The Calm Before the Storm

We have (very happily) reached a bit of a lull in the hectic house buying\selling process. Given that the house hunt has taken over most of our summer, we're trying to fit in some summer fun before we get into closings and moving, not to mention Fall. This past weekend and the next 2 are the only ones we have left until the chaos of the moving storm begins. Also, hurricane Irene was forecast to blow through Boston yesterday. Since we had a brief lull before both storms, we packed our weekend fun into Saturday morning.

On Thursday and Friday, Mike prepped our house for the storm. He removed the grill, patio furniture and all toys from the yard. He rolled up the rugs in the basement (in case intense amounts of rain caused some puddling there), cleaned out the gutters and he got us some supplies from the store - bottled water in case our city's water supply was compromised, batteries to power a radio and flashlights in case the electricity went out and some canned food to chew on if needed. With preparations for the storm made, we packed up the car on Friday and headed to NH.

We left late since I'd had an appointment for a haircut that night. Dylan didn't fall asleep until an hour and a half past his bedtime then only slept an hour until he woke up when we arrived at the condo. After we unpacked, we got him back to bed as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, that boy's morning alarm clock goes off regardless of what time he goes to bed, so he was up at 6:30. We all got up, got ready, had some breakfast, re-packed the car up and headed a few highway exits north to Clark's Trading Post.

Mike and I had been to Clark's once with his sister's family several years back. Dylan, being at an age where we thought he would enjoy it, definitely needed to go so we didn't want to miss out on the venue this summer.

Once we got there, he was super excited to get in his stroller. Unfortunately, not having enough sleep under his belt meant he was a bit cranky and didn't want to get out of his stroller. After a failed attempt to take him into the "Mystical Mansion," we were a bit worried about how he would enjoy the day.

We wandered through the "museum" of antique fire engines and motorcycles and wandered through the gift shops. Then we went to climb on board the train. It was a struggle to get Dylan to get out of the stroller again, but luckily he calmed pretty quickly once we were seated on the train. The train steams along a short distance, hits a dead end then heads back to the station. On this route, you head through the "dangerous" wolfman territory.....ooooooh! We were a bit worried Dylan might get scared at a strange man yelling at the train (since our last trip there one of the kids we were with definitely felt that away) but I think more than anything he was just confused - who was that strange looking guy and why was he so mad?

The Dreaded Wolfman!

On the Train

After the train ride, we headed straight over for the bear show. This is definitely the main attraction of the park. The family that owns\runs Clark's has been doing the trained bear show for decades and treats the bears like family pets. The bears really do enjoy performing.....and the crowds love watching them! They are so cute!

Echo the Bear Swinging

Echo Weighing In (300+ pounds!)

Echo Hiding

Tula the Bear Dancing

Tula Playing Hoops

Tula Practicing Her Scooter Riding
(She's a young bear and still "in training.")

The bears have fun performing but I think a big reason they like the tricks is for the treat they get afterwards. The bears get to enjoy some ice cream!

Echo Licking the Spoon Clean

Tula Getting a Spoonful

Well since the bears got ice cream treats, we of course needed them too! After the show, we headed to the ice cream parlor. Dylan fed himself his favorite scoop - chocolate ice cream with chocolate sprinkles, and I had a vanilla milkshake. Yum! Mike passed on the ice cream. That boy just isn't into sweets. Weird.

Bellies full of ice cream, we walked around the rest of the smallish park and took in the sights. We did do a little tour through the Rustic House. It's one of those tilted, gravity defying optical illusion kind of places. The tour was a bit long and filled with way too many corny jokes but we stayed til the end. By that point, it was a bit past Dylan's nap time so we headed back to the car, having done pretty much all Clark's had to offer anyway, and started the trip back home.

The rain started about 20 minutes from home and it was heavy! The rest of Saturday afternoon, we got off and on rain, but the true storm wasn't to hit until Sunday. So, we hunkered down and waited.

At 7am on Sunday, I was aware that the strong winds had begun. We spent the day indoors (obviously) and waited for the worst to happen. While we had electricity, we would just have a fun pajama day watching movies. I figured we would save the arts and crafts projects I had planned for entertainment when we lost the lights. As the day progressed, a few pieces of our siding blew off (rescued from the yard and will be replaced this week) and I watched our young birch tree blow sideways many times. Lots of limbs and leaves littered the street and it rained on and off. But, we never lost power and never got water in the basement. I'd say we got pretty lucky!

Finally....A Truly Relaxing Weekend

After the highs and lows of the previous week, I was in some serious need of some real R&R over the weekend. And, for once, I actually got it. I pretty much went off the grid (no phone calls, email, etc.) and just spent the weekend doing what I wanted to - spending some quality time with my family.

Saturday, we got up, had some breakfast and packed up. I decided that I wanted to go to the zoo! Mike was happy to oblige so the 3 of us went to the local Franklin Park Zoo and saw some animals for a little while.

Then, it was back to the house for nap time. While Dylan took an unusually long nap, Mike did too. I had some lunch, finished a book and caught up on a little tv. When they woke up, we all got ready to head a little west to Mike's cousin's (Erik's) place. Erik and his wife Jessie are good friends so we want our kiddos to spend as much time together and get to be friends as well. The boys played in the pool, Jessie and I got some quality chat time in, we had a little cookout and a great time together. When bed times approached, we headed home. Dylan went down and Mike and I kicked back for a little couch\tv time together.

Cousins - Justin, Ryan, Dylan 

Ryan, Dylan, Justin

Practicing His Swimming Moves

Sunday morning, we were up fairly early and I made the boys some pancakes. This is starting to become a little tradition as I've done this 3 out of the last 4 weekends. Dylan absolutely LOVES pancakes! My normally fairly light eater can inhale 2 good sized flapjacks (as well as some toast and fruit). Since I make multi grain ones, I can pretend it's somewhat good for him. After breakfast, Dylan and I went for a long walk with my good friend Jenn. Jenn and I chatted and Dylan (happily) zoned out in the stroller. He loves going for walks almost as much as I do.

Sunday afternoon was a rare treat - date time with Mike! After re-reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, it was finally time to see part 2 of the movie. My in-laws came over while Dylan was napping and Mike and I took off to see the movie - the 3D IMAX way of course! It was fantastic! We can't wait until it comes out on dvd and we can watch it again with another Harry Potter fan, Dylan. After the movie, my in-laws drove out to meet us (Dylan in tow) so we could drive them by the new house which wasn't far from the theater. We did that and then split ways again so Mike and I could go out for an early dinner. It's a rare treat when we get to sit face to face with no distractions, other than the waiter dropping by, enjoy a nice meal and talk. Even though we mostly talked about the same topic that have been clouding our day to day conversations, house plans, it was about the more enjoyable aspects of the move and therefore happy.

We got home just in time to put Dylan to bed. Then it was a little more tv time together on the couch and an early to bed for me. For once, I actually felt a little recharged after the weekend. It's been a long time since I've experienced that.

We Know the Gender!

On Friday we had our 18 week "head to toe" ultrasound. I had talked to Dylan about the appointment and told him that we were going to see pictures of the baby. He seemed genuinely excited about it. After Dylan woke up from his nap, the boys swung by my work to pick me up and we headed to the doctor's office for the appointment. We walked in, signed in and didn't even have time to sit down before they asked us to come back.

The appointment lasted about 30 minutes. That was 30 minutes of looking at the baby - every single part of it. We saw the brain and the feet (10 toes) and everything in between - the heart (all 4 chambers), bladder, backbone, belly, hands (10 fingers)...it was really cool. During this time, Dylan pretty much laid down on the floor with his lovey and chilled out. The rainy day must have pooped him out. It was only when we were about 2/3 into the appointment and I had to leave the room to empty my bladder so we could finish that Dylan popped up and started looking for pictures of the baby. What a silly guy!

When we got in the room, we told the ultrasound tech that if the baby was cooperative, finding out the sex was something we wanted to do. So, when she got to that part of the exam, she said "So you want to know the sex?" We both looked at the monitor and we knew immediately - we're having another boy!!!

Obviously, we would have been thrilled either way, but I was (not so) secretly hoping for another boy so I am unbelievably happy to be having another one. And, it was unquestionable - we got a couple of great shots from different angles to confirm the fact. He is definitely not a shy baby! I must also say, that although we only have some two dimensional shots of him, he is going to be a cutie!

As Dylan Would Say, "Hi Baby!"

Headshot

Thumbs Up!

Gross Square Footage

I now know more than I ever wanted to know about this not very exciting topic. Why? Well, the buyers for our house were to sign the Purchase and Sale (P&S) Thursday morning. Instead of going to the lawyers office to do that, they instead almost made the whole sale come crashing down!

It seems the issue stemmed from the fact that our agent used the measured gross footage (done by the guy who did the floor plan we listed on MLS - 2154 sq ft) instead of what's on city records for the gross square footage (1966 sq ft). The 2 measurements differ by 188 square feet. The buyers' agent discussed this with our agent a couple of days after we accepted the offer (2 weeks ago now) and never mentioned the issue to us as she assumed it had been addressed and that was that. However, apparently the buyers' agent didn't discuss it with the buyers until early last week, right before the agent hopped over to Martha's Vineyard for the week, leaving the buyers' lawyer to represent them in all aspects of the deal.

So, come Thursday morning, they brought the issue up with their lawyer who questioned us about it. We explained that our renovations over the years included adding the mudroom and some square footage to the upstairs which obviously has not yet been changed on city records. (I've found out that actual square footage and what's on record rarely lines up.) Apparently, the answer was not acceptable. Because they could not back into our measured amounts by the floor plan we had provided, they decided they wanted to now base their offer on the city's records and drop their offer by $25,000. To say this shocked us and pissed us off is the understatement of the year!

By Thursday afternoon, I was in full research mode to see what I could do to salvage the deal with the price we had all agreed upon. I got the number of an appraiser from my mortgage broker to get in touch with and find more information out about how gross square footage is calculated. From him, I learned that gross square footage is a measurement of the home from the exterior and that cape style home measurements use a formula. Based on the dormers of the house, the formula is tweaked to try and come up with accurate measurements, but 3 different people will likely come up with 3 different totals. His information helped me understand why 1) there is no way an interior floor plan summation would work to back into gross square footage and 2) why sources will differ.

Next step, I contacted my architect that we had been working with on the addition that was never to come to fruition. After 4 emails and 3 phone calls, I was able to get her measurements for gross square footage on our house - 2176.5 sq ft. (It took this many contacts between us because she had 3 different types of measurements on the house and I wasn't clear what she had provided nor was she clear on what I wanted.)

I also searched for my appraisal from the refinance we did back in November when we had decided to stay in the house and do an addition. (Boy, that seems like a lifetime ago!) Of course, being thorough with packing up and preparing our house to be listed, that information is either in a box in my in-laws' basement or in our storage unit. Another few calls and emails later, I learned I could get a copy of that information to me by Friday morning. That square footage came in at 2177 sq ft.

Thursday night was a sleepless night. I was on email and the phone literally all day and into the night on these issues until about 10 pm. By the time I laid down, my mind was still swimming and I stared at the ceiling for at least an hour. That event repeated after I got up for a bathroom break in the middle of the night. Of course, I also woke early with the stress of getting this resolved. So, I was not anywhere near rested on Friday. The P&S was to be signed by 6pm that evening or our house sale deal was null and void. I was not going to extend the deadline because my opinion was that this was a stunt for the buyers to get out of the deal. If that was the case, I wanted to know ASAP so that we could start working with the folks on the other 5 offers we had received. However, if their issue truly was just the square footage, I was now armed with ample evidence to support our numbers. (Actually, I had evidence that the size of the house exceeds our advertised amount so I wanted to be snarky and ask for more money from them. Thinking that might not be the best move, I didn't push for it.)

Friday morning I spent a good amount of time composing an email that contained my research and findings. My lawyer was in a closing most of the morning so it wasn't until after 11am that I was able to get the email to her for proofing then forwarded along to the buyers' lawyer. I tapped my foot, paced and chewed my finger nails (well, not really that since I don't chew my finger nails but if I had any predisposition to do so, you'd better believe I would have) for the next hour and a half. By 12:30 I couldn't stand the waiting anymore and followed up with my lawyer. Still no news. I was sure some back and forth would still need to happen and that 6pm dead line didn't look likely to happen.

With an ultrasound appointment happening in the afternoon (the head to toe exam in which we would find out the baby's sex, among other things....talk about a roller coaster of emotions that day!), I wouldn't be available for about an hour in the afternoon. Luckily, at 2:15 (a few minutes before the boys were to pick me up), I got a call from my lawyer. She said she had the signed Purchase and Sale! I felt an immense amount of relief and elation. We had won the fight! Woohoo!!!

So, after all that drama, the deal goes on. The next hurdle will be the mortgage commitment. If that goes well, it will be smooth sailing to the closing on September 30th. I tell ya, I have been having a really hard time thinking of leaving our house. The up side to all this drama is that it helps me want to be done with the process and move on with our lives, both literally and figuratively. It helped to cut some of my emotional ties to the house. I think I'm ready to move on now.

A Much Needed Weekend Off at the Cape

With the intense schedule we've been keeping the last few months and an even more intense last few weeks, we were happy that a scheduled long weekend trip to Cape Cod was going to give us a little relaxing time. Our good friend Craig had arranged for us to come down to his parents' place in Brewster, MA along with another family. I took off Friday so that we could get some house selling\buying errands and tasks done and during Dylan's nap time, we made the drive down.

Before I give you the scoop on the happy weekend, let me fill you in on a few details from last week's craziness. On Tuesday, Mike had agreed to take care of our friend Kari's son for the day. He's a great kid but a big mamma's boy and I would be lying if I'd said I wasn't worried that Mike was going to have a tough day with a crying kid. My concerns were for naught as Ryan played great with Dylan, had a great time playing at the park, then took the world's longest nap (3.5 hours) right up until his Mom came to pick him up. Dylan was the kid that was high maintenance that day. The poor guy had some sort of stomach bug and was a bit of a mess. As Dylan's been a really healthy kid, Mike found himself in new territory and wasn't sure what to do with the situation. He and I had several phone chats that day, had some temperature readings and he and I both participated in the clean up of the throw up. My poor baby didn't feel good and it was very sad to see! Luckily, once we put him to bed that night, it was the end of the bug. Other than being a little extra tired on Wednesday, he seemed to be back to himself. Whew!

Good thing too because Wednesday, the boys had to get out of the house for the buyers' inspection. It went mostly well but there were a few surprises that we had to call in the professionals on for consult. For the rest of the week, there were a lot of phone calls\emails back and forth to realtors, contractors, electricians, etc to try and get the negotiations settled. We're still awaiting an on site consultation from an electrician on a few issues, but have the rest of the matters settled and should get the P&S signed on Thursday this week. The "For Sale" sign out in front of our house officially shows "Sale Pending!"

So, when Friday came around, we were looking forward to disconnecting from all of that business for a couple of days and heading down to where there's a slower pace of life. Even though we didn't head down in the peak time for the worst of the Cape traffic, we did have delays. I know the Cape is a great place to go and all, but I could never be one of those families that does frequent weekend trips there. Dealing with the traffic on a regular basis would be my idea of a nightmare, not of a vacation.

Once we got there on Friday, we unpacked the car and sat down to chat with our hosts - the home owners (Craig's parents) Bob and Judy, Craig and his girlfriend Dana, and other weekend house guests Craig's uncle David and aunt Lori. A couple of hours after we arrived, the last of the weekend crew finally got through their traffic battle - Mike and Craig's friend Brett, his wife Faith and their kids Katelyn and Tyler. The rest of the afternoon was spent not doing much of anything (yay!) and then we got ready for dinner.

Like people that have been running around like chickens with our heads cut off, we forgot to bring the all important camera. Thankfully, Faith was gracious enough to share her photos. Between that and my trustee iPhone, I was able to actually collect a few decent ones of our trip.

For dinner, we headed to the nearby Sesuit Harbor Cafe in Dennis, Ma. It's a no frills, walk up to order, sit outside on picnic tables, byob kind of super fresh seafood place.....basically, awesome. So awesome that it's a pretty popular place. While some of our group patiently waited in the long line to make our way to order, those of us with young-un's to entertain headed down to the water. Dylan and Katelyn had a great time throwing rocks in the water and observing many small hermit crabs scuttling about.

Boats Stacked High at the Marina (Dylan really wanted to "get in the boat")

Dylan and Katelyn Having Fun Throwing Rocks

Dylan had been a great job steering clear of the water or just getting in up to his ankles. Of course, just as we were heading up to see where the folks were in line, he lost his balance and sat right down in the water! Without a change of clothes handy, he looked pretty funny running around with just a t-shirt, diaper and sneakers the rest of the night!

The food was fantastic! While we savored it all, Dylan and Katelyn wandered about. Katelyn was a great kid watcher and it was so nice to have her around to offer a little help to us.

Dinner at the Marina
(Not the most flattering picture of Mike and I.
While I have gained weight, this picture makes it look
like about 20 pounds more than actuality...
plus Mike and I both appear to have mouths full of food.)

Bob, David, Lori, Judy

Soccer Buds - Brett, Craig, Mike

Hosts - Craig and Dana

Mike Digging the Hole

Which Grew a Lot Over the Course of our Time at the Beach

Dylan (that face!) with the Seaweed He Carried Around for about 45 Minutes

Enjoying the Water

Us!

Katelyn and Tyler

Craig's Sea Monster (from all the sand we dug for the hole)

We got to the beach sometime after 9 and had a great time until 11:30ish when Dylan was begging to go to the car. The poor little guy was pooped out. So, Mike rode a bike back to the house and came back to fetch Dylan and I. Back at the house, Dylan had a great nap and Mike and I snoozed a bit as well before he got a call to grab a car and go down to get the next batch of folks ready to call the beach day done. Once everyone was back, Bob, Craig, Dana and Mike got changed to go run a 5 mile race. When Craig first told us about it, I was going to take Dylan to walk it....but that was when we thought it was a 5K. Adding another 1.9 miles to that distance would have been too much for my inflamed sciatic nerve to take. So, while they were off running, Dylan and I went for a walk through the nearby marsh, back to the beach where we had been that morning and back. It was 2-2.5 miles and I was in pain after that so I was happy to have not done more.

When the racers were back, it was time for dinner! Craig and his parents had planned a big cookout for the night, inviting over some other local friends of theirs. It was a night of great food, great people and great conversations. After a very long day of fun in the sun and a little exercise, we called it an early night to get some shut eye. Sunday morning, we got up, packed up and left so that we could avoid the traffic getting back. Plus, it was tax free weekend and we had some big ticket items to buy for the new place!

Lots of stores were having sales in addition to the tax free incentive, so it was a great time to get that new washer\dryer we needed as well as the treadmill (we've been wanting for quite some time) to put in our new home gym space. After traveling all weekend, spending lots of money and dealing with the crowds all day, we were all happy to come home for a mellow night at home. We all watched a movie together and ordered in some food. For the most part, it was a relaxing long weekend. Unfortunately, I think the extreme activity over the last month has caught up to me and I just can't seem to get feeling rested, no matter how much sleep I get at night. This will definitely be, yet another, early to bed night for me!

Hot Property

Man, the last few days have been a whirlwind. This is going to be a long post but stay with me...I think some of it's pretty exciting. Lots to tell so let's get started.

Friday at work, I was given a box to pack up my things. No worries though, it wasn't the proverbial "you're fired" box, but it was indicative of yet another move I'd have to make. (Why is it all I'm doing these days is packing boxes?) Our company renovated and moved into this building 12 years ago....just about 6 months before I started (yeah, I've been here THAT long!). That amount of years will give some wear and tear to a place. For our building the carpet was showing it's age badly. So, before the weekend before last, the other half of the building had to pack everything away and move out of their desks so that the carpet could get replaced. This last weekend, it was my half of the building's turn. I shut down early on Friday and spent the last hour packing up my drawers, unhooking my machines, and carrying it all (with help on the heavy items) to our conference room.

This morning when I walked in, we had glistening new carpets under our desks. It looks lovely. But, of course, that meant I had to move back in. I got here 20 minutes early thinking that would be plenty of time to get settled by around the first of the work day. Boy was I wrong! It took me 2 hours to get fully up and running thanks to having to wait for help for some things and then my email being all crapped up once I actually got plugged in. After a visit from our IT guy though, I was all set to go. At least I've got one move done!

With all the dust from the moving stuff around on Friday, the allergies I'd been battling all week got kicked into high gear. Friday night I was up a good portion of the night coughing and blowing my nose. Hot, right? In addition to being tired on Saturday, I felt somewhat lousy too. In the usual tradition (lately) of leaving Mike high and dry, he was left to do the bulk of our last full day of preparations pre open house. Being the super man he is, he did a bang up job and we just had a few details to tend to on Sunday. I did help out where I could but was not nearly as useful as I would have liked to have been.

Saturday evening I had to rally. One of my dear friends was in town. I hadn't seen her since Mike and I packed up little 3 month old Dylan for his first big road trip to Rochester, NY for her wedding. I absolutely couldn't miss seeing her, so I bucked up and met her out for dinner. I'm SO glad I did because I got to spend 3 lovely hours chatting with her and 2 of our other friends. It was no big wild night out, thank goodness, so I was able to keep pace. But, of course, it got me home later than I would have liked and then I spent a portion of the middle of the night up (again) thinking of all the tasks we would need to get up and do on Sunday. Isn't that exactly what a sick pregnant lady needs? More lack of sleep....ugh!

Yesterday, Sunday, was the big day! I woke early (that pesky not being able to sleep thing again) so Dylan and I walked down to the grocery store in the drizzling rain, picked up some flowers and fresh fruit to pretty up our place for the open house, and dropped by Panera to pick up breakfast. By the time we got back, Mike was up and adam. We chowed down and got immediately to work putting all our cleaning gear to good use. At 11, I shooed the boys out of the house and had them take the cats with them. Our good friend was out of her house of the day so very generously let us borrow hers for us and some of our furry critters. The boys (and cats) headed there while I got some last minute perfecting of the house done without destructo (Dylan) around.

Although the forecast earlier in the week was for a sunny, temperate day, Sunday soon got forecast for rain and this time the weathermen were actually right. By about 11:30 it started POURING down rain! I went to Home Depot to get some floor mats for the traffic to wipe their dirty feet on and my pants were completely soaked from walking from the exit door back to my car. It was raining cats and dogs! Not exactly ideal weather for an open house. I tried to look at the bright side by thinking that only serious buyers would want to come by. I don't accomplish it most times, but I do try and be a "half glass full" kind of gal!

Our open house was to be 12:30 to 2:30. After meeting our realtor with some last minute thoughts and details, I headed out just 5 minutes until the official start. I got some lunch for me and the boys and went to where they were. We lunched and then put Dylan down for a nap and I headed just another 1/2 mile away to another friend's house I hadn't seen in almost a month (she'd been traveling) to catch up with her. I was back with the boys by 2:30 and was in contact with my realtor via text to see if the coast was clear for us to come home. A couple of people were still there (good sign?) so we waited a bit longer.

Yay! Not only that, she already knew an offer was on it's way. Yay again! Before she left, she got word that a second offer would be coming in. Yay, yay, yay! A while later, she call to say that a couple from the open house wanted to come back with their broker at 5:15 to see it again. Fine, we'd go out for an early dinner. We were out the door around 4:30. En route to dinner, our realtor sent us a text that 3 (!!!) more offers would be coming in...a total of 5! Wowee wow! We just couldn't believe it!

THEN, at dinner, she called to let us know the folks that had just came back for a second viewing made a 6th offer.....for $45,000 ABOVE asking price! If I'd had food or water in my mouth when she told us that, I would have spit it out. I seriously can't use enough exclamation marks to express how incredible we found this! The situation we were in far surpassed our absolute wildest dreams of best case scenario we could have ever come up with. In our minds, we were hoping to get a full price offer and, at best, perhaps two offers and be able to get a few thousand above asking. This was insane! Insanely awesome!

Speaking of insane, at dinner, Dylan was super excited about eating his
corn on the cob. I got my phone out to take a picture of him munching away
and he instantly flashed me this big corny smile. What a silly guy!

Our realtor came over that night to present us with all the offers. A couple of them, including the big overpriced one, had an 11pm deadline so it was decision time. Knowing that the odds of anyone coming back with an offer as strong as our high priced one were extremely slim to (probably) none we accepted that one. Plus, they had a flexible closing so we were able to get the overlap time between houses that we wanted.

We were absolutely on cloud 9 yesterday. It was such a huge weight lifted off our shoulders to have our sale go as easy as it possibly could have. Not only that, it was great to get such positive feedback (through kind words of those that passed through and the many offers we received) on our house. It is our home still, after all, and a lot of love, effort and (of course) money have gone into it. It was truly great to hear so many compliments on it. We are, apparently, THE hot property of our neighborhood!

You'd think after all that I'd be able to sleep. Alas, last night brought another restless couple of hours to me in the middle of the night. Sigh. I suppose it seems to be too good to be true and I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. I hope that I'll feel more confident after the inspection on Wednesday. Oh, and I also just got an email from my realtor that one of the other folks that made an offer understands we accepted someone else's but is happy to pay $10,000 above asking if this first one falls through! I suppose if that's our worst case scenario, we're still doing ALLLLL-right!

We Are Listed!!!

Well, it's official. Our house has been assigned an MLS number. See, we're on the system:

It's been a whirlwind trying to get prepared for this moment and, if we don't sell quickly, it could just be the beginning of a hard road. Keeping a house show ready with a busy toddler will definitely be quite the challenge. Everyone out there please cross your fingers and toes that the perfect buyer gives us an offer after the open house on Sunday! It would be great to get this part of the process over with quickly so we can move forward on all fronts.

You Never Stop Worrying

The one thing I've realized with both pregnancies is that you start being a parent to that growing child inside of you from the second you find out you're pregnant. You do the best you can to be healthy to your body so that you can nourish that little life growing inside you the best way possible. You avoid anything that might be dangerous to the little being...everything from giving up alcohol and sushi to blocking your stomach when you have toddler's leg is heading at it with a kick. The other thing you do as a parent is never stop worrying.

The pregnancy time line is tricky and has slightly different experiences for each person with each different pregnancy. As with child development, there's always a range when things start\stop happening to you. When you aren't right on the calendar, though, you start to worry. Folks have started asking me if I've felt flutters and I haven't (gas probably, flutters not so much). I start getting paranoid that something might be wrong. In between doctor's appointments, there's not much assurance that everything's ok either.

So, leading up to my appointment this week I started getting worried (every appointment really). Maybe that one box I lifted that made my belly feel strained did some damage. Maybe I'm not feeling the baby because it's not alive anymore....the paranoia will drive a girl nuts! I think those appointments every 4 weeks are probably much more reassuring for the mother than the doctor. Yesterday, I had a check up and held my breath until the doppler was moved into the place where I did get to hear a healthy baby's heartbeat. And, the doctor reassured me it's still too early to be feeling the baby move. It being my second pregnancy I may start feeling it around 18 weeks (still a couple away). He also said that my fundal height measurement (a very advance test where they literally take a tape measure and put it on your belly to measure the uterus size) is right on track. Whew! Everything is a-okay! Yay!

But, until this little baby is out of me, I'm not going to stop worrying that everything's going well for the little bugger. There's so much that can happen during a pregnancy and you get very few signs of reassurance along the way that nothing is out of sorts. And other than taking care of myself the best I can, there's no control I have over keeping the baby thriving. The lack of control is not an easy thing for a semi control freak (I've been down graded from the full on control freak I was a couple of years ago...motherhood will do that to you too) to deal with on a day to day basis.

The cruelest irony of all is that the worry I'm feeling now doesn't go away when the baby comes out. It only gets worse. Much, much worse!

No, Please!

This last week (plus) has been absolutely insane for us! The weekend before last, after we'd had our offer accepted on a house, we furiously started prepping our house for sale.

If you've ever sold a place then you can understand how much work it takes. It's much more difficult than actually moving because you have to still live there but make it look like you don't....or better yet, like every nook and cranny of your house is constantly ready to have its picture taken for the front of a magazine (but really just for strangers to come and be nosy). So, last weekend's task was to clear out all the furniture and decorations that we could. Over the last month or so we've been moving some boxes to Mike's parents basement since we knew, at some point (we hoped), that we would find a place and have to get our place ready to sell. Now, though, practice time was over and we had to get the house ready pronto! With the help of my in-laws and some good friends, we packed lots of stuff into lots of cars and completely filled up a storage unit we rented. A great effort was made by all and we felt great about the amount of stuff we got done. Still lots to do, but progress was made.

Last Monday we had our inspection on our new house. It went really well and I cannot brag enough about how awesome Dylan was. For almost 4 hours we were in a house where he wasn't allowed to touch much and he calmly watched movies, ran around with us in the empty space in the basement and hung out with our realtor while we followed around the inspector. Not only was Dylan well behaved, but the inspection didn't bring up any major concerns. Double score! Oh, Monday also happened to be the start of my busiest week of the work month. Like I didn't have enough going on already.

For the rest of the week, we had our grand plans to continue to get the house ready to be listed. Tuesday, it being great timing for it and all, I got sick. So, I spent the rest of the week sleeping, resting, and spending some time watching movies on the couch with Dylan. Hanging out with Dylan was my only way of assisting in the home listing effort. It gave Mike a little time to bear the brunt of all the work and get some stuff accomplished. Poor guy worked his little tail off with no help!

About the only other thing I was able to get done in this time was to send an email to our agent with all our demands\requests to the home owners from the inspection results. To our happy surprise, they agreed to everything. Wow and yay!

By Saturday, I was able to start contributing, physically, to the work we needed to finish up. Good thing too because we had a major deadline this morning - pictures were taken for our listing! Sure, we could leave some of the closet\basement purging\organizing until later but for all intrinsic purposes, we pretty much had to be open house ready. Sunday was the last major push and boy did we push! The list was long but we slowly ticked off almost every single item. We still had some actual cleaning to do this morning....you know, vacuuming and wiping down counters and such, but we were happy and exhausted little clams last night to have all that other stuff done.

The alarm was set this morning an hour earlier than we usually wake up so that we could do some of that cleaning stuff. I left home at 8:45 this morning and Mike still had a good bit of cleaning to do before the photographer got there at 10. But, by golly, that boy got it done. Three cheers for Mike this week and all the work he's done! Hip, hip hooray!

Of course, after this big push we want to do nothing but take a rest. No rest for the weary though, as they say. Tonight we've got to head to the furniture store to buy a couch for our new living room on the last day of their 10% off/no payments or interest for 12 months sale, bills need to get paid (it's the 1st of the month!) and I've got to go through my files to get all the paper work to my mortgage broker he needs to start getting our loan for the new house. Then tomorrow we start cleaning again (that pesky basement) so that we're truly house show ready for when our house officially goes on the market later this week. Oh, and of course we've got all the back and forth hub bub between mortgage brokers\lawyers and realtors this week so that we can get the purchase and sale document signed by Friday (that's how it works in MA - offer, inspection within a week, P&S a week after inspection then closing). Sigh. I will be happy when our open house starts next Sunday. I think it will allow us to have a moment, maybe even two, to breathe. We'll likely all be hanging out in the car - Mike, Dylan, the kitties and I - during the open house but at least we won't feel rushed to go anywhere in particular or do anything.

During all the drama of the week, here is the cutest new Dylan trick to report. As we constantly try and push him to do, the boy is learning his manners...even though he doesn't get them quite right sometimes. We've been trying to get him to say "no, thank you" but he's decided to use the cuter "no, please" phrase.

"Dylan, would you please come over and get your diaper changed?"
"No, please."

"Dylan, I need you to go pick up that toy you threw."
"No, please."

"Dylan, you need to wait to go down the stairs until Mommy or Daddy is with you." (The baby gate\trapper inner has been removed for this whole house sale thing.)
"No, please."

Well, at least we can take pride in that he's stubborn and willful politely.....and pretty cute to boot!

Wish us luck and sanity this week. We definitely will need it.