30 Days of Being Thankful- Day 2

Alright, I wrote a novel last night, so I'll try to keep this one brief.  Today, I'm thankful for my home.  In a few months, my family will have lived in this house (well, owned it) for 20 years.  I'll never forget the night we moved in; my brother, cousin Kyle and I stayed over night BY OUR SELVES while my parents finished packing and cleaning the rent house we were living in.  I was dropped off after a dance (yeah, 12 years old and a middle school dance in the early nineties...good times...), and the 3 of us set up the 2 upstairs bedrooms and bonus area.  We had pizza, soda in a cooler, paper towels, and toilet paper.  This was WAY before cell phones, so if anything happened, we couldn't call anyone.  The boys set up John's room, and played Nintendo way into the night.  I hunkered down and put my room together, and that is where it all started.  I lived here until I got married, then moved into an apartment with Todd, and then we bought a house for our 1 year anniversary.  My parents lived here until 2003, and tried to sell the house, but ended up renting it out for a year.  They approached us about buying the house when Chase was nearly a year old, and we have been here for 7 years now.  It's fun that the boys share my old room, and my older brother's room, and that they've been able to create memories where I had so many.  We have finally started to do some updates, because let's face it, the house is 20 years old! It still functions wonderfully, but things are starting to wear out and 1992 called and wanted it's style back.  While we were gone this Summer, Todd took down the ivy wallpaper in the breakfast nook, which made a HUGE difference, and we had new carpet put in the downstairs (we're going to wait to put nice carpet upstairs until the boys get a little older!) And a few months back we replaced the siding on the house- it's made a huge difference to the look of the house and it's so much warmer/cooler inside! I do have a big list of things I'd like to do to the house before I start back to work when the twins start school (1 1/2 years away...I'm not counting or anything...), but every day I think about how blessed and thankful I am to have not just a house, but a home.  We have a sign that hangs in said breakfast nook that read "Houses are made of bricks and beams, Homes are made of love and dreams," and I really do feel that way about our home.  It may not be brand new or design worthy, but it's comfortable and it's ours, and I love it.

See you all tomorrow!