At Home Alterations { old & new | cheap & beautiful | him & her | ups & downs }

Hi There

Hi blog reader!

We love to write and we love working on the house, so starting a blog made a lot of sense!  It's something we do because it's fun and even if no one reads it, we'd still work on the house and write about it.  Lately though, we've realized how much fun it can be to make friends through the blog.  It's the cherry on top of our already amusing hobby.  So we're going to take a step and say "hi" to all our new friends and give you a chance to get to know us more.  We'd love to get to know you all too, but even if you don't write back we'll still keep writing

An Introduction

Mike

I grew up in the burbs of Minneapolis.  I was kind of a dork in high school... I lettered in band, theater and academics.  I played an instrument called the Euphonium (baritone) and got none of the ladies for it.  Here's a picture of me at my absolute dorkiest moment - thanks for taking a photo of it mom:

I moved on to cooler instruments and played in a couple bands.  Nothing big came of it but I had a blast pretending to be a rock star for a while after college.

I don't play as much these days but I still play electric guitar at our church and play acoustic at home for Katrina   My other love is of frisbees.  I played ultimate in high school and college and play disc golf almost daily now.  When it's too cold to throw a frisbee (which is like half the year here in Minnesota) I snowboard like a gazelle.  If a gazelle snowboards as well as it runs anyway, which I'm assuming is true.

I have a degree in MIS (Business IT stuff) and use it as a programmer, trainer, and consultant for a small software company.

I never considered myself a handy man but I guess my engineer brain is a quick learner when it comes to building, finishing, electricity, and all those other fun home-owner skills.  I like to read and research, so far I've been lucky enough to learn how to do the projects we tackle before we're in over our heads.  They keep getting easier so there's hope!

Katrina

Although I always wanted to be a Southern Belle, I'm a midwesterner at heart.  I was born in Toledo, moved to St. Louis when I was four and then, after five years under the arch, moved to the Milwaukee area.  College brought me to Minneapolis (go gophers!) and that's where I've stayed ever since.

Similar to Mike, I spent a lot of my time in middle and high school on musical activities.  I played the flute in band at school and at church, participated in a flute choir with MYSO (Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra) and for another two years played in UWM's youth band.  I was also in color guard with the marching band during the summer and fall.

I continued to march in guard at the University of Minnesota during college.  I loved every minute of it and still sometimes wish I could return to perform!  I walked away from college with a great group of girlfriends (and roomies) and many fond memories (and a teaching degree!)

After spending a year in China teaching, I returned to MN to work as an Early Childhood Special Education teacher.   I get to be creative, sing daily and help little kiddos which is pretty awesome!

Throughout my life I have always found creative outlets such as music, photography and art.  I still love music but only play during the holidays.  Photography continues to be a passion and I've recently been enjoying interior design and scrapbooking. 

Us

We first met in April 2008 when a friend tried to set us up at a game night.  Our friend only told Mike about the set up so I was oblivious and played to win.  'Conniving' is the adjective Mike now uses.  Needless to say he was totally turned off from the set up.  We randomly  met up a few other times that year and while Mike liked me better each time, I was still in the dark and not interested, so nothing came of it.  We met up again almost exactly a year after our first encounter and that's when the spark hit.  We started dating and knew pretty quickly we were in it for the long haul.  Six months later we got engaged, bought a house and then tied the knot this summer (2010).  Sometimes it seems like everything happened so fast but most of the time it feels like we've known each other forever.

We're getting excited to snowboard, start on the basement, blog, and enjoy being married.  Right now we're working on just being married, but in the future we might add some of these:

About You?

Sometimes we feel like all we talk about is ourselves.  What about you?  Leave a comment or email us to tell us:

• What do you love to do?
• Do you have a blog - if so leave a link!
• What projects are you working on?
• Do you have before and afters of past projects you're proud of? 

Nice to meet you,
Mike and Katrina