Late Breaking News (And a sneak peek!)

Well, the stars have aligned and it appears that our house will be completed ahead of schedule. It looks like we will be able to close next week! 

We were able to swing by earlier this week and sneak in for a few snapshots. 

This is the family room. To the right is the front door, a den, powder room and stairs leading to the second level. To the left are windows that look out onto the covered patio. And behind us is the dining room. 

So, spinning around, this is from the family room looking through the dining room into the kitchen. In the dining room, there is a butlers pantry on the right, and on the other side of that wall the breakfast room that is connected to the kitchen and also looks out onto the covered patio. 

Here is the breakfast room. So on the other side of the wall to the right is the butlers/dining room. 

And here is a blurry photo of the kitchen. There was a bit of a fracas going on about the range installation while I was discretely trying to snap a pic, best I could to while trying to be inconspicuous!

It's an old school floor plan, not "open concept" although, all of the rooms are open to each other. The dining room is in the center of the house and the mud room, kitchen, breakfast room, family room and den wrap around it in a circle. 

Upstairs there is a laundry, bonus, four bedrooms, a double master closet that will function for us as one storage room and one closet, and two bathrooms. 

It's getting so CLOSE!

❈

The Rugs (They're here!)

The custom rugs from Home Depot (Martha Stewart line carpet bound to size) arrived about three weeks after I ordered them. It's a good thing I had help getting them in and out of the truck, they are quite enormous as you can see!

This one is for the dining room. Oh how I love waffle weave! The color is "Natural Twine". The family room rug we ordered is the same color, but a nice plush pile.  

I hear through my secret spy that they started installing the hard flooring today!  Getting so close now! Hope this means we can move up our closing date a little. Fingers crossed!

The Catalyst (Part Two)

Well, the house is coming along.  We have a roof, siding, most of the exterior paint, 

a back deck, the second fireplace (originally just had one exterior fireplace outside on the covered patio which was lovely, but really?  A fireplace outside, but not inside? Yeah no. Please add one to the family room.  Thank you.)  We also have plumbing now.  Electric will start later this week. 

So.

The catalyst.  

Remember this post I wrote about the loss of the lake house being the catalyst for change?  I didn't know what change or when, but that we just had to trust it and go with it?

Now think back, way way back.  Do you remember this post I wrote about taking a deep breath and setting a part of our souls carefully up on a shelf?

We didn't get the lake house we wanted.  Or, the lake house we tried to buy before that. But then...

We remembered. 

Our dream was still sitting there...

Quietly waiting...

And so, just for fun, we started looking around. 

And then we found her. 

And if you were me, and you walked up to her...

And you saw her name....

You would have stopped dead in your tracks and gotten goose bumps...

And maybe you would have had to bite your lip just a little, and swallow a knot in your throat...

Because you would have known pretty much instantly, just like I did,

that she was meant to be ours. 

But the timing! The timing was terrible! We hadn't found a house yet. We had to wait...  We couldn't put the cart in front of the horse.  So we just held our breath and crossed our fingers. 

A month went by.  Still no houses...

Then someone else made an offer. 

Sucker punch. 

Another month went by.  Still no houses. 

The owner of the boat called us. The other buyer's deal had fallen through...

A second chance. 

We didn't hesitate this time. We made an offer and it was accepted. 

A few days later we widened our home search area and found our house. 

And here we are, unwrapping our amazing dream again.  

And life is good.

So very, very good. 

Moving On...House News

There eventually comes a point when it's time to stop waiting and make your own destiny already. 

We've bought a house. 

It's not on a lake. 

It's not even in our current town. 

But it was time. 

Our little family needed a future we could grab on to. 

So, with a little prompting from a sweet friend, we checked out this new little neighborhood.

And everyone liked it. 

The house is currently under construction about an hour north of where we live now, so the above photo is merely a representation of what our house will look like once it's finished. We were even lucky enough to score a lot with green space on two sides. 

And because it is in an area where the houses cost (sadly I'm not exaggerating) half as much as our present surroundings, it was both a downsize in mortgage and and upsize in square footage. 

Bonus - My husbands commute will go from 60-90 minutes each way to 15 minutes. That right there, HUGE!

It's feeling pretty fantastic to let go of the pause button and push play. 

Which brings us to, "But I thought you said you were water people?". 

Stay tuned for "The Catalyst - Part Two". 

❈

So What Is It? (That you want to do...)

Finding a home that will work for every family member (on whatever level) can be a bit of a challenge can't it?  Everyone has to compromise someplace, but everyone should still be happy in the end. It's tough, and even tougher on the heels of loosing a house you love to another buyer. This video was graciously dropped in my lap this morning.

Just when I was starting to loose my resolve, to consider settling...  suddenly I can go on looking. ❈

You can watch the video here: What is it that you want to do?

It's A New Year...

Little Miss Sparkle

So.

It's a new year.

YAY!

It's an exciting time, well... I suppose I mean that somewhat metaphorically....  You see, sometime in the next six months we will find our house.  Don't know when.  Don't know where.  Don't even know what kind of house...  But it's coming.  We've got some hard deadlines to work with now which makes decision making a little easier.

Mid flip - crazy boys...

So, what's the plan?

I guess the plan is to keep our eye out for another lake house.  It's unlikely we will find one at the price point we want to pay, but we'll keep looking regardless.  With one eye on that, our other eye will be on an area near where we are now.  We like to call it the black zone since whenever we pull up the listings there are never ever any for sale in that one area where we'd like to be (if we can't find a lake house).

Vacation beard... (sigh)... (swoon)...

If we don't find anything in either of those two areas by the end of the school year we will expand our search area to include other towns. We do know one thing, we aren't moving two days before school starts again, and we aren't renewing our lease so that pretty much means this train is gonna move in the next six months.

Love him...

And I am so looking forward to that.

I'm ready to pack boxes again.

Like yesterday.

I'm kinda giddy about it.

❈

A Few Of My Favorite Things...

I had hoped to get this list out a little sooner than five days before Christmas, but here you go.  Here are a few of my favorite things.

First up are  Hickies.  They are little elastics for shoes that function as laces.  These were originally a Kickstarter project and are really taking off. I heard you can even buy them at Brookstone now! My kids are terrible about tying their shoes.  Problem solved.  And bonus, hello fashion statement.  They come in loads of colors and are awesome for those high profile shoes your kids want.  Ever notice how in the ads for shoes they don't ever show them with laces tied in bows?  Exactly. These fasteners let your shoes take center stage, not the floppy laces!  And unlike bungee laces, don't have any cording that hangs out. Love them. You can order them direct here: At the HIckies online storefront.

Next, After Eight mints.  I grew up eating these at Christmas and I'm so glad they are still available.  They are little, thin (and it's the "thin" that makes them so good) squares of dark chocolate filled with minty goodness.  Each one is in it's own little sleeve inside the box.  They are fantastic!  I found them at Cost Plus this year and I think you can also buy them in bulk at Amazon.  I gave a lot of these little boxes as gifts this year.  They are just right for a little something special. 

Ok now, do you want to know my very most favorite place to buy holiday wrapping paper?  Hobby Lobby.  They sell these big (thick) rolls of beautiful Christmas paper.  It's that wonderful heavy paper that you can run your scissors across to cut without actually doing any cutting motion.  Bonus, it's more than reasonable at $4 (at the 50% off price). Double bonus, they always have patterns in the Christmas paper aisle like the one above that can work year round.  Stock up! 

Instagram.  What can I say.  I love it.  So much. Such an easy way to take ordinary photos, tweak them with a nifty filter and turn them into something amazing. In less than 10 seconds.  Some of my most favorite photos from this past year have been taken on my phone and created in Instagram.  I'm a fan.  Not to mention, some of my favorite bloggers are also on Instagram too!  Love seeing the little snippets they post between blog entries. ❈

The Kindle Paperwhite.  I lovvvvvvveeeeee this baby. It's actually pretty funny because I know quite a few people who claim to be purists about their reading. They'll "never" give up books for a reader.  That's what I thought too... before I got my first kindle.  Slowly over time, with the sweet lure of instant buying... I've been converted.  And now I say I'm a purist.  But not for books, for ereaders. Because this Paperwhite with all of it's you can read me in the dark and not hurt your eyes?  Is perfection.  I don't want a Kindle Fire, although I hear they are pretty cool. I don't want a reader that can play movies, or surf the web.  I just want one to be my book and only be my book. And the book after that, and the one after that...  

Real popcorn.  At the beginning of this year I stopped making microwave popcorn and started making real popcorn.  I'd forgotten just how easy it is!  You can make it in a pot or get a popper.  The best part is, you can can add herbs and spices (rosemary, garlic powder,etc.) to the popcorn before you fire it up and it tastes fantastic!  I'll never go back to microwaved popcorn, I tried some the other day and it tasted like plastic.  Just another way to cut unnecessary chemicals out of your your food.  Popcorn, YUM! My favorite is Orville Redenbocher's.  I've tried the store brands and Jolly Time and other brands that promise yummy goodness, but they just don't measure up.  Trust me. 

Ok, a couple more things, since it's almost the start of the New Year and all...

Hands down my favorite workout DVD continues to be the 30 Day Shred. It's challenging, but seriously, I can do challenging for 20 minutes.  It makes me feel great physically when I'm working out, even if it's only a few times a week.  And then I feel smart and productive and well, you know how it feels when you are doing something good for yourself, your self esteem soars. 20 minutes of doing something challenging but doable can do that for you.  It's amazing. 

Confession: I have been eating garbage and have not worked out for the last three months since we moved into the rental house.  I guess I was just wallowing and giving myself a free pass.  Apparently a free pass to a place where I don't really want to be mentally and physically. (Insert sarcasm here) Sometimes I can be SO helpful to myself. Guess what happened?  Um....... yeah.  

Guess who worked out today?  Time to claw my way back onto the wagon, but we can talk more about that later. 

Hope you have enjoyed a few of my favorite random things. 

Have the Merriest of Christmases! ❈