Welcome to Our New House & Give-a-Way Winner & Christmas in July!

First things first! I would like to say congratulations to Jen from Jen and Rob for winning the Peachtree Circle sterling charms!! Jen, contact me and I will put you in touch with Leah at Peachtree Circle. Thanks to everyone who participated. I'm working on getting another fun giveaway going at some point in the near future.

Secondly, I would like to encourage everyone to head over to Molly Lou Gift's and register to participate in her Christmas in July swap! Everyone that enters will be paired up with another blogger and will send a gift to their partner by July 25th. The gift doesn't have to be Christmas themed rather can be anything fun and cute that doesn't cost more than $30 (not including shipping)! I signed up and I am really looking forward to this super fun gift swap! It is my first one and I think it is a great idea! Sign up today and perhaps you will be lucky enough to get me as a partner!! I didn't realize it until just now but Molly Lou Gifts is also hosting an AWESOME giveaway! Over $100 in gifts from this super cute store! If you do head over and sign up, let her know that I sent you so I can get another entry!

Thirdly, I think it is about time the I show y'all where Deaner and I are going to be living for the next several years! While we haven't 100% signed the closing papers yet, we are trying to get on the bank's schedule for early next week and things appear to be fairly final. For now I will start with the downstairs pictures that I have taken of the house and tomorrow I will give a tour of the bedrooms! PLEASE keep in mind that none of this furniture is ours and that none of the paint colors will be the same. I think it will be fun to show the "before" and "afters" of our next big project! The first series of pictures is of the kitchen. I really like the kitchen a lot as it is pretty big for a German kitchen. All the appliances are staying (plus we will be getting a 2nd refridgerator from housing which will be in the laundry room!). The color will be going immediately but I like everything else!I tend to love neutral colors so will probably go with some sort of khaki in most of the rooms in the house. Also, Germans take all light fixtures with them during a move so we will be picking out all new fixtures everywhere in the house.

Next up is the living room/dining room area. The kitchen opens up into the dining room and as you can see that the den is situated slightly above the dining room. The dining room has an open ceiling and looks up to the 2nd floor "office space". I'll include pictures of that just to give y'all an idea.Area directly above the dining room.Here is a view of the den.There is also a wood burning stove in the dining room that will help us keep warm in the FREEZING winters here. We have these fabulous marble floors throught the whole downstairs I was really worried about them being cold in the winter. Lucky for us they are HEATED! I'm sure we will still find a use for this though!We are pretty lucky to have 2.5 bathrooms in the new house and this is a picture of the downstairs half bathroom. Sorry the picture isn't that great!The next two pictures are of what is going to be the new laundry room. The current owner of the house is renovating this room completely for me, new floors, ceilings, and walls. This will be the biggest transformation in the house I think as this room needs the most work. Thankfully it should be done before we move in. We will also have a spare refridgerator in here.So, as you can see, we have lots of painting and organizing to do in the upcoming months! Stay tuned for pictures of the upstairs bedrooms tomorrow. We are heading to Brussels pretty early but I might try and write a post tonight. Hope everyone has a good day! I'll be doing laundry if any machines ever open up!