a year ago we were surrounded by too many people and couldn’t see the sunrise until lit had risen over top of all the other houses.
As we continue are transition into country living, we find that getting around the city is actually easier from out here (unless it is snowing, then nobody goes anywhere), which is somewhat ironic since you would think closer to the city meant easier. Just getting out of the neighborhood traffic added an additional 10-25 minutes of driving depending on the time of day. We now just skirt around all of that and get to our destinations faster. It has been a nice bonus to our move.
Over the holidays we continued with a few final pieces to our kitchen reno and it is almost ready for a final reveal. Our main floor will now be complete and we can focus on the last couple of rooms in our upstairs. We have two smaller bedrooms, one is the master and one is my office, although the layout will stay the same we are considering opening them up to look like one big room. This will have to wait for the warmer weather so, I think (hope) we are done for the winter months and can just enjoy.
Tags:
#farmhouse,
Ontario,
Ontario Travel,
Ottawa,
Sunrise,
Sunrises
Sometimes when you are out and about you stumble upon a little bit of beauty. These Muskoka chairs just screamed out to me to come and sit. I was busy working at the time, however, I took that few seconds out to take a shot. I took it so that I could look back and remember that sometimes, you just need to sit and enjoy the beauty around you.
These Muskoka Chairs were captured in Collingwood, Ontario, two days later the entire area was blanketed in snow. Covering the already late in season Fall colours with a beautiful blanket of white.
Tags:
Canada,
Collingwood Ontario,
Muskoka Chairs,
Ontario,
Ontario Travel,
Travel
As you can imagine, life gets pretty busy when you move your family from suburbia to the country. I had all sorts of crazy ideas in my head that I would blog our way through the renovations of a 130 year old farmhouse and move and yet.. here we are, 7 months later (almost to the day) and I haven’t said a word, let me try my best to lay it out there for you.
We got our keys to the farmhouse on the beautiful first day of Spring, we went straight to work. The kids and I ripped out carpets that had to go and Hubby got working on a few electrical and plumbing things that needed to be done before we could rip out the kitchen and bathroom. Our first night ended in exhaustion but the carpets were gone and we were ready for demolition.
Our Saturday started off with a team of three guys doing some great demo on the kitchen and bathroom. It was tough as both were installed as though they would last a lifetime. And although the kitchen and bathroom served the previous owners well with their five (or six) children we couldn’t imagine working in the space that they had used. The kids and I continued our carpet ripping and then got started on painting the flooring underneath. We wanted to seal in any odors or whatever may have been in the plywood from the previous owners before we got to work on installing our own floors. Our work continued into the Sunday, getting as much done as possible before the teams arrived.
Monday morning dawned bringing us a chilly -25C, the flooring was delivered and the painting team were on site. Things got moving pretty fast, which was good because we were under a deadline of two weeks until we moved out of our old house and into our new house.
Over the next week, we painted and the upstairs carpet was installed and we decided to go with move in day #1. We moved everything from our upstairs bedrooms and downstairs tv rooom into their new home.
Our second week at the farmhouse saw the installation of the hardwood flooring, painting of the downstairs studio and living room, laundry and coat room. As the flooring guys were rolling out we were rolling in with the remainder of our belongings.
I am not going to lie, moving at 44 is a lot different than moving at 33. Every single box is heavier and each stair is harder to climb. I swore I would never move myself again, but silly me listened to Hubby when he said it would be easy. Well, it wasn’t. With both of us exhausted from the farmhouse renos and final packing of the old house, it was a sheer miracle (and a little help from Mom, Dad and Sarah J) that we were able to get it done. Thankfully the truck rental company called and told us to keep the truck overnight as our last load was left in the truck while we collapsed from exhaustion for a few hours of sleep.
As our first dawn at the farmhouse rose over the back fields, we knew in our hearts we were home.
Tags:
#farmhouse,
north gower,
rural living,
rural ottawa,
The Farmhouse
