First Snow

As first time homeowners, we are having a lot of firsts come up. Today was the first snow for our new house. It is also the first time we have had Euler in the snow. We had put off buying a snow shovel, but Matt had to break down and get one based on the weather forcast yesterday. I parked on the outside of the fense last night so that I wouldn't have to worry about opening the gate to leave in the morning. Also, if there had been a lot of snow, I could just push it the rest of the way to the street with gravity's help. Euler seems to really enjoy the snow, including taking a bite of it here and there. Luckily, the accumulation was minimal (less than an inch), so no shoveling was required and the temperature was warmer in the morning than it had been the day before. However, there is another storm front coming through, so I am sure we will put the snow shovel to good use very soon.

New Gate

We spent some time on Sunday putting in the gate for the driveway. Not the brightest idea, given how cold it was, but Matt wanted it done. It will be nice when we don't have to go out side when ever the dog needs to go out. We are a little concerned that the quickcrete is not completely solid, but  hopefully the cold weather will not effect its stability. There is still one little spot that Euler can get through when the gate gets put on the hinges. We really don't want to by a roll of chain-link fensing for 2 feet of fence. Right now, Matt has put a piece of cement board there while we come up with a better solution. All in all, we are making pretty good progress on our list of things we want to do to the house. I'm sure this will soon change as the quick fixes get done and the projects that require more than a couple hours and some major demolition are left.

More Unpacking - Slooooooooowly

Not a lot going on with our house this week. Our new bed was delivered on Monday. Subsequently we now have a guest room that consists of more than a blow up bed.

We have decided that we need to do something about closing in the yard sooner rather than later. I left Euler out in the yard with his tie-down clipped to his collar. He slipped his collar off and scared us. Luckily he didn't go far, but closing in the yard has moved up our list.

Our pantry might have some issues. Our basement stays quiet moist which is one of the reasons we got a dehumidifier. This week we had enough rain to see which basement wall receives the most water pressure. Unfortunately, it seems to be the corner Matt has started the pantry. He is concerned and started talking about putting in a sub-pump. One nice thing is that the area we are planning on putting in bookcases seems to stay dry.

I found out that who ever put up the closet rack in my closet did not screw it into the studs in the wall. Of course I found this out when I went up there and saw that the closet had collapsed into itself. This just adds another item to our project list.

I officially changed my residency with the state today. This was the last thing I needed to do in the moving process. At least I think this is the last thing.  Now just to finish unpacking.

I have taken out the Christmas decorations and started to decorate. I am excited to have our first tree. We are hoping to get one this weekend. Fingers crossed!

Pantry

Our pantry is underway. Matt spent some time today painting the soon to be pantry with sealing paint. That area of the basement is more moist and had not been painted as recently as the rest of the basement. Now that alcove is all nice and bright white. Although we had quite a few windows open because the smell was very strong in the basement.

We checked out the Farm Market today. It was more of a flee market today, but we were able to pick up some fresh vegetables. Matt made a root stew with some of the vegetables and the ham bone from our housewarming party. Yum!

New Bed!

We bought a new bed. It is our Christmas present to each other. We spent some time on black friday looking at some beds. Originally we were looking at getting a king size because with the twin box springs we knew that the pieces would fit up the stairs where the queen box springs would not. Luckily we found out about slit box queens. As we checked out a lot of the mattress stores we found out that spit queens are very common around here because of all the bungalows. Split queens cost around a hundred dollars more than a standard queen, but are still less than buying a king. I spent a lot of time trying out all types of mattresses and we finally settled on one. Our new mattress will be here on Monday! I am looking forward to having a mattress that was not a hand-me-down.

On a side note, we are enjoying exploring our new home town. We checked out Inn Season Cafe and are looking forward to going back. It took a while to get our food, but it was delicious.

Sold Mortgage

Our mortgage has been sold. We haven't even had the house a month and our mortgage is now in another companies hands. This seems a bit rediculous, especially considering that this practice is one of the reasons why the housing market down turned. In all honesty, I wouldn't care if our original mortgage company hadn't made us jump through so many hoops to get our mortgage. I'm happy that the terms cannot be changed when the mortgage is sold. It vexes me that it was sold so quickly. If this had happened six months from now I could possibly understand, but now. What is going on with the banking industry that they would sell a mortgage less than a month after it was issued? If they didn't want our business, the bank could have directed us to the company that bought our mortgage.

Housewarming Party

Thank you to all that attended and all who sent their warm wishes.  It was lots of fun to show off our new house to everyone. The christmas lights out front seemed to help everyone find our house. Thanks to everyone for the lovely gifts. Matt is happy to have a full liquor cabinet and a few more knifes in our kitchen set. Euchre and Guitar Hero seemed to be the preferred games of the evening. We also learned that our freezer opens whenever the refrigerator door is closed quickly. (Looks like we are going to have to baby-proof the fridge) Check out a few pictures I took through out the night. I appreciated everyone being impressed with how unpacked we are. For anyone who would still like a tour and were not able to make the party, feel free to let us know.

Chatting in the living room

Peeking in the living room from the porch

Grabbing some of the spread in the dinning room

Euler watching Matt cut up the ham

Playing Guitar Hero

Chatting and playing some Eucher

Lounging in the front bedroom

Playing some more Guitar Hero

Before the House Warming Party

Today is our house warming party. Although we are not quiet as unpack as I had hoped, it will be a nice kick off the the holiday weekend. Since many of our friends are coming into town to see family, we thought now would be a good time. And of course, to have the party before the holiday craziness that follows Thanksgiving.
 I don't think either of us anticipated how busy work and school and moving would be during this time period. Shout out to Kat for helping out, yet again, in the preparations  for the party.  She put up some lights outside, picked up around the house and help prepare some food. All while I went to school and work and Matt was working. I am anxious to get home and get the party started. Pictures and details to follow. If you aren't making it out here, I'm sure that you will be here in spirit.

Completely Out!

Today I moved the last of our worldly possessions out of our old residence and brought them to the new house. Thanks again to Kat for stepping up and helping out. She made a few trips with us and helped clean our old place. We still have some trash to take out there but we are finally moved. Now the unpacking begins! Yeah!

Matt is in charge of unpacking the kitchen since he is the cook of the house. I have already set up my desk and the dogs permanent bed location. The master bedroom is nearly unpack, but until we get a bed frame that will fit up the stairs, our mattress will continue to be on the floor. The totes have been sorted into piles in the garage by type of item (Christmas, craft, tools, camping, dishes, clothes, etc) so the rest of the unpacking should go smoothly. I have put together some shelves for the garage to organize some of the items that will stay in the garage (tools, camping gear, sports stuff). Matt would like to eventually park both cars in the garage but we have a long way to go.

Out house warming party is just a few days away and I am trying to get everything that minimally needs to be put a way taken care of. We also are going to be one of those people and put Christmas lights out before Thanksgiving (Sorry) because the lighting on our street is minimal and we want people to be able to find our house.

Moving Day - Part 2

And 3 and 4 . . .

So we are mostly moved in, just a few things left at the old residence. Since I am driving right by there on my way to school. I will be moving the rest of the stuff over the next week. Unfortunately we have not really been unpacking as we have been moving our things (OK mostly my things). So right now we have a large pile of unsorted boxes that we can't find anything we need. I think a majority of the unpacking might be taking place next Friday since I am done with my observations.

Thanks to my parents for letting us use their Suburban this weekend. As we are both small car people, this is one of the few occasions were we wish we had a larger vehicle. Also thanks to Kat for helping us with a load on Saturday between the MSU game and the Tequila tasting with Dom.

Of course I have been trying not to do too much unpacking because I am attempting to finish my grading/homework. On the other hand, Matt and I are both anxious to be settled in to our new home. We are planning to do as much as we can before our house warming party on November 25th.

Washer and Dryer Installed!

Matt installed the washer and dryer today. This was not a trivial task since the hook ups did not match what we had. The washer also did not want to be leveled. We still need to switch the directions of the doors so that they don't open into each other but that should be an easy fix.

We still have lots of ideas of what we want to do around the house, but its a big undertaking and we are still debating what we should do first.

Moving Day Part 2 this weekend!

Possible Leak!?!

So as we have heard form many of our firends who are home owners, you never know what is going to happen.

Today, Matt had the cable installed, which of course means internet too. My dad came around to pick up the trailer (thanks!) and I brought a car load of more stuff from the old house to the new one after being in class all day.

While Matt and I were having dinner and watching my favorite shows (How I Met Your Mother and Big Bang Theory), Matt looked up at the patch that is in the ceiling in the living room. He thought it looked different then before and got up on the coffee table to feel the ceiling. He think he feels moisture. So we scourer the house for where we put the flash light and go into the attic to see the pipes behind the master bath. From what  Matt could tell it looks like a rain pipe is in the right location, but he couldn't see down far enough to tell.

Keep your fingers crossed!

Move In Day - Part 1

Today was move in day. Overall, I think everything went smoothly.

Matt and I have made a few trips to our new house to drop somethings off and do some chores over the last week. Matt's parents closed on a house just a few days before we did and have decided that they did not want the included washer and dryer that came with the house. Since our house did not come with a washer and dryer, we originally were just going to move the cheap pair that we bought about a year ago. However, we have an electric dryer and our new house is set up for gas. To make a long story short, the pair that came with Matt's parents house included a gas dryer. So Matt, Dom and I went and moved the washer and dryer out of their house on Friday and my parents met us there with the trailer.

We didn't get as much packing done during the week as we would have liked, but with my 22 credit hours and Matt working 60+ hours during the week, we probably should have expected it. Saturday was the MSU-WMU game (Go Green) as well as a workshop for the grant project I work for. I started doing a serious pack when I got home and we accomplished some packing Saturday night.

Moving Day started at 7AM for Matt and myself, as we started moving boxes out onto the lawn. I always think its easier to see what else needs to be packed when the boxes are out of the way. My parents arrived around 9:30 to drop the trailer and Dom and Marie showed up again to help do some heavy lifting. Although my sister was off playing army for the weekend, she sent her boyfriend Eric to help us. Our goal was to get all the furniture and what ever else we could into the trailer. We had the trailer packed sometime around 1PM and we all then went to Jimmy Johns for lunch.  When we finished lunch,  my dad came back to pick up the trailer and we  headed to our new house. We had some minor incidence backing the trailer into our narrow driveway and took out some dirt and grass in our neighbors front yard. At this point we hadn't met our neighbors, but they turned out to be laid back about it. We unloaded the trailer and got most everything where it needed to be. We found out the bed wouldn't fit up the stairs (time for a new one?) and we seemed to have lost one of the feet for the couch (I still maintain that its inside the couch). The dryer is not hooked up yet and we still have some stuff at our old residence. After all of this, we ordered Happy's pizza and enjoyed sitting down and resting.

Again, we would like to thank our friends who continue to help us with tasks that are not easy favors to perform or pleasant to do. Thank you Dom, Marie and Eric. Thank you Dad for driving a trailer full of stuff for me yet again.

Pictures!

For those of you who want to take a look. These were taken a while ago, I think in June.

The front

The back

The attic

 

The master bedroom

 

 

The master bathroom

 

The kitchen

 

The dinning room (if you can see it)

 

The living room

 

The front bedroom

 

The back bedroom

 

 

The basement

Raking Leaves

Happy Halloween!

So today is our first full day of house ownership. We raked leaves, removed moldy drywall from the basement and removed the carpet from the floor of the basement bathroom. Matt's mom and Patina came over for a tour of the empty house. Dom and Marie came over for a tour and to help out with the demo and the raking. Matt and Marie went to pick up some stuff at Lowe's including the much needed dehumidifier. We are blessed to have friends who are willing to help us out with even the most unpleasant projects.

We are setting moving day for November 8th, assuming nice weather.

Closing!

After putting in our offer on June 29th and all the drama that has occurred in the last two weeks, we have finally closed on our first house.

For those of you who haven't heard, this house was a short sale; so most of the time we were waiting for the sellers back to work out an arrangement with the seller and approve the sale. Matt was calling our realtor every week to see if there was any progress. This required multiple extensions on our contract offer to be signed while we waited. When the sellers bank finally got everything in order, then we got the joy of jumping through all the hoops that our mortgage bank required. Since we were applying for an FHA loan, the bank could have stricter requirements. The bank appraised the house at the exact value at which we were purchasing the house. While this did not affect the process of getting the loan approved, it does seem a little shady. The bank also had to inspect the house and the inspector came back with a rather substantial list of thing that had to be fixed before the loan could be approved. Some of the things on the list were ridiculous: cleaning the gutters, painting the trim around the windows, removing the broken garage door opener, and putting up a railing on the stairs. Other items seemed reasonable: having the furnace and roof certified by professionals. We were able to negotiate with the seller to pay to have the small things done around the house. We had the furnace inspected and it past what ever test was required. The roof was a different story. We knew from our original inspection that the roof was going to need replacing in the near future, but we were hoping to get through the winter and replace it next summer. However, the bank was requiring a roofer to say that the roof would last two year and no one was willing to put that in writing. So we agreed to have the roof replaced. But the bank would not let us escrow the new roof. Basically we were being forced to gamble and put a new roof on a house that could possibly not end up being ours. Obviously we decided to bite the bullet and got it done. Unfortunately, our main realtor was in and out of the hospital during these last couple weeks, so it ended up being a whirl wind of stress and complications.

In the end, it worked out and we are now homeowners. Although there are many things we still would like to do as we get settled. Our first projects include: raking the leaves in the yard (yeah fall), putting in a dehumidifier in the basement, removing drywall in the basement and maybe removing the carpet in the dinning room and living room.