We did it!

We put an offer in on a house. We are so excited and are just waiting to hear back... I hate waiting. But I will do it. (Well, I do not really have another option do I) The house has 3 bedroom and 2 bathroom. The living space is nice and open, just how I like it. The house is almost all tile except for the bedrooms. I am ok with that. not in love with it, but ok with it. Area rugs are nice I hear. The walls are a bit dirty and we are wondering what in the world they did to get them that way. We were planning on painting anyway.

As you can see by the picture, a little landscaping is in order. But not much, weeding and some flowers and it will be ok. (If the grass recovers with a little water.) It is worse in the back. They laid sod but never took care of it.. so there is dead sod in the back. But we wanted something that we could put or own touches on. So these little projects that we have to do are going to help us make this a home..... IF we get it. Oh the dreaded if.

This is the front of the house. Isn't it cute?

FINALLY!!!!

I am posting! Sorry I have lied to you all about my updates.. here I am reading all your wonderfully updated blogs and saying that I will fill you in on the happenings of my oh-so fun and exciting life.. and I have not.. I have failed you.... but fear not.. I am back! And here to explain.

Kurt and I are house-hunting... oh yes. It is all so exciting, disappointing, disgusting, frustrating, and heart-breaking all in one. I am sure all of you know what I am talking about. A lot of the houses we like, one in particular, are Short sales. This means that the owners are trying to sell the house for less that they owe the bank before it goes into forclosure. These types of sales are nothing but short... they take months sometimes even over a year for the bank to approve the sale of that particular property. And frankly.. we just don't have that kind of time. So we have been looking for a house day and night. He gets home at like 5:30 so we go as soon as he gets off, until it is usually too dark to see the houses and the street that well. Don't get me wrong, I truly appreciate this opportunity that we are getting to be able to buy our own house, but the process... oh the process is less than ideal. We have seen some real intersting houses out there.. let me tell you.

Well other than that.. I have been trying to get all my homework done for my online classes. They are almost done and I will be so happy when they are. Sunday will be when my last assignment is due and I will no longer be bound to this computer (Well other than to my addiction that is the blogging world)

I just thought I would update you a little on waht i have been doing these past couple of weeks. We have been meeting with lenders and looking frantically for a house. That has become my life.. and I am ok with it for now. :) I will let you know when we find something who knows it may be today.. I am going to show Kurt another house I found today.. We will see.

Updates to come

There are some things that I have been wanting to blog about.. but have been too busy and tired to do so.. I promise I will be back to the blogging world soon. I know I have been a BIG slacker! Sorry about my lack of posts.. I am sure some have given up on me.. LOL But I should have some posts tomorrow.. :)

So long....

.. to the working world. I quit my job.. and it feels wonderful! Today was my last day.. (actually I am still at work.. Shhh!:) ) But there is nothing to do and I am bored.

I have worked for Action Sports for a little over a year now. It was just time to move on. I was really bored with my job, (which there really is no room to grow or go anywhere for that matter), and I was tired of the drama. :) When you work with high schoolers and partiers... that is what you get. The sad part is that I am on the younger side of all the peoplpe who work there and I feel like I am too old to be there.. if that gives you any idea of how I feel when I am there.

As for getting another job.. I think I might hold off for a little bit. My mom's boss is opening up an office here in town so I might work there after a while. But other than that I might just wait until I start substituting after fall quarter.

Well I am going to get back to pretending like I am working...

...Only an hour and a half before I am a free woman!!!

Gone...

My husband is now on his way to Alaska, where he will be fishing for King Salmon and halibut.

This is where he will be staying. I am so jealous..of the scenery that he will be seeing. I am not so jealous of wearing the same clothes (that will smell like fish) for 2 or 3 days while he is fishing because they did not check any baggage because they have to bring home a WHOLE LOT of fish. Usually when my dad comes back we have fish all year long.. until he goes the next year in July. My dad has gone for about 6 years. This year is Kurt's first year. He is so excited. I hope he has fun and catches lots of fish.

Barney and Fires and Cars.. Oh My!!

*Warning.. Possible photo overload. :)

Ok... Well it all started on a quiet little Friday morning when I watched my niece Aubrey. We had lots of fun. We played outside and watched Barney (ok so we watched A LOT of Barney.) When we were playing on the slide in the backyard, she wanted me to help her even though I know she can do it herself.. and has every other time before. But she just kept holding her arm out.. "Sissy help." (that is what she calls me.. Sissy, or sometimes Saucie.. Kim's dog lol) But I know that my name is not the easiest to say.. so we go with it.
We had fun playing together and I love my little Aubrey-girl.

Isn't she so cool with her hands in her pockets.

We ate cereal (rather just the marshmallows out of the cereal) and were mesmerized by that wonderful purple dinosaur. In my defense, I played other games with her and took her outside, but everytime we stopped.. "mumble mumble Barney." :)
I don't know why these pictures are blurry.. but you get the idea.

Saturday was my birthday. So like everyone does on their birthday.. I did homework.. I know right. But my wonderful husband did take me shopping for my birthday. :) Then Kurt and I went and looked at a new truck for him because Chevy was having a great deal.. but more on that later. So we went to Benji's for dinner. It was really good. basque food is my favorite. It was really nice for everyone just to hang out. Since we had a large party, they put us in the back room. There was going to be a party of 30 in the same room but they did not show up until we were leaving. So the 2 little girls that were there Aubrey and Audrey got to run around the whole room and have fun. Here are a few pictures of family from dinner.

Kurt and his mom

My dad and Kurt's dad. Isn't this picture so cute. :) Classic
Aubrey (in pig tails) and Audrey (in purple).
My brother and Tanessa, his girlfriend

And so the fun begins.....

On Sunday, Kurt and I decided to buy the truck we were looking at. So after church we cleaned out his reliable little pickup and went to get a carwash. While we waited, we walked over to Famous Dave's to eat luch. Then we decided to go home because Chevy had loaned us a truck to try out. We borrowed it on Saturday afternoon before dinner and we were going to take it back.

Well...

On our way home, we say smoke coming from near our apartment. We couldn't tell where it was coming from at the time. So Kurt joked "oh look our apartment is on fire." I told him not to even joke about that. Little did we know....

So we turned the corner to the street where our apartment is... my heart sank. Our Daisy, our little baby was IN our apartment. I was freaking out. Kurt told me to calm down until we got to the driveway to pull in.. there were firetrucks blocking the way. Kurt pulled up as close as he could get, I grabbed my keys and jumped out of the car and ran towards our apartment. I knew they would not let me just go running up into my burning complex.. so I looked for a firefighter. He asked me which apartment I lived in.. He allowed me to open my door with the condition that he looked in and made sure it was ok first. I opened the door.. it was so smokey in there. I called Daisy and she ran and jumped in my arms.. I was so relieved I almost broke down and cried.. I think I let one or two tears go.. But I regained my composure... In all the panic.. I forgot about Skylar.. our other baby... Kurt ran in through the back door and got him.. Our neighbor was kind enough to let us put him in their bathroom. But when Kurt went into our apartment, he said there was so much smoke he could not see 3 feet in front of him. His lungs and chest still hurt.

The apartment that we share a wall with and the apartment upstairs from them burned almost completely. Unfortunately each apartment contained a dog and 3 cats each. The lower apartment was able to get their dog out in time.. but the upstairs neighbors did not get home until the fire was almost completely contained. It was really heartbreaking to see them come home.

Our apartment did not have any fire or water damage.. just a lot of smoke smell and dirt. We opened some cabinets and smoke came pouring out of them. I mean everything smells like smoke: my school books, bags, clothes, my hair brush, my loofah! (seriously?), and basically everything.

Oh.. about the borrowed truck... it was about 30 feet away from the burning apartment. Soo.. ya... the emblem warped and melted a little, and the plastice license plate was melted really bad. We told the firefighters and they gave us a card with instrucitons for the dealership, who were not really worried about the damage at all. It really was not that bad.. but still was not our car.

Here are a few pictures of the damage:

This is the backside of the apartments, where the fire started. Their balconies are completely gone. One of the firefighters even fell through the upstairs balcony.

This was before it got boarded up.

This was after they boarded the windows and huge holes the fire created.

This is the backside of the apartments, ours is directly on the other side of this.

You can see all the debris from the walls and balconies.

This was a bike.
Hmm.. that looks safe.

And last but not least... we got a new vehicle!!

Ya right we WISH we could afford this car.. BUt they did let us drive it back to our apartment to get the registration for Kurt's truck we were trading in. They were very nice.. even after we melted their truck. :)

Isn't he so cool. ;)
That's right baby Corvette...
Ok so this is the REAL car... err truck that we bought on sunday evening.


My mom wanted a little family photo with the new truck. :)

We are really lucky and blessed that our apartment only smells like smoke. Nothing was damaged or burned. The walls are a little brown and grey in some places, like around our front door where (after we got Daisy and Skylar out) smoke was billowing out from under the door.

We are now livng at my mom's house while we move our stuff out. We were able to get out of our lease because.. well. the apartment CONNECTED to ours is completely gone. It was a really scary experience, but we thank God that nothing worse happened to us. We are truly blessed to have the family and friends that are helping us and being so supportive. We also just want to pray for the families that lost their homes yesterday. We are actually moving out of our apartment to live with my parents so that the people who lived next door can move into our apartment. So even as I am typing (I am taking a break from homework) Kurt is loading up his new truck with our smokey belongings and piiling them into the spare bedroom at my mom's.

So we had a weekend full of friends, family, fires, and financing. :)

Happy Birthday!

to me.. :) Today is my birthday!! Woohoo!! I am a whopping 22 years old. Ok so I am really not that excited. It just feels like another day. Hmm maybe I am wierd but I was never really into birthdays when I was growing up. I mean I would have slumber parties and stuff when I was in elementary school. When I was in junior high and high school my family would just go out to dinner, then we would go back home open presents and eat cake (if we had gotten one). Well that is what my birthdays have become, which is fine with me. :)

Tonight will probably be the same agenda, except I have no idea where I want to go to dinner. And I know I will be forced to make a decision.