Ramblings of a New Homeowner

Well, it's homeowner(s), but since my husband never writes the blog...

We are loving our new home. Sure, we're terrified of it and all costs related to it, but it's pretty fun owning this much square footage. Every item we had in our old beach bungalow seems miniature now placed in this big house.

On our moving day (last Saturday), it snow-rained the ENTIRE day. It's okay, they couldn't rain on our parade. We were highly successful in having every item moved from the storage unit --> truck --> garage within 5 hours. As we were finishing up our last load, we saw our neighbor walk up to our front door! Our first visitors! And if we didn't already think that we lived in suburbia, we were certain to have that knocked into our senses. The woman and her daughter live on the opposing corner and brought us warm chocolate chip cookies and a card to welcome us into the neighborhood. They are the Smiths. Of course they are. Welcome to the Midwest suburbs of America, right?!

Here's the cookie layout:

Just a little appliance love affair I have going on... isn't she a beauty?

And... since I have a beautiful new kitchen, I am now kicking myself into gear and being more creative with my meal preparations. I made this self-made recipe last night for dinner (and again for lunch today!):

Chicken Panini:

Chicken breast, cooked & sliced

Avocado (I made a guac spread using lemon pepper, garlic, and salt)

Hummus

Cheddar cheese

Sliced Italian bread (buttered outsides)

Mixed greens lettuce

Sliced tomato

Hot Italian Giardiniera

Sliced scallions

and... of course... the George Foreman Grill (I acquired this from marriage. Every bachelor owns one). We don't have a panini press and never really want one. Between our reversible griddle and the Foreman, there's just no need for that additional appliance!

mmmmmmm........

Perfection!

I may be in love with this new idea... and if you come visit... you may find yourself having one...

Now onto other ramblings...

• I love seeing the school bus drive by everyday.
• We have seriously no furniture, it's pathetic. But rest assured, we will have beds!
• We took a walk last night and realized our area, known as Green Trails, is quite possibly the best place to live ever. Now, only if it could get (and stay) about 50 degrees....
• There are 3 parks with play equipment within a 2 block radius of our house and you see no cars getting there. You walk entirely on trails within houses in our secluded neighborhood.
• Squirrels are really fat around these parts and they run all over our yards all... day... long.
• People love wooden swingsets here. I say this as I sit here at the kitchen table and stare at ours, and our neighbor's.
• Geese are HUGE birds that use the sidewalk as their litter box. But, I will admit that I like seeing them.
• We found a new grocery store called Michael's Fresh Market and I am thrilled. It's such a cool place and they carry all kinds of crazy items I've never seen in any store! 
• I just saw 6 middle school students walk by our house. We live 1 block away from the best middle school in possibly all of Illinois. I think it's a top contender to beat most in the country as well. That makes this educator really happy.
• We're going to have serious issues finding window treatments for this house. There are approximately 3 billion windows. Haha. Perhaps my exaggeration was a bit high?
• We're scared to turn on the heater too high and we wash our faces with cold water. We have no idea what the bills will look like for a house this large!
• Our first mortgage payment is April 1. For 30 years of our lives. Woah.
• We are recycling way more than ever now that we live here for a few reasons:
• Germany trained us. They recycle and separate everything and have almost no trash. The trash truck only came about twice while we were living in Germany for six months. Also, since we were made so conscious of being wasteful, we can't go back to being wasteful again.
• It's expensive to throw trash away! A 32-gallon bag of trash costs about $2.50 for a trash truck to pick up. Recycling is free and you can purchase as many bins as you want for $7 each and they will pick up for free. I like it.
• We love our house and we're going to try (I think) our fourth church this coming weekend. We liked the one last week, but we are struggling to find a church with people our age who don't already have kids in preschool. 
• I will make my first roast for Easter this year. I will. I've never done it and it's time to become a big girl. :)