My accomplishments for the week are exactly as I had hoped. I wanted to get all the deep cleaning done on the house and it's all done except the kitchen. The kitchen needs a lot more elbow grease so that will be an all day project that I'll probably save for Monday. Have I mentioned that I really like our house? I quite like it!!
However, our house in Twin is another story. We were supposed to close yesterday. Long story short, the appraisal paperwork wasn't filled out right and the underwriters caught that. Because of this the buyers changed lenders and decided to go with an FHA loan instead of a conventional loan. Old homes like ours don't really qualify for FHA loans. So after the appraisal paperwork got fixed, it was appraised right at our asking price but they listed about eight different FHA required repairs. Boo! I called our very talented friend Brandon Larson who owns Cutting Edge Remodeling and he was so helpful! He immediately got in contact with the realtor putting together a bid for us on how much all the repairs are going to cost. We haven't decided yet if we're going to lower the asking price so they can do the repair work themselves, or just back out of this offer altogether. I have no idea what to do at this point so we're taking it one day at a time, one issue at a time. For the time being we're waiting for the repair bid.
Lance's new job has been really good so far. It's been more of an adjustment than he thought, he was thinking he'd be much more hands on doing embalmings, dressings, cosmetics, cremations, etc. But being the manager he's been in a lot of meetings. I'm sure there won't be quite so many meetings once they get a few more people hired, they're really short staffed like White's was. He's really liking it though and so far everything is going well with his job.
The relief society presidency came to visit me this afternoon. I love those three ladies, I already have three moms here. :) We've gone to all the activities and have met some really neat people. I love that aspect about the church - it's true no matter where you live on this earth and there is always a family there within that ward. We definitely found that to be true in our Charleston ward and are seeing that to be true here. One thing is certain though, you can't sit back and think the church is going to do all the work making you feel like you belong or making you feel comfortable and fit in with the other members. Like anything else in life, you have to make an effort to have the best experience you're looking for. We're trying to make the most of our adventure in Spokane. :)
Lance has Monday off - yay! He hasn't had a holiday or weekend off in such a long time! We were going to explore the Riverfront Park which has several attractions but there's some kind of cook off going on and we don't want to deal with major crowds. So we're still searching for something else to do on his day off. I can't wait!
Friday, August 30, 2013
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Not Everyday Is Peachy
I have to mention Spokane day 6. It was that awful. It was Lance's first day at work which means my first day by myself. Kimball and I got up and were enjoying breakfast together when I heard some water running. I asked Lance about the sound the day before and he said it was just the water from the cooler. Made sense. I kept on eating my Frosted Mini Spooners. Then I realized it wasn't quite that loud the day before so I got up to check it out. Turns out Lance's beloved bidet (which I have now come to hate) sprung a major leak and there were three inches of standing water just in the bathroom.
I waded through the water and turned the toilet valve off. Then it dawned on me that all of our towels are still boxed up around fragile items, we had two to use. I grabbed those two and started mopping up the mess which didn't even soak up 1" of water. Great! I went downstairs to rummage through more boxes to find more towels and found the water was leaking into the basement. It filled the light fixtures and was leaking down the ceiling and walls into the other bathroom. It was dripping and running everywhere. My heart sunk.
As I was trying to rummage through boxes looking for towels I realized the water also leaked into the storage room. Great, I was so done! Needless to say I cleaned it all up the best I could but in the heat of the moment I lost patience and yelled at Kimball. He was being needy and wasn't understanding that I couldn't help him at the moment. Then I collapsed on the couch and lost it. I felt guilty for yelling at Kimball, I was mad this happened on Lance's first day of work when he wasn't available to help me, I was mad at his stupid bidet, I was so upset. So I just sobbed for a good 15 minutes while sweet Kimball came and sat by me trying to comfort me. Love that boy!
I was so tempted to let all my rage out on Lance and text him how much I hate his bidet and what a horrible day I was having. But I knew if I did, it wouldn't make him have a very good day and I couldn't do that on his first day at work. So I ignored him all day instead to prevent myself from blowing up and saying things I'd regret.
The end of my stupid story, I guess I'm still mad it happened. It was horrible. But it's over now and yes I still hate, hate his bidet.
I waded through the water and turned the toilet valve off. Then it dawned on me that all of our towels are still boxed up around fragile items, we had two to use. I grabbed those two and started mopping up the mess which didn't even soak up 1" of water. Great! I went downstairs to rummage through more boxes to find more towels and found the water was leaking into the basement. It filled the light fixtures and was leaking down the ceiling and walls into the other bathroom. It was dripping and running everywhere. My heart sunk.
As I was trying to rummage through boxes looking for towels I realized the water also leaked into the storage room. Great, I was so done! Needless to say I cleaned it all up the best I could but in the heat of the moment I lost patience and yelled at Kimball. He was being needy and wasn't understanding that I couldn't help him at the moment. Then I collapsed on the couch and lost it. I felt guilty for yelling at Kimball, I was mad this happened on Lance's first day of work when he wasn't available to help me, I was mad at his stupid bidet, I was so upset. So I just sobbed for a good 15 minutes while sweet Kimball came and sat by me trying to comfort me. Love that boy!
I was so tempted to let all my rage out on Lance and text him how much I hate his bidet and what a horrible day I was having. But I knew if I did, it wouldn't make him have a very good day and I couldn't do that on his first day at work. So I ignored him all day instead to prevent myself from blowing up and saying things I'd regret.
The end of my stupid story, I guess I'm still mad it happened. It was horrible. But it's over now and yes I still hate, hate his bidet.
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Spokane: Day 3 - Present
We've now been in our duplex for eight or nine days. Everything is rightfully in it's place and unpacked, boxes are flattened and stored, and we feel like this is home when walk through the door. Finally! Ugh, I've been living out of boxes for the past three months and I'm so tired of it. It feels good to be done! Unfortunately, I'm too independent to wait for Lance to get home from work to help me lift and move stuff. I've been a little unkind to my pregnant body and lifted and strained and worked my body to death trying to get everything settled.
Today I had my first OB appointment in Spokane, I think the hospital and doctors we chose will be good. Luckily they do accept Blue Cross of Idaho insurance so I don't have to go to Coeur D'Alene like I was initially told to. My appointment today went well but they are sending me to the high risk specialist for a check up to follow up with the perinatalogist and to make sure we didn't get lost in the shuffle of the move, and that Little Miss is still growing/doing ok.
Kimball has been such a trooper! He did SO WELL on our drive here, did SO WELL for our two day hotel stay, did SO WELL during all of the unpacking and chaos. I'm so blessed with such a well behaved little boy, that might have been because he had free access to all kinds of loose screws, tools, box cutters, cords, chemicals, and who knows what else.
Did I mention Lance is awesome? We had three days with him at home before he had to start his new job and I put him to work! I had to have the washer and dryer hooked up and kitchen somewhat organized and functional before he went back to work. Otherwise we can't survive. He's got to win a medal or something for having to put up with me. Especially putting up with me when I'm pregnant - even I can hardly stand myself right now.
My plans for the next few days is to deep clean. This place needs a serious cleaning all over. And then I can go back to being a stay at home mom and entertain Kimball. We've got a ton of parks and gardens and zoos and fairs and all sorts of other stuff I don't even know about that we need to explore before the weather changes!
Today I had my first OB appointment in Spokane, I think the hospital and doctors we chose will be good. Luckily they do accept Blue Cross of Idaho insurance so I don't have to go to Coeur D'Alene like I was initially told to. My appointment today went well but they are sending me to the high risk specialist for a check up to follow up with the perinatalogist and to make sure we didn't get lost in the shuffle of the move, and that Little Miss is still growing/doing ok.
Kimball has been such a trooper! He did SO WELL on our drive here, did SO WELL for our two day hotel stay, did SO WELL during all of the unpacking and chaos. I'm so blessed with such a well behaved little boy, that might have been because he had free access to all kinds of loose screws, tools, box cutters, cords, chemicals, and who knows what else.
Did I mention Lance is awesome? We had three days with him at home before he had to start his new job and I put him to work! I had to have the washer and dryer hooked up and kitchen somewhat organized and functional before he went back to work. Otherwise we can't survive. He's got to win a medal or something for having to put up with me. Especially putting up with me when I'm pregnant - even I can hardly stand myself right now.
My plans for the next few days is to deep clean. This place needs a serious cleaning all over. And then I can go back to being a stay at home mom and entertain Kimball. We've got a ton of parks and gardens and zoos and fairs and all sorts of other stuff I don't even know about that we need to explore before the weather changes!
Spokane: Day 1 & 2
After we enjoyed a free continental breakfast at the hotel, we headed out in search for a home. This has been our biggest anxiety because being pregnant and sick, I was in no condition to take a trip to Spokane to look for a house, and Lance couldn't get that much time off to go by himself. So with us moving to a new state and city you could see why we'd have high nerves over this, we don't have anywhere to live!
We found several homes listed on Craigslist that we liked and wanted to see so we spent the day looking at homes for rent. We only ended up actually going through two of them, the rest wanted us to drive by before we made an appointment to tour the home. That was a little annoying. The last one we toured was a duplex that I had kept my eye on for the last two months. There weren't any pictures of it online but the description sounded very ideal for what we wanted. Luckily, I kept in contact with the landlord all this time and we were able to tour it on our first day in Spokane.
We didn't need to look at anymore houses, it was exactly what we wanted and within budget. Since we had been pre-approved, on day #2 we signed the lease, got the key, and moved in. SUCH A HUGE BLESSING!!!! I'm so thankful we didn't have to live in a hotel and try to contain a toddler in a little bedroom with nowhere to play.
We are renting a duplex that has 3 bed, 2 bath, 2 family rooms, 2 fireplaces, a laundry room with storage, and a storage room. It has a basement and is about 2000 sqft, I think. We are sleeping in the bedroom downstairs and put the tv and desk in the family room down there. The kid's bedrooms are upstairs. There's so much room for Kimball to run and play! I love having two family rooms. I love sleeping in the basement. I love not having 80% hard floors. I really like our duplex! The only downside is that I have to get used to a small kitchen. The kitchen in our home was so huge and a dream to cook in because I had SO much counter space and tons of cupboards. But luckily we put up some shelves in the laundry and storage room so the majority of the food and dishes are still accessible.
With our last house having no storage, the laundry and storage rooms have been a dream! We left all the home decor, books, garage stuff, craft supplies, and all my beads boxed up. Our lease here in the duplex is only for a year and we'd like to buy a house here. I don't want to repack this home! I'm leaving as much stuff boxed up as I can.
So, we really like our home! A lot! It's only about 10-15 minute drive for Lance to get to work and I'm very close to all the shopping. :) Oh you know how Utah has a church building on every block? Spokane has a park on every block and most of the parks here have splash pads. Score! Kimball loves it!
Heavenly Father has had his hand in this entire move. I'm amazed at how smooth everything has gone! Everything. From our first two house offers falling through to Lance being forced to stay in Twin until White's found his replacement, from our move date getting pushed back to me finally getting out of the awful pregnancy sickness. We exercised our faith and moved without a home to move into, the timing has been flawless. Not just moving but my symptoms and complications with this pregnancy and the timing with selling our house. I'm just left speechless with how blessed we are. I'm in awe that the Lord has been so mindful of us. Now, if I can get through this pregnancy ok then I'll be glad to end this year!
We found several homes listed on Craigslist that we liked and wanted to see so we spent the day looking at homes for rent. We only ended up actually going through two of them, the rest wanted us to drive by before we made an appointment to tour the home. That was a little annoying. The last one we toured was a duplex that I had kept my eye on for the last two months. There weren't any pictures of it online but the description sounded very ideal for what we wanted. Luckily, I kept in contact with the landlord all this time and we were able to tour it on our first day in Spokane.
We didn't need to look at anymore houses, it was exactly what we wanted and within budget. Since we had been pre-approved, on day #2 we signed the lease, got the key, and moved in. SUCH A HUGE BLESSING!!!! I'm so thankful we didn't have to live in a hotel and try to contain a toddler in a little bedroom with nowhere to play.
We are renting a duplex that has 3 bed, 2 bath, 2 family rooms, 2 fireplaces, a laundry room with storage, and a storage room. It has a basement and is about 2000 sqft, I think. We are sleeping in the bedroom downstairs and put the tv and desk in the family room down there. The kid's bedrooms are upstairs. There's so much room for Kimball to run and play! I love having two family rooms. I love sleeping in the basement. I love not having 80% hard floors. I really like our duplex! The only downside is that I have to get used to a small kitchen. The kitchen in our home was so huge and a dream to cook in because I had SO much counter space and tons of cupboards. But luckily we put up some shelves in the laundry and storage room so the majority of the food and dishes are still accessible.
With our last house having no storage, the laundry and storage rooms have been a dream! We left all the home decor, books, garage stuff, craft supplies, and all my beads boxed up. Our lease here in the duplex is only for a year and we'd like to buy a house here. I don't want to repack this home! I'm leaving as much stuff boxed up as I can.
So, we really like our home! A lot! It's only about 10-15 minute drive for Lance to get to work and I'm very close to all the shopping. :) Oh you know how Utah has a church building on every block? Spokane has a park on every block and most of the parks here have splash pads. Score! Kimball loves it!
Heavenly Father has had his hand in this entire move. I'm amazed at how smooth everything has gone! Everything. From our first two house offers falling through to Lance being forced to stay in Twin until White's found his replacement, from our move date getting pushed back to me finally getting out of the awful pregnancy sickness. We exercised our faith and moved without a home to move into, the timing has been flawless. Not just moving but my symptoms and complications with this pregnancy and the timing with selling our house. I'm just left speechless with how blessed we are. I'm in awe that the Lord has been so mindful of us. Now, if I can get through this pregnancy ok then I'll be glad to end this year!
Monday, August 26, 2013
The Dreaded Drive
I slept terribly at Mom's, partly because I was hungry and partly because Kimball got up a few times. Oh well. Mom made us a delicious breakfast, Kimball jumped on the trampoline one last time, and we were on the road at 10:30 ish. It was hard to say goodbye to mom and choke back tears. She's the best. I feel bad for everyone that doesn't have her as a mom.
A normal drive from Twin Falls to Spokane is 8.5-9 hours. We stopped twice for food - lunch and dinner and so Kimball could play and use up some energy - and with me following the truck that doesn't go over 65 mph, take into consideration some road construction and winding around mountains....it took us 13.5 hours to get there.
(Side note: for our meals we just got fast food to stay within budget and looked for places that had toys for Kimball to play on. I've never seen a more complex toy set up than the one at Carl's Jr. in Oregon! I had to climb in and help Kimball for a little bit but I never found the top of that play thing and never did find the slide. It was unbelievably complex! When we were ready to hit the road again I made Lance climb in there to retrieve Kimball and it even took him 15 minutes just to get out).
Both Grandma's are wonderful! They each gave us some snacks for the road and Mom bought Kimball a few new toys for the car that would keep him occupied. I was mostly worried about Kimball being strapped into his car seat for that long! But he did SO much better than expected! He took a nap before and after lunch. After we stopped for dinner, we switched him over to ride with Lance just to give him a change of scenery and to give me a break. I was drop dead tired at this point so I cranked up the radio and blasted the air conditioning to keep myself awake for the last 2 hours we needed to drive. Kimball fell asleep in the truck when the sun went down and after having gained an hour because of the time change, we pulled into the hotel in Spokane around 11-11:30pm.
As a recap: the drive was quite boring with nothing much to look at. Even Oregon was brown and dry but we did eventually see some green forest through the winding mountains. Kimball was such a trooper and did awesome! I couldn't have asked for him to do better on such a long drive, I'm still in shock at how well he did. He did so much better than me!
A normal drive from Twin Falls to Spokane is 8.5-9 hours. We stopped twice for food - lunch and dinner and so Kimball could play and use up some energy - and with me following the truck that doesn't go over 65 mph, take into consideration some road construction and winding around mountains....it took us 13.5 hours to get there.
(Side note: for our meals we just got fast food to stay within budget and looked for places that had toys for Kimball to play on. I've never seen a more complex toy set up than the one at Carl's Jr. in Oregon! I had to climb in and help Kimball for a little bit but I never found the top of that play thing and never did find the slide. It was unbelievably complex! When we were ready to hit the road again I made Lance climb in there to retrieve Kimball and it even took him 15 minutes just to get out).
Both Grandma's are wonderful! They each gave us some snacks for the road and Mom bought Kimball a few new toys for the car that would keep him occupied. I was mostly worried about Kimball being strapped into his car seat for that long! But he did SO much better than expected! He took a nap before and after lunch. After we stopped for dinner, we switched him over to ride with Lance just to give him a change of scenery and to give me a break. I was drop dead tired at this point so I cranked up the radio and blasted the air conditioning to keep myself awake for the last 2 hours we needed to drive. Kimball fell asleep in the truck when the sun went down and after having gained an hour because of the time change, we pulled into the hotel in Spokane around 11-11:30pm.
As a recap: the drive was quite boring with nothing much to look at. Even Oregon was brown and dry but we did eventually see some green forest through the winding mountains. Kimball was such a trooper and did awesome! I couldn't have asked for him to do better on such a long drive, I'm still in shock at how well he did. He did so much better than me!
The Move to Spokane
***Tyring to catch up on my journaling.......this is just a lot of boring details but I still need to journal it.***
On August 12 we were blessed with friends and family who came out to help us move. Initially we were closing on the house on the 14th and weren't going to leave until that day. But the buyers were having a few issues with their financing so we are closing on the 29th - this week - instead. Since we didn't need to stay to close, we decided to leave Twin a day early so we'd have enough time to find a place to live before Lance started work on the 19th.
So back to the 12th - friends and family came to help us load the moving truck. Lance got a 20' U-Haul and a trailer for his Bug that we'd be towing. After putting in the large furniture, we realized the truck wasn't big enough. Panic time! By the time we realized this, U-Haul was closed so there was nothing we could do until the morning. I didn't know what to do and everybody kept asking me questions so I referred them all to Lance. Lance insisted we'd have enough room, so for about an hour or so we had all of the furniture and boxes out on the lawn just waiting to be packed into the truck. Nobody could really do much at that point. I felt bad because we had all of this help but we were at a standstill. Little by little we got the truck packed........and the bug, and my car. Since I was driving my car with Kimball, I had in my mind a wonderfully spacious and clean car so Kimball would travel well for me. Oh no, they had to pack my car clear full too, there was barely enough room for Kimball's car seat and my big fanny in the drivers seat. We were cramped. It was tight. By this time it was about 9 or 9:30. There were a few odds and ends still not packed into the truck or either car and there was no room to be had. Mike Steel graciously let us use his truck to take the load of stuff over to Scott's. I guess we're either giving it all away or selling it, but thank you to Scott for storing it all for us.
We said our good byes at various times through the evening as friends and family needed to leave to get back to their own homes. It was so good to see Adam! As Trish left with her crew, Quentin had to say good bye at least five times. He's got such a tender little heart and he bawled which made me cry. We have the best family! Both sides, I love our families so much and will miss them dearly!!!
By now, it was about 10pm and totally dark. I was beat. My brain was fried. I was hungry. I jumped into my very full car and headed to Donna's who was watching Kimball for me. The poor boy was so tired! Apparently he tried playing with Baxter who was asleep, and Baxter nipped at him. He scratched his eye a little which turned into a black eye in the following days. Mike and Jenna still wanted to see Kimball before we left so I stayed at Donna's for about 45 minutes or so. It was nice to visit and say good bye to Mike and Jenna. We said our good bye's to Donna and John and headed over to the Pettingill Inn where we stayed for the night with the truck parked out front.
On August 12 we were blessed with friends and family who came out to help us move. Initially we were closing on the house on the 14th and weren't going to leave until that day. But the buyers were having a few issues with their financing so we are closing on the 29th - this week - instead. Since we didn't need to stay to close, we decided to leave Twin a day early so we'd have enough time to find a place to live before Lance started work on the 19th.
So back to the 12th - friends and family came to help us load the moving truck. Lance got a 20' U-Haul and a trailer for his Bug that we'd be towing. After putting in the large furniture, we realized the truck wasn't big enough. Panic time! By the time we realized this, U-Haul was closed so there was nothing we could do until the morning. I didn't know what to do and everybody kept asking me questions so I referred them all to Lance. Lance insisted we'd have enough room, so for about an hour or so we had all of the furniture and boxes out on the lawn just waiting to be packed into the truck. Nobody could really do much at that point. I felt bad because we had all of this help but we were at a standstill. Little by little we got the truck packed........and the bug, and my car. Since I was driving my car with Kimball, I had in my mind a wonderfully spacious and clean car so Kimball would travel well for me. Oh no, they had to pack my car clear full too, there was barely enough room for Kimball's car seat and my big fanny in the drivers seat. We were cramped. It was tight. By this time it was about 9 or 9:30. There were a few odds and ends still not packed into the truck or either car and there was no room to be had. Mike Steel graciously let us use his truck to take the load of stuff over to Scott's. I guess we're either giving it all away or selling it, but thank you to Scott for storing it all for us.
We said our good byes at various times through the evening as friends and family needed to leave to get back to their own homes. It was so good to see Adam! As Trish left with her crew, Quentin had to say good bye at least five times. He's got such a tender little heart and he bawled which made me cry. We have the best family! Both sides, I love our families so much and will miss them dearly!!!
By now, it was about 10pm and totally dark. I was beat. My brain was fried. I was hungry. I jumped into my very full car and headed to Donna's who was watching Kimball for me. The poor boy was so tired! Apparently he tried playing with Baxter who was asleep, and Baxter nipped at him. He scratched his eye a little which turned into a black eye in the following days. Mike and Jenna still wanted to see Kimball before we left so I stayed at Donna's for about 45 minutes or so. It was nice to visit and say good bye to Mike and Jenna. We said our good bye's to Donna and John and headed over to the Pettingill Inn where we stayed for the night with the truck parked out front.
Friday, August 23, 2013
Latest Project
About a month ago I made the mistake of going into Joann's to get a spool of thread. That was it just a spool of thread. Of course I had to browse through all the flannel and baby prints and quickly had about 10 bolts overflowing in my cart. Oh boy, the hard task of narrowing it down! So I decided to make one little receiving blanket and the other a rag quilt. Never made a rag quilt before or any kind of blanket or quilt besides a receiving blanket.
Here's a picture of the receiving blanket: a funky colorful safari cotton print, pink and green polka dot flannel on the inside, with a blue decorative zig zag.
Now this is the rag quilt. The pink minky is the whole back, while the other four prints I used for the strips. I didn't use any batting or filling for the middle because I didn't want a bulky and heavy baby quit. I decided to cut it into strips instead of squares because it's much easier and less time consuming. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy-ish it was for my first quilt. Especially needing to have it finished before we moved so I could have mom's help.
Speaking of mom, I don't know why I didn't choose more projects like this a lot sooner. I loved spending this one on one time with her! It was relaxing and I loved learning from her. It made me that much more sad to leave her in the coming weeks. I love you so much mom and couldn't have made this without you!!!
Here's my fabric before we got started.
These are the strips layed out so we knew what order we wanted and to ensure I had enough fabric. I had to go back for 21" more minky.
Nice photo bomb Charity!
And this little baby bump is who the quilt is for. :) I was 23 weeks along.
This is a close up but I haven't washed the quilt yet to make it look raggy. It was just too soft and I have this smallish fear of ruining it if I wash it.
Cox Family Pictures
During the Cox reunion Jerusha's friend took pictures for us which I don't have copies of yet. But I tried to get my own and a few extras here and there without any staging. This includes some good out takes and I just couldn't delete the duplicates. For some reason I missed Jerusha's family altogether.....not sure when that happened.
The story of Lance's life: always trying to entertain someone but Kimball got my genes in this regard. He's not easily amused by stupidity.
Sorry Al, I had to keep this one :)
Our family of 3.5 and me showing at 24 weeks
Play Date
When Bonnie and kids came home with Donna for a few weeks in July, I had Isom over for a play date with Kimball. I knew Bonnie needed sleep. Donna needed sleep. They both needed a break and Kimball needed someone to play with. Isom really didn't know what to do, all day. He really wasn't himself probably because he was with his strange cousin and in a new place and away from his mom. But Kimball loved it! The boys had lunch - peanut butter and jam sandwiches with homemade applesauce, followed by naps and playing in the pool outside. Isom wouldn't get in the pool at all and cried when I tried to put him in there. He borrowed some of Kimball's shorts for swimming and was totally intrigued by the drawstring on his shorts. That's all he needed, the drawstring. But it didn't stop Kimball from getting wet and playing by himself.
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)