Team Benko, Established May 7, 2011

Welcome to Team Benko, consisting of two members and established just a little more than a month ago on a beautiful spring day in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Since that wonderful day (which exceeded all of our wedding-planning expectations!), we've been focused on all the just-married essentials...such as lying around on a beach for a week, making enough room in Beth's closet for a couple of Jeff's shirts, and retrieving the ice cream maker from wedding gift storage (a.k.a. Mama and Papa Salz's living room). We've learned which clothes will most definitely shrink in the dryer, that crock pots really are magical, and that Jeff likes to get up much earlier than Beth on the weekends. (Get that coffee pot a-brewing...) But we have now emerged from our one month without worries or cares and have realized more fully that we still have two houses and - filling those two houses - two sets of EVERYTHING. Time to get to work.

The Beach House and The Villa
Beth currently owns a newly-constructed little two-bedroom townhouse on the outskirts of town, and it has served her well for the past...wow...almost five years. Positives: very low-maintenance, has a garage and a pool! Limitations: far from town, not the best long-term solution for housing. Jeff, however, owns a classic early 1900's house in the Old West Side of Ann Arbor, just blocks from the stadium and downtown. Positives: fun location (also next to an ice cream shop!), plenty of character, spacious living areas. Limitations: needs a little love and maybe a woman's touch.

We quickly tired of "your house" and "my house," and so "The Beach House" and "The Villa" were born. We have set up shop in the Beach House (named for the presence of a pool and a painting hanging over the fireplace of two people dancing along a beach) and have made the Villa (because who wouldn't want to live in a villa??) our newest project.

THE MISSION:
Camp out in the Beach House for a bit while putting love and energy into making the Villa the permanent home of Team Benko.

Why blog about it? We'd mostly like to keep a record of all the hard work that we put into our renovations, since some day we'll look back and say "Wow, we've come a long way!" But we also invite you all to join our journey as we strive to fulfill our home-making mission. It's what we'll be putting most of our time and energy (yikes, and money!!) into for a while, so perhaps you'd like to cheer for Team Benko as we go. (And honestly, if we know people are checking up on us, we might tear ourselves away from the pool and put in a hard day's work a little more often!)

We've already made some good steps, so check back soon to see the fruits of our labor.

 Peace!
J and B

Meet "Team Benko" (because who doesn't love sharing wedding pictures??)