Overheard: Frightening

Scary words from Mickey to start the day:

"...hey Alex, let's play Wipeout!"

(And happy 500th post to me!)

Mishmash

-- I've started packing...hooray! How do you say goodbye to baby clothes? The boys have some I just can't part with, and I know I'm going to end up shuffling them around a hundred times before I find space for them. But I just can't put them in the giveaway box now...or ever, if you want to know the truth.

-- Mickey has a couple of new phrases that make me grin when I hear them. "...Grandma's house is so decorational..." and "...Mom, it's soakin' hot out here!" I think they work!

-- I used chipotle peppers in adobo sauce for the first time the other day in a chicken taco recipe. (Go ahead, say "adobo" a bunch of times...fun!) Then I noticed "chilpotle" on the label and I wondered if any other glaring errors had been made in the production of this can. Of course this blog is not perfect, but I try to avoid paying people to make mistakes.


-- Ya'll...Pete's in the middle of a horrendous travel week. Think about him and pray his travels are safe and he can get some decent rest soon. And his friend's wife is in the hospital suffering with a pulmonary embolism, which, given his history with that demon, has him visiting her in the hospital as much as he can. Her husband was out of state when she went in the hospital...can you imagine. Anyway, he's having a very draining week and I hope he'll be able to have a relaxing weekend...

-- ...after I go see the Harry Potter movie on Friday night with my moms! Woo-hoo!!

-- In my frenzied weekend, I missed a traveling Titanic artifacts visit which my good friend frantically called me to tell me about. And I missed it. I'm a little sick about that one...

The new house!

I'm starting to wonder if I'll have everything packed in time for the move two weeks from today, but then I realize I don't have much choice in the matter. I'm feeling a little like back in college when I procrastinated for weeks before a final then crammed all my studying into the 18 hours before test time (for whatever reason I know a few college freshmen who read my blog; ya'll don't do that, mmmkay?)

As promised, however, here are some pics of our soon-to-be home sweet home. I'm calling them "before" shots, since we have a list a mile long of improvements we want to make:

Raining when I took this shot, so I wasn't getting out of the car to get the whole house.

Does anyone know the technical term for this thing? Looks like something that will require climbing on rooftops someday.

I love the bay windows. There are three sets in the house!

'Cause you needed to see the stone close-up.

Must. Be. Climbed.

Handwashing sink in utility room. Weeee!

Unfinished kitchen cabinets that will soon be "ginger." Better known as medium brownish-y.

"Hey, let's put granite in, but that means we have no budget for a backsplash. Maybe The Hometeam won't notice..."

The third bay window in the dining room just off the kitchen. This one looks out onto the...ready for this...BACKYARD! (Which I have no pics of...sorry.)

Formal dining room. But we're not calling it that because we're not formal (suggestions for other names welcome).

Den. With a weird closet thing that we'll have to define sometime.

Sort of a shot of the yard. It has a fence and trees. I'm livin' the dream, I tell ya.

...and the house has a front door.

With a window like this in the office, I'm sure to write some inspired blog posts for once. Right now I'd settle for just writing.

Stairs...which I don't really like having, except I love these since they lead to...

...a gameroom!

More gameroom.

My favorite bathroom feature: they all have these bureau-type vanities.

Guest room upstairs, too. Crooked ceiling fan included.

Boys' room downstairs next to ours. They'll be rooming together until further notice. Or the fighting starts leaving scars.

"Oooo, and let's not replace any ceiling fans. We can call them vintage!"

The bad news: all the closets are small like this. The good news: there's four of them.

New appliances. Yay!

Storage in garage. I'm very excited about this since we won't have as large a utility room in the new house.

I'm also excited about having a screen door in the garage. Oh the little things...

Spot for our second fridge. I still have mine from my single life. Seriously, save a couple hundred and buy one for your garage. Priceless for summer time drinks and frozen treats, stocking bottled water, trays of party food.

Ceiling fan in the garage. I'm sure there's a sweet spot somewhere those three blades will cool...

Mickey's very intrigued by the mail drop set-up. When he saw this picture he asked "...what happens to the mail when the garage door goes up?" Hmm...

Not looking forward to fitting all my pots and pans in here.

The utility room sink again. I'm in love with it.

I may even leave one remaining piece of "vintage" in the house.

Checkin' in

So just for fun I checked out how many posts I put up here during the last few months. Seems I've been doing things other than writing. Oh, well. I'm so glad ya'll don't hold that against me.

On the house situation: as I mentioned before, we close on both the sale of our house and the new house on July 27. I've finally accumulated a few boxes and have actually packed one as of tonight. Packing is quite overwhelming to think about. So I'm preferring not to think about it. But I'm saying "no" to extra activities a lot, which will be a good thing when I decide to attack the packing head-on.

Tomorrow we visit the new house since I get to choose a stain color for the new kitchen cabinets. I'm more than incapable of making such a decision by myself, so I called a friend to meet me there to help me decide. She doesn't know it yet, but I'm also handing her a tape measure and a pencil to write down window measurements. None of the windows have any coverings on them, which will drive Pete to insanity within one day.

I'm hoping to snap a bunch of pics, too. Just maybe I can take some time to put some up here.

The inspection on the new house is scheduled for Thursday. We hope nothing major will be discovered, or that it is and we don't have to pay to have it fixed!

There's the whole incredible update; ya'll have a fabulous week.

Happy Fourth of July!!

It's a little soggy outside today, so I'm hoping our Fourth festivities will still happen. But just in case, there's this as a worthy substitute.

Ya'll be safe!

And just like that...

(I promise this is not turning into a once a week blog. Mostly.)

So blah, blah, blah...we've been busy and preoccupied all week with house hunting and I've been friggin' exhausted every night, with barely enough energy to pull up Facebook and see who scored 50,000 on some game I never heard of. Tonight, however, we have reached a turning point so I feel somewhat compelled to let ya'll know...

...we found a house!

We'll be closing on our new house on the same day as our current house: July 27.

A lot of people ask me if I've begun packing...the answer is still no. I just felt weird starting the packing process when we didn't have a destination. Really, though, we did: it's out the door of this house... But now I guess I don't have much of an excuse.

I'm sure I'll post some details or pics or something about the new house soon. Or late. You know me by now...

May a rock come flying through our window

If I talk to one more neighbor about our move I'm going to scream. Since our house sold and the "sale pending" sign now graces our lawn, you would think we were deserting the friendliest and most considerate cluster of people on Earth.

It's possible, however, that we are.

At church Sunday, I guess word has gotten out and some people are talking about our move instead of Fr. Jack's sermon...sorry FJ. Since we're only two houses down from the church parking lot, I guess people can't help but notice. A couple of concerned souls live in the neighborhood and they did nothing but gush about how badly they don't want us to leave. This, added to the fact that there's a house for sale in the neighborhood that very nearly suits us but we're still discerning it, and the other fact that we visited several very good possibilities over the weekend but nothing seems just the perfect fit...add a very kind woman's words about how much she loves midtown, our church, this neighborhood...

...it's enough to cause a bit of overwhelm in my head. And it did. And the tears came. In the middle of the parish hall during coffee and donuts. The poor woman, whose name I don't even know, politely asked if this was a bad time for me. "Um," I told her between sobs, "I'm fine."

I just thought the decision would be a lot easier...like when I bought MY first house without even looking at any others, and how I felt when I said "I do" to Pete. (After all, as much time as I'll be spending in our new abode, it's nearly as monumental as choosing my husband. Seriously!)

So I collected myself and the poor woman gave me a very warm hug, and I was fine. And all that occurred pretty much under Pete's nose but he was oblivious thank goodness, as he was gathering napkins and drinks for the boys.

I just really love this neighborhood, which is why it's taken us about two years to make the move to move. I had no idea, however, just how hard it would be. Other than the fact that we need a little more room and a backyard, we've been incredibly happy here.

Actually it would be easier if there was something that we didn't like about the neighborhood, like Pete's truck getting vandalized or a stray bullet grazing our mailbox. Then, my goodness, my difficult decision would become very easy, no?!

So if you have any grievances against the Hometeam...now's the time to take your revenge. And put my mind at ease.