Category Archives: House and Home

In The Air There’s A Feeling Of Christmas

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Last evening, on the way to look at our mattress, I noticed this Christmas tree from a far away distance. As I was approaching, I quickly got my camera and put my window down to snap a picture. This totally reminded me of the song Silver Bells (one of my favorite Christmas Songs) as you will notice the many signs in the picture as well as the “Do not walk” red hand sign right smack dab in the front and center of the Christmas tree. The snow covered the ground so pretty white and I felt as though I were driving in a snow globe. That was the first time ever that I’ve driven in the stuff. Thank goodness they keep the roads nice and clear as I would not be driving otherwise. Hubby did give me some tips as he grew up in it, but I think I’ll pass if it gets too bad as I’m not experienced with this stuff.

Oh yes, about looking at our mattress… We found a very nice King size pillow top marked down at a very reasonable price. It will be delivered next week on our move in day right on time for us to get a good night’s sleep. Talk about relaxation, that’s just how I feel as now we have a place to stay and a bed to sleep on. Everything else is just icing on the cake from here on out!


A Pretty Wintry Mix

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A pretty wintry mix has come our way, who’d a thunk? What a change in the weather since we’ve been back home. We actually had just a tiny dusting of snow the day we left to visit back home but this is what we woke to this morning. The pretty white stuff completely coats the ground and here are a few pictures I took this morning



We’ve had such a crazy busy week but things are going really well. We finally decided to rent an apartment for a year so that we can get a better handle on what area we would like to buy/build.

Now the pressure is off to buy a place and relief takes on a whole new meaning. We found an apartment last week and I could not be happier at this very moment. A place to call home is finally coming our way soon! We should be moving in sometime around the 12th of December and I can’t begin to express just how excited I am.


Let’s just say, we were going to spend a week down south for Christmas and another week back in our old home following Christmas. I’m so stoked about our new apartment that I have no desire to pass by our old home on the way back north. How cool is that folks!?! I am so ready to get settled down and am looking so forward to the New Year!


We are creeping away at our Christmas Newsletter and continue to make progress. But it looks like we are still going to be working on it a while longer. I don’t like being this late but that’s just the way it goes this year.


We did get some shopping done over the weekend as we have a 2 bedroom apartment to completely furnish. First things first as we have been trying to nail a king size bed, and then we will look for the rest of the furniture as soon as we get our bed ordered. Then I have to completely furnish my kitchen as we are not moving anything back home yet. I’m having fun looking for dishes, glassware, flatware, and all the fun stuff to make it pretty. It’s also fun shopping for bathroom accessories and new bedding. I found a great deal on my favorite Egyptian sheets and it will be like Christmas getting our new home sweet home all fixed up. There is light at the end of the tunnel and it’s so nice, bright and truly beautiful.





Home Sweet Home ~ There’s No Place Like Home

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Home is where the heart is, The soul’s bright guiding star. Home is where real love is, Where our own dear ones are. Home means someone waiting To give a welcome smile. Home means peace and joy and rest And everything worthwhile. –Author Unknown



Another picture I took over the weekend and thought it went with my story.



We’re coming to the realization that humans need a place to call home and with that, we have just decided to take a much needed trip back to home. We’ve been gone exactly 9 weeks as of right now and there will be nothing like walking through that door! As Hubby and I were talking about this over the weekend I couldn’t help a couple ‘happy tears’ that trickled down my cheeks. One of these days our new home sweet home will be up here and we both know that day will come in the right time.



Bobby finalized our tickets and we leave here the 10th of November and fly to the mid west to visit Hubby’s family. Then we’ll be off to visit ma a couple days and then we’ll arrive back home to stay through Thanksgiving and return north on Saturday the 24th of November. It would be nice if Father Time would slow down a pace but we’re looking so forward to that much needed time back home! Reservations have been made for our Thanksgiving meal, and this will be our third consecutive year there. No one would ever guess, but we are more thrilled about this trip than any other trip in our lifetime.



We’re thankful for this two week window of time in Hubby’s schedule as he’s going to be in Washington next week and then the week after we get back from our trip, he will be in England. So the timing was perfect for us to get away. Since we canceled our trip to Alaska this past summer, we were given vouchers to use anytime this year. So we rushed headlong with our vouchers for our trip back home and we still have some left over on each of our vouchers to spend on our next trip which is probably home for Christmas.



We are two very ‘happy campers’ in the meantime and Hubby continues to thank me for following him to the ends of the earth. There’s no other place I’d rather be than to be with him and where he is is where my heart is and where my heart is, that’s home.

Hump Day News

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Hubby was hit with the ole sore throat and cold Monday and is feeling worse by the minute it seems. Last night he crashed around 7:30 in hopes to get some sort of relief. As he lay there next to me I noticed his face looked a bit flush and when I felt him, there was no doubt he was burning up with fever.

Back to work again like a trooper today, but I just got a call from him saying that he may be home this afternoon. I feel so bad when he’s this miserable and I hope he’s able to get some rest and knock this yucky stuff soon.

It’s been a morning of phone calls and getting more stuff taken care of. I actually spoke with another realtor today (realtor #10 to be exact) and she sounds like she’s a real go get ‘er. She’s checking on a 10 acre plot of land for us and she’s also offered to check out the entire MLS for listings other than the ones she has. Realtor #8 (the one I really liked and thought for sure she was the one) dropped off the face of the earth and I have not heard from her since October 4th. Realtor #9 was the one I called on the land we looked at this past weekend. The land was advertised with a picture of the lake but when I spoke with the realtor, we found out that the land was not on the lake but had the lake access, no deal for us. So when I tried to find out about more land in the area, the realtor asked me if there was anything else I wanted to see. She didn’t offer check out other MLS listings or anything. We have never had this problem but perhaps some of these realtors would rather sell only what they have listed so that they don’t have to share the profit of a sale or perhaps they would prefer to sell a home vs land as they don’t get as much profit from selling land. I don’t know, this is just a mystery but I’ll continue to call as many realtors as it takes to get the job done.


Beautiful Autumn Day

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We have just spent a beautiful day together! Ah, this land is truly beautiful, offering such quiet, peaceful, and breathtaking landscape! Now, when we were here in April on Hubby’s job interview, there was not even a sign of spring in site, the branches on the trees were still bare but this place was still so beautiful to me. Now having spent the end of summer and fall peaking I’ll have to confirm that we are still in paradise! I keep saying that I have never lived in a place as beautiful as this.

We spent quite a bit of time running errands checking into a PO Box, running to the bank to open an account (we didn’t open it yet), visited The Cider Mill and drove the country side to look at some lake front property.

On the way I couldn’t help but snap pictures of this land which I have yet to do. So below here are pictures taken of our lovely day.



A visit to the Cider Mill.




Pumpkins, Oh The Pumpkins


A beautiful autumn day ~ Picture taken on the way to the lake front property


Another view on the way to the lake


Another Beautiful View


Lake where we may build our new home sweet home. I’m calling the realtor soon as we were not able to pin point the lot! Another drive out there is in order next week!


How Many Realtors Does It Take To Find A Piece Of Land?

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Apparently more than one. Today makes Realtor number 8! And I don’t think we’re that high maintenance either… Hubby and I were actually referred to this new Realtor by one of our friends here at the hotel. And I think I’ve just found our Realtor whose going to finally go to bat for us.

  • Realtor #1 ~ is no longer in the business and is being sued for over a million dollars. She’s in BIG trouble.
  • Realtor #2 ~ Was a smoker and his car smelled of smoke. One strike and they’re OUT!
  • Realtor #3 ~ was a gal in PA that told us there was nothing available
  • Realtor #4 ~ another gal in PA that sent an e-mail providing a few listing saying this is it.
  • Realtor #5 ~ yet another Realtor in PA that only showed us her listings in PA and told us she would let us know if anything else comes on the market. We think she’s only showing her listings as that’s all we saw so we moved on.
  • Realtor #6 ~ Realtor was so pushy and my personality just did not gel with her at all. I have nothing bad to say about her, it’s just that I felt nervous around her. It’s normally just me out with these realtors and I was wishing so badly that Bobby was with me on that day.
  • Realtor #7 ~ The realtor I just went out with this week and is not providing what we need nor is he returning my calls.
  • Realtor #8 ~ Lets just say we truly hit it off and I felt so comfortable with her right from the start. She was so soft spoken, down to earth and made me feel so relaxed. Thanks to our new friends Doug and Evelyn for recommending this gal, I think she’s the one!

I’ve had a wonderful week. Went shopping for houses, spent a lovely day with my buddy Jennifer downtown where we shopped and had a lovely lunch. She introduced me to what is now my absolute favorite department store. I just can’t remember the name of it but I’ll tell ya, I’ll have no trouble finding it though. I looked for apartments yesterday, a place where we can go when the company kicks us out of the hotel. We have an appointment to look at and a place tomorrow morning so we’ll see how it goes. Hubby called and asked if I’d like to join him for lunch today. We had such a fun lunch date and tonight we have plans to go downtown for Gallery Night. It’s going to be fun and I also get to see my friend’s work displayed in one of the galleries, how neat! Hubby will be home soon and then we will be off exploring.

Here’s wishing all of you a Happy Weekend!


A Warm And Fuzzy Feeling Morning

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I usually go to breakfast by my lonesome, except for on the weekends as Hubby leaves the house (hotel) without breakfast. I always have friends to chat with down there and I’ve never been one to mind doing things by myself. This morning I met yet another friend Sally Pullano (sp?)! We somehow struck up conversation when she asked if I was alone and could she sit with me at my table. She and her husband just moved back here from England and we bonded beautifully. We sat down there sipping our coffee long after our breakfast was finished and had such great conversation. They have already been here at the hotel for 2 months and leave this Thursday. When I asked her how in the world I missed her as I’m always down there ~ she replied “I usually come down for a later breakfast” That explains why I’ve never seen here in all the 5 weeks we’ve been here. The beauty of staying where we are is that we have truly met and made some wonderful people.



I’ll be leaving in just a bit for more house hunting but pretty soon we are going to be telling the Realtor “Land Only” for us please. We feel things are moving in that direction and we couldn’t be more excited.


Vehicle Hoopla

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What a wonderful weekend we had and this has been such a great Monday. I’m caught up on my laundry for the week and have everything all put away, took a nice nap this afternoon and got quite a bit of research done on-line regarding a place to call home.



Hubby and I are going to try to meet a little after 4pm in hopes to get our cars registered and get our new drivers license. I was not able to finish what I started Friday and Saturday we had trouble getting our vehicles registered. We printed out our proof of insurance but the gentleman at the counter would not accept it as he needed something with the bar code. I made another call to the insurance company requesting the information with the bar code and they faxed it over to Hubby. Hopefully we have everything we need in order to make it happen this evening. And we plan to be have our residence here soon.



I have a lovely appointment with the realtor tomorrow, and looking forward to narrowing something down. In all honesty, we are both narrowing it down to a desire we have to build our next home. And it’s so exciting to think about, unless of course if we find the place that’s already built and it calls us home.


A Summary Of The Last Couple Days

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The last couple days were filled shopping, house hunting, errands and whatnot. Tonight we arranged to go out with our friends Donnell and Michele again and we truly had such a wonderful evening. We met at our favorite Japanese restaurant and enjoyed the entire evening.



Donnell and Michele will be checking out of the hotel next Saturday and I know we are going to miss seeing them around. We’re going to swap numbers so that we can continue running into them long after we’re out of here. It’s been pretty amazing meeting new friends along the way and we know there are more friendships to come.


More Shopping

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This week has been moving right along. Yesterday I spent a good portion of the day at the mall. I have many clothes to buy more like winter clothes. I’ve been hanging out in my short sleeves from the moment we arrived but we can definitely feel a wonderful change in the air.



I’m off house hunting again this afternoon. Our new Realtor has some goodies to show and I can’t wait. But before my little trip, Hubby asked if I would like to meet with him for lunch today and that sounds like a wonderful plan.


Time Waits For No One

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I’m one who enjoys having plenty of time to get ready no matter what it is I’m up to. I give myself 45 min to an hour depending on where I’m going so that I don’t have to rush around or forget to do anything before I’m out the door.

Well, I had an appointment with my Realtor to pick me up here at the hotel at 12:00 sharp. I got up and leisurely meandered down to breakfast around 9:30 this morning. After breakfast I came back up to my room and started in on the computer for a while. I kept checking the time at the lower right of my screen thinking I had all the time in the world and planned to start getting ready by around 11:00.

The next thing I knew, it was 10:30 and reached for my cell phone to make a quick call. Hm, my cell phone registered 11:30 AM, what’s up! I looked around at the alarm clock and clock on the TV and both were blaring out 11:30 AM! I don’t know what is going on with my computer as I’ve already changed the time in there but for some reason it decided to revert back to Central Standard Time. Hubby’s going to have to figure that out as I’ve already done it once and thought it did the trick.

This was one of those rare occasions where I had to get ready in a flash. Took a quick shower, quickly dried my hair and pretty much quick, quick, quick everything. All the while trying to remember everything I wanted to have with me!

Well I had just enough time to get ready and by the time I reached the landing, the clock was striking 12:00 noon and I saw my Realtor pull in. I had everything I needed in hand and was out of here on time. I just hate that frazzled feeling but I managed.

The house hunt went pretty well and there are 4 homes that I want Hubby to see this weekend. I’m not so sure what he’s going to think so we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.


Surprise

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We’re on the threshold of turning a new chapter in our lives. We will turn our last page in the south and begin anew up north sometime late August. As much as we’ve enjoyed our stay in the south (5 years now), it’s time to move on. That’s right, we’re moving!

We were cruising along when out of nowhere a job opportunity fell into Hubby’s lap. He was approached way back in early March with a promotion. When Hubby asked “how would you like to move to north” once again I replied, “I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth.”



Hubby’s interview took place on April 27th. It was the ‘business trip’ I talked about when we came up north, as I didn’t want to disclose those details at the time. The company provided a ticket for me and put us in contact with a Realtor in the area. I went house hunting while Hubby was interviewing and we spent quite a bit of time surveying the land. The picturesque landscape took my breath away from the moment we arrived. I was immersed in paradise and the beauty of the quiet rolling hills called me home. By the time we got back home the notion that moving north could become a reality hovered within the nooks and crannies of my mind. And for the first week or so Hubby heard me utter the phrase, “I’m homesick for the north.”



On the morning of my birthday, I was getting numerous calls and birthday wishes when Hubby called. He asked if I was at my computer and the answer was yes. Then he said to check my e-mail. I opened my e-mail to see his ‘JOB OFFER’ right there before my eyes. I was elated beyond belief and tears began to trickle down my cheeks. He could hear the excitement in my voice and there was no need for him to ask how I felt, he already knew.



Before long, we will begin our new journey to what seems like a far away and beautiful land, one where we are ready to call home. We’re looking forward to this new unexpected chapter of our great adventure. Farewell to the south and Good Day to the north!


A Day In The Yard – First Cut This Spring

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It’s that time of year again. We didn’t slumber for long yesterday as we both wanted to get outside and cut the grass for the first time this spring. The lawn is not completely green but it needed a little pick me up. We have two self propel mowers and what a difference that makes. Hubby takes the top side hill and the far back hill and we split up the cutting until we meet in the middle and the job is complete. Hubby takes on the edging and weed eating and I tackle the blowing and making sure I get “ALL” the grass from the edging out of the cracks. I like to see nice clean lines and do not blow the clippings in the yard. The clippings are cleaned up and bagged for the garbage man. It’s so nice having things spruced up again this season.