New house DIY: kitchen makeover!

Our first DIY of the new house HAD to be the kitchen. It was a total cave! Words can't even describe how funky it felt to be in the original - when we first went to look at the house, I didn't even really walk into it. I had no idea what the sink looked like or anything else. I just sort of glanced over in the general direction and decided that I wouldn't enter the black hole that was where one would prepare food. I had to look at the listing online to remind myself what the heck the thing looked like! All I could remember was feeling hellish while in it's presence. Anyhoo, I can wholeheartedly say that tackling this thing head on was the right move - it was so mentally and physically exhausting to get done, we would have been miserable if we tried to do it after moving in.

Our escrow was insanely short - just three weeks! It was supposed to be 30 days, but everything went so smoothly, there was no reason not to just hand over the keys. So on October 2nd Chad got word that we would be closing the next day. That night, he came home and told me that we were in fact going to close early, so let's go to Home Depot "right now," get some paint and start working on the kitchen starting "tomorrow." WHAT? I sort of freaked out that we would be moving WAY sooner than expected - forget about redoing a darn kitchen! That was too much for my brain to handle. But after a night of misdirecting my anxious feelings towards Chad in a not-so-nice way, I felt refreshed and ready to go! Thankfully, we waited until the 3rd (the official day escrow closed) to go to Home Depot, then headed over to the house with two car-fulls on the 4th to start unscrewing the cabinets.

EVERY.SINGLE.DAY we went to the house with carloads. Chad would load his car the night before, then leave for work the next morning at 6:00 am, then go to the house after work where he would find me unloading my car into the garage with the two kids running around. Then the two of us would stay there until 9:30 or 10:00 at night sanding, priming, painting, painting, painting, painting... then finally screwing the whole thing back together again! The total project took from October 4th - October 12th (move in day!).

The kids were such freakin' troopers. I know everybody says that about their kids in the face of adversity, but ours really freakin' were. The whole length of the project, there was no couch, no bed, no TV, no NOTHING for children to do for hours on end. On top of that, the whole thing was dirty. Really, REALLY dirty - the carpets were practically black, the tile had a light dusting of grease or something gross and the walls were sandy to the touch. Oh yeah, and the backyard was filled with dead, pokey weeds. It was insane! Thank goodness for good friends and family coming out with us a few days to play with them! Also, thank goodness for siblings who are little buddies. It was great! Exhausting, but great!

And while we were at it, we redid the entertainment center, too. Soooo worth it just to bang it out! Woohooo now we love it all!

Content

I know this is cheesy, but I am just so gosh darn content living in this here house... NOT in Orange County! What has happened to me? Who am I?! How can this be so?!

I used to think that the label of the "Inland Empire" was pretty, well... gross. I mean, "the Inland Empire???" It sounds like something Darth Vader would like to have under his control. "Orange County" is just so sing-songy and beautiful... the IE? Yuck! But NOW! It's like some foreign being has crawled into my body, making me do things like stay home for 6 days straight - not even turning on the car once! - and gardening and just looooooving doing laundry because it's in OUR garage! I know! What on earth!!!! Things have truly been the best. This was so not us over the last few years while living in rental hell. It used to be as soon as the four of us entered the door we were looking for a reason to leave again. Staying at home was unbearable! Here... it's the opposite and I couldn't be more enthused to say so.

I know that part of the contentment probably has to do with the fact that with the holiday festivities we have plenty of reasons to run to Orange County for a play date or family fun thing, so it will be interesting to see how I feel in say, March, but for now I'm just loving it.

Also, this last weekend our family took a trip down to Phoenix where my two best friends have lived for the last few years. Now, neither one of them live any where near their families. The closest lone member to either one of them lives 2 hours away, and the rest are 6+ hours or a plane ride removed. They just moved there because that's what their lives were calling for at the time (one for a job, another to pursue an awesome dream of hers). Seeing them so entrenched and in love with this entire life they had created out of essentially nothing was so encouraging to me. It made me feel great about actually enjoying living NOT super close to my family (even though, let's be real, it's only about 40 minutes away). Prior to our trip, I would think to myself "man, I love living here! ....but it's not Orange County so I don't want to love it too much because that means that I'm officially okay with not living in Orange County." Of course I will probably have millions more thoughts like those, but I'm pretty darn happy hangin' in these here 1,350 square feet. It's the bomb!

Our house, our home... OURS!!!!

The culmination of our crazy obsession with buying a home came to fruition exactly 2 months and 2 days ago! We are so incredibly freaking thrilled to be in this home of ours. It has been a massive thought in our household for months and months and months - maybe even was pushing the "years" territory. During the middle months of this year, we really got serious. We made the decision to take the leap and move out of Orange County, something we had been wrestling with for a verrrrrrry long time. Back in 2013 and the beginning of '14, there was even a small chunk of time where we were seriously considering Denver, and even more seriously Austin, Texas! Based on my reaction from moving 40 minutes away from my family, I can wholeheartedly say that I'm glad we didn't remove ourselves an entire airplane ride away from them!

Anyhoo! It's been so darn nice. The last 2 or 3 years of our renting lives were pretty miserable. Not only did we never achieve that "homey" feel with any of our places after our first apartment in Irvine, but we were constantly PO'ed at the whole renting institution. The thought of our payments going up after a mere 12 months was agonizing, especially after we got down and dirty with our budgets. The fact that we pretty much had to choose between the kids sharing a room and living in a less desirable part of town really was a kicker. Apartment/rented condo living with a man child was slowly beginning to mean soccer balls, tennis rackets and hockey pucks slamming into every possible wall imaginable, including the ceiling. Thinking about neighbors down below us while two toddlers sprinted into the kitchen every other second? No thanks. It was becoming unbearable! Our (my) poor families had to endure our complaints - I was beginning to think that we were becoming the pariahs of the family get-togethers. Sorry guys! 

The "looking" process was pretty speedy. It's like as soon as we gave ourselves over to moving out of the OC, the smoother things went. We put in an offer on one short sale that we later found out was not bank approved, and then we put another offer in on a different home in that same neighborhood, only to find out that the whole tract was not FHA approved. On our 3rd or 4th day out, we found our little home on Autumn Lane! Save for a horrendous kitchen and a little TLC on pretty much every portion of the home, we were in love! Best of all: it's in walking distance to Carter's preschool and the elementary school! LOOOOOOOOOVE! Chad is now 10 minutes away from work - MAJOR HEART EYE EMOJIS. Before we found our house and we were in the "looking" process, I was telling one of my Body Back moms about the trepidation I felt moving out of the OC. She told me that I had no idea how much less stress I would be under with a hubby who works close by, and how, surprisingly, less stress the kids will hold because of it. I thought that I probably wouldn't experience that nice feeling because I really didn't think I was stressed out from any of Chad's commutes in the past. Turns out she was right! We are all so relaxed knowing that the dude is right down the street - I can't explain why. It's just freaking nice! 

I will admit there was one week of pure misery when we first moved. We closed on October 3rd, did a massive kitchen face lift, and then moved in on the 12th. I kept Carter in his preschool in the OC because (wait for it...) I felt really bad pulling him out during the Halloween festivities! There it is! Everyone was making fun of me for spending the night at my parents' house during the last few weeks of October after we just bought a house but I just couldn't handle switching his school during those fun times at school! I was clearly an emotional wreck. Anyway, come the last day of school in Orange County, I truly was a crying mess. I spent the night at home in Corona, then on Thursday morning woke up early, hit the toll road and dropped Carter off at school, all the while trying not to burst into tears because "this was it" regarding our life in Orange County. After the drop off, Kota and I had some time to kill before visiting a friend who had just had a baby, so I took her to get a doughnut and to watch the ducks at the RSM lake. During the picturesque mommy-daughter time, I was straight up crying! Like HUGE tears just coming out of my gosh darn eyes! I must have looked like a crazy woman sitting there with a little girl! Thank goodness for sun glasses, but still, it was weird. When I picked Carter up from preschool, one nice mom asked me where we were moving and I just started crying. Next, all the kids came out of the classroom to tell their parents, "CARTER IS MOVING TO CORONA!" "CARTER IS MOVING TO A DIFFERENT COUNTRY!" Tears, tears, tears, tears, tears. I was semi embarrassed but I truly COULD NOT stop. Then we had a lunch picnic date with our best buddies at the park and even there I really couldn't stop crying! After that I headed home, swiftly hit traffic on the 91 where the kids fell asleep and I was left alone to stew in the misery that was me driving on that damned, traffic-prone freeway. My mom called and I started crying again. That was the last of the hysterical tears, but I assure you, they threatened for a week. During said time, I swiftly began searching "Corona Real Estate Trends" where I learned that I could sell our home, make a profit and high tail it back to the motherland. I was pretty hysterical and was probably making Chad nervous and crazy. Hahaha now it's laughable, but back in those dark days, there was NO laughing going on.. hahahaha!

^^^Carter running some football plays on "his" new drive way.

^^^Kota showing us her moves.

Now we're chill and loving it!!! It's such a wonderful feeling to be settled. It also probably helps that I have the coolest 3 humans on the planet to hang out with everyday so.... YEAH!

Our year with Dave Ramsey

I don't even know where to start with this crazy freakin' topic, but we've hit a big milestone over here in the Cisneros house and I'd like to record it. As of September 5th, we punched in one years' time with the guy who has become the third member to our marriage: Dave Ramsey.

Prior to September 5th, 2013, we sort of prided ourselves on being badass money handlers. I know - cringing right now. (It's sort of painful to write this out because it has to do with that all-sensitive discourse: personal finances - even though I joke on here all the time that I'm a cheapo. Just had to get that out there.) Anyway, I know. Totally like us - we who in hindsight always seem too cocky for our own good. At one point, we actually were great cash jugglers! ...And then came half of our student loan payments. ...Then came the other half of our student loan payments. ...Then came the day where we realized somewhere along the way we stopped paying off our credit card in full each month and it had morphed into credit cardSSS. ...Then came the days where our oldest babe started participating in extra curriculars. ...Then came the day where our youngest babe wanted to participate in extra curriculars. ...Then came the day where I realized that my business finances were very different from our home finances and I wondered what the heck was up with that.

...Then came the day where while lounging around my parents' house, I picked up the book. I started flipping through, stopping on the italicized personal stories of couples young and old slaying astronomical amounts of debt. $200,000 here, $110,000 there. $45,000 left, entire home mortgages right. After spending a lengthy afternoon absorbed, I ran through Barnes & Noble to buy it (all while wondering if it was a good idea to spend money that day... It had an immediate effect!). Over the next few days, I jammed through the whole thing then quickly turned on Chad to get to readin'. He was not so into it, which made me into a crazy woman.

Case in point: I told Chad how I was so happy that we had paid off the one credit card I had had since 18 and, casually, he said that thing was definitely NOT paid off. I said, "No, no. Remember we paid that off like last year?" And he said, "No babe, that thing is almost maxed out." WHAT WAS HE TALKING ABOUT? Then I looked inside my purse and realized that my Bank of America CREDIT CARD looked almost identical to my Bank of America DEBIT CARD - I had been using the two simultaneously all while thinking I was being "good" by just using the debit option! I (loudly) cursed America and whoever the hell had invented credit, then grabbed scissors and cut my card in half! Chad was wondering what the freakin' hell was wrong with me and why that fact had been the one to break the camels back. I told him that either he read the book or I will be taking over the finances (which sort of offended him, sorry babe! And let's be honest - a little unrealistic), so following a teensy argument, he went up to read. After a few days, we were a reformed couple.

On September 5th last year, we sat down to figure out what was up with us. Well. BOTH our minds were blown at the total amount going toward the categories of student loan payments, credit card payments, grocery shopping, eating out, etc., and BOTH our minds were blown after surveying our several bank accounts (not in a good way. Also I'd like to point out that when your husband works at a bank, several bank accounts are opened over the span of several banking institutions. I don't know why this is, but it's a - rather dumb - fact).

Anyway, first thing was first, we had to create our "emergency fund" which, thanks to selling off a few choice baby items, grew very quickly. Then came us trying to figure out leverage for our "debt snowball." The immediate and only realistic option was to sell our brand-spankin'-new Kia Sorento, the action that ultimately got us flying. Severe budgets were put in place and ongoing mom-to-mom sales were continued. Birthday, baby shower and wedding gifts got a massive mark down and Christmas last year? I want to say that 75% of the gifts were purchased through mentioned mom-to-mom sale sites. It was a huge, GIGANTOR change for us. Prior to this, I never really understood people who had to turn down going to a dinner or a night out because "they couldn't afford it." Truly it wasn't a judgement thing, I just honestly didn't get it. After that first night, I GOT IT. Within the several months that followed, never in my life had I thought about money as much as I had during 2013-2014.

(Now, I say this with trepidation...) A few days prior to September 5th of this year, I told Chad that I literally had never felt so poor in my life. I knew I felt this way because every single, teensy tiny dime was spoken for, all with great causes now that we had undergone so many months of painstaking analysis, but it was a fact. Every penny was going toward the debt snowball, the newfound down payment we'll be shelling out (hopefully) within the next few days/weeks/months, our constant, extremely strict weekly budgets and small bursts of fun. It sounds hard to believe, but the "poor" I spoke of came from a place of pride: I've never been more sure of the "real" status of our personal finances (I've come to refer to the credit purchases of the world as "fake" - but genuinely understand those purchases if you have enough cash to cover them! Not that it's any of my business. Ahh! See? Hard to talk about!), even if that means planning ahead for events several weeks in advance and/or thinking about price tags way more than one could imagine. "Poor" really could have been interchangeable with "money conscious" within that particular conversation, but would have been ridiculously redundant considering our daily budget talks. (I'm really not trying to sound righteous! These are just the facts after following the Rams' common sense advice.)

On September 5th, just a few days ago, I did the numbers - took a look at exactly what we had accomplished over our 1 year. It was all right there in black and white: serious hard work, partnership and new understandings. We've come a very far way in terms of our crazy, school induced, credit card happy, we-want-our-kids-to-participate-in-every-activity-on-the-face-of-the-planet-if-they-want-to debt and I couldn't be more happy to say we set out, stuck to a plan and will keep on going. In case you're wondering, we're still in the "debt snowball" arena and will be there for quite awhile, but hey! That's cool with me, man!

I don't want to put any pressure on myself, but I think I'll write all the facts and figs out at the very end, when we can move on from "debt snowball" to the next baby step (or maybe not. Maybe by then I'll have so much respect for the power of the dollar that my own bank account would slap my wrist for even thinking of casually slinging around things of such magnitude! Magnitude = great importance, not dolla bills - heyo, banking jokes!). I know - lame way to end the longest post ever, but I just don't want to put actual numeros out there as we continue down the path towards freedom. It's been a cool ride, only bearable because Chad's a pretty awesome dude to do just about anything with in the name of marriage and awesomeness. Without him I'd surely have shot my brains out.

But anyhoo! Go out and get the book, I say! I can hardly believe a single human being read to the end of this long freakin' post, but if you did, Dave is calling your name. Woohoo for one year down!


*And by the way, I still feel like a major deuche-o for publishing this considering what it's about - dough. On the other hand though, it's been such a large part of our lives it would be weird not to, you know? Okay, had to say that! 

Total picture catch up

It's the last day of August, it's the last day of August! Here are a few random thoughts on this (semi) relaxing afternoon:

- This is my 500th post! Cool, eh? Here is what I'm considering to further my thinking-way-too-much-about-my-blog chronicles: I think I'm going to go through and delete all the dumb, this-has-nothing-to-do-with-my-family, I-don't-even-care-about-this posts. Namely anything that has to do with that brief period of time where I thought it would be really cool to become this big ole' blogger. HA! Anyoo, it drives me nuts when I see those old posts come up because I know the mindset I was in while spending time on them: not very authentic, yo.

- We're potty training Dakota right now! I potty trained Carter during the month of August when he was two, so you know. Gotsta keep things consistent! What this means, though: us not leaving the house. Now us C's are not exactly homebodies, is what we've discovered. It's literally torture to stay inside and/or not drive somewhere. Before nap time I was about ready to gauge my eyeballs out. Later on I think we're just going to HAVE to leave this here <1,000 sq. foot space. It's going to have to happen.

- This is the post where I'm uploading all of the coolness from 2014 that I've yet to hit. Cool moments from a cool year. Fun stuff! 

^^^Newport Beach timeshare, August

^^^Carter's first AYSO U5 team, THE NINJA TURTLES with Coach Dad!!!! (Poor Kota! My heart was breaking for her during his first practice: she was so upset she couldn't play with the "dudes" and Daddy!)

^^^Baby Baylor's baby shower and birth day! (How disgusting that I hadn't documented this!)

^^^A spring time trip to Knott's with 4 out of the 5 grandbabes when the sister was pregnant. It was a hot freakin' day. Carter especially loved when I was forcing him to "smile for the camera!!!!" HAHAHA that second picture kills me!

^^^Beach day fun with my favorite people sometime early on in the summer festivities. Also, Carter and I are the same person sometimes.

Woohoo! Feeling caught up and awesome!

Dance life!

A few months ago Kota took her first tiny tip-toed steps towards her future involving all things dancey and tutu-y and ballet-slippery and pretty-pretty-princess-tiara-y. I signed her up for Mommy and Me ballet class! Now this action was not a flippant, "every little girl must do this so I guess we should sign you up too," type thing. It was a well thought out, deeply researched, overly emotionally packed "I'll spend a few Saturdays in a row at the local dance clothes store just to make sure I get you the RIGHT leotard" situation. Totally normal for a 2 year old's, one day per week, half hour class. Totally.

I'll forget about the fact that I really didn't like the teacher after class 1 (where we had an awesome substitute instead of the usual chick who I wanted to punch in the face). I'll also forget about how judgmental I was of this "studio!" It was one of those types of places where kids can do anything and everything under the sun but none of the training is that great, you know? Like a jack of all trades but master of none type places? Yeaaaaaaaah we won't be attending there past Mommy and Me because obviously I can't have my daughter being taught that mediocrity in disciplines such as ballet is okay! NOOOOOO! Lastly, I'll forget about how I spent WAYYYYY too long trying to pick out the best and cutest purple leotard/tutu for her big first day and wouldn't you know it?? IT WENT MISSING! We've found it since, but I had to put her in this old tutu that's still super cute but not THE one.

Anyhoo, she did great, her little buddy Ella did great and us two moms (who were two of the three moms who were participating in this MOMMY and me class) were super proud. I realized that Kota really is one hell of a tan child under fluorescent lighting and that she can totally coupe. COUPE! Super proud dance mom, over here!

 ^^^Doing the "seal" with Miss Cynthia!

It was the best!!!!!!

Coach Chad the Dad!

Hey-o for an enormously productive day! Thanks to us completely running out of every morsel of acceptable breakfast food after the weekend, I got the kids going at 7:30 am for an early morning Corky's breakfast date, went to Stroller Strides, hit the mall for some post-class camaraderie, swung through Trader Joe's for an epic grocery haul, sprinted through Albertson's for laundry detergent and wipes, cleaned out the car once we got home and got the kiddos into quiet/nap time after an awesome lunch! Woo!

Okay but what trumps the epicness of today was this awesomeness: Carter getting to tell EVERYONE that we got to "Meet the Coach" for his first AYSO soccer team - "I got to meet my DAD!!!!!! MY DAD IS THE COACH!" 

Yes! Chad came home a few weeks ago and let us know that he will be coaching Carter's first soccer team. I almost cried. On Saturday we had the first event where everyone got to meet their coach at the local elementary school. It was an hour long meeting where we all first sat in a half-hour-long power point presentation (all of us meaning a million families with young children who were NOT interested in hearing about how "once your child becomes a star player around 8 years old, they will be tapped for All Stars." Oh thanks! NEEDED to know that while trying to quiet down my insanely bored 2.5 year old!). After listening to the way-amped commissioner, we all broke up into small groups to meet each other. Let me tell you, our team is boss. 

Team name? NINJA TURTLES! Team Manager? An awesome dad! Kids activity while we all talked? Playing tag! We're off to a good start with ole' Coach Chad the Dad. Pretty excited about it. 

Gooooooooo Ninja Turtles! Now get out there and kick some U5 ass!!!!!!!! We do not do fun. We do winning. The league does not keep score at this age but you better believe that we will. No goal = running laps. LIFE LESSONS SHALL BE LEARNED AND WE WILL HAVE FUN WHILE DOING IT, DAMNIT!

He-he-ho-ho! I keed, I keed. Stoked for some entertaining Saturdays at Wagsdale Park! Woo! And how cute are these bubble blowin', messy haired, undies donning, sticky-from-running-around all day, on-the-verge-of-being-potty-trained maniacs? Yay for 2.5 and 4.5!