Crazy Times

This past week has been so crazy!! Not only are Rene and I busy with the house and trying to get things ready, a guy I work with asked me to make a cake for his daughters birthday. I was a little apprehensive because I've never had to make a cake... for money. I was so worried that it wouldn't come out the best. I wanted it to be perfect more so than any other time. And to top it off, I wanted to use fondant and I had no experience with it whatsoever!! I was reading up on it and found out that rolled butter cream is easier to work with and tastes a little better so I decided to try it out.

Now, because I'm a little bit of an overachiever I decided to make 2 cakes. A princess cake where the bottom of the dress is the actual cake and then an additional cake for the majority of the 'party' to enjoy. My concept for it all was way over the top and I had to simplify it a bit. For a first attempt, my cakes didn't come out too bad.

3rd Times a Charm :)

Yesterday, Rene and I went house hunting again and the day was pretty productive. We increased our searching area and looked at a ton more homes. There were two homes we liked. One was a little smaller but absolutely beautiful!! It had laminate floors, a beautiful kitchen, and these fancy shmancy European sinks. The second one was larger, not as fancy, but had a great backyard, island, new carpets, ceramic tile floors, and 2 pantries!! :)

Both homes were found pretty early in the day but Rene really wanted to look at all the houses to ensure there was nothing better. When we got back to our realtor's office we discovered both homes we liked had offers on them so our realtor suggested we put in a double offer... and that's what we did. We were so worried that we were going to get out bid, again. So this is how great our realtor is, he only gave the sellers 2hrs to respond!!!! Isn't that great?!! Within the hour, both sellers had accepted our bids (only 10 mins apart) and we were in quite the predicament. We were going back and forth on the homes and even after we selected one, we sat there pondering if it was the right choice.

So which one did we choose???? The second one!! Did you catch that??!! We chose the larger of the two with the fabulous backyard, 2 pantries and island. :) Here are some pics...

The outside of the house, and our car :)

The emance, beautiful kitchen (counter tops to be replaced by seller)

The formal living room with fireplace

Upstairs, there's a huge open loft... perfect for playing :)

Master bath has a garden tub, soon to be Whirlpool tub, and seperate shower

The backyard, half of it... We have the lake on one side and the woods on the other. It's gorgeous!!

Going nowhere fast

So, last week Rene and I found a home we absolutely loved and put in an offer. We soon found out there was another offer on the table so we had to figure out how much we were going to bid and everything. Well, both offers were sent into the bank at the same time (did I mention it was a foreclosure??). Anyways, about 31 hours later (who's counting?) we find out a third offer was slipped in and they out bid us by a 'huge margin.' :( I was a little depressed, but at least we had a back up, right? Wrong!!! Our back up had multiple offers being thrown in so we knew it wasn't something we wanted to get into. So after looking at about 40 homes in the area we like, we are looking again. This time, we are expanding our search area as there aren't many homes left. Time's a-tickin' away... We'll see what happens after this next search.

But some good news among all of this... The earnest money we had given CP Morgan has been returned!!!!!!!! We received a check in the mail the other day! :) It's such a blessing to get it back, Rene and I weren't looking forward to losing all that money. But now we can put that towards a new home, once we find one.

Where do we go from here??

Rene and I just saw on the news that our builder, CP Morgan, has gone belly up... bankrupt... This leaves us with all these questions. I'm at a complete loss for words. What makes this all that much more frustrating is the fact that Rene and I have been in contact with them and there was no hint this was coming. We were completely blindsided by it, we still are. I don't know what we are going to do, if we'll get any of our money back.... nothing. This royally SUCKS!! I'll keep you posted.

A New Addition...

Rene and I bought a kitchen table!!!! What did you think I was going to say? Well, this table is something I've been looking at for about a year. It's crazy to want something like a table especially to think about it for a year, but I have been. I'm so excited though, now Rene and I wont have to eat sitting on the floor at my Korean table... as much fun at it is, Rene doesn't enjoy it much.

Details on the table: it has 8 chairs, counter height (so on the taller side), and a leaf for expansion. It's a Mahogany color (not sure of the type of wood) and oh so lovely! Well, take a look.... it's going to be beautiful in the new house! :)

Thanks to Dene and Mike for the beautiful table runner and place settings... this was a gift they brought back from Korea :) And it matches our table perfectly!!!! (oh, and I've been wanting to paint my kitchen a deep red so it's even better!!)

Forgot to Mention

There were a few things I meant to add to the previous post and forgot.... So when Rene's car was broken into (mind you it took place in our apartment parking lot) I became worried that it could happen to my car. After discussing our concerns, we decided to go ahead and get an alarm system for my car. We ended up with an alarm/auto start combo which was a pretty good deal. However, just this past week we were finally having the bypass for the auto start put in and when Rene went to pick it up he accidentally wrecked the car. :( I wish I had pics to share, but I haven't taken any yet. It's not as bad as one might think.... I had been expecting so much worse. Anyways, while backing out of the auto place's garage Rene was trying to maneuver around the dumpster they have in back and turned just a little too much and took off the driver-side rear view mirror and put a pretty good sized dent in the front fender (right in front of where the door and fender meet). Nice, huh?!! I'll try to remember to get some pics and post them as well.

Where to begin?????

So these past few weeks have really been trying. It's really just been one thing after another. If you haven't already heard, Rene's car was broken into and the stereo was stolen. Thankfully, that was the only thing taken but still! Well, the key hole was jammed and then they like cut out the dash... Take a look

Here's what's left of the dash and the front part that surrounds the radio.

Now, moving on.... Back in May, Rene and I signed up with these builders to have a home built by March 2009. It looks like we wont be moving for quite some time... they project mid-April but Rene thinks it wont be till Mid-May :( Here's the deal, the guy we originally signed with is no longer with the company and I guess things got 'misplaced' in the shuffle. The new guy handling everything kinda dropped the ball (we think) and so things got delayed. Now, with the economy the way it is a lot of those the builder contracts work out to has laid people off hence putting everything behind schedule. The only positive thing out of this is that we may get some type of compensation. We have given them some options on how we would like to be compensated, we are just waiting for their answer. Now, I'm pretty impatient so I had to get some pics of the model home that's pretty darn similar to ours.

The outside of the house. Our colors: white brick, silver moss siding, and a steel blue door.

When you walk into the front door there's the front room (which we plan on having our piano and a blue chair I absolutely love). The half wall is going to be moved a few feet into the front room and have some cubbies in it that face the back living room. The living room, of course, will have our couch and TV.

Here, the living room opens up into the kitchen. There is plenty of space as you can see, and below you will see the island! :)

As stated above, the island and lots of cabinet space. The opening to the left goes to the garage, half bath and pantry.

Now, I only have pics of the master bedroom and bath because we actually changed the layout of the upstairs. So you'll just have to wait to see the rest!! :) Now, this room is huge and has these beautiful windows that bring in so much natural light.

You walk into the bath and there's a nice his/hers vanity...

And a whirlpool tub and shower (I didnt find it neccessary to show the toilet)

And finally, off of the bathroom is the walk-in closet. It is way to big!! I had Rene lay in the middle of it so you could see just how big it was. It could pretty much be a small bedroom.

Now, many of you may be thinking to yourselves, "Why did they get such a big home?" To answer that question, I have dreams of filling up the home with lots of babies. We haven't had the blessing of children yet, but I hope it'll be soon.... and lots of them!! :)

Whitby's in Chicago

So the first weekend of December, Cambria and her hubby, Bryant, meet up with us in Chicago to play for the day. I've been meaning to write about this for the longest time, but with the holidays it seems like everything got pushed back. Anyways, Rene and I drove up to Chicago and actually enjoyed ourselves. Our first time, we somehow ended up in the "ghetto" and then had the hardest time getting around. We were more prepared this time. However, we had to go the day the Bears were playing a home game... many of the areas were shut down for the game. After we were done eating and shopping, we went to the Aquarium. We had to walk a ways to get there because all the parking was taken up, and we went right by Soldier Field. I think it was pretty neat for Rene since one of his teams is the Bears.

Happy Holidays

I've been meaning to write for like a week but I had the opportunity to work some overtime. Anyways, last Friday after Thanksgiving, Rene and I went to the tree lighting ceremony in downtown Indianapolis. With us being in a big city, we thought this was going to be a grand tree and all. However, we were a little disappointed. There was no real tree, they just strung some lights off the monument. There were a lot of people and they had a stage where people sang some carols.... but it just wasn't that great. I felt bad a little because I had to talk Rene into going and then it was a big flop. Here are some pics, you can judge for yourself.

I just liked this one of a church that was lit up

Around the monument they had set a perimeter where they had large Nutcrackers and lit trees.

And here is the tree, I have one of it not lit up but it was just too ugly :-(

The following day, Saturday, Rene and I put up all of our Christmas decorations. The apartment looks so pretty! The greatest part was the following morning we had our first snowfall. Here are some pics of the snow right outside our front door. The only bad thing about snow and Indiana is that it doesn't stay... it just melts and makes it like Alaska's "break up." However, we will enjoy it while it lasts :0)

Coming home to a surprise =)

Today while I was at work, Rene called me to find out my favorite food. I thought he was trying to be sneaky and figure out what I would like for my birthday. However, there was a better surprise waiting for me!! I came home from work to find Rene in the kitchen making dinner. I was instructed to sit down and not look. Rene had been working for hours to create a home-made meal of beer battered halibut, french fries and tarter sauce...... oh what a guy!!! It was all so delicious, I haven't had good halibut since we were back home in Alaska. :-) Here are some pics: