Our realtor called yesterday to say that we had an offer coming in. But we haven't heard anything official yet. We're still waiting...
In the week and a half we've been on the market, we've had 12 showings! So we've been pretty busy with that. It helps with keeping the house clean since we have one (or two or three) about every other day. Not a whole lot of time to make too big of a mess.
It would be great to get something so soon into the game. But a game it is!
Monday, April 28, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
Breaking Away
So how much does my husband love me? Enough to send these hot boys to my mail box! Or, was it that he had grown weary of my constant complaining that I couldn't see them. I LOVE this movie. Seriously. That's how dorky I am. I don't understand why its not an easier find. Is it ever readily available on the shelves of the local video store? Or scheduled to show frequently on the Dish? No! Still...I'm shaking my head in confusion. It won an Academy Award in 1979 for Best Original Screenplay and nominated for 5 others! How is it so unappreciated? I often hit the search button on the Dish hoping that some day it will be on - and on a channel we get. The rare occasion that it is playing, of course we don't get that channel. So one night I again in vain searched for this gem and once again it was only available on some random channel. Whine, Complain, etc. Did you want to ask what happened next? ...my weary husband who loves me ordered it for me online. And it showed up today. What are we doing tonight? Oh, he gets to watch it with me of course. Did I mention that he thinks its a ridiculous movie? Maybe its just that he doesn't appreciate a young Dennis Quaid in short shorts?Anyway, if you are in need of a decent yet dorky, clean, feel good movie about 4 small-town teens and their quest to fit in...try it. You might like it too!
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Time to move on...hopefully soon
It official. Our house now has an MLS and we are officially on the market to sell. I am so TIRED! What a chore just getting the house ready. Our realtor had an interior designer come over to help us "stage" our house. Give me a break! I thought she was going to help us with our furniture and paint, decorations, etc. But no. She only focused on things that can be seen unless it is opened. She spent and hour going through every cabinet and cupboard of my kitchen "instructing" me on how every thing should be arraigned. "All of your pots and pans need to have the handles facing the same way. As well as the lids need to be stacked in order from biggest to smallest." Are you serious?! When its time for us to leave the house for a showing, I'm going to be more concerned that they are cleaned and not coming in the van with me!
"You need to sort your spice jars and line them up by lid color." "If there's anything untidy, the client will assume that everything else is untidy." Great so now they'll think I'm OCD!
" Your pantry needs to look like the shelves at A.J.'s."
"All your appliances need to have the cords wound up and rubberbanded."
Here's something I found amusing. Its expected that the counter tops in the kitchen be bare of anything that you actually use everyday. But for some reason its okay to place big bowls and vases and such to show off the space. Is that weird. "Take everything off the counters so that the potential buyer can see the space they have to work with. But make sure you put this big bowl of fruit out and you need this and that in this corner to show off the space!" I'm confused.
Moving on. In the closets (linen/coat), "Your shelves need to look like the shelves at J.C Penny." "Tri-folded with the folds facing out. Not all the way to the edge, but close."
And in the master bedroom..."are these the only pillows you have?" "Well then, every morning when you wake up, you need to turn your pillows over so that the wrinkles from where you've slept won't show." "Your room needs to look like a hotel room that you've just checked into."
"Your closet shelves need to look like the Gap or Old Navy."
And in the Master Bath..."No one wants to see the products that you use. So everyday after you shower, take everything out and put it away." This one shouldn't be too hard since its not everyday that I get a shower!
I suppose I should feel complimented that she didn't have anything to say about our furniture or paint choices. (Thanks to Suzanne and Cindy Goff who repainted the inside of our house while they were living in it for us during our short time in Boston. So if she thought we had taste - nope! Here's a shout out to the Goff's!) All she suggested was to purchase a plant or two. Fake of course. Its amazing enough that I've kept Lane's little cup of grass alive,that he got from preschool.
Here's a good one. "Let me see your tableclothes." I have one. "Oh! Well, make sure that you always have it ironed and ready to go. So that when you get that call you can throw it on and be on your way.
Wait, she did have a complaint about our set up. Because our computer is set up on our kitchen table. Is this a problem. ; )
Now, because Pat is concerned that I am being too harsh I will say this. I thought that she was very kind and well skilled in what she does. She's quite thorough and is truly concerned that we do everything we can to sell our house in a timely manner. And for that I was grateful. I just found it annoying because of my own reality. I have 3 kids ages 3, 2 and 1. When I get that call that someone wants to come look at our house. I'm sure it will be like this...Are there any diapers laying around? How much laundry can I stuff in the van around the car seats? Is everyone diapered (or sent to the toilet) and clothed? How fast can we pick up all the toys? But sure, if I get enough notice, I'll go through a broader check list. From now until we move...oh what fun!
Oh and for the record - just for her - I did line up my spice jars, make my pantry look like Trader Joe's (cause I shop there, not A.J's), fold all my linens and clothes to look like some unnamed store, and purchased a few fake plants and flower arraignments. As well as did more packing away.
So, interior designer, thank you for your helps and tips. I apologize for rolling my eyes at you (but only in my mind, of course.) You do your job well. And I'll do my best to live up to your standards.
Here's to moving - I'm tired!
"You need to sort your spice jars and line them up by lid color." "If there's anything untidy, the client will assume that everything else is untidy." Great so now they'll think I'm OCD!
" Your pantry needs to look like the shelves at A.J.'s."
"All your appliances need to have the cords wound up and rubberbanded."
Here's something I found amusing. Its expected that the counter tops in the kitchen be bare of anything that you actually use everyday. But for some reason its okay to place big bowls and vases and such to show off the space. Is that weird. "Take everything off the counters so that the potential buyer can see the space they have to work with. But make sure you put this big bowl of fruit out and you need this and that in this corner to show off the space!" I'm confused.
Moving on. In the closets (linen/coat), "Your shelves need to look like the shelves at J.C Penny." "Tri-folded with the folds facing out. Not all the way to the edge, but close."
And in the master bedroom..."are these the only pillows you have?" "Well then, every morning when you wake up, you need to turn your pillows over so that the wrinkles from where you've slept won't show." "Your room needs to look like a hotel room that you've just checked into."
"Your closet shelves need to look like the Gap or Old Navy."
And in the Master Bath..."No one wants to see the products that you use. So everyday after you shower, take everything out and put it away." This one shouldn't be too hard since its not everyday that I get a shower!
I suppose I should feel complimented that she didn't have anything to say about our furniture or paint choices. (Thanks to Suzanne and Cindy Goff who repainted the inside of our house while they were living in it for us during our short time in Boston. So if she thought we had taste - nope! Here's a shout out to the Goff's!) All she suggested was to purchase a plant or two. Fake of course. Its amazing enough that I've kept Lane's little cup of grass alive,that he got from preschool.
Here's a good one. "Let me see your tableclothes." I have one. "Oh! Well, make sure that you always have it ironed and ready to go. So that when you get that call you can throw it on and be on your way.
Wait, she did have a complaint about our set up. Because our computer is set up on our kitchen table. Is this a problem. ; )
Now, because Pat is concerned that I am being too harsh I will say this. I thought that she was very kind and well skilled in what she does. She's quite thorough and is truly concerned that we do everything we can to sell our house in a timely manner. And for that I was grateful. I just found it annoying because of my own reality. I have 3 kids ages 3, 2 and 1. When I get that call that someone wants to come look at our house. I'm sure it will be like this...Are there any diapers laying around? How much laundry can I stuff in the van around the car seats? Is everyone diapered (or sent to the toilet) and clothed? How fast can we pick up all the toys? But sure, if I get enough notice, I'll go through a broader check list. From now until we move...oh what fun!
Oh and for the record - just for her - I did line up my spice jars, make my pantry look like Trader Joe's (cause I shop there, not A.J's), fold all my linens and clothes to look like some unnamed store, and purchased a few fake plants and flower arraignments. As well as did more packing away.
So, interior designer, thank you for your helps and tips. I apologize for rolling my eyes at you (but only in my mind, of course.) You do your job well. And I'll do my best to live up to your standards.
Here's to moving - I'm tired!
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Answered Prayers. Dead Batteries.
I prayed for wind today. Thought it was in vain. But to my pleasure we had glorious, beautiful, windy day. To my great sadness...got 2 pictures and the batteries on the camera died. Of course! Hopefully we'll get to do it again soon and have Pat take the pictures. But both boys did fly the kite. As well as a little boy at the park. It was so windy that Pat had a time trying to get the kite down. We had such a grand time. All 3 kids rode to the park (in our neighborhood) in the wagon. It has a little trailer attachment just the right size for Nora. We brought the Kite blanket Grandma Suzanne made for us. Which was the only blanket worthy to come on this adventure. And best of all...it was only 75! We won't see another day like that until November. Thank you for answered prayers and wind!
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
My little Lane Face
As the previous post mentioned, we made a trip to Costco today. We left with everything on our list plus one. That's pretty good for us. This extra item was a big, fancy kite. (not that fance, like $10 fancy). While we don't often have enough wind to justify having a kite, it does happen on occasion. In fact, tomorrow is supposed to be cooler with some good wind. Please pray for wind! So all day today I hear about this kite and we need to get it out of the garage and fly it. I often wonder why I torture myself with buying these things. But back to the story. At bedtime, once again Lane asks about the kite. And once again I said, "when the sunshine wakes up and after school." And here's why I love my little Lane Face.
"When the sunshine wakes up, he's going to find our house and blow wind out of his mouth onto our trees so we can fly our kite!"
Oh how I pray for wind tomorrow for my sweet little Smith faces. And hope that you have lovely weather where ever you are.
Oh how I pray for wind tomorrow for my sweet little Smith faces. And hope that you have lovely weather where ever you are.
More reasons
For winning mother of the year...
Nora's BIRHTDAY was over a week ago and I'm just barely getting around to posting a shout out for that! Good grief. In honor of her and her birthday, I made brownies for us to enjoy...without her. What a nice and thoughtful mom. But don't you worry about her. She quite enjoyed the gift bag full of tissue paper - all for her to rip, shred and even taste. Now that's really all a one year old wants anyway. But Grandma Diane pulled through, showed up mom and dad, and actually bought Nora a gift. You can see that she was grateful that someone cared about her. Time out. I did do something for her. I painted her fingers and toes. *no pictures of those. Its very true that I do not take the greatest pictures* Anyway, we decided that the painted toes were cute. The painted fingers, kinda creepy.
Happy Birthday, Nora! We love your face!
(So mean! To show it to her and then take it away. There was a point...we let her try to help blow out the candle. That makes it okay, right?)
On another note. I realize that as Nora is getting older and is beginning to notice when she is being left out, I have to rethink a lot of our habits. Like Costco. Who doesn't love to wander around Costco and taste all the yummy samples? When we went this morning. I gave a particular sample to Lane and Kyle but not to Nora. The entire time the were enjoying said treats, Nora was constantly trying to grab at them and complaining that she didn't have one. This scenario can only get worse. I guess it means no more Costco samples, no more pretzels at the mall. And sadly for Lane, no more "oval sandwiches" (translation - cheeseburgers) at Wendy's. I have no idea why he ever started calling them that. Since everyone knows their buns are circles and their meat, infamous squares. And worse...no more 25 cent ice cream cones through the McD's drive thru. We only do that when dad is traveling, anyway. We'll just have to find another tradition. No, I'm not whining or complaining about these things. Of course I am hoping that it will help shed a few pounds. I'm only sad at all the repeated "but I want to!" and "sorry, we can't do that anymore." Even more, the possible "Nora, Nora, Nora!" (Translation - Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!" *SIGH*
Nora's BIRHTDAY was over a week ago and I'm just barely getting around to posting a shout out for that! Good grief. In honor of her and her birthday, I made brownies for us to enjoy...without her. What a nice and thoughtful mom. But don't you worry about her. She quite enjoyed the gift bag full of tissue paper - all for her to rip, shred and even taste. Now that's really all a one year old wants anyway. But Grandma Diane pulled through, showed up mom and dad, and actually bought Nora a gift. You can see that she was grateful that someone cared about her. Time out. I did do something for her. I painted her fingers and toes. *no pictures of those. Its very true that I do not take the greatest pictures* Anyway, we decided that the painted toes were cute. The painted fingers, kinda creepy.
Happy Birthday, Nora! We love your face!
(So mean! To show it to her and then take it away. There was a point...we let her try to help blow out the candle. That makes it okay, right?)
On another note. I realize that as Nora is getting older and is beginning to notice when she is being left out, I have to rethink a lot of our habits. Like Costco. Who doesn't love to wander around Costco and taste all the yummy samples? When we went this morning. I gave a particular sample to Lane and Kyle but not to Nora. The entire time the were enjoying said treats, Nora was constantly trying to grab at them and complaining that she didn't have one. This scenario can only get worse. I guess it means no more Costco samples, no more pretzels at the mall. And sadly for Lane, no more "oval sandwiches" (translation - cheeseburgers) at Wendy's. I have no idea why he ever started calling them that. Since everyone knows their buns are circles and their meat, infamous squares. And worse...no more 25 cent ice cream cones through the McD's drive thru. We only do that when dad is traveling, anyway. We'll just have to find another tradition. No, I'm not whining or complaining about these things. Of course I am hoping that it will help shed a few pounds. I'm only sad at all the repeated "but I want to!" and "sorry, we can't do that anymore." Even more, the possible "Nora, Nora, Nora!" (Translation - Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!" *SIGH*
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Why I should win mother of the year
If its time for voting, here is why I feel I qualify...
I always make sure my children are fed well balanced, nutritious and regular meals.
And that they get sufficient sleep so as to be properly rested and full of energy.
As well as giving them plenty of freedom to explore, discover and develop their minds.
(See that face? Now that's love!)
And that they get sufficient sleep so as to be properly rested and full of energy.
As well as giving them plenty of freedom to explore, discover and develop their minds.
(See that face? Now that's love!)Need I say more when these pictures tell so much on their own? How can I not at least be in the running for such praise and prestige?
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