POOLESVILLE DAY!!

Last weekend we took advantage of getting to know our new town better by attending the annual "Poolesville Day" with our friends and family. Even though it was a bit drizzly, we had so much fun! After doing a tour of the model of our soon to be new home, we hit the streets! Poolesville Day actually started out with a very early 5k run (which everyone opted for breakfast instead!) followed by a parade, lots of fun craft, food, and everything you can think of stands..... Plenty of bouncy activities for kids, a rock wall, pony rides (Aliza was excited for that one!), a petting zoo, face painting, oh yes...and the best funnel cake EVER!! OK, perhaps I am not the best judge of that considering it was my first experience with it....but YUM!...and the list goes on! While walking around we even bumped into 2 families that will be our future neighbors, so it was great to get to know them a little more too :) Our friends Lindsay, Mark and their 7 month old twin girls Addison and Brooklyn, our friend Matt, and Aliza and Aaron joined in the fun! We can hardly wait for next year when we get to walk to Poolsville day with our little guy in tow!

Lindsay and adorable Brooklyn :D

Oren and Matt trying to get this group moving forward while girls were shopping for hair bows :p

Ummm, ADORABLE :D Aliza and Aaron being cute...

Aliza and Aaron being even more cute.....seemed to be the theme of our trip :D (Aliza's moccasins were getting wet)

2nd trimester clothes getting snug, baby bump getting larger = baggier tops..... but I can't complain!! Getting even more excited now that we have cooler weather! :D

Why not add more to our plate!?

So quite a while back while Oren was away in Seattle, I was watching the show "House Hunters" and browsing the housing market on redfin.com for fun (which we would do on occasion just to see what was out there) and I came across my dream house!! Beautiful full front porch, PLENTY of space, AMAZING kitchen....well, everything about it was perfect! I sent the listing to Oren just for fun and said.... "my dream house.... maybe someday" :) He commented on how beautiful it was and we left it at that. Of course when Oren arrived home he said "ok let's go" and to my surprise we were off to go look at the new community in Poolesville, which we fell in love with... but none of the lots we wanted were available yet. None the less, it threw us into our on going house hunt. We were on again off again with the hunting process (boy does it get tiring!), trying to decide where our ideal area was we wanted to be. We fell in love with the Poolesville area. It is a small town country west coast feel.... it felt like a relaxing, friendly place to raise a family and come home to at the end of the day. The only draw back being that it is a little bit further commute for Oren. He tried it out a few times and realized it really isn't much further from where we are now and there is an alternate route that cuts out one of the worst freeways during traffic! So we kept our eyes on that area. To our surprise, right before our trip to St. John, 3 great lots opened up in the new community we had looked at previously. So we put a lot hold on one, mulled it over while we were away.... and made an offer when we returned. After much back and forth, changes to how we wanted the house....WE GOT IT!!! :D OUR DREAM HOUSE :D So in a few weeks they will break ground and start building our home where we will raise our family...very exciting times! The expected move-in date is April. So we will be busy busy busy getting our place on the market, over seeing the building process, having a baby, moving, Passover shortly after!! Phew!

Front of our lot taken from our new neighbors deck, the entire neighborhood is already so nice and welcoming! We met most everyone at a meet and greet put on by the builder right before our deal was made.

Back of our lot. The tree line is protected area, so there will be no building ever to take place behind us... Hello privacy! Another thing we love is the spacing between the homes, unlike most neighborhoods in the DC area, where the homes are on top of each other...they might as well be town homes!

If you want to check out the model, click below....
It is the "montgomery" model and will look most like the last home model picture shown in photos. Although we are not doing a side load garage and brick as the picture shows, we decided on a front load garage and a stone base. (Although the pictures show a TON of upgrades/additions we are not getting, if you click on the interactive floor plan you can get more of an idea of how it will really be) :)


 http://www.brightwellcrossing.com/modeldetail.php?mod=3

It will certainly be a nice change from our small condo we are already growing out of! We can hardly wait for all of the exciting changes to come :D

BABYMOON!! Hello St. John!

When I first heard about babymoon's years ago I thought it was the best idea! Your last and final big trip before your baby comes and your life changes in many different and very busy ways! So when Oren called me from work one day and said we are going on a babymoon to St. John in the Virgin Islands.... I was SO EXCITED!! And the best part was, we didn't have long to wait. We anxiously kept our eyes on the hurricane status (yes it is hurricane season) and Irene skimmed by them as a tropical storm, but threatened the East Coast. Luckily, we flew out hours before shutting down the airport in Philly, and as we flew out the pilot pointed out the outer rim of the hurricane...YIKES! So we headed off to hurricane ally and avoided the hurricane :D We got the BEST weather, and can I just say it is amazing there!! Crystal clear blue water you can walk right out into the ocean up to your neck, look down and see your feet with fish swimming around.... families stuck their babies in floaties and floated right along with them in the ocean!! We are already thinking to return with baby in tow (and family!) in 2013 (since 2012 is already spoken for) :) It was so beautiful, we came back tan, relaxed, and ready to prepare for our new little man on the way :D

Our view checking in at our Westin time share.

Our native friends....the iguanas, we saw EVERYWHERE! Even in the tree outside our balcony!

View on the way to the beach for the day! AMAZING!

Baby bump Kwiatek!! (he has been moving and kicking quite a bit these days!)

More beautiful views from our drive around the island.

 Awaiting our dinner reservation with a great view :)


It's crunch time now, I have baby showers to look forward to, Lamaze classes in Nov., getting baby stuff set up, plan a bris, and only 18 weeks left!! YIKES! (and that is IF I carry to full term)...my mom delivered ALL of us 3 weeks early and my Dr. said I have a 50/50 chance I will do the same :P We are very excited for the journey we are on, and even more excited to share it with you! XOXOXO

Bathroom remodel....again.

Finally we set aside a week to remodel our bathroom....again. Before Oren and I even met he had done extensive remodeling. From the kitchen to the floors and bathrooms. Unfortunately, the hired contractor did some shotty work, leaving us with the need to redo the bathroom again. Luckily, our awesome and talented Uncle Bill is not only a great home inspector, but also knows the ins and outs of the correct ways of everything construction and remodeling :D

During demo we found everything the last contractor did wrong, along with the growing black mold! We are glad we did this now before baby Kwiatek comes! The boys worked hard all day while the girls and kiddos played! What a fun job for me :) We went shopping, swimming (had a very HOT week!), visited the Smithsonian Air and Space museum, and enjoyed our time together!

Uncle Bill working on pipes...

Bathroom in progress..... Stay tune for the compleated look! Now that Oren is back to work it takes a bit longer! But we are CLOSE! I am hoping by the end of this week it will be DONE! :D

Sparky found every cozy spot and Julie LOVED it!

So did William :)

At Air and Space in front of space shuttle :)

Sharing shabbat :)

We LOVED having you Kibbel Family! We love you and will see you soon!