nah, nah, nah, nah…

(sing it with me)…

hey, hey, hey…

GO-OD-BYE!!!

….

You know what I’m talking about, right?

Tomorrow morning, that stanky old uterus of mine is comin’ OUT.  Along with my appendix and any and all endometriosis that happens to be lurking around my innards.

So Doug and I made it to Atlanta last night and are roosting in a hotel over by Northside Hospital.  I go in at 6:30 in the morning and surgery is scheduled for 8:30.  It should take around two hours and I hope to be out of there and back at the hotel by late afternoon.  If everything looks good, I will be allowed to head home Friday evening.

I know that lots of ya’ll have been praying for me for a long time about all of this.  Thank you for those prayers, and please keep them up!  I need just a few more days of them to get me through the surgery and recovery process and we’ll put a great big “ANSWERED FAITHFULLY AND GLORIOUSLY” stamp on the prayers for this whole mess.

I’ll try to post an update when I can.  (ie. when the happy drugs wear off and I can remember how to spell my name.)  I’m off to attempt to get some sleep.

Ya’ll have a blessed week and wonderful week…

So we’ve been riding on this E-ticket attraction (for all you youngins out there, that’s Disney-speak for a white knuckle thrill ride) that has been our lives for the past 35 days.

To recap, here’s what’s been happening…

• On April 6th, we received a purchase offer for our house.  It was a bit less than we hoped for, but the buyers were not asking for us to pay any of their closing costs or for any money to be spent on repairs.  It was, in essence, an “as is” contract.   They also dangled the carrot of a quick close in the text of the contract.
• On April 7th, after prayerful consideration, we accepted the offer without a counter.  It was time for us to go.
• On April 9th, we went to look at houses in the Mt. Dora area.  We fell in love with the first house that we saw.  It was perfect and had absolutely everything that we hoped and prayed for.  The house was a REO property (bank owned), and was priced WAAAAAAAAAYYYYYY below market.  And WAAAAAAYYYYY below anything else that was in it’s much fancier than us neighborhood.  We walked around the house and mourned the fact that we could not make an offer on it until our own house closed.  We said a prayer that God would keep it for us, and moved on.
• On April 12th, Doug and I drove to Atlanta to meet with the surgeon that I was hoping would do my hysterectomy and endometriosis excision.  The appointment went better than I could possibly have hoped for.  A sonogram revealed a mass that my surgeon believes is a clump of nastiness made up of my right ovary, my appendix, and all kinds of endometriosis lesions and adhesions.  This finding made the insurance coding for my surgery a virtual slam dunk…it would be covered.  Surgery was scheduled for May 19th.
• While sitting in the waiting room for my appointment, our realtor called with the news that our buyers were willing to go into warp speed on the closing so that we could make an offer on the house that we loved.  The new closing date was set for April 26…just three weeks away.
• Three weeks away.
• We prayed and put together an offer on the house we wanted on April 13th.  The bank came back later with news that there were multiple offers, and asked for our “highest and best”.  We gave it to them.
• We found out a few days later that our “highest and best” offer was still quite short for their taste.  We walked away.
• We placed an offer on a second bank owned property.
• After a few days and several inspections, we started doing the math on the repairs needed on that one, and walked away when we learned that the bank was holding firm on their price.  We would end up paying more for that one than the original one when repairs were figured in.  No thanks.
• On April 21, a storage Pod arrived at our house.  With the help of some great and faithful friends, we began to stuff it with all of our belongings.
• We spent our last night in our old house on April 26th, and moved in with my parents.  (We moved out in three weeks, ya’ll.  Now THAT’S crazy.)  Thank God for my parents…they have been beyond wonderful to let us “squat” here while we shop for our next house.
• On April 27th, we submitted an offer on a 104 year old home that we absolutely fell in love with.  It was cuter than cute.  On April 28th, we came to an agreement with the sellers and went under contract.
• On April 29th, we closed on our old house.  A beautiful Christian family with three precious kids got it and we couldn’t be more happy about that.
• On May 1st, the deal on the adorable old house began to go south.  We learned that we would need to rewire the house, replace the roof, put in a new air conditioner and replace some VERY expensive windows.  On top of that, no company wanted to insure the thing.  I was told that even if we were to do a complete update (the only way to get insurance on it at all), we would always pay at least twice a “normal” homeowners policy rate for that house.
• On May 3rd, we came to the sad conclusion that we would have to walk away.
• On the evening of May 3rd, Doug popped out with the question…”I wonder if that original house is still on the market?”  Sure that it couldn’t possibly be, I called our realtor.  He called the broker for the house, who told him that it was under contract, but that the buyers were starting to “act crazy and get on his nerves”.  We began to pray.  Could it be?
• The next afternoon…May 4th, our agent called with the news that the buyers walked.
• That evening, we submitted the same offer that we gave the last time we tried to buy the house, picking up where we left off.
• On Thursday, May 6th, the bank countered, dropping the price much less than they did last time, but still not low enough for us.  We stood firm.
• On Friday, May 7th, the bank came back and dropped the price to within $1000 of our offer.  We prayed, and with great joy and peace, agreed.
• Our inspection is tomorrow.  We are hoping for a quick close so that we can move in to our new home mid-June.

I’m blown away at how magnificently and graciously God has answered so many prayers over the past 35 days.  Our old house…finally sold.  My surgery…finally scheduled.  Our new house…our new home…a blessing above and beyond all that we could possibly ask or think.

So that’s been our 35 days of crazy.  I’ll try to update when I can and write more about my surgery when I get a chance.

Ya’ll have a blessed and happy week…

So I’ve come to the conclusion that I have officially LOST MY MIND.

It’s happened to me many times before, so I am well aware of the symptoms.

anywho…

1:00 P.M. Thursday came and went and we heard not one whiff of a response from the bank re: our offer for the house in Park Place.  True to our word, we walked away and at 1:01, sent in an offer for the Mount Dora house.

In the middle of all this, our house was being emptied with the help of our wonderful friends Ofelia and Steve and Sonya.  (If you ever want to see a freak show, watch Steve pack a Pod.  He’s got like 65% of our house packed into about 25% of the container.  My jaw drops in wonder every time I look at it.)  I sold our big sofa and breakfast table (thank you, Craigslist) and moved our photographs and important papers over to my parents’ house.  It was a day full of crazy.

Thursday night, we drove up to Mount Dora to take another look at the house.  When I walked in the door, I was suddenly hit with the sickening waves of buyer’s remorse.  (Not that we had purchased anything yet…all we’ve got is an offer on the table.)  This was a shock to me.  We saw the house two times previously, and both times, I absolutely loved it.  One of the times that we saw it was during a hard rain, and as I looked out of the family room into the backyard, I muttered to myself, “It feels like home.”

So imagine my confusion as I walked around the house and suddenly began to see all of the things that we might/could/would have to spend money on.  Air conditioning.  Electrical?  Plumbing?  ewwww…master bath.  Wave after wave of OH MY WORD hit.

yeesh.

I told you that I am crazy.

After confessing to Doug my feelings, he was calm and supportive.  We decided to sleep on it (after all, it had been an exhausting and overwhelming day) and see how we felt in the morning.

Yesterday morning came, and I continued to feel the same way.  We decided to leave the offer on the Mount Dora house on the table but continue to look at other houses.

Last night, we looked at three more.  The first was a new home in a defunct subdivision (with the curiously hilarious street name “Myopia Hunt Club”…Doug had fun with that one as we looked around the subdivision with street after street full of empty lots…a developer with a sense of humor, no?).  The owners are underwater on the house and are looking to unload.  It’s a great house, but has the same ridiculously high volume ceilings that we have in our current house…ceilings that we know jack up power bills and make it hard to change out light bulbs.  The next house was an immediate no.  The floor plan was one of the most whack that I’ve ever seen.  The third and final possibility was truly a lovely home.  It’s over in Tavares, right off of Lake Eustis.  The owners have done a lot of work and upgrades, but I just couldn’t get with the floorplan.  It had a weird flow to it.  I kept walking around the house, willing myself to bond, but it just didn’t happen.  So no on that one.

We stopped for dinner to relax and talk things over.  While there (sorry guys…there’s really no ladylike way to put this TMI revelation), I discovered that I had started what is likely going to be my last period EVER (Hysterectomy coming on May 19th…can I get a woo-hoo?!).  Suddenly, Doug and I had the knowledge that in the middle of all of this, I’ve been in full on PMS mode.

I don’t like anything when I have PMS.  This morning, Doug said, laughing…”You don’t even like ME when you have PMS”.  (I still love you though, honey.)

This morning, true to my crazy form, I woke up and realized that I do indeed again love the Mount Dora house.

Somebody needs to lock me up and throw away the key.

So, now we wait.  It will likely be Tuesday or Wednesday before we get any kind of response from the bank.

In the meantime, we found out that the closing on this house has been delayed for a few days.  It will likely be on Wednesday or Thursday.  While my PMS addled brain kept going to a doomsday scenario of this deal falling through, the small shred of common sense that remained in my head told me that a few extra days for us to finish our packing is a good thing.

Well…that’s it for now.

I hope that ya’ll are having a relaxing and wonderful weekend…

So last Friday, the seller’s agent for the house that we have been attempting to purchase called our realtor and reported that they had multiple offers on the property.

The agent asked us to send in our “best and highest” offer.

We did.

Today, the bank countered at 7,500 above our offer and wanted us to increase our deposit amount.

ummm….Exactly what part of “best and highest” offer did they have difficulty understanding?

We are not giving them one more dime.

We “countered” with the same amount, increased our deposit to let them know that we are serious buyers and gave them a deadline to respond to us by 1:00 tomorrow afternoon.

At 1:01, we walk.  I will be all done playing with that bank.

There is a contract on the desk beside me for the other house that we have been looking at.  It’s ready for Doug and I to sign and fax in after the deadline on the first one passes tomorrow.  The other house is also bank owned, and is in a fantastic location…walking distance to downtown Mount Dora and just around the corner from some of our church peeps.  (Run for the hills, Tiffany!)  The house was built in 1978 and has great bones.  The yard is awesome…big and fenced in…plenty of room for the boys to run and play.  It also has a wood burning fireplace, something that Isaac has been requesting.  It needs appliances and some cosmetic work, as well as some TLC in the master bath (BOO icky shower with no tub!).  The floor plan is quite similar to my parents’ house, which we love.  We’ll see.

So that’s what’s going on in our house hunting saga.

More when we know…

…to report that I’ve got absolutely NO news yet.

So I continue to pack…utilizing Stephie K’s wonderful packing method (see comments two posts down)…and wait.

My sister will be here soon to help stuff boxes.

In other news…

My parents are at the JFK airport, expecting to board a Swiss Airlines flight to Israel tonight.  As of now, the flight is still on track for departure.  Please pray that they are able to get out…this is the dream trip of a lifetime for my Mom and my Dad is a bit excited about it too.  I’m thrilled for them and keep hoping and praying that everything stays on schedule for their trip.

On Friday, Doug and I spent the better part of the day digging through boxes in our garage and laughing ourselves stupid over some of our childhood memorabilia.

We found a recipe book from Doug’s early elementary years.  His teacher had the students write down their favorite recipes and published them without editing.

Here is Doug’s masterpiece:

“Penut butter coockys”

“You need dow and a few spinkles of penut butter on it.  but before you spinkle the penut butter make the dow look round and then you put the flower on and the penut butter and then put it in the oven and when don you put a fork on top and then your don.  by Doug T.

Sounds fabulous, no?

I’ll post news when I’ve got some…

Ya’ll enjoy your Tuesday…