Ben and Alonna » house http://www.benandalonna.com Living vicariously through ourselves... Tue, 29 Nov 2011 03:51:55 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.3 en hourly 1 Welcome to Colorado http://www.benandalonna.com/2011/01/welcome-to-colorado/ http://www.benandalonna.com/2011/01/welcome-to-colorado/#comments Sun, 16 Jan 2011 05:42:31 +0000 Alonna http://www.benandalonna.com/?p=3319 Occasionally in life, things just fall into place. That’s how I feel about our recent move from Idaho to Colorado, and I couldn’t be happier with how everything has turned out.  Here are the highlights:

Colorado!

  • A new job : After 3 months of searching, I accepted a position with Seagate in Longmont, Colorado.  The new job has gotten off to a great start.  I’m excited about the work (ASIC Verification for SSD drives), I like my boss and coworkers, I’m happy with the pay and benefits, and the location is perfect.  And an added bonus: part of my team works in Shakopee, MN only 20 minutes from my parents’ house.  This means I can occasionally work remotely from that site while visiting family and friends.
  • A new home : At the last minute, we found a rental condo in a NE Boulder community called “Gunbarrel”.  We are loving this area – we have easy access to both Boulder and my job in Longmont, yet are surrounded by farms, open space hiking and biking trails, and great mountain views.  While the rental is only temporary, we’re thinking about sticking to this area when we search for a new place.
  • Boise House – SOLD! After only 3 days on the market, we accepted a full-price offer on our house in Boise.  We credit this to the perfect combination of a nice house in a great location, setting the right price, a lot of preparation, presentation and staging, and a good dose of luck.
  • Enjoying the Rockies : With a little bit of summer left when we arrived, we were able to get in some mountain biking and hiking.  With winter is in full swing, we’ve been hitting the slopes, and Colorado snow has not disappointed us!
  • Family Time : We spent Christmas here with Ben’s Mom and sisters Kim & Beth.  We had a blast – snowshoeing, snowmobiling, sledding, and snowboarding.  I’ve also been able to see my family a lot this fall and winter.  Mom & Dad visited in October, I spent Thanksgiving, New Year’s and my birthday in Minnesota.
  • Every day life, with a view : I hope this never wears off – every day I am impressed by the beautiful scenery here.  Just driving to and from work puts a smile on my face.  We always knew there was something special about Colorado, and we were right.  Plain and simple – this place just feels like home to us, and I don’t expect to ever leave.
  • Article on Briefcase to Backpack : Read about my feelings upon returning from our trip around the world.
  • Travel Photo Book : Check out this photo book I made of our world travels.

Here is a collection of photos from the past few months.  I hope everyone is in as good of place as us and enjoying your life to the fullest.  Here’s to a happy 2011 & beyond!

]]> http://www.benandalonna.com/2011/01/welcome-to-colorado/feed/ 8 Fixing up the house http://www.benandalonna.com/2008/06/fixing-up-the-house/ http://www.benandalonna.com/2008/06/fixing-up-the-house/#comments Wed, 25 Jun 2008 04:28:58 +0000 Alonna http://www.benandalonna.com/?p=46 This Spring Ben and I are fixing up the house and yard.  Since we’re trying to move closer to work (Eagle area), we’re planning on either selling or renting out this current house.  But there is a decent amount of maintenance that we’ve been opting-out of for the past few years.  If you haven’t already learned this lesson – it turns out that if you put off yard work for 3 years, it’s MUCH harder to get it back under control.  Especially when it involves rapidly spreading vines…

Here’s a photo from last year of the front of our house.  Notice the vines crawling up near the front door – they extend all the way around that nook on the side of the garage.

house - with vines

We cut out all of the vines, dug up an old tree stump, and painstakingly pulled all the vines off of the side of the house, sanded what they left behind, and painted.  We also painted the front door, put in an azalea plant and woodchips.  Here’s some photos:

Ben digging out the tree stump Alonna sanding Ben digging out the tree stump

Alonna painting house - new look house - new look

We also added knobs and drawer handles in the kitchen:

Ben installing cabinet knobs kitchen cabnet knobs

And here’s a couple random photos – Ben planting peppers in the garden, and a praying mantis we found on our house:

Ben planting peppers praying mantis ]]> http://www.benandalonna.com/2008/06/fixing-up-the-house/feed/ 0