Well, tomorrow it is official. Johnny and I will be moving to Wisconsin. Johnny's entire team is being integrated with the rest of the development team located in Wisconsin, and in this bad economy and non-existent job climate, we've got to stick with the job he currently has. So, that means we've got to sell the house, pack up and move!

There are lots of projects being tackled to get the house sellable but I honestly will not have the time to take pictures and post them because Johnny's last day of work in Virginia is Feb. 27th. After that, he is moving to Wisconsin and I will be following him just as soon as the house sells.

I'll probably wind up taking down this blog at that point, since it wouldn't really be a selling point if a potential buyer happened upon a laundry list (with pictures!) of all the things wrong and/or funky with the house.

Hopefully after the move is completed I can start up a new blog... although we're getting an apartment in Wisconsin and are not very likely to buy another house anytime soon. So, thanks for taking this long, slow, boring journey with us as we recorded our trials and tribulations through first-time ownership. And please, wish me luck selling this place! It is not likely to be an easy process.

Haven't posted in forever, but since we just finished putting up the tree and decorating the living room for Christmas, figured I'd throw some pictures of the results. Place looks pretty good, if I do say so myself! :)

The fireplace



The tree (right in the front window)



The cat, barely containing his excitement...

Well, last Friday (July 6th) was my last day of work. Well, last day of PAID work, as of course there's more than enough to keep me busy around the house for years n years.

I'll also be going to my sister's in just a couple of weeks to help around the house before and after my nephew is born. Woohoo!

In the meantime, I'm doing what I can to stem the tide of filth and junk that has taken over our house these past few months. John's been working 50-70 hour weeks since, well forever, so it is definitely a good thing that I'll be tackling things at home.

I'm also looking forward to being able to cook on our new stove a lot more (since putting it in, it's just been sitting there, more of a fast-food staging area than anything!)

I've been watching a lot of cooking shows like Good Eats to get back on track with my culinary skills. There's one with some foreign chef that I really like... I just hope my kitchen can withstand the vigorous techniques I'm learning:



That reminds me, my sister has all this cake decorating stuff on her amazon.com wishlist. I keep meaning to show her this episode of my favorite cooking show. It might be quite instructional -- I never knew a caken-smoosher even existed before this. How I got along without one? No clue.

I think I'll kick Plan B into effect and start seeing if any other houses in the area came on the market since we stopped looking.

Well, here we go! We are off to attend our home inspection as well as the termite/moisture inspection.

Crossing our fingers that everything is good.

We know the house needs some work, but today we find out how much work it REALLY needs.

They accepted our offer!

Now the fun starts! I have to 1) figure out who our lender will be, 2) arrange the termite/moisture and home inspections, 3) work out our finances to make sure we'll have enough to close and 4) try to work!


We can't wait to get this house. It is going to be great to have a place of our own. Some people don't want the responsibility of taking care of a house. Johnny and I don't mind. In fact, it's what we want.

I can barely concentrate but for thinking about paint colors, new doors, landscaping, etc.

We are supposed to close on the 27th. It isn't much time, but we're still wishing it could be shorter!

So much paperwork, so little time...

First things first, I will order the home inspection. We are really looking forward to going around checking the house out with a professional (and I can take a closer look at the walls, rooms, space, yard, etc.)

So, the offer has been written up, signed and submitted. I hope the offer will get accepted!

Well, we saw a few small houses, some dumpy houses, some cluttered houses, one REALLY WEIRD house, and 2 fixer-upper'ish houses.

It came down to a 1350 sqft house with no pool but room for one vs. a 1070 sqft house with an above ground pool, nice back yard and 2 story workshop.

After some deliberation, we decided the larger house would be harder to bring up to where we wanted it. It also would be harder to justify having a pool and nice interior in that neighborhood. It was a bit lower class neighborhood than what we would like.

Soooo... we went with the smaller house. The good news is that it's painted bubble gum pink everywhere but the siding. I think that drove almost all potential buyers away. The price was already reduced from $205,000 to $199,900.

We've already been pre-approved for a higher mortgage than that, so it should be doable.

We're going to think about it & sleep on it (always a good idea), and hopefully we'll submit an offer tomorrow!

I'm excited & so is Johnny. I've got a good feeling about this one!

After much deliberation, debate, indecision and backpeddling, Johnny and I have decided that we want to, and probably should, buy a house.

Kim, our real estate agent and a friend of the family, is taking us out to look at approximately 1 billion houses today. What can I say, I have a long list of houses to view! :)