Tag: moving

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Activities Family & Friends Health Household Mothering Uncategorized

Moved, Old Cell Phone, & My Thyroid

We are moved-finally.  I thought that would be it, but the fun is only just beginning.

We lived in our old place for 11 years, and it was clean- clean until we moved every last piece of furniture out, and took down every last picture.  How come I never noticed that the walls aren’t really white anymore, but more like a light gray, and where did all those crayon, and little dirty hand-prints come from? 

So now we have more work that we thought  on our hands to do as quickly as possible, so it is ready to rent.  We have managed to put away most of our stuff in the new house, so at least that is somewhat organized.    But until you move all your stuff into a new place, you never really know.  This new kitchen is bigger, but I can’t fit everything from the old kitchen into the new kitchen.  At least we have a basement for storage.

I also wanted to get the computer set up as quickly as possible, and called a few weeks ago to make sure Internet would be on.  It was, but they failed to tell me I needed a new modem.  So I had to wait for that to be shipped to me.  I kid you not- the computer had been up and running for five minutes, when my cell phone locked me out.  It has never done this before, and it is the only phone I have in the house.  It wanted a PKU code- whatever that is- it was locked on that screen.   I tried taking the battery out and resetting it, and it didn’t work. I looked for help on-line and T-Mobile said they would send me the code-to my cell phone!  That wasn’t going to help me, because the screen was locked waiting for the PKU code!

After posting my frustration on Facebook, I realized that the phone was still hooked up at the old house.  As soon as the boys woke up from their nap, I loaded them in the car and went back to the house to call T-Mobile.  The boys were running and playing  around, and every noise they made was amplified by about 500% in the empty house.  It was lovely trying to tell the nice lady at T-Mobile that I was at the end of my rope with this cell phone.  A few minutes later she had it unlocked, but could not tell me why it had locked up in the first place.

I really, really, wanted to take the phone and back over it with the Jeep.  But I needed a phone for tonight and tomorrow.  I didn’t think my phone was that old, but it is almost two years old, and I have been told any phone over six months old, is considered old.  Evidently, I have a dinosaur for a cell phone. 

It wasn’t that big of a deal when I had a land line at home too, but now since this is my only phone, I can’t have another day like today, and thank goodness there wasn’t an emergency.  So after work tomorrow, I am going to go cell phone shopping.  Time to say good-bye to the Nokia 6010. 

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I know what kind of phone I want- we’ll see if I end up with it.  🙂

If that wasn’t enough, I had a yearly exam today, and I was told my thyroid is enlarged and it needs to be checked, ASAP.  I asked the doctor what does that mean, and she said it shouldn’t be enlarged and something is causing it- hormones, stress, a growth, or in rare cases cancer.  She drew some blood to check my thyroid levels and said that would tell her in a few days some information, but I need to go get an ultrasound at the hospital so they can look at it.  I really think this is stress or possibly hormone related, so I am not going to dwell on it for now, but if you want to send some positive thoughts my way, I would appreciate it. 

I know I promised pictures of the house, but I can’t find the camera.  Maybe I can take some on my new cell phone and post them soon. 🙂

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Activities Family & Friends Holidays Me

New Year’s Eve

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Ever since having kids, I have not been out on New Year’s Eve.  In fact, I was doing well if I could even stay up until midnight, to ring in the new year at home. 

My kids are growing up, so I guess I get to go out again for New Year’s, and I am really excited about it.  I’m going with my sister, brother, and their spouses, and some of their friends.  Joe is going to have a boy’s night in, with Ryan and Cole.  I told them tonight I was going to go out, and they were going to have a party with Dad- I told them they could have some hot chocolate, and they just thought that was the best thing ever.  🙂 It is cute how sweet and innocent they still are. 

We are going to have dinner at a delicious restaurant in Cherry Creek that my sister used to work at, and her best friend is the manager there now.  Then we are going to go to a nice drinking place (bar) and say good-bye to 2008.

I don’t usually make New Year’s Resolutions, but I do get in mind some goals I would like to accomplish for the upcoming year.  The big one, is to finally get all our junk worldly possessions moved to the new house, and get our place rented, so we can finally finish up with all this house stuff. 

I also wanted to lose some weight, but due to the stress of trying to move all our worldly possessions to the new house, I lost some. That is always nice, but I do want to start a regular schedule of doing some exercise a few times a week. 

One other big goal is to not let the house fill up with so much junk- really.  I don’t know how it gets so accumulated, but it is really freeing to throw away and donate so much of the stuff that has piled up; stuff we never use.  Moving is good for a few things- one of which is getting your life de-cluttered  🙂 

I’d love to hear any other resolutions or goals everyone has- I might even be able to add a new one to my list.

Whatever you are doing on New Year’s Eve, be safe and enjoy.

Happy New Year!

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Activities Cole Family & Friends Holidays Household Mothering Parenting Ryan

Another Thrilling Update

I wish I had a brilliant or at least somewhat exciting update for you, but I don’t. 

We’ve been working on the house, and trying to get everything else done in daily life that must get done, like work, errands, parent, spend time with the boys, etc.  I still haven’t started packing yet, but that is soon to change.  Joe started bringing home boxes the other day, so now that fun chore is on my plate.

I really don’t mind, but there is always way more stuff you realize you have.  I am hoping we can donate or just get rid of the stuff we haven’t used in years, and be done with it.  Like the extra microwave that has been sitting the pantry now, for eight years.  If our microwave ever broke, we had a spare.  Except it hasn’t and we have had a microwave sitting in the pantry for eight years.

I usually blog at night- but I have been so tired physically and mentally, I think I have blogger’s block.  If you don’t see very many posts here in the upcoming weeks, I haven’t dropped off the face of the earth.  But with moving, fixing up the house, and the upcoming holiday season, I’m not sure how much time or motivation I will have to blog.  Please continue to check in- I know I’ll get my blogging mojo back eventually.  🙂  You can find me on Twitter, and I seem to be able to post 140 character items, much easier and regularly than actual blog posts these days.

I pinkie swear I will post pictures of the new house and the progress we have made.  Joe finished painting the boys’ rooms today, and he’s going to start on our bedroom tomorrow.  I placed the carpet order last week, and that should be installed right after Thanksgiving.  We are ordering our engineered hardwood flooring tomorrow.  We have decided on a honey hickory color which is a golden brown- not too dark or light.  We should have it around Thanksgiving.  It has to cure at room temperature for a week, so Joe should be able to install the floor, the beginning of December.

The brand we are getting has a locking system, so there is no need to glue or nail the pieces together.  Joe is optimistic he can install it in a few days, rather than a few weeks.  So it appears we are on schedule to move into the house by the end of December.  Not sure where we will end up having Christmas- in the old house, or the new one, but Ryan is already wondering about the tree this year, and how Santa will find us.  🙂  Cole has just been talking up a storm and telling us he wants Santa to bring him a dump truck.

I’m also trying to plan Ryan’s fifth birthday party, which always sneaks up on me, since it is just two weeks after Christmas.  I booked the venue this year in JULY- so that is set.  Now I just have to get save the dates out to people, and hope I’m not over the number of guests we are allowed to have.  Guess I had better double check on that.  Ryan of course, is just thrilled to be turning five.  I’m wondering where the time went, and how did my ‘baby’ become a little boy, who is just weeks away from being five years-old?

My mom is coming out for a visit the week of Christmas and will be able to spend an entire evening, and the next day with us.  I’m excited for that, and to be able to show her our new house.  Ryan and Cole are excited to bake cookies for Santa with Nana. 

So that is all we have been up to.  Stay tuned for another exciting update in the near future.  🙂

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Activities Household

Under Contract

If you remember a few months back in our house hunting,  we had found the one, but the sellers weren’t interested in selling it, so we were not able to get it under contract.

Since then, we have looked, looked, and looked some more at houses in the town we are currently living in, and also in nearby surrounding towns. We were coming up empty.  Either the houses were too small, needed major remodeling, or we just couldn’t find what we were looking for. 

I had an idea that house shopping would be like wedding dress shopping- you just know the minute you spot that perfect wedding dress.  I would see pictures of houses for sale on the Internet, and from the pictures they looked promising.  I knew the minute we drove up to a house, it would be the one. 

Uh, not really.  After two months, we were not finding what we wanted: a house that had- at least three bedrooms, a back yard on the bigger side, and room in the house to grow: translation- a basement, oh yeah, in our price range, in a neighborhood that we liked.

Evidently this is harder than I thought.  We found a house in August, that was almost the one.  It was in a nearby smaller town.  It was a few years old, but had only been lived in for a year.  It looked almost brand new.  We were really close to making an offer on it, but we hesitated.  It would have been fine for us now, but as the boys grew, it really didn’t have any more room to grow.  We both felt like we would outgrow it in five years, and it felt like we were settling for something we knew wasn’t right, but hoping it was.  

So we passed on it.  The evening we decided to pass on the house, I was checking the listings again, and a brand new listing caught my eye.  It was in the same neighborhood (that was our first choice) where we had tried to buy the first house.  We set up a showing right away.

While looking through the house, we both just knew it was the one.  It had everything we were looking for, with a few extras.  However, nothing is perfect.  The house was getting ready to be foreclosed, so it needed some work.  It needed to be cleaned, painted, new floors and carpet.  It needed a little more work than what we were hoping for, but that was the only negative.   

We made an offer a day later, which turned the deal into a short sale. This was in the middle of August, and we had to wait for the banks holding the mortgages on the house to approve our offer.  As of last week, we were still waiting.  We technically didn’t have a contract, because we didn’t want to start spending money on the inspection, mortgage application fees, etc., until we were sure the banks would approve the offer.

Last week, we were still waiting on the final bank holding the first mortgage, which is the no-brainer, because they would be paid in full.  We didn’t understand what was holding up their approval.  Turns out, they needed a signed contract to assure them, that the sellers really would be selling the house.  So as of last Thursday, we were officially under contract!

Hopefully the bank will get the approval processed- they already said they would, once we had a contract, and once they do that, we will close within 30 days.  But in the meantime, no one else can come along and make another offer on the house, while we wait for the bank. 

We are trying not to get too excited until we close (because you never know what can happen between now and then), but we definitely just got one step closer to moving.