Thursday, July 26, 2007

We Moved!



Whew! What a whirlwind few weeks. Robb has been traveling a bit for work and we have been home packing up our lives. Then last Thursday AM, we got up and went for it. With the help of a lot of wonderful friends, family, babysitter, pizza guys and some hired hands….four days later we are all moved. Alas, all our stuff is in storage, and our tiny little apartment is unpacked with the hopes of it feeling like home soon.

Our lives are in ‘limbo’ right now, if you will. However, when I was trying to decide the actual definition of ‘limbo’, I came up with the thought of….somewhere between heaven and hell. Therefore, not knowing where that place really is, I decided to think we are in a transition period of our lives. Blessed that our home sold to a wonderful couple in such a short time and thankful tiny as it may be, that we do have a roof over our heads and then excited that there is the prospect that we do have some exciting new adventures ahead of us. Building a house can be stressful, but it can also be exciting. The idea of something to look forward to, something new, and something we actually had the thought, the design, and input to a new place we will hang our hat and call home for many years. ….so again, our family motto right now is…”keep our eye on the prize”.

Now, if we can just remember that as we are stepping all over each other, waiting for one another in the one bathroom, hearing every bit of noise, no garage, and keeping the noise level down to something that the neighbors too can hear themselves think.

I must say, the kids love it. They think we are on a camping trip, we have three pools, a small patio and green grass to call their own, a work out room, volley ball court, and basket ball court – all of which Jacob thinks he needs to do daily. I only dread the day, they start asking to go home.

So, for now…I leave you with the thought of…..we moved!

Friday, July 20, 2007

T-1 - Moving Day!




Tomorrow is moving day! We knee deep in boxes and once we move to a permanent place our children will have to make our next move to the Old Folks home.

It may be a while before you hear from us and apartment living, but rest assured we will be up and running soon.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Summer Has Arrived!

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Dear Blog,

You have been missed. Sorry for the delay – no good is excuse is really ever a good excuse, so I won’t even bother!

Since our last visit, we have been busy – something like crazy busy! Seems like summers always go this way: The lazy days of summer don’t exist around here.

First let me just say, I would not have guessed the last several weeks would have happened to us in this lifetime. No, we didn’t win the lottery – but we are crazy.

-Rewind-

We spent the better part of the winter doing things to our house ‘as if’ we planned to sell it. But also keeping in mind we may live here for a while longer (you know, we don’t have a place to go to and the real-estate market isn’t what it once was). So, we started cleaning out things, painting everything, laying new flooring everywhere, re-arranging things, and just plain de-cluttering.

In the meantime, we fell in love with a great new neighborhood that builds Craftsman style homes to ‘your liking’. Robb and I spent a great deal of time in April and May redesigning this 1900’s look a like home that would include the modern day features that we need. Well, the drawings came back from a builder that we just adore and we absolutely loved it. This particular home isn’t any larger than our current home, just MUCH more functional for our family.

Therefore, I came up with the crazy (I say “I” and “CRAZY”, because Robb will not take any of the blame for this one)…to get the house ready, hire a realtor and get our house on the market before we left for vacation early June. We did just that. It was whirl wind couple of weeks, but the day we left for vacation, the sign went up in the yard. Now, I digress a bit….my thinking was this…its summer, not to hot – yet, and prime time for new house hunters to start looking for a new place to live. I have also been watching the homes in the neighborhood and things aren’t really selling all that quickly – say something like 120 days or so, on the market. So, I thought, let’s see what happens and in the mean time get our ducks in a row. Well – you knew it was coming – we sold our house in 15 days. YEP, 15 days! A nice young couple with a family who is purchasing their first home and they liked ours. We have all the signed paper work and will be closing no this house July 30. WOW! You can imagine our surprise – Where do we go, what do we do, we don’t have a house, one isn’t built, we really do love this new neighborhood, why look elsewhere and every other scenario any sane person could come up with. But we still signed the papers and took the deal.

To make a very long story short…..after what seemed liked endless conversations and ‘what if’s’, we are moving. We have rented an apartment for the short term, everything else will go in storage and we will either build our newest dream home or begin looking for another home. We figure – home is where your hat is – and we are taking our hats with us.

On the kiddo front, they are doing great. Jacob finished his first year of preschool and attended his first summer school session. Isabella has turned two and I MEAN TWO. Jacob is taking Karate for the first time, and both kids are enrolled in summer gymnastics. They like to play outside every minute of the day, they swim like fish, and ending the day with a Popsicle seems to be our thing.

We did head off to Branson, Missouri to see the Chinese Acrobat show with some friends here and met up with some friends we met while traveling to China last year. We drove to Colorado where the kids got to spend the week at Grandma’s and with their cousins. They loved every minute of it. Jacob went golfing with dad for the first time. We went boating for a day at a beautiful lake and both kids attempted fishing with grandpa. We visited some hot springs pools and swam for the day. We had a great day visiting the Royal Gorge and mom and dad even played a little poker at night not losing too much. Other than that, it’s been all HOUSE here.

It’s been chaotic, hectic, fun dreaming, crazy, and little nerve wracking….be careful for what you wish for. We have a couple of really hard labor intensive weeks ahead of us, but we welcome the new upcoming chapter in our lives and can’t wait to fill you in on the rest. Until then, enjoy the summer.