Happy Mother's Day!

My Mother's Day was great this year. It was low-key, but very nice.

We got up and ate the remainder of the lefse as well as fried eggs (Leif's favorite) and Little Smokies (Skadi's favorite courtesy of Bompa). The kids gave me cards as their gift wasn't complete yet from Artsy Fartsy - I can't wait! Leif wrote "Happy Mother's Day" on the card for me all by himself! He learned this at school and was terribly bummed that his teachers would only let him write one card. I made enough of a fuss about it to him that apparently he wanted to do another and one for grandma too.

We released our butterflies (see below) and then hung around the house. Friends came over for a playdate with the kids. Then for dinner AB made filets - which were fabulous and we opened a nice bottle of wine.

See how unsuspecting they are. They have no idea I am taking their pictures. This is about the only way I can get photos anymore...

Because as soon as they find out I have the camera... THIS happens:

It used to be just Leif that would act silly... he has pulled his sister in on the antics.

This *could* go on for hours.

Me and the kids - ignore Skadi's short dress. I was going to try on all her summer clothes (that were found) from last year but we started with this dress and stopped with it too. Something about my daughter putting it on and saying, "I a princess now!" Oh and that she would NOT take it off. I will wash it and put it away after today. *Sigh*

Loving my front yard right now. Check out the Japanese maple and the blooming rhododendrons. Hope they are still blooming when my mom gets here.

Another unsuspecting photo - AB has the waterfall running. The kids are a touch obsessed with it.

Love this one - just ignore the ketchup on the face.

How it went down...

So for those of you following the house saga... here is how it went down.

This last long weekend AB and I spent a fair amount of time wandering houses with our agents. We actually had a great time with them. Or at least I really enjoyed it. Even for the houses that we just aren't interested in, it was fun to get ideas. We also had in there an appointment with one of the local builders mostly for information gathering.

On Friday we hit five houses. The third house struck us. We both fell immediately in love with it and it was the first house we have seen so far where we knew we needed to get an offer in.

I am kicking myself because it has been on and off the market for awhile now. The first picture of the exterior... not something I would have been interested in. So while I was going through finding houses to check out when we started looking, I probably flipped right by it. It wasn't until we were starting to exhaust listings that fit our criteria that it popped back up again. This time I took a better look and immediately said we had to see the house.

We saw it, we loved it. It wasn't a grand house. It had a stellar view, but was a pretty modest house on a half acre lot. But we left the house knowing there wasn't anything we would change about it and feeling we could live in that house forever.

Saturday we got our act together and scheduled another viewing. When we arrived we found out that an offer had been received for the house and so we knew we would need to move fast. We went and saw the house again and went directly to our agents office and made an offer - which took forever since there was also a rent-back agreement to be filed. The couple are older, wife's health is declining and they need a smaller house and are building one which will be finished in May. They didn't want to move twice and so we readily wrote up a rental agreement with our offer letter.

Our agent presented the offer in person as she likes to do. She explained that it isn't done so much anymore, but she likes to make a personal connection and tell the seller a little about the potential buyer. In this case I tuned her into the fact that I knew the husband through work, how I knew him and she ran with it.

We waited Saturday evening. We waited Sunday. Finally at 5pm our agent called us with the answer.

In the listing agents experience she has never had a case like this. Offer letters came in within hours of each other for the exact same price and the exact same rent back agreement. The difference? We had asked they split the closing costs with us and the other buyers did not.

This should be an easy decision for the seller right? Except that the wife liked Terese and really wanted to sell the house to a family. She debated with her (very analytical analytical) husband all day, which was why we didn't get the answer quicker today. In the end, the husband won out and we lost on the offer.

Back to the drawing board.

AB is more disappointed then he thought he was going to be. I am less disappointed than I thought I was going to be. AB actually has said he is a little ticked too. The sellers never countered. Who doesn't counter offer? If they wanted to sell the house to a family, why not counter and ask for the same offer as the other buyer? Or more? Because we could have and would have done it.

At this point we have looked at everything in our region fitting our criteria. We are hoping to see some new homes hit the market in the next month or so. We will also start looking for lots and considering building. But given that we were willing to not have a house until May potentially, it also says to us that we should not be in a hurry. Interest rates aren't as great as they were initially touted - so that isn't a reason to push it either.

We will just take our time and see what hits the market here in the next few months while we look for lots and decide what the layout of our house would be - if we build.

The ups and downs of househunting

This past weekend we went out twice with our agents - who we really adore. I was thrilled when they reported to us that their afternoons didn't feel like working - felt like hanging out with friends instead. We picked the right agents.


Before we were truly househunting - just browsing - we met them at an open house and immediately fell into a good rapport with them. It is a husband-wife team and they have four kids ranging in age from a month older than Skadi to 16 years old. Lucky for them they also have a good support network locally since they both grew up in the area.


So far (crossing my fingers) our real estate agents are just superb. When we moved here 6.5 years ago we hooked up with a woman who we considered firing a number of times.

KayJay.

My MIL found her through her referral network in a boom time. That should have given us a hint there. Houses were moving like hotcakes - we lost out on a few - and here was an agent who was willing to give up a portion of her fee to my MIL for the referral. And then we discovered she was NOT a go-getter. She didn't listen and was determined to find us some awful little house in a neighboring town. She would get us in her car and "yes we will go look at this house over here, but first..." and then she would drive us across the river and exclaim about the virtues of the town. Great place, I am sure. I know now that it is a nice place, but I still won't live there if only for the long drive to work. And she would just drive around, and drive around. She wouldn't call first before showing houses - we walked in on people more than once - and her reply was "well they want to sell their house don't they?" (It is agents like her I fear when we eventually list our house.)

And in the end, we found our house and asked her to show it to us. She said as she showed us that she had skipped over the MLS listing because it didn't have pictures. (Rolling my eyes.)

This time around we opted to skip the referral. We had met a number of agents throughout the last 6 years through a variety of interactions from friends and from open houses and the Parade of Homes. We met Kevin and Therese and instantly knew we could easily work with them. And like they said the other day, it is nice when you look forward to "hanging out looking at houses" with a couple instead of dreading getting in some old ladies Caddy that stunk of perfume to drive around imprisoned.

We hit five houses this last weekend. The first we walked in and loved. Loved the house completely. AB pointed out minor things - the enclosure that holds the fridge limits you to that size of fridge and we would like a slightly larger one. AB wants a double fridge... *sigh*. And there was no cable outlet in the library for those of us using cable internet. Things that a home sold by a builder could be remedied. The house was on a nice view lot in a neighborhood I am quite fond of and was about 4200 square feet, rambler with a walk out basement on a large lot with about 1200 sq ft of the basement unfinished. It was exactly what we are looking for.
At about $25K higher than our highest end price we think we can stomach. Therese suggested an offer at that highest end price. But even then we are talking $75K more than the house we are looking to build, for essentially a very similar home. That house still looms out there... but the price just was a show stopper.

Another home that we wanted to love was also a rambler with walk out basement and similar in size with 5 bedrooms on an extraordinary view lot. The one problem with that house could not be remedied. The kitchen was smaller than the one we have now. The kitchen made the house a no go for us. Everything else about the house we loved and would have probably been willing to make an offer on our high end for this home. But that kitchen... nope, couldn't do it.

We hit three others - a funky geriatric smelling three level (most likely custom designed) house built to take advantage of views in a great neighborhood at a great price. But the stairs. The stairs that never ended. And the stairs that my daughter tumbled down while there. The stairs killed the house. As well as the geriatric smell.

Another house on a fabulous lot across the street from one of our favorite parks and at the foot of a great hiking trail. But the house was too small at 3 bedrooms with a bonus room. The last house was a really fantastically finished rambler on a large view lot - though little of the house took in the views. It had a fabulous kitchen and family room and the finish work was truly amazing. But it had two rooms that are a waste of space for our family - a formal formal living room and formal formal dining room. Sure I have these now but we have worked with it and changed their purpose - the formal living room is our office and formal dining room a playroom. But the layout of these rooms in this other house was just not great for dual purpose. Loved the finish work, but not the right house.

Where are we now?

It is interesting where your mind goes when you are talking about such a large chunk-o-change.

We have both had our waffling periods. AB admitted he was in one last night.

"What are we doing? We just got to a point financially where we can do and buy extra things, where we can take off for a long weekend for skiing or swimming and buy nice things that we want. Why are we going down this road now?"

I understand. I have been there too. I still love our house much of the time. I really love our patio and pergola and the thought of leaving that makes my heart ache. The thought of leaving the house I brought my babies home to tears me up. Of leaving that wall that has the kids height marks written. I told AB that all I have to do to remedy that is open the pantry. Or look at Skadi's "bedroom". Or think about where we would put our guests who visit.

I waffle in what a good house for us is. Do we take the path suggested by many who have made money in real estate to buy the biggest and best house you can afford? Or do we go the economical route and go with good enough to get us by. Do we build and get *exactly* what we want - gourmet kitchen and all. Or do we listen to what everyone has told us about the headache that is and wait and wait until we find our dream home? What if we never find our dream home? Is a dream home realistic? What are we doing?

Leif also decided the other day that he isn't sure he wants a new house. One of the houses we saw this past weekend had lots of very neat toys for a boy just older than Leif. He was sure we would buy the house based off of this. When we told him no, this house wouldn't be ours a switch went off and he has since decided it wouldn't be a good idea to get a new house. Even he has started waffling.

I am hoping that by the end of the day Friday we will have gathered enough information to start narrowing down our path forward. We are looking at about six houses - two of which AB and I are both very interested in based off of size, styles and locations. Others we feel probably aren't for us, but that we need to see to check off the list. And really... who knows - maybe they are for us - a few photographs only say so much. After we look at houses we have a meeting with the builder of the Parade Home.

I am really hoping that by the end of the day Friday that AB and I have decided on a direction to go with regards to a new home.

Cold turkey

I am not, will not, can not go shopping tomorrow.

I do not want to hear about great deals at stores. No deep discounts. No 75% off. No way no how.

Can't do it.

Our path to a new house

I gave a brief thought about starting a different blog for house stuff. Then I laughed. I am having a hard enough time keeping up with two active blogs. So if you don't want to wade through house post - click away.

Our real estate agent came back with shocking news this afternoon. The Parade Home that we would like built on the corner view lot in Badger Den? "About the same price" as the Parade Home.

I was glad this conversation was not in person as my agent would have gotten a view of my tonsils.

You see this is a view lot in a great location and the other lot was a great location, but a view of a drainage pond and neighboring houses. Sure when you think about it there are things that were probably added to the Parade Home price - like probably landscaping, most new houses around here include minimal (i.e., front yard only) landscaping. Fencing is another. The media equipment in the media room. The wine fridge in the bar. All the extras - drawer knobs and pulls, custom window coverings, basically all the things that make it a Parade Home and not just another house for sale.

AB and I rely on my FIL's advice on houses and loans a lot. He is in the mortgage loan business and has made a lot of money in real estate. He has advised us to keep our house as a rental and we have had a number of people concur with this stating it would be a great rental property. We will refinance this house and buy another.

His advice is to start talking to the builder - because another surprise is that they could have the new house built in 4 months - however, still look around. We do have about 10 more houses we need to see before making our decision. But comparable quality houses of the same style - rambler with a walk out basement are selling for $100K more in the same general neighborhood. However, we haven't seen them... yet.

And I am not kidding myself that our home probably will cost more than the Parade home once I add two walls to make a 5th (small) bedroom in the basement instead of a huge wetbar, move one wall to make a larger walk in closet (it was obviously designed by a man), have a laundry chute or dumbwaiter put in (because I am not hauling laundry from the Master across the house, down a flight of stairs and back across the house when the laundry room is below the Master to start. Sort of. Oh and the kitchen - I plan to kill the eat in area and extend the island for both a larger work area and a place to put some bar stools since the dining room is like steps away. And I don't have a cafe type table or want a cafe type table in that tiny area.

But other things we may decide to kill to save money on - no fancy wooden inlays in the bamboo hardwood. Built in office components not really necessary. AB is considering killing the deck and having his brother(s) come out and help build a deck themselves. And we *can* do the landscaping ourselves... I suppose.

One thing we are excited about with this builder is the house is Energy Star compliant and "green built". Important things!

And before I get too far down this road I do need to e-mail the list of homes we still want to see to the agent. Though my FIL did advise starting to sit down with the builder here soon.

Catching up

It's been awhile since I have felt my blogging mojo. I was worried it got up and went. But seems it was just a momentary lapse and I have a whole list of things to blog about now. My biggest obstacle is time.

Since we returned from Colorado I have been very busy with work (in a good way), getting ready for that big holiday that is lurking just around the corner and just trying to keep up with the daily grind. Oh and not to mention we have undertaken a new task... finding a new home to buy.

So while the Kraft Macaroni and Cheese cooks, Skadi sleeps, Leif and AB are outside shoveling snow (Leif is trying to sled down our driveway that has no slant to it), I will get on it.

I have found my love for this time of year again. I was worried I was going to have a funk of a holiday season. This has never really happened to me, but I was seeing how easily people could slip into this. Then Leif found his love for Christmas, Skadi started screaming "SANTA", and it started snowing. And snowing.

And it's snowing right now!

So first bit of news is that we were gently nudged off the fence with regards to buying a new house. It didn't take much pushing to get us moving since this is something we have wanted/needed for a long time. We have come to know the market in the area pretty well over the last almost a year or so as we frequent open houses and drive around dreaming. We have met a number of real estate agents and this last week we picked one. Or two actually. A husband-wife team with kids our kids ages who are really nice people. And they seem to get us and understand what we are looking for.

Thursday they came over to start the market analysis on our home and Friday we went out and looked at five houses with them. We hit one more yesterday.

After seeing six houses AB and I both agreed on what needs to be done.

We needed to make an offer on a Parade Home we visited in September.

Unfortunately for us our agent told us Friday night that the house was under contract and set to close on Monday.

It was probably good that we felt the strong sense of missing out and regret for not having moved on the house because it emphasized to us what we want in a house. And we may have stumbled upon the better alternative - a view lot in a local neighborhood owned by the builder of the Parade Home. It is a most awesome lot - an end lot on a "loop" where the only people accessing the loop will be the people living there. The houses "below" are a good grade down the hill and so nobody to impair the view.

Our agent is on the case and will hopefully get us information here soon that will help us decide if we are building. In the meantime we are listing the things we would change in the Parade Home - we have no need for a wet bar in the basement of the size they built - we would rather have another bedroom. AB is insisting the theater room stays, though he is finding other places to cut expenses as we are pretty sure the price tag is going to come in higher than that of the Parade Home given the view lot.

We are on pins and needles waiting and are hoping not to be disappointed.

All in all though, we are doing great here. We are looking forward to a wonderful Christmas with a great meal (providing we don't get snowed in and have to make do with what we have in the house). Ok and we wouldn't be snowed in - AB and I are quite versatile in the snow. However, we have been here when the town was shut down due to snow. AB is smoking a prime rib, which makes me drool just thinking about it. We will have broccollini (and the kids will rejoice in their favorite vegetable - seriously), mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls, some fabulous wine and Pioneer Woman's pumpkin cake (sans raisins of course) for dessert.

Samblich Pie

"Time for bed honey pie!" I called to Leif.

"Why did you call me that?" he asked.

"I always call you that, I like it," I said.

"Well I think you should call me 'samblich pie' instead, okay!" he tells me.

....

Leif lived in his cape the entire weekend. Seriously I am not sure it was off of him for more than an hour for a bike ride. On Saturday Leif went to answer the door as one of his friends was visiting. We opened the door to see the other little boy standing there... also wearing a cape. The caped crusaders played hard.

It was a busy weekend. Skadi and I went to swimming, then we all hit some Parade Homes. We went home for nap and I cooked dinner in preparation for guests.

Sunday our doorbell rang at 9am while we were finishing up breakfast (pumpkin waffles) and it was our babysitter. Only three hours early for her babysitting stint.

"NOON, not NINE!"

AB pointed her towards home and asked her to be back in a few hours.

AB and I had nine homes to finish up on the Parade of Homes route and we decided to tackle that last day sans children. They would rather stay home and play anyways.

Our sitter came back at noon and we chit chatted while AB finished showering. I asked how her trip to the cabin was and she told me she confused the weekends and she is going next weekend.

"Next weekend?" I asked her.

"Mmm hmmm!" she nodded with a mouthful of macaroni and cheese.

"So you aren't going to be able to housesit for me then?" I asked her.

She had that characterizeable blank look on her face for about 20 seconds. Then the bell dinged and she stammered trying to figure it out.

I made her promise that she get back to me asap. In the meantime AB has put plans in motion to just bring Winny along to the condo, which is probably a better option anyways.

I think she has the ding dong, ditzy teenager thing going on. It has been something with every single of the last three scheduled sitting jobs. Her mom is super and I am trying to be uber understanding. But this flightiness has me concerned and unimpressed.

Not to mention the fact that when we got home four hours later she was on the couch with Leif (while Skadi played on the floor) and he exclaimed, "we watched Tarzan, Mulan 2 [which I had put aside unopened in reserve as a reward] AND the Spiderman movie?"

"Spiderman movie?" I inquired with my eyebrow raised.

"Yeah," he wanted to watch it she said.

"It's rated PG I think," I told her.

She looked at me.

"He's four," I reminded her.

Ok, so I remember a babysitter letting my sister and I watch Friday the 13th all the while we declared, "it won't scare me". (HA HA HA HA HA.)

Yeah... our neighbor girl has been put on hold for babysitting pending a little growing up, or something.

So anyways... Parade of Homes. Mediocre. It's a Parade. I want to be wow'd. I wasn't wow'd very often. Only a few houses wow'd me. One we want to buy. Though there are enough little things I would change that I have trouble pulling the trigger. AB a little less so. I am thinking building the same house with a few modifications is more likely.

There were too many homes that were seriously just "open houses" with no decor. That's just a waste of my time.

So anyways. Weekend was good. Busy, but good. I cleaned out my dresser and threw away clothes, made another stack for keep (but not here) and a bigger stack for Goodwill. It was my effort to at least *try* and get started on my September goal before the end of the month. AB rolled his eyes at me when I mentioned the word "paint" this afternoon.

SO maybe my kitchen will be in November...

Finding our place

I am stop and go, start and end, confused all around, regarding a house. I want one, but I don't know what I want. AB wants one and doesn't know what he wants. We can't agree, then we can agree, then we aren't sure.

After spending a good part of today wandering open houses we walked away settled.

We walked through a model house (littered with Parade Home awards) and loved the style. We got to talking to the agent, told him what we were looking for and he sent us to a seemingly obscure address.

"What? I housing development there? I didn't know there was one there, that's only like a half mile from our house. Are you sure that's the cross street?!"

He assured us he had a house we would love and if it wasn't perfect (based on his 15 minute discussion with us) he would make it perfect. We would love it.

We raced across town - he phoned his partner to have her wait there for us.

We stood in the driveway admitting that there was really no reason for us to walk in. We loved it already. And loved the location with a park just down the block. We could tell it was exactly what we wanted and in a fantastic location. One of my qualms about moving to this point has been that I do love being blocks to the grocery store, a half mile to Costco, etc. If it weren't for the apartments, we might have considered adding on.

Something beckoned us and we walked through the double doors. Leif carried his new plastic, highly obnoxious sounding nail gun in. I apologized to the agent, explaining what a long afternoon it had been for him. She shrugged and smiled - thinking I am sure, about her potential commission.

Yep, we loved it still.

Four bedrooms, wonderful hardwood floors, a huge Master Suite, a huge gourmet kitchen with a pantry as big as our second full bathroom now. An oversize three car garage you could play basketball in, a shop, a bonus room with a full bathroom and closet, a covered patio with outside ceiling fan on a half acre lot. Everything. It had everything.

AB commented if we were house hunting in earnest he would have wanted to make an offer right there. But we aren't house hunting in earnest.

The development is in phase one of four - and not filling overly fast.

We have time.

We now have two house designs (this one and the other where we met the agent at) we like from the same builder and two neighborhoods we could build either house in. (I like the new neighborhood - AB favors the other.)

And for the first time I am not feeling rushed or freaked out. I feel as though we have made our decision and we just need time to save the money to build our dream house.

We have agreed that we are done driving around. Our lazy afternoons from here on out are going to be spent getting the house ready to sell. Painting the exterior trim... fixing the baseboard and plaster in the bathroom... getting the ducts blown out... getting pictures of the house with our backyard looking lush... putting in blinds... painting... epoxying the concrete patio...

The list goes on and on...

Catching up

Summers in this region really are fabulous. I can say this with enthusiasm right now since the number of 100+ degree days have been few (most so far were while we were in Alaska), making the weather very tolerable and our desire to get outside insatiable.

The entire family wants outside. Skadi is a grump? Take her outside, it cures her.

I was comparing this past weekend to prior colder months regarding progress on my monthly cleaning and organization goals. It has taken me nearly 6 weeks to get my Master bathroom and closet picked up and organized. And it wasn't *that* bad beforehand. Two weeks to do my linen closet? Really... it isn't that bad... it is that we are just never home anymore.

On Friday I picked Leif up from preschool (Skadi already being home sick with AB... I will avoid going into details of that day since in staying home for my four hours in the morning I came far too close to telling off a co-PI who decided to ask me that I "make sure my kids aren't sick on Tuesday". Because she either thought I was lying, would rather be home with a sick kid instead of working with her in the lab, or should find something else to do with my sick kid rather than stay home with her. Anyways...)

We made a quick run by the fire station to check out the details a second time before the birthday party the next morning. Then we grabbed dinner from the Korean place and ran home.

Saturday morning Leif had his birthday party at the fire station. I was quite pleased with how it went and how well we were able to keep things flowing. The kids and parents seemed to enjoy the tour and I, for one, learned a lot. (Did you know that 80% of the calls are medical?) After the tour we had pizza on the back lawn, a pinata and then cake (ice cream was forgotten in the cooler). The kids ran and played. Leif only had a few turkey moments. I will post pictures later.

We went home and put Skadi down for a nap and hoped Leif would nap. It was silly to think that he maybe would I suppose. Not like AB and I weren't near complete exhaustion ourselves.

Once Skadi woke up we headed out to the Art in the Park festival. This is one of my favorites every year. And every year I think about in 2004 how very pregnant I was and how very hot it was. We wandered through the artisans booths. Had dinner with a guy I work with and his "5 3/4 year old" daughter (who took Leif under her wing) and just had a plain good time. AB took Leif to play on the playground equipment while I wandered the last 1/3 of the show with Skadi. We did, however, get stuck at one booth. "Me and Mom's Hats".

After painstacking decisions, Skadi has two hats for this fall and winter. I loved the brown beanie with the big pink flower, but also fell for the bluebell hat as well. Skadi could care less of the bluebell hat, but loves her brown beanie with the floppy pink flower. If I put the bluebell hat on her she rips it off and puts her beanie on. She was a kick at the booth and the artist told me she hadn't had such good advertisement all day, as Skadi tore through her hats, pulling them randomly (and sometimes two at a time) onto her head and oogling, "ooooh!"

We left the park as the show was closing and managed to keep the sleepy kids awake in the car so they would fall asleep in their beds at home.

On Sunday we let Leif open his presents from grandma, Bompa and my sister over the webcam. He was thrilled with the fishing pole. Skadi was thrilled with the tackle box once she got all the tackle out and could replace it with her Little People and AB and I were thrilled with the huge box of Lincoln Logs. I also hope Leif will come to love the Richard Scarry's Greatest Storybook Ever as much as I did - many thanks to my sister.

After the present unwrapping we loaded into the car and headed to the orchard to pick donut peaches. Unfortunately they were still a week or so away from prime picking, but AB (being his normal inquisitive self) did manage to purvey a bunch of cherry and apple wood for his smoker. Since we had packed a lunch we didn't see any reason to head home.

Instead we drove around looking for open houses (not many on this boat race weekend) and houses and lots for sale while stuffing food into the kids in the car.

We found two houses that if we actually got the guts to call an agent we are very interested in seeing. Very interested.

But I am just scared of heading down that path again when we aren't completely ready. I am afraid of falling in love with a house. Our intention is to go out and get ideas for eventually building our own since we had pretty much decided on buying a lot at the end of the year and then building. The one that really has me stopping though is seeing a newly for sale house in the small development containing the lots we like. It is the style we like, 4 bedrooms and TWO pantries. And affordable. Reasonably. At least it is within the range we are eyeing.

AB is waiting for me (I think) to say I want to look at it. I do, I really do. And then I don't out of fear. So I am trying to ignore it exists for now.

Trying.

So we realized that no good could come from house hunting and headed home to put Beaner down for a nap. While she napped it dawned on me how many times I have declared needing an external hard drive to back up my photos. Suddenly while I was printing up pictures for Leif's birthday day at school, I was overwhelmed with a fear that my hard drive was going to crash any second and lose every single photo I had ever taken. As soon as I mentioned wanting a hard drive, AB jumped on the opportunity to go to Costco.

We ended our Sunday outtings with the trip to Costco (also examining the treadmills there) then AB and Leif went to fly a kite at the park since it was awfully cold for swimming, while Skadi and I got groceries.

And after writing this, I think I am dead tired all over again.

Poof went the house!

So in case you are following along... My MIL arrived today and after she and AB did a Costco trip that packed my husband's Outback to epic proportions then we all met the real estate agent at the house. (My MIL was my Costco mentor - she taught me well and it is always her first stop when visiting.)

She agreed that it is a beautiful house. But here is where I understand why my MIL makes a great living as a real estate agent. She rocks at it. Not only does she know houses, but she knows lots and utilities and "typical" city/county markings and construction.

Things I had glossed over... she pointed to the seams of the carpet and how poorly they were adhered. She pointed out the size of the "kid's rooms". Yep, tiny.

She grilled the agent and came to the conclusion that he knows more than he is sharing about the land behind the house.

She is intuitive that way.

Then she spied the neighboring diagonal shaped lot that wouldn't have an obstructed view if the county land was built on, that would have only one neighbor.

"Well I see why they love the house," she told the agent, "it is a gorgeous house. And there are things that will really work for them in this house. And some things that won't. So thanks so much for the time you have spent thus far. Could you get the information on the two neighboring lots to this one, we might be very interested in those."

See how she seamlessly handled this? This type of thing is not my forte.

And why I am thrilled she was here to help us find clarity.

We have a plan we are going to put forward. One that AB and I haven't been wondering if it was the best thing for us...

Find a lot, buy it. Wait a year and get our finances in better shape while we design our house.

Then build.

I am very happy with this path forward.