sold!

we sold our house.

oh yeah.

 

only took us 2 weeks.

in total, i did 6 house tours.

7, if you count two 6th grade girls hoping to talk

their parents into moving.

i did a few things to make the house seem a bit more functional and pleasant.

here are my top ten tips: 

 

1- took all my extra shoes and all my winter sweatshirts out of my closet.

it made the closet look organized and bigger.

i wanted to make it seem like we had plenty of room.

this goes for any jam-packed closet in the house.

de-clutter.

 

2- i put live plants in most all the rooms.

i think it makes it look more homey, green and inviting.

no to mention it helps decorate a space without 

making it seem too personal. 

it needs to look like a home,

but a home that could work for a number of people,

not just you.

 

3 - all of brette's extra things around the house were stored.

no highchair. no jumper. no babygates. no baby toilet.

the house looked ready for ANY family to move in.

not just one with small children.

 

4 - all bathroom toiletries were put away.

i have a basket of products i keep on the counter.

i made sure and stored that away so the

prospective buyers didn't think we were lacking on storage.

clean off your counters - - bathrooms and kitchen.

 

5 - i turned on every lamp in the house.

i think it makes the home look warm, bright and inviting.

lighting can really change the way a room feels.

 

6 - i wiped down the deck furniture and put out a few

outdoor place settings so buyers could envision 

all the fun outdoor dinners and deck parties.

your outdoor space can be just as important as your indoor space.  

 

7 - i deodorized.

not that i think my house smells,

but i do have two dogs running around.

i swept and vacuumed over and over, always

adding arm & hammer pet fresh to the carpet.

and then i'd click on my scentsy (orange scent) in the kitchen.

it smelt clean and the citrus smell makes me think of summer.

 

8 - i cleaned.

the bathroom fixtures were shining, the table tops were dusted

and the mirrors gleamed.

you want to make sure the house looks cared for and well kept.

 

9- i had ronnie make me a list of dates and specific upgrades.

people asked lots of questions and lets be honest,

i might be able to tell you when we painted

a room, but i don't know how new the water heater is.

that kind of stuff was always ronnie's job.

so i had two pages of specifics he wrote out for me.

i could go over our heating and cooling,

sump pump, roof, foundation, garbage disposal, appliances.

you name it and i had some info on it.

it made me seem super knowledgeable and probably

helped put any buyers' mind at ease with a quick answer

to any of their questions.

 

and last,

 

10- i made ronnie, brette and the dogs leave.

the point of showing your house is to make the

buyer think that it could be their house.

if you have your kids and your pet and your family

running around, it makes them feel like a visitor

when they should be envisioning their own life here.

sure, it was kind of a pain - - for ronnie.

he had to leave with everyone in tow and find something

to do for an hour, but i think it was totally worth it.

a couple times he took brette out for dinner, so

i put the dogs in their bed in my car and left it running with

the air conditioning on.

a little extreme, but louie would have barked his head off the entire

time and ruined the house showing.

 

so there you have it.

a little bit about what worked for us

when showing and ultimately selling our house.

 

now who wants to be invited to our packing party?

we only have a few weeks to get everything out.

i'm overwhelmed.

shit hit the fan

no, actually shit was everywhere but the fan.

in brette hair, on her hands, her pj's, her crib, her sheets.

it was nasty.

 

she woke up a little early and i wasn't quite done

getting ready for work so i let her play in her crib.

i'm guessing 15 minutes later, i go in to get her

and i am hit with strong smell of poop.

i'm just thinking that i have gross diaper to change.

until i open the curtains and turn on the lamp.

dun dun duuuuun.

brette was having a full on poop party.

of course, i'm all ready for work in a dress and she's trying

to touch me with her poopy little fingers.

ahhhh.

there is quite the pile of it on her sheets so i take off her shirt

and lay it over the pile so she'll stop touching it.

gag. choke. vomit. gross.

i get all her clothes and diaper off and

wipe down her back and toosh the best i can.

i put her in the bathtub and start scrubbing.

then the best thing in the world happened.

my mom showed up to watch her.

oh halleluiah, i have backup.

so i conveniently  had to go to work and left my

mom with poopy laundry and poopy hair to wash.

i'm hoping this never, ever happens again.

or if it does, let ronnie be the one that finds her.

 

but as you probably guessed,

this is just the precursor of a sick kiddo.

 yep, all day yesterday she kept getting worse and worse.

runny nose, slobbering, not sleeping, diarrhea, pulling on her ear and cranky.

we're headed to the pediatrician this afternoon to get her checked out.

stupid summer sickness.

weekend recap

busy weekend.

 

i had a half day at work on friday

so i was finally able to see dana and her kids.

(plus our bff, kass joined us)

we have the exact opposite work schedules,

so we literally can't ever hang out. 

it's a real bummer.

it was only for a couple hours,

but it was long enough to get the details on each other's lives,

bitch about people and

swap stories on our husbands and kids.

just what i needed.

 

 

 

i had to work saturday morning,

but beforehand i drove half way to warrensburg

to meet my mom and drop off brette.

she watched her for me so ronnie

could have some time to work on a couple of pieces

of siding that needed replaced on our house.

its kind of hard to do that with a one year old.

after work i drove down to warrensburg

and hung out with my mom until my dad got off work

and then we headed to my cousin's house

for her surprise 40th birthday.

i ate lots of food and then dominated a piece of chocolate cake.

i'm pretty sure i gained back any of the weight i had lost.

we made it home in time to get brette to bed and finish my book.

i know. my saturday night is killer.

 

 

sunday, we woke up to cloudy skies,

but made it to the park for awhile before it started raining.

brette had a ride on daddy shoulders

while louie and leia ran a like stallion, stopping only for potty breaks.

i was really awesome and made biscuits, sausage and eggs

for a big sunday breakfast.

this was the first time ever and

will probably never happen again,

but hey, i need to impress ronnie every now and again.

 

 

after brette's nap we headed to ronnie's sisters house for a family day.

ronnie's mom and grandma were in town so

it was nice to spend some time with them.

(and somehow we didn't get one stinkin' picture)

while we were there i got a phone call from

a lady that had made an offer on our house and she

accepted our counter offer.

wahoo!

if the inspection and appraisal go accordingly,

we will have to be out of our house by september 1st.

even as i sit here and type this i feel the overwhelming

desire to get some boxes and start packing.

now all i have to do is figure out this damn sellers contract.

 

 

hope you all had a nice weekend too!

a healing heart

my FIL had heart surgery today

so b and i spent the last 5 or so hours

in the hospital waiting room.

once the doctor came out and told us that

it was a little bit worse than he thought,

but still a success,

we all let out a big sigh of relief and i packed up

brette to take home for a nap before she we had a meltdown.

the rest of the family stayed and waited for him to get through

recovery so they could see him.

i heard some stories about dear old dad-n-law that i

had never heard and learned a few new facts about his life.

that's always interesting.

but mel, to me, is my dessert partner.

we equally love anything sweet and often times,

we can convince each other to go back for seconds

even though both our spouses are looking at us like,

really, fatty?

we just cackle and add ice cream.

i'm really happy things went well for him today.

brette definitely needs lots more time with her grandparents.

 

we're waiting on ronnie to get home from work

and then we're headed back up there so we can visit him.

it actually ended up being a nice day with my in-laws

and i got to spend some quality time with family from

out of state that had never met brette.

of course she dazzled them.

and ps - if there is an award for best behaved kid

in a waiting room - - this girls wins.

thank god.

 

 

 

all in all,

today was a good day.

 

pray for a quick recovery and

lasting health for ronnie's dad

and my indulger-n-law.

 

our trick pony

we've been busy over here

teaching brette the weirdest tricks.

she has three new ones.

1 - if you put out your pointer finger and say

ET phone home,

she will touch her pointer finger to yours.

i think it hilarious.

 

 

our next, and even weirder trick,

(this one ronnie taught her)

is if you say superstar

she will raise her arms straight above her head.

oh hey, its mary katherine gallagher.

 

 

her third and final trick is mimi's fault.

she started singing brette the "little green frog" song

and now brette sticks her tounge in and out

like a lizard. all. day. long.

 

 

so yeah.

our kid is cool

and easily influenced, what?

 

 

 

ps- our house has had two showings and one scheduled for tomorrow.

keeping out fingers and toes crossed.

 

 

 

family ties

i've had a few extra hours at work in the last couple weeks

and my sister-n-laws definitely came to my rescue.

sheri, ronnie's sister, watch b for a few hours

during a morning training session.

its nice that brette got to spend time with her and her kiddos.

looks like they had some fun together.

 

 

then the next week my other sister-n-law, jaime, 

watched b for two whole days while i was at work.

(a combo of more training and my mom being gone on vacation)

i was a little worried that brette would throw down

the gauntlet since she's so used to sleeping in her own crib.

but luckily, jaime found a way to easily put her to sleep.

thank jesus.

 

and i love getting these photos throughout my day

so i can see how much fun b has with her two cousins.

i think they are going to be best friends.

 

 

these two really helped me out and gave brette fantastic days with her cousins.

ronnie, on the other hand, who is totally used to having brette

and knows her schedule,

sent me this on friday:

 

 

he took her on a bike ride when she was supposed to be napping.

idiot.

poor girl had to sleep sitting up.

 

 

fsbo

for those of you who don't know real estate lingo

fsbo = for sale by owner.

ronnie and i are officially going to try to sell our house.

 

i found a site that lets me list our house for free (yay!)

and it goes on all these other websites too.

 

Zillow	HotPads	Yahoo
Frontdoor	Zillow Mobile	HotPads Mobile
Backpage	ByOwnerMLS	Enormo
Oodle	Trovit	Zumper
Lovely	Trulia	Others

it lasts 60 days and then i have to renew it.

but i'm trying to be optimistic.

hopefully it will sell within that time frame.

i think if it goes longer then that,

we will either take it off the market until next spring

or list it with a realtor.

 

i guess this is just a shameless plug

for all of you locals that read this

to spread the word.

but also, i'm am really excited at the possibility

of moving somewhere new.

if i could pick up this house and take it with me,

i would.

but we've decided that dream of owning some acreage

outweighs how much i love this house.

 

 

now i have to get back to cleaning.

this place is going to be spotless!