Home Sweet Home!

It's done!!!  We can finally talk about it!  IT IS OURS!!!

Last week Todd and I signed the papers and picked up the keys to our very first house.  I tell you what, though, it was a huge struggle to keep this one quiet.  Everyday for the last two months I have wanted to shout it out to the heavens and everywhere below it that this was happening, but after the last time we tried to buy a house ended badly, we decided to keep this to a need-to-know situation.

In the end everything happened very quickly (even if the last three weeks seemed to drag on with one drama after another).  At the end of February my MIL e-mailed me a listing for a house in South Salem that she thought we might like.  The listing looked promising so I called Knipe Realty, a complete cold call based on an ad at the bottom of the listing.  For some reason they put me in touch with Nicole Greenspan in their Portland office (a HUGE God-send), and she made arrangements to meet with us and take us around to three or four other houses that Sunday.

Well, it turned out we didn't like the first house, or the second.  The third was nice, but a bit out of our price range.  After two more "definitely not" houses, she told us to keep the third house in mind, give her a few more details about what we wanted, and go and talk to a broker about financing.  She gave us the name of Nelson Lomax at Landmark Professional Mortgage, who just happened to be a customer of Todd's.  He called us that night and scheduled an appointment for that week.

After meeting with Nelson, and getting pre-approved, we decided to not lose momentum and scheduled a couple showings for Todd while I was out of town.  The first house he saw was a manufactured home in West Salem that had come through my e-mail a couple of times.  He told me flat out that he wanted me to look at the house when I got back and see what I thought.  A few days after I got back I walked into the house and from that point on all other houses paled.

A week later we made an offer and discovered that we were not the only ones coveting this beautiful home.  The seller put it to a bid and we came out the victors.  After that it was a matter of getting inspections, appraisals and paperwork all done.  We did discover that the house needed one thing done before we could close, but that was done fairly quickly.

As I said above, it was the last three weeks that were the real nail-biters.  We were supposed to close on April 30, but after major delays with the appraisers, Title, insurance, HUD, and our lender (whom I will lamb-baste in my mind for years to come) we were required to take out not one... not two... but THREE extensions in order to keep from losing the house.  Even with the extensions we still had a harrowing 11th-hour signing that nearly required Todd to take an extended lunch just so we could get everything buttoned up in time to get the keys on the last day of our final extension.  But you know what they say - all's well that ends well.  I never appreciated that phrase until now.  Nothing else matters now except the fact that we have the house!

Oh, you want to know about the house?  Okay, here it is.  The house is 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and 1,782 square feet.  It has vaulted ceilings and an open floor plan.  The kitchen is large with a wrap around counter and opens into the living room, dinning room and family room.  There is a fire place in the family room, ceiling fans in the family room, dining room, and master bedroom, and a WALK-IN CLOSET!  There is a separate utility room off of the kitchen that leads to the garage, which is split level to the house.  The back yard is uneven and needs to be re-fenced, but it has a perfect east-facing spot for a small garden.

I'm sure I will post pictures of my future remodeling of the house at later times.  But until then, thank you Lord, and everyone else who has had a hand in making this happen!

Greetings from Salem!

Wow!  Who knew that moving would take so much out of me that I would need to take an 8-month hiatus from blogging?  Well, to celebrate making it back to blogging, I have changed the look of the blog.

Our lives have been very eventful in the last eight months.  Here are a few high lights, month-by-month:

September - We arrived to fairly hot weather and were able to get some awesome family time in before Todd started his job and AJ started his new school.  Gordon and Scott (the FIL and BIL) helped us move and stayed one extra day.  The day they left my parents arrived to visit.  Two days after they left Chad and Jamie (BIL and SIL) arrived to visit.  What a wonderful time!

October - Todd started work, AJ started school, Gordy and I decided to "get lost" a lot in order to find our way around town without depending on GPS.  It only took us two weeks to stop using it.  Halloween was fun (the boys were Mario and Luigi) and we were able to sneak a trip down to Eureka to celebrate Ti Aula's birthday.

November - More adventures around town.  The leaves turned, so we were able to have some fun in the leaves.  Rain toward the end of the month provided Todd with his first challenge as a carrier: delivering mail in a flood.  Was able to host Thanksgiving with most of Todd's family (missed MIL).

December - Busiest month of the year!  I decided to bake goodies for Todd's co-workers 2-3 times a week, and apparently they liked them.  My parents surprised me by visiting the weekend before my birthday.  I cried like a baby (we are talking huge sobs) when I opened the door and saw them standing there.  The in-laws were here for Christmas and then a week later we traveled to Eureka to celebrate with my family.

January - The New Year was rung in while visiting family in Eureka.  After returning home the rest of the month was spent settling in to a routine and enjoying life.  Mommy and Gordy spent a lot of time at the YMCA and the biggest excitement of the month was the "new" bunk bed Daddy found while at work for $25.

February - Being a short month, it flew by very fast.  Uncle Scott and Mike and Justin all sneaked in visits at the beginning of the month, and the boys got to spend a bit of time at the Discovery Village.

March - This month was packed VERY full.  Between a quick trip to California for my niece's birthday, Easter, another visit from Mike and Justin, and AJ being invited to TWO birthday parties we were busy every weekend.

April - Finally, last month opened with a BANG!  AJ turned 6 and my parents surprised him with a special visit.  We celebrated all weekend by doing some of his favorite things and ended it with a party at his favorite pizza restaurant.  The rest of the month zoomed by.  As the temperatures started to rise we spent more time out of doors.  It culminated with a visit from our cousins, a trip to the Ag Fair, and a case of pneumonia for AJ.  Not the ending we would have chosen, but he is doing much better now.

28 Days of Nor Cal Adventures: Week 2

Ha ha ha!  I can't believe I thought I could keep up so much activity through the first week of school.  Wow!

Well, AJ started School (and I'll post those pictures later) and he loves it.  He had a great first day, a rocky 2nd day (luckily I was asked to stay and help out that day, cause he fell apart pretty fast), a fantastic 3rd day, and a not so great (but still okay) 4th day.  Over all, I think his first week of school was a success.

We started our packing process this week.  I am in the process of packing up our entire bedroom.  Not easy as it is the messiest in the house, so it was the obvious first choice.  Office is next.

Gordy is reeling from all of the changes and is emoting in some very extreme ways.  Tantrums are nothing compared to the acting out that this kid has been doing.  All our warfare is more like it.  His good days are the days we watch Little Miss.  At least on these days he has a playmate.

This weekend has started out rough with AJ catching his first cold of the season.  Luckily I was expecting it, so I am totally prepared.  With luck we will still have fun this weekend and he will be recovered for school on Tuesday.

Well, gotta go pack some more!

28 Days of Nor Cal Adventures: Day 5

DAY 5 (August 24th): Highland Park

This is the park from my childhood.  My grandmother lived near this neighborhood, so more often than not we found ourselves playing at this park as little kids.  The wooden structure in the above picture was brand new two decades ago and used to be the high light of the park.  Unfortunately, nostalgia is about all that recommends this park...for parents at least.

I find one thing very humorous, though.  Kids and parents have a whole different rating system for parks.  Kids are happy with any park that has slides, swings, or climbing sets.  It does not matter how clean or new they are.  This park had all of these things and was definitely NOT clean or new.  The boys had a blast.

The boys are getting a lot better at crossing the monkey bars.  Pretty soon they won't need Daddy's help.

The climbing spiral is always a favorite spot for the boys, no matter what park we go to.  If the park has a spiral the boys will spend at least five minutes climbing up and down it.

Gordy went down the Fireman's Pole for the first time all by himself.  I missed the first one because it happened so unexpectedly, but he was more than happy to do it many more times for the camera.

AJ had lots of fun.  Playing tag and hanging off of equipment that was finally tall enough for him to do so.

These three toys are actually about as old as, if not older than, I am.  I have seen pictures of myself playing on these exact toys when I was about Gordy's age.

28 Days of Nor Cal Adventures: Day 4

DAY 4 (August 23rd):  Babysitting Cousin & Garage Sale!

Well, I'm pretty sure Thursday was destined to be a not so adventurous day.  First of all, my niece came over to spend the day with us today.  We love our Little Miss, so it's not like it was a chore, but jealousy usually runs rampant on those days so I was expecting Gordy's attitude to be less than ideal.  And, of course, he did not disappoint.

My usual course of action is to get them outside, or if the weather is not great have them re-organize the toy drawers (a.k.a. taking everything out, mixing them up and then watch Mommy/Auntie put it all away). Well, the weather was okay, so after breakfast we headed outside.  We played on the swings, climbed on the playset and played with the balls.  While the kids we playing hide and seek I managed to get a swing to myself.  I was pumping away, and before I knew it I was swinging REALLY high!  Once the boys noticed they wanted me to push them really high.  No sooner had I sent AJ to fence top level than I felt my shoulder pop.  NOT COOL!  I managed to satisfy Gordy's swinging demand and them we all ambled back into the house.

Thank GOD Todd got home early!  He was able to do the heavy lifting and watch the kids while I managed to sort the rest of the baby clothes for the next adventure of the day: THE GARAGE SALE!

(BTW:  Little Miss will probably never allow Uncle Todd to "cuddle" with her again.  She learned "cuddle" is code word for nap.  Kudos to Uncle Todd for that success, though.)

The garage sale was more successful than we expected.  Seeing as it was Thursday, we didn't expect much, but we figured "Why not?".  We managed to sell a few items, so that was cool.  The boys entertained themselves by playing tag with Daddy, or showing browsers how the Total Gym Worked.

We are continuing the garage sale Friday and Saturday, so hopefully more stuff will be unloaded on these days.  Definitely going to at least a park during these days.

28 Days of Nor Cal Adventures: Day 3

DAY 3 (August 22nd)- Ross Park (M & 11th Streets)

On the suggestion of a friend, for Day 3 we went to Ross Park.  I learned later that my mother had babysat in this area as a teen and had taken her charges to Ross Park regularly, so this added a bit of nostalgia to our trip.  Of course there is little else that is nostalgic about Ross Park now.  Nearly everything at the park is new and improved!

Our first stop was the Monkey Bars.  AJ started it off, but got gun shy, so Gordy pushed his way to the front and barreled right on through with Daddy's help.  After that AJ was willing to make one more attempt, this time with Daddy helping a little bit (or giving him a wedgie!).

This was seriously the tallest slide I have seen in a while.  The day ended when Gordy fell over backwards from the bottom trying to get off.

Rock climbing!  This was a cool feature.

This is a balance board.  The key is to try to balance with no hands.  AJ attempted it, but decided he preferred the stability of using his hands.

I have said in the past that Gordy has a very odd "fear factor".  He is afraid of monsters, ghosts, spiders, bugs, carousels and loud noises.  Yet he has no problem climbing tall structures and hanging precariously by his hands until he can drop safely.  My odd little Dare Devil.

This is one of the only features in the park that is not new.  It is an old spring centered teeter totter.  It would be pretty difficult to launch anyone from this considering Todd needed to help the boys just to get it to go up and down.

Bottom line, we had a great time at this little park!

28 Days of Nor Cal Adventures: Day 2

DAY 2: Freshwater Park (August 21st)

This being a pretty busy week, I decided that the best options for getting us out of the house this week would be to simply go to a different park every day.  I really wanted to go to as many parks that we hadn't been to as possible.  I recalled a friend of mine mentioning going to Freshwater Park last week, so I picked this park for our first stop.

Gordy, of course, went right for the playset and slide.  This kid would live in a tree house with slides and swings if that were an option.  He had blast running around a new playset.

Next, both of the boys ran for the sandbox.  I don't think either of them had ever seen an actual sandbox before, so this was a WAY new experience for them.  AJ immediately wanted to make a sand castle, so that was pretty much it for him, until we went for the water.

We all noticed that one of the swings had been broken from the top.  Instead of a typical reaction of a "normal person" (which would be something like "ah, that sucks"), Todd thought "Hey, I can climb up there and fix that".  Well, it didn't work.  But his ability to shimmy up the pole inspired him to start doing pull-ups.

Gordy wanted to do pull-up too!

Finally we made it to the water.  The last time I had been to Freshwater Park was 8 years ago, and the swimming hole had still been under construction.  Never had I imagined that the swimming hole would be this nice.  It was awesome.  I felt bad for not bringing the boys' swim trunks (for like 30 seconds, until I remembered it was cold and over cast).  They still had fun and we did let them wade in the water for a little bit.  I promised them that the first Sunny day next week I will bring them back for a swim.

28 Days of Nor Cal Adventures: Day 1

Yesterday my oldest son finally asked me the question that I will probably get asked a million more times (but this was the first time).  "Mommy, how many days until we move?"

The answer both shocked and inspired me.  I counted it out and told him that we had about 30 days left in Eureka.  Of course he had to ask how many 30 days was, and I tried to explain it by showing him on the calendar.  In doing this I started to think that it would be cool to create a calendar to count down the days until we leave, except that might simply depress me, or worse, freak me out.  Instead another idea popped into my head.

I have been researching things to do with kids in Salem for over a month now, in an effort to build up excitement for the move.  Well, yesterday it finally occurred to me that there are actually a lot of things to do in Nor Cal that the boys have never, or rarely, done.  Why not do some of these things in the month leading up to our move.  My mom even gave me the idea for a scrap book just a few days ago.  So here we go with Day 1.

DAY 1 (August 5th) - Mad River Hatchery

I know, I know...I cheated.  But I hurt my neck on Sunday and didn't really want to leave the house yesterday, so I figured since we had already gone to the hatchery two weeks ago I had one "freebie".

After church on August 5th, my parents, my sister and her family, and our family all piled in our cars and drove to Blue Lake for a picnic at the Mad River Hatchery.  I hadn't been to the hatchery since I was in 3rd grade and no one else in our group had ever been until this year (my sister had taken her family for the first time the week before).  We have a family friend who works there, so the idea had crossed my mind to take the boys, but I just kept putting it off.  Then my sister went and I realized how much the boys would really love seeing all of those fish and getting to feed them.  So that was it.  No more putting it off.  We were going to do it.

It was a beautiful day for a picnic.  Sunny, light breeze, hot but not sweltering.  We were in heaven, until...  We got to the hatchery and the first thing I notice is the missing diaper bag.  I had run out the door after my youngest and had forgotten to go back in the house for the diaper bag after putting him in the van.  Silly Mommy!  Lucky for me my sister was willing to share my niece's diapers.  (Poor G!)

After lunch the real fun started!  We got to check out the fish (and the resident cat).  The baby fish were too little to feed, but they were still pretty active and interesting to watch.

                                  

The big fish were where it was at though.  There was a food dispenser that cost a quarter to feed the fish.  Not sure exactly what the money goes toward (probably keeping the facility open to the public).  Either way it is a worthy cause in my opinion.  And we definitely did our part to contribute.  I'm pretty sure we nearly drained that food dispenser.  Everyone, even the adults, was getting a kick out of watching the fish get excited over the food.  At one point the fish got so excited they actually broke a dividing board in the tank.  Todd fished it out so the maintenance guy could see it on his rounds.  I think everyone had a wonderful and memorable day.