Thursday, October 29, 2009
putting it back together
The drywall guys are here fixing the office. The flooring company came to measure. Brandon Stanger went home teaching with Chris last night--they did both of their sets of families. Then he came over to check out our damage and let us know he does this kind of thing every day and could likely get us a better price on stuff. sweet! I don't really know him well, and am sad about that. He seems really cool and just a happy energetic person. From what I know of his gorgeous wifey, Connie, she seems the same. What a fun couple! So, we're getting put back together. I was a tad embarrassed though. I spent yesterday playing with Ava in my free time. We had a tea party and then got ready for trunk or treating and then had girls over for cocoa after--because HOLY CRAP IT WAS COLD! My kitchen was a NIGHT.MARE when Brandon and Chris came back-as I hadn't gotten to it yet. Well I'll post some photos soon of this mess and the journey of fixing it.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
aaaaaaand....rant
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! I am being email stalked by a Listing Agent that we chose not to hire. Every week he sends me emails with something negative about my listing, and snooty commentary eluding to how we should have hired him, and then ends it with, "good luck" or..."just trying to help." It's kind of like bashing someone and then ending with "bless his heart!" Hey, insulting me on a bi-weekly status doesn't make me regret NOT hiring you. It really just reaffirms that following my gut was right, because you're jerkier than I thought! GA!
*end rant*
*end rant*
Sunday, October 25, 2009
3rd time's a charm
So after 2 no shows, the buyers agent from Herriman finally came through, yesterday at 11:34. I hope we are able to get some feed back on what his clients thought.
Vic from Alpine said we're all dried out and took the fans. I wasn't going to go to church--as Simon and I usually end up in the smelly nursing lounge for most of church anyway. But we all packed up and went anyway. I figured if he needed to feed, I'd just come home. Well, we got there, and it turned out the special needs mutual was doing our sacrament meeting. It was so phenomenal. How amazing to have a mutual where they can meet, be accepted as who they are and have fun together. the whole time I wondered...how different life in PA would have been for my sister if she would have had a place to go like that every week. A place to shine. A place to be seen as the incredible girl she is. She's grown so incredibly much over the years. No one expected much of her at all, and now she's in her senior year of college, handling a work load that would give me nightmares. She talks about Masters degree soon too. Incredible. They sang this song called Someday, written by their YM president. It spoke of how someday they would see, speak, think and hear like "you" and how someday kneel at the Father's feet and be told well done. I couldn't hold in the tears. Ava was concerned that water was coming from my face...but I just held her tighter. Such wonderful happy people.
After church, we drove down to moms for October-birthdayfest. Pam, Russ and Mom all have October birthdays. It was great fun! We did a huge salad dinner--everyone brought their favortie salad stuff and we share. I love these dinners. You can eat multiple salads if you want, and not walk away feeling gross. You know that you're eating well. We got mom Nightmare Before Christmas, and ava insisted that she watch it RIGHT AWAY. After the movie we played Quiddler. FUN FUN GAME! must be a new cabin game for sure! The Godfreys would rock this game. i can only imagine Meesh and Eric battling it out.
Well I'd better get upstairs to meet senor adjuster--hopefully he's feeling generous.
Vic from Alpine said we're all dried out and took the fans. I wasn't going to go to church--as Simon and I usually end up in the smelly nursing lounge for most of church anyway. But we all packed up and went anyway. I figured if he needed to feed, I'd just come home. Well, we got there, and it turned out the special needs mutual was doing our sacrament meeting. It was so phenomenal. How amazing to have a mutual where they can meet, be accepted as who they are and have fun together. the whole time I wondered...how different life in PA would have been for my sister if she would have had a place to go like that every week. A place to shine. A place to be seen as the incredible girl she is. She's grown so incredibly much over the years. No one expected much of her at all, and now she's in her senior year of college, handling a work load that would give me nightmares. She talks about Masters degree soon too. Incredible. They sang this song called Someday, written by their YM president. It spoke of how someday they would see, speak, think and hear like "you" and how someday kneel at the Father's feet and be told well done. I couldn't hold in the tears. Ava was concerned that water was coming from my face...but I just held her tighter. Such wonderful happy people.
After church, we drove down to moms for October-birthdayfest. Pam, Russ and Mom all have October birthdays. It was great fun! We did a huge salad dinner--everyone brought their favortie salad stuff and we share. I love these dinners. You can eat multiple salads if you want, and not walk away feeling gross. You know that you're eating well. We got mom Nightmare Before Christmas, and ava insisted that she watch it RIGHT AWAY. After the movie we played Quiddler. FUN FUN GAME! must be a new cabin game for sure! The Godfreys would rock this game. i can only imagine Meesh and Eric battling it out.
Well I'd better get upstairs to meet senor adjuster--hopefully he's feeling generous.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
i don't get the joke....
So right after I finished my update blog this morning on the progress of our flood clean up, Staceyroo-our Realtor, called to say that a buyers agent called to schedule to see our home and was excited to show his buyers around. She filled him in on our situation, and he was insistent that his buyers could look past the torn up kitchen and basement rooms. They set the appt for tonight between 6-7. I cried. I couldn't imagine having the house viewed in its current state. 1/2 the kitchen floor is gone, the carpet has a fan blowing under it, with 1/2 the pad gone...it looks like a wave pool...and the basement office is missing insulation and drywall. Chris got off work early, and Angie was amazing and took Ava. We spent the next 3 hours cleaning the house and rearranging furniture. All the living room stuff went back into the garage--no easy task I assure you. Those couches are sooooooooooooooo heavy! With the generosity of our neighbors, the home smelled of "Skinny Dippin" my favorite scentsy flavor, on every floor. Aside from the 'ride the wave' carpet, and 1/2 kitchen floor missing, the house was as set as it would be any day. washed windows, vacuumed floors, dusted every inch, blah blah blah. We went to Angies to wait out the clients coming by. 7,8,9...NOTHING. NO ONE. Stacey called the agent to find out what had happened and to give him an update on professional courtesy, but only got his voicemail. SERIOUSLY, I understand things happen in the real estate world...but you know my house has gone through hell, and yet you insisted on scheduling an appt. AT LEAST CALL TO CANCEL!!!!! What would Miss Manners say? At the end of the day Chris says "I EVEN VACUUMED THE STAIRS!" and "EH, at least our house is clean---considering." So, bring it on world. What else you got for me?
1 of many updates to come i'm sure
So...this morning Alpine Restoration came back to check on the progress of things. The fans and dehumidifiers have been running since about 11am yesterday. So far?
The vinyl needs ripped out of the kitchen. Which means it will be ripped out of the bathroom and hallway and laundry area too. The baseboards will come off as well. They are hoping that the walls will continue to dry upstairs.
Basement progress. The wall that the water ran down is an exterior wall=insulation. He's concerned about that. Insulation doesn't dry out as well as sheetrock and they may need to take out that wall to avoid it growing mold. YUCK! and the drop part of the ceiling in the basement is still wet, so they are going to put a fan under it to see if it'll dry out by tomorrow. if not that goes too. deep breathing. deep breathing.
The vinyl needs ripped out of the kitchen. Which means it will be ripped out of the bathroom and hallway and laundry area too. The baseboards will come off as well. They are hoping that the walls will continue to dry upstairs.
Basement progress. The wall that the water ran down is an exterior wall=insulation. He's concerned about that. Insulation doesn't dry out as well as sheetrock and they may need to take out that wall to avoid it growing mold. YUCK! and the drop part of the ceiling in the basement is still wet, so they are going to put a fan under it to see if it'll dry out by tomorrow. if not that goes too. deep breathing. deep breathing.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
and the floods came up
This morning, I woke to Chris screaming my name. I wandered down the stairs in a slumber, assuming he'd run out of toilet paper or something. Instead, as I reached the living room, my eyes shot open as my feet were WET! The kitchen and living room were flooded. Chris yelled something about tape and I rummaged to find the duct tape. The line for our ice maker had burst and spent the last 7 hours or so flooding our house. I called Alpine Clean up in Kaysville and they showed up about an hour later. Chris had shopvac out house for 2 hours by that point, and sucked up like...over 20 gallons of water. IN.SANE. I'm glad we called them. They put up giant fans and dehumidifiers. tore out the padding of the carpet. checked the walls. they'll be able to tell us later in the day how much will need actual replacing. all i can say is...yeay for homeowners. They said it could take a couple of days. So...I have a baby, a kid with a chest infection--on antibiotics so not contagious, but still has a horrendous sounding cough and a torn apart house. what was it sister jolly always told us at rehersal...LOOK FOR THE TRIALS...EMBRACE THEM! IT MEANS YOU'RE ON THE RIGHT TRACK.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
witchtastic
Friday night, Sandi invited me to join her and the gals for witches night out. I almost didn't have a costume, other than a sparkly hat, but Aaron saved the day by buying 2 dresses for NAT, one of which was too big for her...but fit me. yeay! With some fishnets from mom, and shoes from nat, tada! I was a witch. The most fun part was getting everyone witch-a-fied. Katie met up with us too. She drove like a bat out of hell to get down from Logan in time. All in all--it was a pretty cool night. Freezing. and far too many people-some of whom were not dressed in even a witch hat, but fun! The bread bowls were amazing! I wanted to post with more pictures, but I didn't have a camera, and Becca hasn't posted hers yet. *hint.hint* Marcy took the one I have posted. Thanks Marcy <3 Yeay for dressing up! Next year, we're going to throw our own party. With Caramel apples that don't stick to the paper and cider, and lots of dressing up! yeay for feeling 19 again.
p.s. false eyelashes itch like cr*A*zy, but totally worth it.
discouraged
This weekend we were invited to my parents' timeshare in Park City. We got up, packed and left the house in perfect condition. every.light.on. The forecast said it was going to be sunny and mid 70s. I was so excited and sure that droves of home buyers would go through our home. Much to my dismay, however, not a single realtor stopped by our home. It's been 2 weeks, and only one realtor has brought their buyers through our home. I've looked online, and our photos outshine our competition and our price is dead on. I'm not sure what more to do. It's not so nerve wracking to keep things nice, as It's becoming pure routine. Get up, make beds, wash dish, wipe counters, clean windows....blah blah blah. I know it's not realistic to want my home to be sold by week 2, but I'm really discouraged that people aren't even coming by. Chris says I need to not give up, because we know this is what the Lord is guiding us to do. I'm just not a very patient person at all. I put it up on KSL, but craigslist is scary to me, so I've not listed it there. Craigslist used to be a cool place to list things, now it's a place to be scammed, in my opinion. Anyway...that's all I really needed to get out.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
another midnight..another random blog
so for over a week the kids have been having really strange sleep patterns. Up late, then waking up at 2 hour intervals, and napping opposite of eachother...pretty much causing me to get just enough sleep to clench the sanity I have left. Then, today...Ava fell asleep at 7 and Simon went down about 9...so Chris and I watched a movie together...and about 10:45 headed to bed. And after being exhausted for days...I find myself lying there...eyes WIDE open and brain churning away. WHAT?!?! It's almost 12:30am and I'm suddenly fully awake. Is this some kind of voodoo karma?
A few good things did come from this however. I got to chat with an old college buddy. I was roaming my obsurdly large list of Facebook friends and writing on people's walls that I don't typically visit. I wrote on my old friend's wall--you should say hello facebook hater. A few minutes later...he wrote hello on my wall. We struck up a facebook chat and caught up for a few minutes on our lives. Alex was my "brother" from freshman year of college. He, Julie, Jennie, and I got to be really close. He started dating Anna and stayed close friends with us, which was really cool. Iw as also close to his roomies Booker an dCraig. Alex married Anna my sophomore year. Then, I left BYU-I and lost touch with him and Craig and Booker. Thanks to facebook, I have reconnected with Craig and now Alex. He was telling me about their soon to be 2 year old son, and it sounds like I'd better gear up for an adventure. Simon is 7 months already. SEVEN MONTHS! Soon, it will be him that's nearly causing his own concussion.
Anyway, it was great to hear from him and catch up. I love talking to my old group of friends. It makes me realize that I'm still in here somewhere. Beyond the week old ponytail, sweatpants, and stench of baby spit up....deep deep down, I'm still here. I may not be able to digest FRANKS anymore (so.so.sad) and need to have a couple tums as dessert...and need to use spell check on words and sometimes (eek) grammar...but a part of me is still here. And, if you're a mom, you're probably with me here when I say...that's DARN GOOD TO KNOW! I feel lost sometimes. Like, the girl I've always been is gone and I don't know the person on the other side of the mirror...but someone should get her a hairbrush and some facial cleanser. yikes! Ok well enough rambling. I'm going to lie back down now and force myself to relax.
A few good things did come from this however. I got to chat with an old college buddy. I was roaming my obsurdly large list of Facebook friends and writing on people's walls that I don't typically visit. I wrote on my old friend's wall--you should say hello facebook hater. A few minutes later...he wrote hello on my wall. We struck up a facebook chat and caught up for a few minutes on our lives. Alex was my "brother" from freshman year of college. He, Julie, Jennie, and I got to be really close. He started dating Anna and stayed close friends with us, which was really cool. Iw as also close to his roomies Booker an dCraig. Alex married Anna my sophomore year. Then, I left BYU-I and lost touch with him and Craig and Booker. Thanks to facebook, I have reconnected with Craig and now Alex. He was telling me about their soon to be 2 year old son, and it sounds like I'd better gear up for an adventure. Simon is 7 months already. SEVEN MONTHS! Soon, it will be him that's nearly causing his own concussion.
Anyway, it was great to hear from him and catch up. I love talking to my old group of friends. It makes me realize that I'm still in here somewhere. Beyond the week old ponytail, sweatpants, and stench of baby spit up....deep deep down, I'm still here. I may not be able to digest FRANKS anymore (so.so.sad) and need to have a couple tums as dessert...and need to use spell check on words and sometimes (eek) grammar...but a part of me is still here. And, if you're a mom, you're probably with me here when I say...that's DARN GOOD TO KNOW! I feel lost sometimes. Like, the girl I've always been is gone and I don't know the person on the other side of the mirror...but someone should get her a hairbrush and some facial cleanser. yikes! Ok well enough rambling. I'm going to lie back down now and force myself to relax.
Monday, October 12, 2009
To view our full listing with all the pictures...just click here
It's been almost a full week. We've had one agent come through--Saturday. He says it shows very well, is clean and bright...lots of thumbs up. His clients wanted a fully fenced bigger yard though. At least, at least I know that the negative we received wasn't really something I could change. Sure, we could throw money at a fence, but it wouldn't change the size of the yard...and we don't have the budget for that anyway. Also, I'd miss the ease I can get to Hilary...not sure she would ;) but something about seeing Kate at that window .... makes my day!
A lot of people think now that our house is perfect, that I'd want to stay more....but it's the opposite. Now that we've got it looking great, I'm wishing we were already gone, before Ava or I mess it up. I'm a clutz and I do before I fully think things through, and Ava is an artist and has the need to draw. Not sure where she finds pens and crayons, because it can take me a good 20 minutes to track one down, but I'm actually having nightmares of her painting the walls and kids invading our home with muddy shoes. I don't do well living under such extreme clean rules. I'm not a slob, I hope...but having to have things perfectly in place 24/hours a day is nerve wracking to me. It's hard on Ava too. She's learning good habits though--making her bed--so cute to watch! And cleaning up what little toys she has here, before moving to the next activity.
We know this is a move we are meant to make. The Lord is calling us elsewhere. Yesterday, they were talking about the saints being called to move just as soon as they'd get their homes settled...to colonize new parts of Utah...and I just kept thinking over and over, that's kind of what we're going through. We just put SO much money into this house with the basement and such, and as soon as the last project was finished, Chris comes home and announces it's time to switch gears completely in our lives...throw out the plan and start anew. Usually, something like that would make me sick for days as I plan and replan etc, but I felt it was true, and kicked our butts into high gear getting things ready. I'm sad to leave our area, but I feel we'll be back perhaps..I really want Ava to attend Eve's preschool. We're still going to be close for playdates etc...it's just time for Chris to be able to move on with his life professionally and scholastically. It's going to be a growth period for all of us....now I'm learning my constant lesson...patience. May there be enough to get me through this ;)
It's been almost a full week. We've had one agent come through--Saturday. He says it shows very well, is clean and bright...lots of thumbs up. His clients wanted a fully fenced bigger yard though. At least, at least I know that the negative we received wasn't really something I could change. Sure, we could throw money at a fence, but it wouldn't change the size of the yard...and we don't have the budget for that anyway. Also, I'd miss the ease I can get to Hilary...not sure she would ;) but something about seeing Kate at that window .... makes my day!
A lot of people think now that our house is perfect, that I'd want to stay more....but it's the opposite. Now that we've got it looking great, I'm wishing we were already gone, before Ava or I mess it up. I'm a clutz and I do before I fully think things through, and Ava is an artist and has the need to draw. Not sure where she finds pens and crayons, because it can take me a good 20 minutes to track one down, but I'm actually having nightmares of her painting the walls and kids invading our home with muddy shoes. I don't do well living under such extreme clean rules. I'm not a slob, I hope...but having to have things perfectly in place 24/hours a day is nerve wracking to me. It's hard on Ava too. She's learning good habits though--making her bed--so cute to watch! And cleaning up what little toys she has here, before moving to the next activity.
We know this is a move we are meant to make. The Lord is calling us elsewhere. Yesterday, they were talking about the saints being called to move just as soon as they'd get their homes settled...to colonize new parts of Utah...and I just kept thinking over and over, that's kind of what we're going through. We just put SO much money into this house with the basement and such, and as soon as the last project was finished, Chris comes home and announces it's time to switch gears completely in our lives...throw out the plan and start anew. Usually, something like that would make me sick for days as I plan and replan etc, but I felt it was true, and kicked our butts into high gear getting things ready. I'm sad to leave our area, but I feel we'll be back perhaps..I really want Ava to attend Eve's preschool. We're still going to be close for playdates etc...it's just time for Chris to be able to move on with his life professionally and scholastically. It's going to be a growth period for all of us....now I'm learning my constant lesson...patience. May there be enough to get me through this ;)
Monday, October 5, 2009
OUR HOUSE IS OFFICIALLY FOR SALE!
We are listed with Stacey Bowman 801.390.1718 Exit Realty for $178,900. None of the basement was photographed, but it was professionally finished, and has an office, theater room, and gorgeous bathroom-complete with a shower that pretty much makes you feel like your in a Tahitian Water Fall. Also, we have the greatest neighbors you could ever hope for!
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