Christmas Coma

That is what I call the last few days. We have stayed in our jammies for most of the day and have played games and did puzzles. We our hosting a New Year's Eve party for our Sunday School class on FRIDAY! I looked around today and wondered when the last time I vacuumed or anyone did for that matter :) I put the kids to work and they did a great job helping. I am happy to say that all their new stuff has a place to go for now. I totally want a organizer for the closet in the family room and then everything will have a permanent place! I am feeling better about having a party here that is for sure. We have really enjoyed the few gifts the kids got this Christmas. Lots of games and puzzles...PERFECT! I hope everyone has a wonderful New Year!

Almost done!

We went out last weekend to get end tables and lamps for our living room. Which was somewhat fun and some what frustrating. We had picked out end tables online that we both liked but when we got to the store they were junky and not the right color. I say we are almost done because we would like to get art work or something for the walls and also crown molding for the ceiling. I really like the way molding looks and want it in that room. Here are a few pictures that my hubby took of the new tables. We even have some pictures out finally :)

The couple that we bought our house from had a package delivered to our house. We contacted them and they came and got it. I offered for them to come inside but they said another day. The lady looked into the living room real quick and said, "Oh you took down the book cases." I kind of felt bad, but not completely, it is our house now. Anyway, they brought us a gift for holding on to the package and getting it back to them. Totally unnecessary but just shows you how sweet they are!

Stealing

I'm just going to link to my hubby's blog because I am too lazy to do what he has already done!!! Here are the pictures of the house updates so far. Just need to wait for a little more money and off to the next area of updating. Check it out here... there are I believe 3 separate posts of house updates.

Been awhile..

I haven't really blogged much because most of the stuff going on with us has been about settling in and getting projects done. We are so close to being finished with the living room. All we have left are to buy the trim and crown molding which is easy to do we just have to pick them out and buy them. I absolutely LOVE the colors we choose for the living room. I can't wait to actually show you those pictures! We need to get internet first.

As for summer activities Monkey started basketball camp at school and he is really enjoying it. Tonight starts the first night of baseball with our church league, we're all excited about that. And GG goes to camp in a little over a week. Man do I love summer and all the fun it brings with it.

update

Well this will be the 3rd consecutive night we have stayed at the house. We are far from being unpacked but we are functional in all the rooms! Tonight is the first night that we are J and I are sleeping on a bed and not an air mattress. I LOVE our new bed and pillows. It would be nice to have couches but we don’t have the living room painted yet so there is no rush. It works for us at this point because we don’t really ever sit down unless we are eating and we have a table for that. We have been so blessed by my parents housewarming gifts. Yes I said GIFTS. They got the kids each a mattress and they bought the girls bedding (the boys already had some), a lamp for our bedroom, and a dining room table (it seats 10 with the leaf). I wanted to get a big table that sat 12 but I really think we could probably squeeze 12 in this table if we needed too. I am very happy with the table size. I am just very happy to be home. I can see us living here, Lord willing for at least 30 years if not longer. I shouldn’t gain weight with all the stairs I will be doing...laundry is in the basement and the bedrooms are on the second floor! Let’s see this afternoon I was able to pull J away from working to go to a wedding. It was a really beautiful outside wedding. Afterward, we went out with a few couples for dinner. Tomorrow we are going to the other house and grab the last of our things and clean. We hope to hand over the keys and move on. The couple who own the house are just the sweetest people and we have really enjoyed being their neighbors, I’m actually kinda sad to leave but the commute was killer. Plus, it was only a 2 bedroom house so we were a little cramped. In other news the kids finish school next week I believe their last day is the 9th but it could be the 10th not sure?!

Packing Packing Packing then...

Unpacking unpacking unpacking that is what we have been doing. One night we stay at the “old” house the next we stay at the “new” house. I can’t wait until we only have one place we lay our heads, not that I’m not grateful to have the other house to live in and get healthy again in.

Can I just say that I hate funerals? Especially when they for family who are so young, in the last post I said she was 20 I was wrong she was 22 not that it makes a huge difference she is still gone. The only nice part about something like this is getting to see extended family even if everyone is crying. At the luncheon a girl I used to play with during the summers was telling me she thought she saw me at Disney in September. Her face was priceless when I told her I was at Disney in September and told her the dates I was there. She said, “Then I wasn’t crazy for thinking I saw you. Cause I really did.” One thing I wasn’t aware was going to happen to me was seeing my grandpa’s brother Larry (they look very much alike) at the wake and missing my grandpa so much I just started crying. Just thinking of that encounter is making me cry. Lastly I want to write my most vivid memory of my cousin Jessica. She is 9 years younger than me and in the summers when we went to my grandparents farm you weren’t allowed in the house unless you had to use the bathroom. My Aunt Penny and Uncle Mark lived at the house at the farm. One summer my Aunt Penny let me be her mother’s helper with Jessica (the baby of 4) she was about 2 years old and was on a medication for some sort of sickness. My Aunt told me not to let her have milk because of the medication she was on. Well Jessica wanted milk for breakfast. She had a bowl of cereal (not sure if she got it for herself or I got it for her) she also had an empty cup. She wanted milk in. I told her she couldn’t have milk and that her mom said she could have orange pop. She let me pour her the pop and then dumped it in her cereal and then demanded milk in the cup. She never got the milk but she did eat the cereal. She was definitely a girl who knew exactly what she wanted. I am happy to know that she is once again able to dance, run, talk, and do all the things she has missed out on the last 7 1/2 years since she was in a horrible car accident. She is resting in the arms of Jesus with her best friend Jackie, who died in the car accident.

Life right now...

is totally and utterly crazy. In trying to prepare myself for all the work that was going to ensue after we bought our new home I fell sort. BIG. TIME. My feet ache like never before and all the muscles in my body are sore. Since closing on this home we have ripped out carpet (J), put in hardwood (J and his dad), painted the girls room and boys room (J and I). Put together our new table (J, Red and I), vacuumed the 4 bedrooms, stairs, living room, dining room, kitchen and family room (me), mopped all the above rooms except dining room and living room (me), wiped down all the kitchen cabinets etc. (me). We hope to get a truck on Friday night at get all the stuff out of storage and into the house. We have our bed coming on Saturday so we will be sleeping on the air mattress one final night. Throw in the mix that my cousin (20yrs old) passed away and going to the funeral for that this week life has just been BUSY. Even through all this busy-ness I still feel so blessed. There have been times where J has said to me, "This house will either make us stronger or brake us."

This just keeps getting better!

We had our closing this morning. The sellers were there which is unusual. We had some small talk before everything began and then all the signing began. Once the signing was done we were waiting for the bank wire to go through. During that time (about 25 minutes) we talked to the couple who are in their 80's. They have been married for 57 years and have 3 kids but no grandkids. They were just the sweetest, nicest people. Red was wearing one of our church shirts and the wife asked about it so we told her about our church. Since they have moved they haven't been able to find a church. We invited them to come to our church since it is only about 15 minutes from their new home. I think it would be really cool to have them attend our church. The husband gave J his business card, yes he is still working at 80, and told him to give him a call and he would come over and show him everything about the house. I am hoping that when he does come his wife will come too and she can tell me about the flowers in more detail. We did talk plant/flower/trees but it would be nice for her to point them out. Anyways, the reason it was taking so long was that the money wire got messed up and they sent the money to the right bank but wrong account. They told us it could take up to 6 hours to straighten it out. Which meant we wouldn't own the house for 6 more hours. Also during that 25 minute period they handed over the keys and garage door things. Their attorney told them that they didn't have to hand over the keys because it wasn't ours yet but they said we could have the keys anyway. It wasn't like they didn't know where we lived :) About 2 hours later we got the call that everything went through and it was officially our house!!! After the closing we didn't waste any time, we went and got stuff out of the storage, dropped Red off at school, and went to the house. I cleaned the entire upstairs. I wiped down the windows, vacuumed the floors and then mopped them. J went to get the hardwood floors we had ordered. When he got back a man pulled into the driveway. It was the son of the sellers. He welcomed us home and talked to J for quite awhile. He was a really nice man and he was so happy that we were moving in with our 4 kiddos. We didn't end up getting as much stuff as we wanted to get done but we made a pretty good dent in the things that have to get done before we move in. J ripped up the carpet in the living room and I helped get the staples out. We picked the kids up from school and got more stuff from storage, came home, kids did homework, we had dinner, cleaned up the kitchen and out the door we went. J had a surprise for us. We went to see a women's basketball game. It was pretty cool. We didn't stay until the end because it was getting late but we watched 3 quarters. Now the kids are sleeping and J is taking another load of stuff over to the house. I need to go make lunches then I am going to back another long day tomorrow. We are painting the white walls. I need color in my life!

Holy Hot-ness Batman!!!

It isn't even June yet and we have had to turn the a/c on. This is going to be a hot summer and I am so glad that I decided to go ahead and buy the pool passes for this year. We are actually putting them to good use today. The kids and I are meeting some friends at the pool after school. It is going to feel so good to be in that cool water. This morning we went to some other friends house and the two littlest played on their slip and slide. Anyways J and I decided that we were going to drive together today and J doesn't get off of work until 7:30 tonight so we are swimming to kill time.

Tomorrow is the BIG day. You know the one where you sign on the dotted line that you are going to pay X amount of money for a house which you end up spending double that amount when all is said and done. Don't let that above sentence fool you. I am so excited. It is almost like it is too good to be true. The kids are really excited about it too. They have been such great troopers through this whole thing. They have been sleeping on air mattresses for almost a year now, 8 months to be exact. They are really looking forward to having a real bed again just like J and I are. Over the last few days it is cool to hear them talk about the new house and the things they are looking forward to about it and the things they like about it. Now I just have to wait an hour for school to be over so I can get in the pool :)

On the wire...

I have had about a dozen thoughts I have wanted to blog about when I sit to write I either have forgotten them or they don't come out right so I have stayed away from even posting them. I do want to write about two things that happened yesterday. I'll go in order of when they happened. I got a call from our mortgage broker. We are doing an 80 10 10 loan which means that we put 10% down and take out two loans one for 80% and the other for 10%. The two loans are from two different banks. Our first loan which is the higher percentage has cleared for closing this Thursday. The other small loan has not yet. Well the interest rate dropped for the 1st loan from 5.125 to 4.875 and she was calling to see if we wanted to try and change our rate on the first loan. Here is the catch it might not get approved by Thursday and do we want to take that risk? The second loan hasn't clear yet so there is a chance we still might not be closing on Thursday due to that situation. Add to the fact that J's work schedule once June hits is jammed packed with stuff because it is the end of the school year. In the end we decided to stick with the rate we first got and if for some reason there is a major issue with the second loan and we aren't going to close Thursday then she is going to put the lower interest rate through. We just really want to move on from all the craziness and stress of this last year. But I am just so happy and feel so blessed to have had this house we are staying in to be able to heal and get better. What a major year this has been for our family.

The second thing that I feel is blog worthy is we had our final walk through yesterday and the kids came with us. It was AMAZING to show them their new bedrooms and see them run around the house and be so excited about moving in. It was like a little glimpse of what living there is going to be like and I just can't wait to make it our home. This house has a lot of storage space and closets and what not...so they were playing hide and seek. While we were there 3 of the kids had to use the bathroom and none of them had to wait for a toilet!!! J and I were talking on the way home about how this house has all the criteria we were looking for in a home. We feel so extremely blessed. God is so good! Now we just have to wait out the kinks in the above situation and we are good to go :)

3 weeks and counting...

Three weeks today we close on our new house. I am getting very excited about it but also very nervous and scared at the same time. I have been feeling pretty good since moving into this house but we don't have a lot of our belongings here. (I will say that if I go off of the diet I start to feel junky so maybe it doesn't have much to do with our belongings?) Once we close we are going to move the rest of the things we kept into the new house. We are going to wipe them down again and vacuum with a hepa vacuum and buy a few more air purifiers but I still get nervous. I really feel that I will be ok with this move it is just the unknown of it all.

Things I am looking forward too...starting the adventure of growing my own veggies and some fruit. The kids want to do strawberries and blueberries, we'll see. My main focus is on growing the staple vegetables we use a lot like onions, zucchini, tomatoes, and peppers. I hope to have a garden that has a huge variety of foods to eat from. The best part being that they will be organic! Along with the must haves I want to grow asparagus, cucumbers, romaine lettuce, and garlic. I also am looking forward to having a garage again but added bonus of it being attached. I have only been able to park in an attached garage for 10 months of my life and I LOVED it. So excited. The kids will be able to ride their bikes outside again. So many fun things to look forward too.

One more thing about the house. We just got the appraisal for the property and it appraised 16,000 more than we are buying it for. Our mortgage broker (who we go to church with) said she thinks that it is probably worth even more because they tend to go on the lower end of things. What a blessing.

Giddy

We are Praising the Lord over at our house today. I feel like a little girl, with the biggest smile on my face and a bounce in my step. I got the call from the guy who tested our air! The house passed with flying colors to the point there wasn't even any mold fragments in the air. It is CLEAN. We can move forward with purchasing this home. It has been such an answer to prayer to be able to type this post out. Now they just need to fix the few things we are asking and we need to get our financing which should be easy and quick then wait for the close date. Don't know if I mentioned this or not but there are a few things we want to do to the house before we move in like take out the carpet in a few areas and put in hardwood. Very minor things :)

Putting Off

I've been avoiding this blog and putting off writing because I feel like if I write about what is going then it really is happening. Well it is. If you want to know the scoop keep reading if not then I recommend leaving.

We had our home inspection on Tuesday of last week and the guy who did the inspection to J that out of all the houses he has ever inspected this is probably the best one he has ever seen. There are still things that need to be fixed like the oven doesn't work. I like to cook people we NEED a working oven! But all and all the house has "good bones". We were able to schedule the mold/air test the next day. He told us the results would come back by Friday. This is when things took a turn for the worse. On Thursday he called and told me he had the results back. However he feels that they are inaccurate and he wants to come retest. Apparently, before he came to that house he tested another house and cleaned his stuff but he feels since the other house had the HIGHEST level of Stachy he has ever tested that he might not have gotten the machine clean enough. He thinks our air sample was cross contaminated from the other house. He is going to be bringing a new pump and tube to retest our place. That happens tonight on a Sunday. We should hopefully know by Tuesday what those results are so that we can either move forward with the purchase of this house or start looking for a new place to buy. At this point I am not holding my breath that we will be buying this house. I have started looking online again. I know that God is in control of this whole situation and I have been praying like crazy that God would give us a clear sign. Right now I feel like the signs are a little mucky. Meaning out of all the houses we have looked at this is the only one both J and I felt at peace with putting an offer in. But then all this happens with the air testing, it starts to get cloudy. If you think about it and you feel like it, we could use some prayers for restful sleep and clear decisions.

On a totally different topic. Yesterday we took a day trip. Friend of ours from church lost her 91 year old grandma. We went to the funeral. On our way there we stopped at the boyhood home of President Ronald Reagan. It was really cool. Then afterward we headed to my mom house but before we went there we stopped at the house that her and my step dad designed and built. I showed the kids my hand print on the porch when I was about 11 years old. It was really weird to pull up to that house. They sold it about 7 years ago and to a guy I graduated High School with so that is a little weird too. We had dinner with my mom and her boyfriend and then headed home. The kids did so well and we actually had a lot of fun together as a family.

Freakin' Out

We put an offer in on a house late Friday night. We came to an agreement late last night. I am excited to have a place to call home again that will really be ours to care for but I am so scared at the same time. I feel like God's hand has been in the situation the whole time. Just to give you and idea. The house that we bought has been on the market since Aug of 2008 that is a year and seven months. I'm sure people looked at it and for whatever reason they didn't buy it because it was being saved for us. The price of the house in this market was over priced but they kept coming down from the time we first saw the house. I know I have some location issues but I really do feel at peace about this house. Though I am freaking out about the home inspection and the mold testing that still need to be done. I don't want to get my heart to set on this house because it might not pass the mold test though I really feel it will. I was in the house for over an hour and was fine plus we had just come from a moldy house and I was still fine. I want to think positively about all that is going on because God has been so good to us. We have learned so much about food and air quality. We have trusted in Him to provide a shelter until we have a place and he provided BIG time with an empty furnished house. There are times I look at our monthly income and monthly outgoings and wonder how we are able to make it, but I know it is God taking care of us and it feels good. Some of the positive things about the house that I am really excited about is that it has a nice sized garden already in place. There are even onions and chives growing already! I can't wait to start learning more about gardening and growing our own veggies. I think it will bring our grocery bill down! Also the yard is a good size and it isn't a corner lot. :) The kids will have fun in the sun playing in the back yard something we have never had. There is room for a deep freezer in the garage or basement, I've always wanted one of those. It has a master bathroom, total score. There are 3 toilets, this is huge, as usually EVERYone has to go to the bathroom at the same time it seems like. There is a laundry shoot. The laundry is in the unfinished basement and has plenty of storage for me to start making my own laundry detergent, another way we can save money and the environment of toxic chemicals. Homemade laundry soap will also help with our detoxing, so many benefits. It has radiators, this will totally help with air quality. We close at the end of May so we will have some more time to save a little more money to help with the down payment and closing costs. We hope to rip out the carpet in the living room and on the stairs and put in hardwood before we move in. Then we will have to buy furniture since we don't have a table, mattresses, couches (though I think we have that covered) and other random not so big ticket items.

House Hunting Day 2

I think I just need to decompress after looking at houses and blogging is the way I do it. So sorry if this is boring but I *need* to do this so that I can sleep tonight!!! We looked at 3 houses today.

#1 was a 3 bedroom 1.5 bath splint level. It was outdated but not too bad looking. We saw some signs of previous water in the lower level family room. J looked in the crawl and he could see water pooling. Great I thought this is how today is going to go...this house is out.

#2 4 bedroom and I think 2 bath, I don't really remember because we didn't see the whole house. We walked in and it was bad news right off the bat. We went to the lower level and J looked at the ceiling and there was black mold in the corner. He says to me, "Get out of here, now." We were in that house maybe 5 minutes. Totally out.

#3 This is our second showing of this house. It was the one we looked at last time for about 10 minutes because we were so discouraged with the other houses we looked at. It was also house #3 on the last house post! Anyways, J's mom came to look at this house with us. It is not updated at all but it has "good bones" and Sue says. She was so excited about the laundry shoot and I had to laugh. She called me after we left and said if we buy this house she wants some veggies from the garden. One thing I wanted in a house was a place to grow my own food, among other things, of course! We both feel at peace (most of the time) about this house and feel like it could be our next home but I still am feeling rushed. Our Realtor said we should put an offer in tomorrow. I don't know if I'm ready for that. It is a HUGE step. She doesn't want it to get snatched from underneath us but I think if it does then God is saying "NO" to this house right? Besides it has been on the market for 510 days. The kitchen and bathrooms are the original people. Not too many people are wanting to do that much work to a house. I just don't know right now and I can't fall asleep because I keep thinking about it and praying about it. But now that I have put it out in cyber world I have decompressed and I should hopefully be able to fall asleep?!

I can't sleep...

I need to get some things out of my head so that I can fall asleep without thinking about them. I am planning a fun day with the kids tomorrow and the last thing I need is to be TIRED! It is the one fun thing we are doing during break, I don’t want insomnia to rob of us the joy the would bring. Today marked the first day of physically looking at houses. We have looked online for about 2 months. We saw 5 houses, one was a last minute idea. I will go in order. I brought my camera and a notebook with. I took notes but didn’t take any pictures. Sorry!

#1 Was a 3 bedroom 2 bath with full unfinished basement. The house was really outdated but had some really nice qualities about it too. The 3rd bedroom was really small. Though the master was a great size and had a huge glass sliding door to the patio. It had a shared master bath which is really nice, we could close it off so it wasn’t shared. It has a really nice size mud room with laundry and a HUGE pantry. J and I started talking about our kids probably not wanting to be in bunk beds through high school. The basement was really big but we would probably never finish it so would that space really be the deciding factor? The living space on the main floor was just not big enough in my opinion. Another down side is that it backs to a little lake. Our Realtor didn’t believe we could put a fence up since none of the other houses had one up. I just don’t know if I would feel good about that. Not that I ever leave my kids outside alone but things happen fast, you know? In my head this house is out, not so sure what J thinks.

#2 Just down the street was a 4 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath with a partially finished basement. This house was AS IS. It had a newly done kitchen with stainless steel appliances. I really liked the layout of this house. The bedroom sizes weren’t bad and it had hardwood in the bedrooms and carpet in the living room and family room. As we were walking around J noticed the ceiling in the kitchen was boiling. He touched it and it was moist. The second time he touched to make sure it was really moist he poked is finger through it. We went to see what could be causing the wetness but aren’t sure which bathroom it could be coming from. This house being AS IS with our issues with mold. We both without really talked about it said this house was out completely.

#3 We were on our way to another house when we asked our Realtor if we could check out a house in the same neighborhood. She called and we were able to go in. It was a 4 bedroom with 2 1/2 bathrooms. Master had it’s own full bathroom. Though it was pretty small. Most everything in this house was old but livable. It had a HUGE (20x20) family room off of the kitchen. The living was a verily good size too. The dining room was pretty small though. The kitchen was old but we could make do for awhile in it. The rooms were not very big. The master with the bath was only 12x10 not sure if we would be able to fit our bed and dressers in it. There was a 14x10 room that would probably work better for us and we would give the other room to GG. This house has a lot of potential but we would have to spend a lot of money to make it the way we would want it. The yard on this house was nice. It had a spot already laid out for a garden and it was fenced. The garage was an extra deep one so tons of storage. It also had a full unfinished basement. This house is up in the air. If we could get it at a good price and could save enough money within a few years to update it.

#4 The was a 4 bedroom 1 1/2 bath house. It only had a living room no family room. It also had a full unfinished basement that was very big but these people had SO much stuff in it it was really hard to get a feel for the size. Actually the whole house had a TON of stuff in it. The garage wasn’t attached to the house which was a big negative for me. I just wasn’t very impressed with the inside. The yard was pretty descent. Oh yeah and our Realtor asked that no one was home and there were 3 people there. When she went to look at it she said there was like 15 people in it so I guess that is an improvement. It was just weird to be looking around with the people there. I think J and I are on the same page that this house is not as big as we want.

#5 This house was beautiful. It had 3 bedrooms and 1 1/2 baths. It had a very nice open floor plan that we like. The negatives were it had a detached garage, the kitchen was really small, the dishwasher was in the basement (weird), the coat closet was in the 1/2 bathroom and you had to go into the bathroom and shut the door to open the closet. Other than that it was nice but too high priced.

I feel discouraged that we aren’t going to find a house we can afford. I just keep praying and asking God that J and I agree on the houses and that He would lead us to the right one. I think this process is going to be a long one.

Spring Break!

The kids are off all the week and then next Monday. This year is gonna be pretty lame. Last year we went with another family to an indoor water park this year we have nothing big and fun planned. As of yet. I would have to talk J into something first but that doesn't look very likely as we are trying to save money to buy a new house that won't put us in starvation mode! I actually have to find someone to watch the kids Wednesday morning so we can go look at houses. Our realtor doesn't want the kids along as they can be too distracting which I can totally understand we just need to find someone to watch them! I haven't really been on this blog much but there has been so much going on in my head. I am actually struggling to try and articulate it into a post.

One of the biggest things that I am struggling with and thinking about often is food. I am such a weak person when it comes to sweets. I love them. I really do. My husband has bought ice cream again and I am doing everything I can to not open the freezer for fear if I see it I will want to eat it. Or worse yet I will eat it. We had our small group over on Friday and I did eat the dessert. UGH! I hate that, why can't I just say NO. I have no will power. Why do I have to be tempted by sweets EVERYwhere I go? It is just so not fair. I want to be normal and eat whatever I want and feel fine but that is just not the case. I feel silly typing that it isn't fair. My kids say that all the time. God never promised fairness. I need to go make my grocery list for this week.

House Update...

We don't have one...in all seriousness we have started the process in looking. How our Realtor works she sits down with us to get an idea of what type of house we are looking for size wise and all that other jazz. Then we look at houses online to fine ones then drive by the ones we are interested. We were able to eliminate a few houses just by driving by them for various reasons. Then she previews the houses that are still on the list. She picks the top 3 to 4 houses she thinks we would like and then takes us to them to see. We are at the process where she is previewing the houses. Next is setting up a time that we can actually go look at the houses. The biggest problem we are facing now is that the kids are off of school all next week and the following Monday. She doesn't want to wait that long for us to see them but she doesn't really think it would be beneficially to have the kids with as well. I just keep falling back on the knowledge that God is in control of all of this and that He has the prefect place for us to be living we just have to listen to His leading.

Want to be a Kid

We close on our house tomorrow making us homeless. But not really we have a place to stay but it isn't ours. I just want someone to pick a house for me. There are so many houses out there. I just want to be a kid and have someone else do the grow up stuff. Don't get me wrong it is very exciting going to pick a new house the only problem is it is very scary at the same time. Because of my health issues we have to be very careful what house we choose. I pray that the people we encounter in this journey will be very honest with us about the questions we have about their home. There are A LOT of dishonest people in this world and that is what makes this SO scary. I don't want to end up where I was 8 months ago. I need a safe place to heal my body and the kids' bodies so that we are completely healthy again. Over the next few weeks or months however long it takes we will be in search of a new residence. Which means that most of my computer time will be spend looking at houses online. Please pray for us as we start this journey all over again. Though it is nice to know that the other house is (almost) sold and that we can look without having a mortgage hanging over our heads. Also I pray this time will strengthen our marriage and not drive a wedge between us. This is STRESSFUL people and when you have this kind of stress you need to be covered in PRAYER. Thanks I will try to update as we go along but don't hold me to it. I will still try and keep up the menus as I like to go back and see all the different things we have been eating and trying!

Two things...

First thing is that the guy buying our house wants to close 6 days earlier. That is so GREAT. That means we can actively start looking sooner and maybe we could get in on that $65oo credit for home buyers. We shall see. We know that we absolutely don't want to rush into buying anything that we aren't completely sold on. With that excitement it means that we have 9 days to pack up the rest of the house and garage and get it into a storage unit. That is a BIG task. At least it is getting warmer outside so that I can pack without freezing my little tushy off ;)

The second thing is just plain maddening. We got home from a nice dinner out where all the kids ate free. To find on the credit card statement that someone stole our card number and charged $495 to an online lego store. This is the part that I am very grateful that I am married to a police officer. He just took over. Called who needed to be called and he just handled it. AWESOMELY. Though I will say that the company that charged our card would not tell us where the products where being sent so annoying. I guess they have to protect the criminals, so stupid. That is really all I feel like writing.