Cheers to the Drama Free Christmas!!

That's my wish anyway...

I was just thinking that it was a pretty uneventful holiday season, which is probably what jinxed me, when I found out a few days before hand, that my father in law was going in for surgery-- an out patient procedure-- on his shoulder. While he was getting the once over the nurse asked him about his oxygen saturation levels, which were low. He told her that she was the 2nd person to ask him about that recently so he asked the anesthesiologist about it and was told that he should be tested for sleep apnea, etc, when he's feeling better. Then after surgery they decided to keep him over night because of how low his sat's were. So they settled him onto a room and started to run a bunch of tests. Found that he has a partially collapsed lung that he wasn't aware of. Which was why he was so winded and couldn't keep his sat's up. He ended up staying two days and coming home with oxygen.

Then Kelly came home sick on Friday, and Cameron also woke up sick on Friday. Cameron was with my sister for two days because she watched him while I went to sit with my mother in law during the surgery, then she decided to keep him an extra day to give me some me time. Which I cleaned. lol Poor Brenda is sick now too. :(

So I've had two sick kids for the weekend, and my cute, adorable 8 month old dog we just got, went into heat!!! As if I didn't have enough to deal with already. It's been so long since I've had a dog, I had to look up how long their in heat for: IT'S 3 WEEKS!!!! She's been bleeding all over my house! And I can't get her fixed until she goes out of heat!! I just hope she's done by Christmas!!!

Which as it turns out, we are going to be having here.
And, I've been baking cookies all weekend and trying to finish my sister's Christmas present! I'm not even half way done yet and less than a week to try and finish it. I might be giving it to her with what I have done and taking it back to finish it and then giving it back to her.

I got a bunch of packages in the mail today, so once I wrap them, I am caught up again. I'm trying to keep it as stress free as possible. lol

Oh and hey, I tried to make some peppermint hard candies, and the first little bit was fine, but I had to keep putting it back in the oven, and it got a bunch of air bubbles in it and made wrapping it around a wooden spoon (for the curl effect) very hard. It kept breaking apart where all the bubbles were. It was the first time I have ever made candy so I don't know what I did wrong. If anyone out there does, please let me know. THANKS!!!

Here is the recipe, it was super easy until the bubbles happened. lol Even with the bubbles, it's still really good!!

HARD CANDY PEPPERMINT TWISTS

1 Cup Water
1 Tbsp White Vinegar
2 Cups Sugar
1 1/2 tsp Peppermint Extract
1/8 tsp Red Food Coloring

Coat two 9-in. square baking pans with nonstick cooking spray; set aside. (Do not use butter or foil to prepare pans.)

In a heavy saucepan over medium heat, combine water and vinegar. Add sugar. Cook and stir until sugar is dissolved and mixture comes to a boil, about 8 minutes.
(If sugar crystals are present, cover saucepan for 1 1/2 to 2 minutes to allow steam to wash crystals down.)
Cook, without stirring, until a candy thermometer reads 300 (hard-crack stage), about 26 minutes.

Combine extract and food coloring. Remove syrup from heat; stir in peppermint mixture until well blended. (mixture will bubble up slightly.) KEEP FACE AWAY FROM MIXTURE AS ODOR IS STRONG. Immediately and carefully pour into prepared pans (Do not scrape sauce pan or tilt pans to spread mixture evenly.) Cool for 1 1/2 to 2 mintues.

Using a sharp knife, score candy into 1/2-in. to 3/4-in. wide pieces, about 3-in. long. Place both pans in a warm oven (150 or your ovens lowest temp) for at least five minutes or until candy is warm enough to cut but cool enough to handle. Using a heavy duty kitchen scissors, cut along scored lines, one piece at time. Immediately wrap each piece around the handle of a wooden spoon; remove candy and place on waxed paper to harden. Continue cutting wrapping until mixture in pan begins to harden. Return pan to oven for at least 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, remove second pan from oven. Cut and wrap as before until mixture begins to harden. Return to oven and repeat with first pan. Repeat until all mixture is cut and formed into twists.

YIELDS about 1/2 pound.

(it was in the returning to oven process that I got all the bubbles.) but it's still yummy!!

The Joys of Christmas

Normally I really do love this time of year. With this weird weather we're having I am just not feeling at all Christmas-y. I put up my tree. I even went and got it from my mother in law's house all by myself. She wanted a smaller tree for her house so she gave me her old one. I love it. I've done it with red ornaments and white lights. Very pretty. Anyway, I've put up a tree, a few wall decorations and that's it. No outside lights, no lights anywhere else in the house. It just doesn't feel like Christmas yet. Maybe that's why.

One a plus side, Pat and I finished all our Christmas shopping in one day! And we even squeezed in a movie!! We got Pat's present while at Best Buy, and he's been like a little kid ever sense. "I better hook it up and make sure that it works properly", "If we wait until Christmas and it doesn't work it'll be too late to take it back," "It's only got like a week return policy, I'd better hook it up now and make sure that it's ok." He even suggested that I hook it up and then have somewhere I have to go for awhile and leave him here to "not" play with it! lol

I had to order my present today. And BONUS, I got free shipping and no tax!! Go Me!! LOL I am getting really good at finding deals on line. I think that means that I shop online too much! Not like I'll stop anytime soon. It's just so easy!

On other news, we got a dog. Her name is Dixie -- most days. lol I sometimes call her Daisy, not sure why, she is an 8 month old Border Collie. She is so cute and fun! She is just full of energy. When the wind blew leaves across the yard she was in heaven running after them and chasing them. And when it snowed, she was scared to go out, until we showed her that its ok to go out in it. That it won't hurt her. Then she had a blast!! Nose down in the snow, flipping it up into the air and trying to catch it.

I'm wrapping all the presents we have here tonight so that they are all done and I don't have to worry about it. The only other person I have to buy for is my dad. He likes coin stuff so I have to go to the coin store for his, but other than him, we are completely done!! YAY!!!

So why am I not more in a holiday mood?? Good question, but I am going to assume it's the weather. I don't like gray days. And it's hard to think Christmas when it's so warm outside. I could never live somewhere where it never snows in the winter. I don't mind visiting, but I like the differences in the seasons. And it's just too warm. Which in a way is good, because our car does not go in the snow at all, and with Pat driving to work everyday, it's better for us this way. But I hope that it does snow in time for Christmas, so we can have a white Christmas. lol

And of other news, I dyed my hair red, only it went ORANGE!!! I have orange hair. It's like Anne of Green Gables red, or maybe the Wendy's 'Wendy' orange. Even Pat doesn't like it. So I guess I live with it for a few weeks and try to fix it. I would post a pic, but it would embarrass me too much. lol

A few classic's revisited

So lately I have been reading as much as possible. And I have to say that although I have new authors I love, the classics will always be my favorites. Such as "Jane Eyre", "Pride and Prejudice", "Persuasion", and "Sense and Sensibility" to name a few. (Yes I am aware that I love Jane Austen.)

The other day I was browsing the Barnes and Noble website and found some books for my Nook. The titles were interesting enough to peek my interest. Such as "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" I mean COME ON!! Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth and Zombies!!! How could that not sound good to read!! So I bought it! And I laughed so hard!!! Pat read it after me, and he said that in the parts that it was Jane Austen's words or part of the story he was bored silly. Where as I love the book so I wasn't. In essence, the book that I bought was Jane Austen's work with Seth Grahame-Smith adding in zombies.

I mean the first sentence went from: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife." (and yes I remembered that from my memory I have read it that many times.)
To: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be want of more brains." (I had to look this one up.)

How can you not buy that book!!

So I started to look around, and although I want "Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters" I haven't gotten it yet. But I did just get "Little Vampire Women" and another version of "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" that is written by another guy and is mostly his work based loosely off Ms. Austen's novel. And my dad recently gave me "Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter" which I haven't read yet but I am going to. It's by the same Seth guy. Who incidentally is going to write Tim Burton's "Dark Shadows" starring another of my fav's, Johnny Depp.

And some more fun facts, "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" is going to be made into a movie!! That I really want to see, though the book was full of blood and guts so I am sure that the movie will be too. I just hope they don't make it a 'serious' movie like the original movies are.

While looking for the covers of these books I found one titled "Jane Slayer"!!!! I so HAVE TO HAVE that book!!! I just hope it's as good!!

I'll have to let you all know after I finish them all how they were. But I am going into these with a 'that's completely ridiculous' attitude and so I am sure that I will enjoy them immensely.

My friends

EDIT:  I was getting too many hits on just this one entry so I changed the name of it from friends to what it is.... I don't really know why 77 people have decided to look at this one post... I also removed the friends logo because 132 people from mostly other countries has no need to view my blog. lol

So I was thinking the other day and I decided that I miss several of my very good friends. I miss people that I would rather not be friends with. I miss friends who are gone and can never come back- no matter how much I wish they could. It's not like I don't have any friends,I have friends, if you go by my facebook page, I have 183 friends. Though, admittedly a good portion of those are my family and some are people I don't know at all BUT I still have 183! It just feels lately like I don't have any.
I read a quote the other day and it totally fits.
"The trouble is not really in being alone, it's being lonely. One can be lonely in the midst of a crowd, don't you think?"
"Sometimes I can go into the mountains and stay by myself for days, weeks, and I'm not lonely, yet at a party surrounded by a hundred people, I am more lonely than ever."

And I must say that I know how that feels. Lately, since we've moved in, I feel very lonely. I have friends around, yet I still feel lonely. I don't know why all the sudden moving back to the place I grew up would make me feel lonely but it has. I hardly ever saw any of my friends where we lived before but I didn't feel as isolated as I do now. Even when I'm with family I still feel lonely. Some days my house is like Grand Central Station, but it doesn't change how I feel. I'm sure that this too will pass, my hope is that it does soon.

And now the unpacking...

Confession...
There hasn't been that much unpacking.... I unpacked the important things, and now we have boxes in the basement that are still sitting there full... I didn't want to be one of the tons of people that said, "oh I've been in my house for 4 years and still have boxes that need unpacking" Yeah, I'm pretty sure that if after 4 years I STILL have boxes-- they're getting thrown in the garbage! My problem is that once they made it to the corners of the basement, I just don't think about them anymore. The family area where the TV is is all cleaned and livable, but I still have boxes waiting to go into my office and Pat's man cave is nothing but boxes because I need to go in there and paint but I haven't done it yet. Why? Glad you asked. Because I don't want to. That's why. I only had two very small rooms to paint and I painted mine, and am not in the mood to do the other one yet. Plus I have a really big dining room table that isn't wearing it's legs on it's side in front of the man cave. See it was supposed to go in the storage room until we need it this Thanksgiving, but it's too heavy for me to move by myself and Pat's always tired when he comes home so I stuck it in front of his door hoping that he'd feel like helping me move it sooner and guess what? It's been there for 2 weeks now. So much for that brilliant plan. Maybe one of these days I can get him to help me move it on in to the storage room. I ran my foot over twice while trying to move it just to where I moved it to. I also plan on going into the storage room and reorganizing everything that's already in there because when we moved in things were just thrown in there and now its a big huge mess and I hate going in there. So I need to fix that and just haven't yet. Cause I'm being lazy on that one...;) And other than learning the noises of our house, (the pipes for the sprinklers make this horrible banging noise when they shut off and they were set for 530am- for the first few days we wondered if someone was banging on the side of the house, it was not fun!) I love the house. The neighborhood is fairly quiet and we've even used the fire pit for some dutch oven cooking and roasting marshmallows. Good times!

FINALLY!!!!!

We got our house!!!! I am so excited!!! I got to get the keys today!!! They are recording this morning and then they will call me to meet me there and hand over the all important keys!!! I also have to get the power in our name today before they close so that they don't shut the power off for the weekend. That would suck but certainly wouldn't stop me from moving in. I'm going to be going up there today and tomorrow and painting two of the rooms. Just because we're not blue people and the rooms were painted blue.

I am just so excited!!! I need to run to get ready for the day. It's going to be a busy and full day!!!

Almost there....

A few things I've learned through this whole experience.

1. Never go through the bank we are using to buy a house!
2. It's better not to buy a modular home if you can help it. I love our house, but if I had known all the inspections it's had to go through- I might have passed on it all together. Or at the very least added more time into all our "deadlines".
3. Deadlines are just dates that are put on the paper to scare you into doing things when they want it, but no one else has to follow them or adhere to them. (Except maybe the sellers too??)
4. They made the buying of a house almost impossible since the economy crashed that it's not a good time to buy, even though everyone keeps saying that it is.
5. I may never sell my house, (unless it's like childbirth and you 'forget' all the bad because of the potential good) because this process has been a nightmare!
6. Trying to pack with a 3 year old going behind you trying to pull everything out is a pain in the butt!!


Our good news we got the other day turned out not to be so good after all. The insurance company after telling us that they would insure us and that they were all good to go and everything, the next day they told our processors that they wouldn't insure us for the full loan amount, after we had asked them that specifically. So we ended up calling the guy who is insuring it right now, cause we knew that he'd insure it for us now, and we ended up getting an even better rate for our house, but our car insurance did go up about 10 dollars. BUT we have better coverage on the car so I'm not all that upset.
And so now here we sit.... 3 days past our financing deadline and we still have no answers. Everyone (our families and Realtor) is telling us it's fine and that they are scheduling our closing (tomorrow morning) and our final walk through,(tonight)and everything like we're closing on Wednesday- which is tomorrow- even though the bank hasn't given us the final YES that we want to hear.
I really hope they all know what they are doing. I think at this point if for some strange reason we didn't get the house, my Realtor would go postal on the bank.
Honestly, the underwriters have had our completed file since Friday morning- Does anyone how long does it take for them to look it over one more time, since they've looked it over twice before, and decide. What really irritates me is that the bank and the underwriters knew all along the dates of our deadlines and they keep procrastinating until they've passed all our deadlines. So are the deadlines only for the buyers and sellers, but not the financial institutions??
Everyone keeps saying that if we weren't going to get the loan that we wouldn't have gotten this far, yet the people who tried to buy the house first couldn't buy it because their financing fell through at the last minute. Does that mean that they got this far to be told no? What is 'the last minute' really? I just don't have answers to these questions but because of those questions I can't relax very well.
I may add another post after this one today if and that's a big IF, we actually get an answer from the bank today!!

Finally some good news...

Ok, so today we ended up getting some good news, just not the news we really want. We got a really good deal on our home owners insurance. YAY!!! And it went really easy and the lady there was super nice and fast. AND SHE CALLED BACK WHEN SHE SAID SHE WOULD!!! My poor Realtor is sick of dealing with the bank and the underwriters. She'll call them with something, and not hear back for hours- sometimes not for days. She got so sick of this that she called both the girls who are working on our loan, then emailed them, and then faxed them. And guess what... She received a call back. The second inspection was done this morning and now we've heard that it's under review and so *HOPEFULLY* we will have an answer today!! I know, I know... but I can always hope... and pray... and beg... and borrow... and plead... And I guess if that doesn't work I can always sit down and have a good long cry.

(Just kidding on the whole crying thing...)

Then again, maybe not. lol

We are hoping to get most of the house packed this weekend. That is assuming we have an answer by Friday. I have also boycotted packing any thing else until we get an answer. I didn't pack anything yesterday and today we got the first bit of moving forward good news that we've had all week, and for the last week too. So it's gotta be that I was jinxing it.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

So we have 10-- count them-- 10 days until we move, 8 until we close!!! I'm kinda starting to freak out a bit- I'm not gonna lie.

As soon as it's my house, I'll post some moving pics and then I'll feel like it has been totally worth it.

Hopefully my next post will be to tell everyone that it's our house!!! :)

The continuing saga...

So we heard back from the bank and they did adjust the price, but not as high as it was. It's right in the middle. The sellers are happy, we are happy and the bank is happy. So everyone is happy right? Wrong! Cause then the bank was asking for more paper work, which we provided. Now it's the stupid underwriters that are jerking us around.
I have been run through the ringer with this house deal. I know that buying a house is a big deal, but honestly, can you make it any harder?? Now we are being told that the underwriters want an engineering report on the house and because there isn't one, we have to pay $400. for it! And our financing deadline is TODAY! But they said this isn't anything that has to do with our deadline, which I don't understand, but whatever. It doesn't have to be done by today which is good because if it did, they'd be hearing a lot from me. We've been trying to get in touch with them for 2 days making sure that we were meeting all their demands. But it does need to be done before we can get a for sure YES. Everyone keeps saying that everything looks good, and that they don't see any problems, but I want the for sure YES!!! I honestly can't take it anymore. I am stressed to the hilt. I am sick of this apartment, sick of all the boxes everywhere, some packed, some empty.
I have a confession.... I am not packing as much as I would normally be packing because I'm afraid of jinxing it. If I pack it and then we don't get the house I really don't want to unpack everything. :(
I am tired of my neighbor sitting outside yelling at her kids all day because she's too lazy to go and actually get them. Instead she sits on her porch and yells as her kids wander farther and farther away. Her kids are 2 and 3ish.
I really want to sit outside on my patio enjoying the evening air as it cools off, (saying that it will might help it really do it, right? I didn't think so either but it's worth a shot) and not hear her yelling all night long.
I want to start decorating my house. Repainting walls, taking off the horrible wall paper, picking out curtains.
This house has been sold twice since it was built. You would think that if it wasn't sound, someone would have noticed by now!!! All the money they are sucking out of us, it's any wonder people aren't buying houses now and the housing market is in such bad shape.

Our new house or not?!?!

So.... We have decided to buy a house. It's actually been pretty easy, with a few hick ups here and there. We did the whole pre-qualifying, in the middle of the week. Then I started to try and find some houses to go look at. I looked online, at several really good sites. Found several that we really liked. Now being new to the whole home buying experience we had no idea what "short sales" were, and go figure almost all the houses we liked in this area were short saled. So we looked closer to our parents and found several that I was willing to walk through. Oh the joys of that. I had no idea what to expect, but it wasn't what I found.
House #1 was in the area I grew up, just down the block in fact. It was a nice looking house -- from the front. It was down right scary from the back and inside. It was decorated in the 50's or 60's and hasn't been done since. Including the appliances that they were leaving with the house. It had been empty for quite a while and was in sad shape. The carpets through out were that green shag carpet, stained in several places, I wasn't even sure the oven or range top (which were separate, the oven was in the wall which I was excited about until I saw it) would actually work they were so old. The basement was a big scary mess!! AND it had a BROILER in the basement instead of a furnace. I've never dealt with a boiler before. I'd rather not start now. For the condition the house was in, they wanted WAY WAY too much money. Now I know that you can talk them down, but with all the things we'd have to replace before we could move it, it was a big fat NO!
House #2 was a nice 4 bed, 2 bath with a huge yard-fully fenced- with a 2 car garage. Now we had appt's to see all these houses with our Realtor Kelly who is FABULOUS!! I just love her!! Anyway, we show up at this house to find out that the people renting some of the rooms were in various degrees of dress and being ready. ***CONFESSION*** I really liked the outside and upstairs of this house, but I was terrified by this house.
The lady who owns it was renting out single rooms, so there were 3 mini fridges, downstairs was so terrifying that I wanted out as soon as possible. They had set up a couple hot plates down there in a make shift laundry room and kitchen. The basement had a mother in law apt without the kitchen part. They had a closet that used to be the coal room, complete with a coal shoot opening outside, which they had made a bed in there and was renting it out as a bedroom. All the doors had dead bolts on the them and everywhere they could stuff a body, there was a body stuffed there. We had to knock on bedroom doors, ask to look inside, which we peeked in and left, and them we were asked if we wanted renters. UMMM.... NO WAY IN HELL!! We are looking for a house that we can move our family into, not to share our house. The downstairs bathroom made me laugh so hard, but given the condition the house was in, I'm not at all surprised. Right when you walked down the tiny steep steps, you walked into the huge laundry room/their mini kitchen. If you turned to your right, there were 2 bedrooms, a bathroom that just had a toilet and sink, and right out in the middle of the open area was a communal shower!!! You could see over the top, and under the door, it was that open. I was so amused that I seriously laughed for at least 5 minutes and then again when we were outside looking at the yard. I was almost 3000sq ft but felt so cramped and tiny because of how full it was.
House #3 I LOVED!!! But it was also partially unfinished. And more work than we wanted to take on. It was 6 bedrooms- I know we don't need that many rooms, but it was in our price range because it needed some work. The house had such history- I could tell- just when you walked in and looked around, you could feel it in the air. It was weird, it didn't feel bad at all, but just walking through the rooms it felt like I was trying to walk through water. My lungs were laboring like I had just spent 30 minutes exercising. I loved the layout of the house, the huge yard, mostly fenced. But it had only 1 working bathroom and one under construction. The original part of the house was built in 1864 and it had been added on to several times. And not very well in some places. Like I said, I loved it, but way too much work to make it comfortable for us to live there. Plus, it didn't have any air conditioning except a small window one and that meant that the 3 rooms upstairs were going to be hot in the summer and cold in the winter. We'll pass this time around.
Now house #4 was perfect! (It's also the house we put an offer on, I'm just sayin')
It is a 5 bedroom, 2 bath house with a full basement, a nice sized lot-fully fenced- and lots of great little things, like ... A gas fireplace in the family room downstairs, a storage room (we even talked them into leaving their upright freezer-bonus!!) My only complaint about the whole house, is the size of the bedrooms. They are pretty small. Though, it's hard to say for sure because they had all the rooms FULL of furniture. I must say that I love LoVe LOVE the kitchen. It isn't big, but it's just right. All new appliances and a gas stove which I am super happy about. They are leaving a swing in the back yard, and there is a fire pit back there and a nice big patio. I think we'll be spending a lot of time on the patio so I'm very happy.
House #5 was nice, a 4bed, 2 bath house even closer to our parents than the one we are trying to get. It had a newly remodeled kitchen, which was nice, but you could tell that they did the work their selves and in some places, not very well. The yard was smaller and I didn't like it as much. It just wasn't our house even with a nicer, bigger, newer kitchen. OK, nicer isn't really comparable because I liked the other kitchen better. It was brighter somehow. This one wasn't even clean. They had swept cereal under the cabinets which you could still see.
The owners of the house we are trying to get really know how to stage their house so that it was welcoming and bright and cheery and lovely.

We like house #4 so much that right after we got done looking at houses we followed our Realtor to her office (on a Saturday and my birthday to boot) put an offer on the house, and less than 3 hours later she called me to tell me that they had accepted our offer, happy birthday to me!!
We found out that someone else had put an offer on the house before us but their financing feel through, so we were able to snatch it up.

Now comes the stress... We are doing everything they want us to do. We got the inspection, we gave them our earnest money, and we were just waiting for the appraisal. When it came in, we had a slight problem. The house didn't appraise for what we offered them. It appraised for $8,000 less. Now the stress really begins to have fun. The sellers agent wants a review of the appraisal because she doesn't think that the guy was very thorough. And all this is happening while banks and offices are closed for the 4th of July holiday. We are starting to get close to our deadlines which is making me nervous. The sellers have already put another house under contract and have paid for their inspection as well. They want out. They said that if they can't get a review or if it doesn't change than they are willing to drop the price. Which is good for us, but I need to know ASAP- If we need to back out we need to do it before the middle of the month. We are less than 3 weeks from the day we are supposed to close. I've taken in our 30 day notice to the apartments, I want to start packing non-essentials so that I'm not rushing to pack last minute. And now, I'm like- do I keep going, do I wait for word from them or the bank!?!?
UGH!!! It's enough to knot my shoulders and make my tummy in knots. I'm actually better now than I was before. When I found out on Friday I was pretty nasty- I know it's hard to believe, but yes it's true. I was down right bi%!hy.

Ahhhh.... I feel better, having gotten that off my chest. When I find out for sure, I will post pics of my house!! :)