Graceland: Dining Room & Kitchen

Graceland has a formal dining room. The color scheme matches the entry way and overall them of the front room of the house. 

 

 

The kitchen is directly off the dining room. The tours of Graceland began in the late 1970's but until Elvis' last family member who was living at the property passed away the kitchen was off limits to the public until the 1990's.

 

The kitchen has the Formica countertops and original carpet. It also has the original light fixtures and cabinets. Everything has been kept in tack. This is the very place that many of Elvis' peanut butter and banana sandwiches were made. This is personally my favorite recipe of the Kings....

It's extremely easy to make and delicious. Elvis loved all kinds of different foods and if you are interested in eating like the King then you can check out many of his other recipes. He has a great Pecan Pie recipe and of course that famous PB & Banana sandwich.

Next up on the Graceland tour... the Jungle Room!

Weekend Review

On Friday, I came home after a long day of work to a new Fitbit band from Beezy. I've been wearing the pink one I got since Christmas so it was a really nice change. This one seems very Spring/Summer.

 

We also went out to dinner and celebrate because the house finally got some offers and went into contract with one of the bidders! We are finally in contact and can move forward with our new home and getting out of our current one. We are so thankful. I really have to credit it to Saint Joseph. We buried him exactly as the instructions stated and read the prayer card. We believed, we asked him every day to bring us a buyer. The day after we buried him we started getting tons of showing. In the 5 days that we had him buried we had more showings than the other 21 days it was on the market. Then we had two people buyers who really wanted the house. We went with the best one and now we are in contract. I am so thankful and so is Beezy. I'm going to continue to thank Saint Joseph for his blessings.

On Saturday, we headed to West Sacramento to see a River Cats game...

We have been to the field before but not for an actual game. We had been there and on the field for the July 4th celebration but had never gone to a game. We went with about 10 people from Beezy's family and it was a lot of fun. The game went into extra innings but the Sacramento River Cats pulled out a win!

On Saturday, I also had another makeup trial done. The first girl that I had gone to did an OK job on my make up but I didn't like how she did my hair at all. I also didn't like the fact that she was cussing up a storm for the entire 2 hours that she did my hair and makeup. I mean really... we had just met and who wants to hear someone cussing every three words on their wedding day? No one. So I had another make up trial with a different person. This girl however, only does make up. I know her pretty well because she was in Puerto Rico with us last March. Now we are searching for a hair person!

Sunday, I booked our tickets to the Elvis Exhibit in Las Vegas, Nevada. 

It just opened this past week and I can't wait! I'm so glad that we got our tickets because the Saturday that we are there, they only had one time slot left open. That's how fast it's selling out. We also had a limited time frame of when we could walk through the exhibit because of our Britney Spears tickets and the fight. The exhibit is taking place at the Westgate which use to be the Las Vegas Hilton which was originally the International where Elvis first started his performances. SO excited! It's going to be a great weekend trip.

We spent the rest of Sunday getting the house ready to go for the inspections and the appraisal. The countdown is on and our fingers are crossed!

The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

The Good...
We are literally right around the corner from the holidays. This is by far the best time of the year. I love Thanksgiving and Christmas. I love decorating and baking and wrapping presents. Most of all I love getting to see my mom. I can't wait to see her and watch her open gifts from Santa.

Christmas 2013

 

Speaking of mom's Beezy's mom sold her house and she's camping out in our spare bedroom! We've got a permanent house guest.

The Bad...
Remember the fire that happened at my house last week?

 Yes it was bad. There use to be a wooden privacy fence there.

Well SMUD had the nerve to tell me it was caused by a Mylar balloon getting caught in the line. Um... excuse you? The incident report that was prepared by the experts says you had an explosion at the poll that caused live wires to be on the ground. Liar liar... now your pants are on fire.

The Ugly...
The prices of flights! Have you booked a flight near the holidays lately? Well guess what, the airlines are just waiting to gouge you with the prices. Last year I went to West Virginia for Thanksgiving. We booked the ticket very last minute. When I say last minute I mean within 14 days of the holiday. It's still weeks away and the price right now is 400.00 more than what we paid last year 2 weeks before. It's INSANE! If I had the time, I would slow boat it or train ride it because seriously it's insane the prices they want to charge people to go see loved ones.

12 More Inches

On Friday, I thought my weekend was going to be like any other weekend. I'd relax, run errands, get some stuff done around the house etc. Well that idea went to hell in a hand basket real quick. Now before I jump right in and let you know the crazy, catastrophic events that occurred. I want you all to know that I'm fine. Beezy is fine and Tesco is still begging for treats. Friday night started out completely normal. I came home from work and Beezy and I decided to run a few errands. We desperately needed printer ink because we were completely out and needed to print something for his work that was due the next morning. We left the house and hit up Target and grabbed some Chipotle for dinner.

Saturday is when it went crazy.

Saturday, I sat around in my pajamas for hours catching up on Watch What Happens Live and all my other Bravo guilty pleasure shows. I played with Tesco and read these beauties...

It immediately sparked a frenzy. To answer the question. No I am not engaged. I love wedding and bridal magazines. Yes, we have been talking about it. 

Later in the day, Beezy's mom stopped by. She's in the process of selling her house and she's going to become our newest roommate for awhile. She came over and dropped off a lot of her plants. When Beezy got home we left for a little while to run an errand. When we came home that's when it all went into the hand basket. We get out of the car and my neighbor who has never spoken to me in the two years I've lived here starts running across the road, barefoot screaming that my house was on fire.

WHAT?

She then tells me that there was an explosion and the fire department banged on the door and no one was there to answer. At that point I felt like I was in one of those moments caught on candid camera. We had ordered a pizza in the car ride home so we've got the pizza kid at our door step now, the neighbor yelling there was an explosion at my house while standing in the middle of the road barefoot and Beezy in the house seeing what the heck she's talking about. I didn't know what to do. I told her thank you and started making my way to the house. I told the pizza kid to hold on and as I walk through the door, I've got Beezy telling me not to look in the backyard.

What do I do? Immediately walk to the backyard. Tesco in the meantime was meowing his little head off because as much he doesn't want you to know it... he's a scaredy cat. And Oh...my...God.

This photo was actually taken the next morning and the night cool air helped dissipate the black ground. Here's is some photos that were actually taken right when we saw it...

 Literally 12 inches from the house!

The fire came so close to the house. I mean literally it was 12 inches from catching the house on fire. All I can say is, Thank God the house didn't catch on fire. It would have only taken another 12 inches for it to have set it ablaze. I definitely think my grandpa was watching out for me. When I bought this house two years ago, there was hummingbirds everywhere. We see them frequently around the house and Beezy saw one the other day. We always said with my grandpa anytime we see one it's him watching out for us. Well he definitely was on Saturday.

Here's the best part. The fire department and SMUD didn't even have the courtesy to leave us a note on the door. We had to make about 15 calls before finally being able to find out what caused it. The non emergency line told us that an explosion happened at the electric pole and caused a down live wire. The down wire then caused the ground fire. Called SMUD and haven't heard a thing yet. Their next call will be from my insurance. So far their customer service at SMUD is a negative two right now. Since their wire could have burned my house down, I feel like they better get on it. Thank goodness the house is ok and we are ok.

We spent Sunday resting from the stress. Beezy even sold his Raiders tickets. Let's hope we don't repeat this weekend ever again.

Home Tour: The Before

Before we began moving everything into the house, I've got photos to show how it all looked. There's three other bedrooms here not photographed and my master bath. The bedrooms were all newly painted and brand new carpet. In the living room/dining room and kitchen there is brand new hardwood flooring. The bathrooms both have been freshly painted and tiled. I also lucked out with new ceiling fans, stainless steel appliances in the kitchen and a jacuzzi tub in one of the bathrooms! 

entry way/living room

dining area connected to the living area

Kitchen

Another view of the kitchen

One of the 4 bedrooms.

The hall bathroom with a jacuzzi tub.

Once we started bringing in the boxes... oh my! It was instant clutter and chaos. 

Please tell me most people's living rooms look like this that first day of moving in. 

Now I just have to finish unpacking a few more things and hang more on the walls and then I can show you the after photos! I might show the progress tomorrow. It's slowly coming together. Hopefully, I can get everything unboxed by Thursday or Friday.