Finally Settled

Now that the dust has settled, it's time for an update blog post!

So, last I wrote on May 6th, Nick had accepted a job with a law firm in Stevens Point. We spent the previous weekend refreshing the kitchen (painting the countertops, putting in a new sink and faucet, new knobs, cleaning the cabinets), painting the deck, and basically packing up half of what we own to stage the house.

We had our listing appointment on May 7th. We decided to go the flat-fee MLS route to get the best of both worlds, since we were all ready to go. The house was listed on my birthday, and we got three showings scheduled for May 10th. We received an offer (full asking price!) on May 12th. We countered over some minor details and they accepted our counter May 13th, asking for closing to occur in exactly one month. On May 14th, I took the day off and we left the kids with Nick's parents and toured eight houses in the Rapids/Point area. Found the one for us, on which we put an offer on May 16th. We accepted the counter and whew! What a heck of a week!

Did I mention Nick moved up to Waupaca to stay briefly while we were down in Madison and start his new job May 19th? At least at the end of that week, we had a mini-holiday planned to celebrate our 6th anniversary. We met up in Green Bay, left the kids with Nick's parents, then had a lovely weekend forgetting about everything while we were up in Sister Bay. Nick lost his wedding band at the state park at which we went hiking one morning. We were so fortunate to find it just sitting in the parking lot where it just slipped off his car trunk, after our third trip up to that park in a day. Definitely got use out of our day pass!

NOTE TO ALL POTENTIAL HOMEBUYERS: Learn from my mistake, and DO NOT change any part of your mortgage application before closing. NONE. I was offered and accepted a job in Rapids three days before our scheduled closing. I informed my company the next day (my last day in the office) that I would be leaving at the end of the month. The bank called to verify my employment THAT AFTERNOON. And suddenly, closing fell apart. I had to scramble to prove my new offer was real, and it had to go back into underwriting for verification. Argh, argh, argh. Things were going so well - we knew it was only a matter of time before the other shoe dropped.

Anyway, it worked out well - the house builder/seller allowed us to move in on Friday after we closed on the house in Madison, and we scheduled the new closing for a few days later. He's been so incredibly nice and helpful in this process - let us move in, got our appliances hooked up, and he's making fixes around the house for us as we find them.

We love, love, love our new house. Everything is just *nice*. Big beautiful rooms, an unfinished basement, plenty of dirt the kids can track inside... :o)

And I'm finding that living up here again is both good and bad...
I missed: Seeing awesome lightning storms, very little traffic, having family so close by
I didn't miss: Instant sinus infections, no Target, wonky cell phone reception (which we just fixed by switching. Yay for new phones! - Head's up, new phone numbers coming soon!)

As for the kids, Felix had his last day of 4K before we left Madison. How much things have changed! He insisted on wearing the same shirt, so you can see how much he's grown. Possibly even the same shorts. :o)

Felix: 4.5 yrs & Iris: 21 mos