On The Move

As before mentioned, our time living in the Jonesborough house was short lived.  The landlord had no interest in doing anything about all of the water intrusion issues and the mold was getting worse and worse as time went on.  Right before moving out of the house, we had someone come and do some mold testing.  He told us basically how it works is he takes an air sample inside the house and one outside the house.  If the levels are higher inside the house than they are outside, it is considered unsuitable.  We recently received the results.  The measurement per cubic meter outside of the house was 2,700.  The measurement inside the house per cubic meter was in the 23,000's. 

We are now living in Kingsport.  We have been a lot more content in our new home.  One of the best parts is we have been able to really make it our own place.  We have been doing a lot of renovations and personalization.  It all came to a hault during the holidays, but we have resumed the work.  Will and I have done lots and lots of painting.  We currently have 3 of 7 rooms painted, though one room still needs another coat or two.

For many of the rooms we decided to go bold.  In our livingroom we decided to do gold walls with red and brown accents.  When we started our first coat of paint in the livingroom we hated the color.  It wasn't at all what we thought it was going to be.  Instead of looking gold, the walls looked pumpkin orange.  But with another coat of paint and time to dry the color darkened quite a bit and we are now very pleased with it.  We were also able to pull up the old nasty carpet in the livingroom and hallway and replace it with wood flooring.  We still have some finishing touches to do, but it already feels warm and inviting.  One of such finishing touches is to make a collage of framed pictures on a large wall space above the couch.  This is where we plan to hang the temple picture my parents had framed for us, the Reed Family sign we received as a wedding gift, various pictures of our family, and a red and gold mosiac mirror Will bought me for Christmas.

The kitchen was painted a much quieter color.  We decided to go with porpoise gray with dark blue accents.  The kitchen is taking on a very country theme.  We are planning on sewing our own curtains for this room as well as making round braided rugs for the newly tiled floor.  Will's uncle Craig was kind enough to come lend a hand for a couple days to get the tile down.  The tile has really opened up the room.

Unfortunately, our refrigerator is too large to fit in the spot it is supposed to go.  So now it is where our kitchen table would belong and we have no room for a regular table.  My parents offered us a small pedestal table my dad built for their bridal shows, so we are currently using that.  We just have to decide how we want to fix it up.  Right now we are considering just painting it.  Our plan is to finish up all the last touches on these two rooms and then move on to the spare bedroom.  We have really enjoyed all the time spent working together on making our house into a home. 

The Holidays

Due to technical difficulties (aka a worn out computer that like to shut the internet down while I'm in the middle of a new blog posting), it has been a while since we've given any updates on life here at the Reed home.  Things definitely got busy thru the holidays for us.  It was exciting to spend our first Christmas season together as a family.

For Thanksgiving we were able to celebrate with tons of delicious food at Ryan's relatively new apartment in Johnson City.  We each picked a couple favorite dishes to prepare and bring.  After stuffing ourselves to the brim, the boys all settled down in front of the TV for a nap while us girls went to work on the finishing touches of my quilt.  It was a pleasantly uneventful and relaxing day with the family.

Hannah and Coatsy

The most exciting part of November was definitely the latter part of the month when Will and I had three house guests show up for the weekend.  Our amazing friends Jency, Joe, and their baby Coatsy came all the way from Randolph, Utah.  We spent the first couple days here in the Kingsport area and then for their last day we took them to the Vegas of the east, Gatlinburg!  The only thing that could have made the visit better is if they had time to stay a few extra days.  Despite mine and Will's best efforts to sell them on Tennessee, They packed up and headed back to Utah where they shortly thereafter purchased a ranch in Idaho...Maybe we should have skipped the tour we gave them of Eastman.  Will and I are hoping to be able to visit Jency and Joe soon and check out their new place!  Despite the slight grudge we're holding for them not moving east, we're still very excited for them!

December was quick to follow!  Being newly wed college students, money can certainly be short to come by.  It was no different for us in December.  We weren't complaining too much, however, because this made Christmas shopping quick and easy!  We spent the night Christmas Eve with the Reed family in Greeneville, and headed to Abingdon first thing Christmas morning.  We attended church with my parents, Hannah, Caitlin, and Ryan, then headed to the Hood house for presents and more delicious food!  We had turducken for the first time!  It was very interesting and very yummy. 


New Year's Eve was spent quietly at home this year.  Will had made plans to play an online game with some friends and I spent the evening writing the talk I had put off for the previous two weeks.  New Year's Day we went to church where I gave my talk and then headed to Greene County to Will's parent's. 


It is study time again for Will.  The new semester is here.  Will has decided to switch his major to Spanish Education.  We are hoping ETSU will allow him to test out of some of the required Spanish classes.  Last semester he was forced to take the most basic Spanish class because he didn't have three years of it in high school.  On his second day of class, his teacher heard him say one word in Spanish and asked him if he was in the right class.  After spending two years on his Spanish speaking mission, he pretty well mastered the basics of the language.


My education plans are still up in the air this semester.  I may, at some point this semester, start a program at a different school in Johnson City, but my main goal is to work as much as possible to help Will finish up his degree.

Payton is still queen of the house and ruler of our lives.  She has recently started her career as a model for Reflective Moments Photography.  She recently starred in promiscuous birthday suit Valentines Day shoot.  She proved herself to be as talented as she is beautiful!