Our soon-to-be house!

So this week has been absolutely CRAZY!  Monday night we called our agent and said we really wanted her to see the house and let us know what she thought of the price.  We were pretty convinced that it was over priced.  We were able to set up a time that night and headed over there while my mom stayed home with the little man.  When N and I got there the couple who owns the house were leaving.  We were a little awkward about the while situation because we didn't know if we were supposed to meet the owners or not.  The woman started walking toward our car as she was heading to hers so we got out and talked a little bit.  She told us some things about the house and we told her how cool we think it is that they have lived there for 55 years.  The man walked out shortly after and we talked about BBZ and our love for their beautiful home.  They were very pleasant and seemed like great people.  We toured the house, which reaffirmed how much we really, really loved it.

Monday night we went home and spent about 3 hours cleaning the poo out of our basement (literally as the cat's litter box in down there).  Our current house is almost 100 years old and the basement is pretty much a utility basement.  It was dirty and unorganized and we made it look 10 times better!  It still needs lots of work, but at least we feel less embarrassed about a stranger seeing it.

So Tuesday I went to work and had a meeting which ran late.  This sucked because N got a call from the realtor that someone wanted to see our house!  On one hand it sucked, but on the other it was great because our house had only been on the website since the morning, so we were pumped!  We went to the park and out to eat with my mom during the showing and came home hoping that the family loved it.  Well, they didn't.  They didn't even come inside.  The realtor told ours that it was because they had 2 little girls and our house is on a pretty busy street.  That was disappointing, but we're keeping up hope that someone will buy it.  Even if they don't, we are in a great place for rental homes and will certainly rent the house if it won't sell.

Our agent then came over Tuesday night and we conjoured up our offer.  We did a lot of digging to try and find comps for the area, but the house was just simply overpriced.  We didn't want to insult this amazing couple, but we also didn't want to overpay for their house.  We ended up offering quite a bit less for the house than they were asking and hoped for the best.

Wednesday was a hard and long day!  I completely convinced myself that we were not going to get the house.  I decided that our house is fine and to take it off the market and wait to sell would be ok.  I was being a pessimist and expecting the worst, so I would be prepared for the worse.  N and I also decided how much our absolute maximum would be and refused to change our minds.  They countered with exactly what we said our max would be.  We raised our offer a little and they countered at a little higher.

We accepted their offer tonight!

So on June 23rd we will be the proud owners of a beautiful home in one of the best school districts in the county!  We are so thrilled and couldn't be happier!  I really do hope we sell our house, but at the same time, we are prepared to rent it out if we need to.  We could actually make some money off of it and wait a year or 2 and the value may even go up!  We have no idea what is going to happen and man, does it feel good!

Here are some pictures courtesy of realtor.com

This is the house from the back.  It sits on .8 acres and feels like a cabin in the woods!

The landscaping is absolutely amazing!  The woman who owns it works for the local botanical gardens and has native state plants throughout the property.

I can just see BBZ exploring these woods with his neighborhood friends!

This is the front of the house, which to me hides the beauty of the backyard.

Here's one from the side that shows the shed that sits behind the carport.  I thought I wouldn't like not having a garage, but this 3-space carport is actually pretty cool.

This is a view of the entry way and the foyer and the great room, which was added as an addition on 1970.

This is the upper level of the big addition.  I love all of the wondows and the view of the back yard.  Can't you just picture how beautiful the snow will be!?!

The dining room and the steps that lead to the original roughed-in basement, which has a workshop and washer/dryer hook-ups.  There is a ton of storage space down there.

The kitchen, which is much smaller than ours, but I think I can deal :)

So that's our soon-to-be house!  There are 2 actual bedrooms upstairs and one very large room that they used as an office.  Off of the office is another room that we could turn into a bedroom if we want to throw some 2x4s and drywall up.  We're not sure which room wil be ours because the bedrooms are smaller than the rooms we have now, but once we're in there I'm sure we will figure it out.  This is crazy and exciting and somewhat hard to believe!  We'll keep you guys posted on how the inspection and appraisal goes...please send any renters or buyers our way!

"Ya know, I'm not a planner...

...I'm more of a flybytheseatofmypants kind of gal, you know...moment to moment.  Yeah that's me.  Mmm-hmm." ~Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman

Anyone who knows me knows that I AM a planner.  I look at a situation, analyze it, create a plan and then execute it.  That's me, not the flybytheseatofmypants kind of gal like good ol' Viv from that wonderful movie.  Well, our family has found ourselves in a crazy whirlwind of housing excitement that started yesterday.  Let me back up a little.

N and I have been planning on moving next Spring.  N signed up for a daily newsletter from our realtor and had been sending me updates of what is available in our price range in the areas we will consider.  I have found a few I liked and set up times to see them, only to get disappointed when I realize we aren't moving for another year.  N saw it as a time to shop around and see how far our money will go in different areas.  I saw it as a tease with constant disappointments.  We came to a compromise to only look at open houses as a fun way to spend a Sunday.  We found a house that we liked online and of course, we loved it in person.  It is everything we want with lots of character and it's really one of a kind.  It's hard to not pursue a one of a kind house when it's well, one of a kind.

So we called our agent yesterday and wondered how realistic it would be to move forward.  We talked about the details and set up for her to come meet with us this Wednesday.  At around 7pm last night, she called us back and said that because the tax incentive ends on 4/30, we really should put our house on the market right away to have it available to any last minute shoppers.  She said she would be at our house at 7:30am today with the seller's agreement and back in the afternoon to take pictures.  Holy cow!  So I put BBZ to bed and spent all evening getting our house ready for pictures and to be shown.  It is absolutely amazing how fast one can clean when there is this much at stake!  Plus my mama is in town and helped a lot.  She is also here all week which is perfect for showing it since Miss Delilah Jones would not have anything to do with a crate.

So here we are, thrust into the world of mortgage loans and PMI and down payments and showings and keeping the house clean with a toddler and will they accept our offer contingent on the sale of our house and everything that goes with it.  As much as N and I try to plan things, life always seems to happen to us the way it is meant to, so we are just rolling with it and trusting our instincts.  The ride sure is fun!

I'm trying not to be too excited about this house because I want to remain willing to walk away from it if it doesn't seem right, but I just can't help how awesome it all is.  The people who own the house have been there since it was built in 1955.  Generations of their family have grown up there and visited on holidays and they have poured their hearts and souls into the house by making it eco-friendly and full of native natural Missouri plants in the yard.  N and I love the idea of having our family live in this house for the next 55 years.  I am trying not to get my hopes up about this house, but it is really hard.  Wish us luck!

A 5K Race and Our Rain Garden.

What a full weekend this was!  Friday night we helped our friend celebrate his 30th birthday, but not too late though because I had to be at a fundraiser early on Saturday morning.  For the 3rd year in a row, the agency I work for put on a 5K Roll and Race in a gorgeous park.  This year I volunteered for the earliest shift so the family and I could participate.  We aren't runners (although N has been running lately) so we walked the whole course in about 53 minutes.  We walked BBZ in his stroller but got him out to walk across the finish line.  Here are some pictures!

I am so glad there was a photographer there to snap these!  N's sister's husband also raced.  He ran though, and made great time too!

We went to lunch and had to hit up the local record store on International Record Store Day, which is apparently the Saturday after tax day.  N got a record and a CD with Bob Marley songs geared toward kids.  I have listened to it all weekend and it's pretty great!

So the day was already long and we were all pretty pooped.  We went home and all took a 2-hour nap!  We woke up refreshed and played outside for a while before enjoying a delicious dinner at Pei Wei.  I may never go back to PF Changs again!

This morning BBZ woke up at 6:25am and would not go back to sleep, despite his grouchiness.  He made it up for 3 1/2 hours before finally giving in to his sleepiness.  He slept for 2 hours and I got lots of housework done.  N has been planning to build a rain garden in our back yard to catch the runoff water that sneaks into our basement when it rains.  It has been a very dry April for us, but nevertheless, he bought the plants this morning and the Z family spent the day outside digging in the dirt and planting some plants.  Check it out!

Hey there, Mama!

BBZ loves digging in the dirt, and loves worms!  He calls them his baby and becomes extremely concerned if his baby falls on the ground.  He's such a little boy!

\

N dug the big hole Easter weekend if you remember.  Here is where we laid out the design...

I have the blackest thumb in the world, but this digging in the dirt was great!

It was a family affair!

But for some reason BBZ thought that his shovel full of dirt belonged here...

Like I said, he is such a little boy!

Here is the final garden!!!

One very busy day!

And busy it sure was!  It started with a visit to a new daycare.  Let me start by saying that I am not upset with BBZ's current situation, but I drove by a fairly new daycare this week that I finally decided to call.  I wrote their number down a few times and finally called this week.  When they said that the tuition is significantly less than what we are paying now, I thought it was worth looking at.  It is much smaller than the one he is in, but I kind of like that.  There are only 7 teachers at the whole school compared to 7 teachers in BBZ's room and the room next door (they often combine).  One thing I do hate about his school is that the person that's there when I drop him off is never there when I pick him up, so getting a good summary of the day's happenings is tough.  It has been extra crazy there lately and I hate when I go to pick him up and it's too busy to talk to his teachers about the day.  I guess there are things I don't like, but I wasn't really looking for a new place, just exploring our options, I guess.  It was really nice, but there are down sides too.  We are also talking about moving sometime in the next year or so, so just because this place is close to our house may not mean that it's close to where we are moving.  Like I said, I really liked it, but I don't think I liked it enough to drive there no matter where we move, so I think we will probably keep him where he is at least until we decide to move.

So anyway, that tour was at 8am this morning, so afterwards we headed to the Zoo to meet up with some girlfriends and their babies for a play date!  We got there early so BBZ and I had some fun tim playing with the ducks and in the elephant fountain.  I got lots of great pics today too!

BBZ has a new love of birds.  He kept quacking at these ducks!  He even stuck his finger in the fence and got bit!  Not hard though, thank goodness!

He found these plants that fell off of a tree and he thought they were worms!  He kept saying "da-da' when he saw them because N has been digging in the garden and helping BBZ finds worms.  He collected a few and put them on the top of his stroller, just for Da-da.

He stood in front of this gorilla and totally posed for this photo opp!

He got a big kick out of the orangutan!

This giraffe (aka jaff) was his absolute favorite!

He kept getting closer...

...and closer!  BBZ kept tearing up grass and trying to feed it to him.  Too cute!

We stopped and had to have some french fries, although he didn't eat as many as usual.

We ended the day with a train ride all around the Zoo!  It was such a fun day.

BBZ fell asleep in the car for about 15 minutes on the way home, and I thought he would sleep some more when we got home, but no such luck.  He had his second wind when we got home!  We played for a little while and I finally got him to nap around 2:45pm.  He slept for a little over an hour and then we had to leave again!

I have been doing some soul searching about my job lately and trying to decide what some long-term plans should be for me.  I love my job, but I often feel like I need to be working toward something more.  2 years ago last December I completed all of the papers to begin my 3000 hours of supervised work toward my License in Professional Counseling.  I looked at the papers from back then this week and I literally got pregnant about 2 weeks after the papers were signed.  I guess things have a funny way of working out because I don't think I was really invested at the time.  I am still deciding, but I think this is the right time to dedicate the next 2 years to this supervision.  Having an LPC will open lots of options for me and my career.  I am very happy where I am, but I don't know if it would be worth it to have 2 kids in daycare on my salary.  I would really be paying to have kids in daycare.  We want to have another child at some point, so these are things we need to think about.  We'll see.  So anyway, tonight there was a speaker at my graduate school who is the director of the committee who approves applications for supervision and licenses counselors.  I was able to ask some questions and get some good information.  N's sister was kind enough to watch BBZ on very short notice since N is at a baseball game.  What a day!  I planned to give BBZ a bath when we got home, but he was beat.  It stinks too because tomorrow is my La Leche League meeting and we don't usually get home until late.  We'll see how tomorrow goes, we might be able to squeeze one in.

Wow, that was a lot for a Wednesday!  I hope everyone enjoyed theirs as much as I did!

Waaay back When-sday!

Nikki and me, with BBZ and little Paige in utero at Wakarusa June 2008

It's still kind of fascinating to me that BBZ was really in there, growing and getting big enough to be born.  I remember feeling him in there, and eventually seeing his little feet and arms move around, but sometimes it's hard to believe that he was actually in there.  It's crazy.

I have a friend (who in his sometimes cynical ways) said that having a baby is a miracle that happens 1000 times a day.  This makes me laugh because it is true!  I wouldn't call growing a human a miracle as much as it is so very natural.  It felt like it was the reason my body is here.  It was the most natural and human thing I have ever done.  I think I have mentioned this before, but I find it fascinating that humans don't have a "human" thing that we do.  There isn't really a "human" thing that every human does.  In fact, many humans wonder much of their life about what they should be doing or want to be doing.  Birds don't do that.  Bees don't do that.  At least not that I know of.  Birds have a birdliness that drives their behavior.  Bees have activities that they do that literally make the environment we know stay in existence.  What do humans do?  We often spend our lives trying to find that out.

For me, having a baby felt as close to human-ness that I can imagine.  To procreate helped me connect with ancestors from years past just by picturing them doing things such as bathing or nursing their children, both practices that have occurred since the beginning of time.  I felt connected to nature, while hosting the place for my child to grow.  It was an amazing experience, one that I am looking forward to having again sometime in the future.

Happy Hump Day!

I should have added this before, but here are our little miracles now!

Not Me! Monday

It has been a long while since my last NMM, so here it goes!

I did NOT completely forget to post BBZ's stats last night from his doctor appointment last Wednesday.  This blog is for him and to keep track of this stuff, so I never forget to blog about you know...him.

(as posted on Facebook, but corrected for slight weight error) 18 month stats! 22lbs, 12 ounces (10th percentile) and 33 inches (75th percentile). Yup, still tall and skinny! His language is ridiculous, he's curious and interested, he already shows his kindness and empathy and likes to have things in their place (I wonder where he gets that :) Thank goodness he is healthy and happy!

After sweating my you-know-what off in the house yesterday with our guests, I did NOT realize that the fans were going the winter direction.  N did not try to tell me this for way too long before I decided to try them the other way.  I know that I always turn them around in the winter for maximum furnace efficiency and would obviously have to switch them back.  Duh.

I did NOT giggle at myself and my continued effort to hand express breastmilk in the shower with the hopes of spraying it farther than my last attempt.  I am a grown woman and am not that easily amused!

I did NOT force BBZ to take a bath last night despite his desperate need to go to sleep.  I always read his cues and would never be worried about something as silly as sending him to school with dirt under his nails and ice cream in his hair.  I would never hold him down and scub his body with one hand while attempting to help him avoid drowning with the other.  He did NOT smell clean and fabulous this morning either!

I did NOT eat way, way too much candy yesterday during our Easter celebration.  I have complete control and never over endulge.  I definitely did NOT eat a piece of hawaiian wedding cake that my grandmother made right before bedtime, and if I did, I would NEVER take 2 pieces and smoosh them together to make it look like one.  Even if I did do that I would never think I could get away with it since I was the one who put the cake away, therefore being the only one who knew the real size of the cake pieces.

Whew, that was great.  Want to join in?  MckMama is having a contest tonight for people who link up, so draft a post, link up on her blog and see what she and the other moms have not been doing this week!

Happy Easter!

I cannot believe that it has been an entire week since my last post!  Actually, I can.  The weather in my part of the world has been absolutely incredible.  BBZ has to be outside pretty much all of the time and has been staying up later, so this puts a damper in my routine big time.  I love it though.  He was sleeping much better until last night, but I am good with 2 night of straight sleep mixed with one of having to get up.  I really am ok with it.  He goes right back to sleep and the time with him is kind of nice.

Our new routine goes pretty much like this:

4:45pm - Pick up BBZ
5:00pm - Get home, nurse, say hi to N
5:15pm - Take Delilah for a walk to the playground and play
5:45pm - Cook dinner, N and BBZ play outside
6:15pm - Eat dinner
6:45pm - Give BBZ a bath
7:30pm (or so) BBZ goes to bed.  This is sometimes later depending on what we have going on.
7:45 or 8pm - Start diapers or other laundry, make lunch for tomorrow, and relax with N

This is every night, except Wednesday when we play outside all day besides nap time and lunch time.  I love this time of year!  It's not too hot, the breeze is fantastic, and we can sleep with the windows open.  This makes it difficult to have computer time :)

My parents and sister and nephew came in town this weekend for Easter!  They got here on Thursday and we took BBZ to their hotel to welcome them.  This extended his bedtime to about 9pm, which began the first of 2 sleep-through-the-night nights.  Friday night my family had dinner with my grandma, grandpa, aunt and uncle, so we headed over to our friends Nikki and Zach's house.  We headed home around 9:45pm, which led to our the second night of sleep-through-the-night nights!  Maybe we need to keep him up more often.  Saturday my mom an BBZ and I went shopping.  He was such a good boy!  He was going to stay home with N but N had some yard work to do to get ready for everyone to come to our house on Sunday.  We went to a wonderful dinner at the Cheesecake Factory to celebrate my sister's birthday and came home and crashed.  BBZ went to bed around 8:30pm, but woke up at 3:30am and again at 7am.  Oh well, I'll take the 2 night I got!

We had my parents, my sister and nephew, N's parents and my grandparents over for Easter today!  N made an amazing meal and we literally played outside all day long.

This was Friday before we went to dinner.  Look at that cheesy smile!

Silly da-da, that's BBZ's hat!

BBZ helping us clean the house for our company today

His cute little Easter outfit.  N dug a hole yesterday with the plan to plant a rain garden to catch the runoff that has been ending up in our basement.  BBZ thought it was the coolest place in the world to play!

Playing wiffle ball with Mama.

Playing in the cozy coupe with Papa.

Cousins.

I love this one of his little, muddy shoes.

CJ was a big helper!  He was very patient with BBZ and made sure he found lots of eggs during our hunt.

Egg hunting with Grandpa

This one is my absolute favorite!

Eating M&Ms with Da-da.  That's my grandpa in the background whose house we visited a few weeks ago.

My little family.

Sisters...Happy Birthday, sis!!!!!

Chillin' on the back porch.

It was a beautiful afternoon!

OK, maybe this one is my favorite :)

I hope everyone had an amazing Easter and a great week!  I'll try not to let another week go by without an update.  Have a great week!