Guess what I did today?

I shoveled the driveway, removing a good four inches of snow while more of the fluffy white stuff fell down around me.

I finally unpacked the boxes in our office.

I washed a sink full of dishes and did two loads of laundry.

I sewed the er..."private area" of my husbands work pants where a tiny hole appeared. I have no idea how or why he gets holes in this area...I don't ask questions.

I used the lint roller on hubby's work shirts...cuz I know how much he hates lint.

I organized all of my info for the upcoming Relay For Life event and emailed my fellow team mates with that info.

I uploaded a zillion pictures and sent them (via Wal-Mart.com) to be printed.

I put new pictures in my two photo collage frames. I made a grocery list.

I windexed (yes, that's a word) our coffee table and took out the recyclables.

While I did these things, I watched the episodes of Jon & Kate Plus Eight and Little People, Big World that I TiVo'd (gosh I have no idea how to spell that) Monday night and four episodes of Full House.

What have you done today?

Not Me!

I'm jumping back in - feet first- to the crazy fun of Not Me! Monday, hosted by the fabulous MckMama.

I did not recently cave and join the multidudes of facebookers in the "25 things about me" craze. I did not learn some new things about myself in writing my 25 things and I didn't share my list with my mom (via email) because I thought she'd like my answers.

I also did not go with my mom to see "He's Just Not That Into You" at the theatre on Saturday while hubby was Sturgeon Spearing. I did not point out (to my mom, whose husband - my dad - is also a scrooge about Valentine's Day) all the lovely couples in the theatre with us watching the movie. Together. With popcorn. Nope not me!

I didn't feel bad when, upon returning home from the movie I found the sweet Valentine's Day surprise hubby had left for me to find. I did not take back my mean thoughts about him and promptly call his cell phone to declare my love for that man.

Because I was so enamored with the gift I didn't find, I most certainly didn't grumble about having to trek into the cold, in my jammies to pick up my dear husband from the bar later that night.

I most definitely didn't cry when I realized that all those gosh-darn-curl-up-in-a-ball-because-they-hurt-so-bad cramps turned into my period; meaning I'm not pregnant even though we've been trying for eight months to conceive and that stupid pregnancy book I've been reading "told" me that all the signs were there this time and I would most certainly find out I was pregnant. (Whew! Gotta take a breather after typing that one.)

I have not been very emotional lately, and didn't cry when I thought my brother-in-law was laughing at me when he was really laughing about an un-related joke he'd just heard. I'm not that sensitive.

I did not create a "To Do" list for today and have not already accomplished nearly half of that list including #7 "Blog."

I am not, right now, paitently awaiting the Fireplace Fixer Guy who is schedule to inspect our fireplace today. I am not sooooo looking forward to curling up by it later this afternoon with a good book.

I am also not even the teensiest, weensiest bit worried about whether or not this Fireplace Fixer Guy - whose name is Edward, apparently - is a rapist/murderer/all around creep. I'm not that paranoid and don't mind one bit being all alone in our house with a guy I don't know.

I am not waaaaaaay excited for my friend Sarah and her cute lil family, who just bought a new house! I wasn't even a little bit jealous that their offer was ACCEPTED without much difficulty. Because I'm not bitter about our home-buying experience at all. (Smile)

I am not going to sign off right now to watch a Brady Bunch marathon on TV Land while I dust, do dishes and wait for the (maybe creepy) Fireplace Fixer Guy.

I did not cut my own hair this morning after setting up and cancelling several appointments at a local salon. It has not been 8 months since the last time I paid someone to cut my hair. I did not just cringe as I typed that.

That's all....

Have a great Not Me! Monday!

P.S. The fireplace guy just showed up...he's not creepy! Hooray!

The Joys of Owning a Home

Guess what I did last night? Go on, guess. Need a hint?



Still can't figure it out? Here's another.

See all those containers gathered around the sump pump in our basement? See the water dripping down the walls of our basement? Now, take a guess.

Yup, you got it! We had a sump pump disaster last night. Wanna hear about? No? Too bad...

It all started with the recent thaw, you know the one that melted the 12+ inches of snow that had accumulated all winter in one, warm and windy day? Yea, that one.

That thaw created an adorable little pond in the empty lot right next door (see first photo - that's not snow, that's water). That little pond immediately started dripping its way into our basement, prompting the sump pump to kick in every two-three minutes.

We weren't too concerned at first though we realized that because the house was a foreclosure and it sat empty for nearly a year, there could be some problems. That's why we checked on the pump and basement every hour or so.

Everything was fine until 8 p.m. last night when I checked on the basement and saw water, lots of water, seeping in through the walls! My shouting quickly sent hubby outside where he found the pipe thingy that was supposed to take the water from the sump pump to the sewer system had frozen and was instead spewing water right along side the house. When too much water accumulated in one place, the ground became saturated and the water started coming in through the basement walls. Ugh

Mark quickly set me up with a lemonade pitcher, all the garbage cans/coolers/large storage bins etc. we had in the house and instructed me to "scoop" the water out of the sump pump to keep it from running while he frantically called plumbers and both of our dads for advice.

The plumbers were not helpful, but thankfully our dads came to the rescue. My dad rushed over with a hack saw and some large black tube material, while Mark's dad gathered the tubing he uses to drain their sump pump water away from the house. And I kept scooping.

My dad and Mark sawed off the offending, frozen portion of the sump pump pipe and attached my dad's temporary tubing while I - finally taking a break from scooping - ran to my father in law's to get the "good" tube. (As seen in the second pic.)

Thankfully after some experimenting, Mark and my dad rigged up something they thought would work to get us through the night. By this time it was nearly 11 p.m. Guess what my sweet hubby had me do then? Get back on my very sore knees on the hard cement floor so I could strain my already very sore back to dump. the. water. back. into. the. sump. pump. hole.

By this time, I was treating that water like liquid gold! It took a lot of hard work to keep up with that scooping - as fast as I could remove the water, more was rushing in because of that gosh-darn-stupid-little-(gigantic!)-pond next door!

So I dumped the water back in and crawled into bed...only to be awoken two hours later when the alarm went off signaling me (or hubby) to check on the sump pump. And that's how the rest of the night/morning went - getting up every two hours to check.

Today (I'm off work) I am aiming to get everything up off the basement floor and onto the shelves Mark made, just in case there are more sump pump problems (there better not be!). I'd better get to it, that pond isn't getting any smaller....

Ahhhhh the joys of owning a home.

Our House...in the middle of our street...Our House...

Some house pics for your enjoyment!!!

We re-carpeted the entire house....
and re-painted the entire house!

Our cozy fire place!

All About Hubby

Husband Meme

1. Where did you meet? at the golf course where I bartended and he frequently golfed

2. How long did you date before you got married? we dated a year before getting engaged and then it was two more years till the wedding - I had to finish college!

3. How long have you been married? almost 16 months

4. What does he do that surprises you? Plans sweet date nights or brings me something he knows I like

5. What is your favorite feature of his? the way he walks, his hands, his smile...

6. What is your favorite quality of his? he's waaaaaaay funny

7. Does he have a nickname for you? honey

8. What is his favorite color? blue

9. What is his favorite food? anything with meat and veggies

10. What is his favorite sport? Football/Baseball - it's a tie

11. When and where was your first kiss? July 18, 2004 (our first date)by my parent's garage

12. What is your favorite thing to do as a couple? hang out together, watch movies

13. Do you have any children? nope, not yet

14. Does he have a hidden talent? He can actually sing quite well..when he tries

15. How old is he? 26

16. Who said I love you first? He did, while we were slow dancing to one of our favorite songs at a Tim McGraw concert he took me to.

17. What’s his favorite type of music? country

18. What do you admire most about him? He's a hard worker, he's financially smart and he checks into everything to make sure we're getting a good deal and it's "right" for us.

19. Do you think he will read this? Nope. I know he won't.


HUSBAND MEME

1. He’s sitting in front of the TV - What is on the screen? Football

2. You’re out to eat. What kind of dressing does he get on his salad? French

3. What is one food he won't eat? Shrimp - he's allergic.

4. You go out to the bar. What does he order? Captain & Coke or Lime Green Tom Collins

5. Where did he go to high school? mmmm that might be too much info to put online

6. What size shoe does he wear? 13.5

7. If he was to collect anything, what would it be? Green Bay Packer memorabilia

8. What is his favorite type of sandwich? I was just informed that he LOVES eggsalad sandwiches...I have never seen him eat one, however.

9. What would the Husband eat every day if he could? Hu Hot

10. What is his favorite cereal? Cap'n Crunch

11. What would he never wear? Pink

12. What is his favorite sports team? The Packers and the Brewers (a tie)

13. Who is his best friend? me first then his brother Randy

14. What is something you do that he wishes you wouldn’t do? Get frustrated easily and "yell" at him

15. How many states has he lived in? just one

16. What is his heritage? german

17. You bake him a cake for his birthday; what kind is it? Chocolate/caramel from Manderfields Bakery...I don't bake cakes.

18. Did he play sports in high school? Football

19. What could he spend hours doing? playing Madden on his Wii

I'm baaaaaaaaaack.

Whoa! Can you believe my last post was January 17?! A lot has happened since then. I'll do my best to fill in the blanks.

When I last posted we were devastated to learn that the closing date for our house had been pushed back. Again. That's right - we were given four different closing dates and we watched each pass by with nothing being done.

It was down right upsetting. We had some complications because our house was a foreclosure, owned by the mega company Freddie Mac. So, of course a lot of the house sale/closing had to take place out of state in Virginia of all places.

Wait. Let me back up. I want to document all of our struggles with the purchase of this house so we can look back and laugh our heads off at everything that went "wrong."

Here's how it all went down:

Back in November I was sitting in my deer stand, having just taken a four-point buck. I was celebrating my victory and texting back and forth with my husband when he wrote "How do you feel about living in _______" (insert small town where he grew up).

I typed back "I don't care where we live as long as it's in a HOUSE."

He made it happen. Two days later we toured the house. Two days after that we wrote up the offer to purchase the house. Three days later we had an accepted offer. A week later we met with a local banker and signed zillions of papers to get the ball rolling on the loan.

See how smoothly things were going at the beginning? Then the shoe fell.

The day after we met with our local loan officer she called Mark to tell him that she couldn't do the loan because the laws regarding foreclosed, manufactured homes had recently changed. Our only hope, she said, was to get our loan directly through a mortgage broker.

Luckily our realtor knew a broker, who was part of her same real estate group. So, Mark set up a meeting with him. In the mean time we had to meat with our realtor two more times to sign additional paper work that the seller, Freddie Mac required.

The day of our meeting with the mortgage guy came and we went to his office only to be told that he wasn't in and his secretary didn't think he was expecting to meet with us since he was at a Christmas party with his girlfriend. Um, excuse me? We had that appointment set for weeks.

Hubby, who does not like to be pushed around, some how got the secretary to give us both his cell phone number and his girlfriend's number. We finally got a hold of him and he simply said "Oh, I must have forgotten."

Soooooooooo we left all the paper work there, with his assurance that he'd get things started and we'd set up another date to meet with him.

At the start of all this we were given a closing date of December 30, 2008. We soon learned that would not be happening and our closing date was pushed back to the first Friday in January.

We had to meet one more time with the realtor so sign more papers for the sale and then we simply had to wait to make sure the title cleared - something we understood our realtor was taking care of. The week we were supposed to close we learned that date was being pushed back to Tuesday of the next week because there were still some issues with the title.

We met with the mortgage guy and signed all the papers for our loan. And we waited. Through all this, Mark hounded these people - calling them 5 to 6 times a day wanting to know what they were doing to make this happen. I'm soooo proud of him for sticking up for us and staying on top of this. We definitley wouldn't have gotten this house if it weren't for him.

Finally, Mark was fed up with getting half answers and he tracked down the numbers for the actual people at Freddie Mac. And he started hounding them.

We learned that the title had been cleared for some time, but Freddie Mac was waiting for paperwork from our mortgage guy before they would finalize the sale! Here we had the mortgage guy telling us that he was waiting on Freddie Mac. Ridiculous.

So Mark yelled some more and we had another closing date set for January 19. In the mean time we had already purchase the new paint and carpeting for the house, had a date set for the carpet install, had a plumber and furnace guy set to come to the house and had movers all lined up for Saturday, January 24.

Then. We got the call. On January 19 we were informed we would not be closing. After Mark had already taken time off work, after I had already informed my new boss that I would need a few hours off to close. We. Were. Not. Closing. Again.

To say the least, I was crushed. It felt like this was never going to happen for us; like we were being punished for some reason.

Mark threatened these people. My husband, the man that has not a mean bone in his body, yelled/screamed/and threatened these people within an inch of their lives if they did not make this happen for us.

We closed on Friday, January 23 at 3:30 p.m. Mark had the keys to our house in hand that morning at 7:30 a.m. as per his agreement to spare the lives of our realtor and mortgage guy.

We closed without hassle and quickly high-tailed it to our new house to begin painting. We worked on the house till 1 a.m. and went back to our apartment to sleep for a few hours. We woke at 5:45 a.m. that Saturday to finish packing some things, then I met my sister-in-law (The Painting Queen) back at the house to work on painting. Our moving helper guys (aka my brother, a couple of Mark's brothers, my dad and my buddy Ryan) showed up at the apartment to load up and 2 trips later we were officially moved in!

It's been a whirl-wind of activity ever since. We painted every wall in the entire house, re-carpeted every room in the house, did some extreme cleaning, changed some light fixtures and all the locks/door knobs in the house, re-wired some stuff, unpacked a lot of stuff, organized still more stuff...and here we are - enjoying our new house.

I must admit at times I was ready to throw in the towel. I simply couldn't believe everything that was happening to us and felt like we had the worst luck ever. Now I see the reason for it all.

We are so happy and I have an even great appreciation for my husband and all that he does to insure my happiness. Amazing.

In the last week or so, I've been worried about financial things as I learned my hours were being cut at my new job. Today I realized (after looking back at all that happened with this house) that I need to let go and know that everything will work out.

Watch for some fun, new house pics in the very near future because I'm baaaaaaaack, blogging buddies!

Not Forgotten

Dont worry, I promise I haven't forgotten about this little space in the great blog-o-sphere. It's just that we've been going through a very trying time and I really haven't felt much like posting.

I promise some day (soon) to share the details of all we've been through in the last two weeks. I just can't bring myself to type it out quite yet.

In any event, I'm so amazed that through it all we've found the strength and faith to brush aside those "why me's?" and other thoughts of feeling sorry for ourselves and really appreciate that we have each other no matter what happens.

No more than ever, we recognize just how many families there are out there who are struggling and in need of prayer and kind thoughts.

Here's just a small list of those I've been thinking of/praying for this week: Amanda, Harper, Brayden, Eden's Family, Little Russ, and Ashley.

It's so important to remember that even in times when we're feeling all alone...scared...forgotten...there's always someone we can turn to.

Blessings to all of you!