Our little house on the prairie

Well, we have been all over the place and saw 40+ houses since the day we arrived (Aug 4th). Just as we thought we were ready to put an offer on a house, we had to leave for the Napa Valley, CA, for a friend's wedding (he was also in our wedding), so we had to put things on hold till we got back. But because we had to skip town (it was a nice get away as we dropped the kids in IL with some of Randy's family), we had to wait till we got back this past Monday. Well, CA was great, but before the weekend was over I was chanting "My kingdom for a beer! My kingdom for a beer!" It's a beautiful place but when you stop to think about it, there's absolutely nothing to do but visit wineries and shop. OK, OK, they do have one of the few Culinary Institute of America schools there, so we had to go and have lunch on their patio and even took a class to learn how to make Heirloom Tomato Gazpacho and that was a lot of fun! You know, I wasn't a fan of cold tomato soup before, but that was pretty darn good!

Anyway, in the meantime we found out that the house we were about to put an offer on, which claimed to have 1.95 acres, had in fact (according to city records) 0.95 acres. Could have been an honest typo but the price we're willing to pay for a 0.95 acre property is quite different than one that has 1.95 acres. So, we took yet another look over the internet on what was out there and found 3 more promising properties, ended up visiting one this past Tuesday and made an offer on it by Wednesday. The house is perfect (well, almost perfect), beautifully updated (even if I don't like some of the room colors - but that's minor), it's a 4 bedroom (not including the basement which is fully finished) and has 1.7 acres. Does not have a pool but with a yard that big, we can afford to wait (winter is coming up anyway). And is located in an excellent school district.

They took our offer, but we had to agree to close Oct 1. We really wanted Sept 14 (or sooner) but for that to happen, they said we would have to up the offer by $5,000 more, so I told Randy I won't mind travelling back and forth to take the kids to school. You know, after all, what else am I going to do with myself not knowing a soul (apart from our landlady - kidding, our friend Kittie who we are staying with) and not being able to unpack or do anything else?? So the next step was to make sure our friend Kittie was OK with us staying here till Oct 1st. When I tell you the woman travels a lot I'm not kidding (she's only been here half of the time we've been around) Randy had to call her in Mexico where she is till the end of the week. So, first she said we couldn't leave, then she said Randy and the kids could move on but that I had to stay (I've been doing my part to spoil her by cooking really good meals every time she's home - my evil plan seems to be working - ha, ha, ha!!).

So now that we know what our home address will be we can start working on school registration. Yesterday, the kids and I took a drive to their new school, filled out all the paperwork and this coming Monday we have our "Meet &Greet" with the teachers. Dorian actually requested a "boy teacher" (they have 5 third grade teachers) and by the looks of the very friendly school secretary, he will probably get it.

Yesterday was also a momentous occasion as the new homeowners of our place in Texas signed the contract in the morning and we did our portion in the afternoon. Such a weird feeling knowing that won't be our home anymore. Don't take me wrong, I'm super excited about the new place (we're gonna have a basement!!) but it's still sad to leave the only home our kids have ever known...

Today, Saturday, the moving truck will start the trip up here. The owners of the house we're buying have agreed to let us use a large building they have on the property (could be another 2 car garage by its size) to place our stuff in till Oct 1. It will take some creative placement to fit everything, but Randy is good at organizing overloaded refrigerators so I'm confident that this skill will translate to a larger scale.

Hubby also spent an hour on the phone before he left for Texas and finally got AT&T to change our DSL account to a dial up, so even though it takes longer to do anything, as long as hubby and/or his lap top is at home, I can log on.

Truman doesn't seem to be traumatized by the yellow jacket encounter. He goes back out in the patio and sits on the very same picnic table with me for my morning coffee (I know, don't you feel bad for me!? ). It helps that my knight in shining armor armed himself with a stick and some spray and completely destroyed the hive that was under the bench so I haven't encountered any more flying menaces. While we were gone to Napa Valley , our friend Kittie was here so Truman was well taken care of as well. That cat is some lucky creature!!