Pathetic Stalkers

So Rene was out the other day talking to one of our neighbors across the street and found out that our neighbor to the right is a player for the Indianapolis Colts!!! When Rene told me this, I instantly thought, 'my new bff!!' Pathetic, right?? Anyways, since then we have wanted to meet this neighbor of ours more than anything... if nothing else, to verify whether or not its true. We think it may be a good possibility... he's hardly ever home, is a very big guy and drives a nicer vehicle. Yes, we know this doesn't mean anything, but our hopes are high :) Rene was out watering the lawn yesterday and our neighbor was hanging out on his deck. They both said hello in passing and Rene was trying to water as fast as possible. When he finished, just a few minutes later, he planned to go over and chat only to find our neighbor had retreated into his home :( I hope we can befriend this neighbor of ours!! LOL

In the new house.... Finally!!

It's been quite a while since the last post. We've been so busy with the move and getting ourselves situated, and not to mention waiting a whole week for AT&T to hook up our internet. Regardless, there's much to catch up on.

After we closed on our house, we began packing like mad to get ready for the move. We pretty much packed everything in 3-4 days! Amazing, right?? We planned on moving Saturday, April 18th which just so happened to be the day I was also doing the Race for the Cure. Here are some pics of the 'Race'...

Jeff Saturday (from the Colts) and his wife

Some of the hundreds, of thousands of people who participated :)

A beautiful day to walk.... this is just a bunch of people coming across the bridge

A look at all of our stuff... we (or rather the muscle...aka Rene) was able to get all of our boxes into this tiny room.

Oh, and I must mention these beautiful flowers from my good friends Corinne and Brandon as a house warming gift.

And now for...... ALL MOVED IN :)

So I am super excited about our front door... I don't know if any of you remember, but this was just a plain door with all these windows in it (about half the door). We wanted to cover the windows so you couldn't see in but didn't want shades or anything. On one of the many trips to the Home Depot, we found this stuff called Window Film... it sticks to the glass and provides privacy and helps to insulate the window. Well, I used it for our bathroom and front door. We love the door though because it really does look like stained glass!

The front room... just a nice place to sit, play some music, read or relax

Here's something a little strange about that room... the previous owners had this huge mirror put in. We looked at taking it out, but it would be just too big of a mess right now. The one plus is that it does make the room feel bigger :)

Our living room.... pretty self explanitory.

THE KITCHEN!!!!! Here's a view of our new table and kitchen....

and then while you eat, you have a nice view of the outdoors
Our master bedroom... it's huge!

and last, but not least is the loft... we are currently using as the workout area.

So, there's the house. Hope you enjoyed looking at it as much as we love living in it!!! :)

Whirlwinds and Rollercoasters

A very many things going on here... Monday rolled around and Rene and I were ready to close on our house. I got the time off from work, again, and it wasn't until I was home to pick up Rene we found out we were not going to be able to close. The story goes, we were supposed to close at 3pm but then we find out the seller had scheduled the closing appointment for 2pm so I took off an extra hour. Then our lender didn't have the appraisal paperwork completed in time and when they finally did have it all together the titling company couldn't fit us in. So they requested we reschedule for later in the week, some time after 2 pm... I told Rene there was no way I could do that as I've had to change my schedule about 8 times already. Luckily, they finally did something to accommodate us and made the appointment for the following Wednesday at 8:30am. Rene and I crossed our fingers that everything would work out this time.

If that wasn't enough, word gets around yesterday at work that there may be another lay off... this would make it like the 5th time or so, the last time being only one month ago. All of this was speculation as management doesn't tell us a thing, but it soon became a reality. A good friend of mine called me just 10 minutes or so after he left to inform me he was let go... No rhyme or reason for it, he was a great worker, did his job well and they needed him in his position. :( About a hour later, another friend leaves work and calls me and says he was let go too - and he's the father of 3 little ones... So much tension and uneasiness. I never got the call that night and I prayed that I never would.

This morning, Rene and I go to the titling company and we have signed all the papers!!!!! We are now Hoosier Home Owners! :) And on my way to work, no phone call! As of this moment, I still have my job but there are 9 people unemployed. It was such a bittersweet day.... It is quite the day for us to count our blessings.

2 Days Away....

There have been a lot of frustrations with buying a house... at times it seemed like we would never get a home here in Indy and be forced to live in our apartment. However, we can see the horizon.... We will be closing on the house this coming Monday, April 13th. :) Yesterday, our Realtor and Rene both went to the house (separately) to make sure things were in order. Unfortunately, our seller is out of town and will not be cleaning up the mess he and the plumber made, but we will close and have our home!! So, today after I'm done here at work Rene and I will head on over to the new house and do some spring cleaning. Currently, our yard looks a little white trash as there's trash all over the place so we'll be happier when that's all cleaned up. Once it's all cleaned, we'll be ready to move!! Rene will spend his Monday packing while I work and then next Saturday, the 18th, we will move into our home!! :)

Speaking of the 18th, Indianapolis is hosting the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. I'm pretty excited because I will be participating!! I have joined with a group of ladies, some cancer survivors, some still going thru treatments and then friends and family. It's going to be a wonderful experience and I'm excited to be a part of it.

Trying to Count the Blessings...

Lately I have been feeling pretty down in the dumps. :( There have been so many things going on, and not many are good. The house we found, just may not ever be ours. We went to the house this last Monday and found out the seller had not fixed anything. The inspection was done two Monday's prior so it's not like he hasn't had the time. During the inspection, we saw some water running on the slab from under the siding. When we went to the house this last week, we wanted to check on this so we started a lot of the water in the house. At first there wasn't much happening and then we walk into the kitchen and there's a puddle forming right by the island. More water was coming up through the tiles... We're pretty sure there's a broken pipe in the slab. When we realized that, our realtor called the seller's realtor to let them know and to have them get it fixed. And all of this only 1 week from when we were scheduled to close!

Then, our lender called us a couple days ago to advise us that the county we are moving into require 2 inspections be done, one by us and the other (i don't know who from). We find out today that they inspection cannot be done till the 10th and then they need an extra day to submit it. Making our close date the 13th, at the earliest. Only, the seller leaves town on the 8th... I have no idea what we are going to do or how this is going to work out.

Some other issues/items have been on my mind as well. Rene and I have been married now for a little over 3.5 years and we have yet to start our family. Not because we don't want to but because we cannot. I have wanted children from the beginning, but it just hasn't worked out yet. Every once in a while, I get into this funk where I'm pretty sad about it but lately it's been a lot worse. I just don't know if we will ever have the blessing of children. And at that, I'm at a loss of what else to say.

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!!)