Cats cats cats

It has been a month since we moved in our house (it'll be exactly one month tomorrow as we moved in Feb. 24th) We've been busy with our projects, including removing the woodstove in the living room and it looks so much better without it! I will post the pictures later.

I notice that many cats live around here... in fact, three cats already stopped by and greeted our babies! (Steve and I will not let our cats out until we take them to the vet for the shots and wait until the weather becomes warmer and we may let them out eventually...)

We met one of our neighbors, Linda, and she seemed nice. She told us about the previous owner of our house and I did not appreciate the fact that he left his grey cat, Bear, and that cat has been living in Linda's backyard. :/

Anyway, here's the pictures as you can see why there's a quite several cats around here!

Bear - it's apparent that he used to live here -

it's awful that the previous owner just left him here :(

Of course, Pumpkin was being a curious cat...

Greeting each other... cute!

My other cat, Sora, being cautious...

It really broke our heart when Linda told us about Bear's pain around his mouth as it hurts when he eats dry food. She and her hubby couldn't afford to take him to the vet, so we gave her $20. We also felt like taking Bear in but knowing that taking one more cat into our home will put a burden on our shoulders, so we couldn't...

Later, Linda took him to the vet using our money for Bear's exam and told us that he has gingivitis/gum disease, something like that... he may have to be put to sleep if it spreads around his body and isn't being fixed up. *sighs* We and other neighbors will keep our eyes out for him...

That very evening, the black cat came by...

As usual, Pumpkin being friendly...

That black cat's eyes are scary! ;)

Yet other cat in our front yard

Although, he didn't greet our cats...
but he was certainly being friendly ;)

Refining the house

Right now we're just cleaning and fine tuning the house as we realized that it takes a lot of time and patience to decide on what to do with remodeling process. So, right now we are just going to refine the house by cleaning up, free up its space (by taking down the wall between two rooms), and paint the prime white (we'll decide on the color later).

Our next project will be remodeling the kitchen (I don't like its ugly white 1960s cabinets!). Then perhaps remodel the bathroom sometimes this summer as I know it's impossible to redo everything at once! Yes, we were too eager to do everything at once but we need to focus one thing at a time.

Anyway... enjoy the before and after photos. :) (You can click on the photos to become bigger)
















See the "entrance" wall between the two living rooms?

I felt kinda claustrophobic too! We took the "entrance" wall down between the two living rooms... scroll below to see the difference















Our little fireplace - it's still there but we plan to take it down















It turns out that it was an OLD green/gold wallpaper behind the white painting, probably 1960s style















See the gold/green thingie?




















Steve & his dad, Jon, at hard work! (Jon was so sweet as he stayed at our house for a week to help us... bless him and we're lucky to have him. We love you, Dad/Jon!)




















More clear picture... I turned off the camera's light. (If you see the recent and next photo - there were a lot of dirt everywhere, probably from taking down the wall)















Naturally, it was a mess















Finally complete! Looks much better, isn't it? (We will take down the wall between the kitchen and living room later)















We're still deciding on the final paint color... maybe Beige? Tan? We'll see...















No more wall. Yay!

More before and after photos!

The "before" bathroom with ugly wood wallpaper. Ew! (The stuff isn't ours - it was a previous owner's. I took the picture the day we visited)




















Steve & his Dad took down everything but the wall had wood stain




















Finally complete! We painted it with prime white color for now. We will decide on the color later.




















Close-up of the bathroom




















I "died" when I saw the wallpaper! (The frame wasn't ours, it was previous owner's - I thought it was a cute picture but definitely not my type)




















Wall paper down! Again, the wood stain was "stuck" so we had to cover it.




















There! Looks much better, isn't it? What color should we pick to paint... hmm?




















God forbid the wallpaper in the kitchen... of course, it was a MUST to take it down! (Oh, just so you know that the stuff weren't ours - it was the previous owner's)















One of our awesome friends, Ben, who was willing to lend a hand for a while. Thanks, pal! ;)















I was a happy lady that day! (We plan to purchase the new appliances, probably stainless)

I will post later with the kitchen's new look - probably a few months from now. :)