While packing up our house, I found our old family books with printouts from the year of our adventures on our blog. And I read through stories and shed a tear or two on how much we've grown and how much I'm already missing my kids when they were little and they aren't even big yet. So I'm going to try to blog more often so I can print out these books again and keep them.
And yes, I was packing up our house because we MOVED!!
We spent a short almost 2 years in Kingman and after moving there quickly determined it wasn't our forever spot. This was a waiting room. I won't sugar coat it, it was a very hard two years for our family for different reasons, but I also won't lie and say that I don't miss parts of it now that we are out. Kingman is beautiful in ways that other parts of Arizona don't have all in one spot- the desert, the mountains, the flowers, the sunsets. I loved taking pictures out there immensely. And I made some lifelong friends there that I am sad to be away from (thanks facebook for making me feel not quite so far away!!). It's also where we had our beautiful baby girl Wren, and for that and all these reasons Kingman will always be a part of me. I know Craig would probably be content to never visit again, but I can't say that's the same for me. I'll be back again someday.
After a year of living there we started applying for jobs again. We were eager to get back to our Colorado home. We didn't really tell anyone for a while, we were at the temple one day and just felt like it was time to start looking, and we wanted to see how things played out. It took a lot of no's before we got a yes. That was also difficult to spend half of our time there playing the waiting game- it's a cruel game to play. Getting your hopes up and moving your family mentally to place after place wears on you. But in the end, it paid off- Craig was offered a job for the Rec District in Montrose, CO. We almost didn't apply for it. We'd been looking for jobs on the front range closer to our families and Montrose is a good 5 house from there, so we didn't go for it right off the bat, but decided we might as well try and see what happens, we could always say no.
I'm so SO glad we did. In fact despite the fact that I wanted to be back along the front range again and be nearer to family, I had my reservations about finding a job that would pay enough to find affordable housing out there (it ain't cheap and houses go quick!)- that was a serious worry for me. We were able to go to the temple after he got the job offer before we gave them an answer (thanks to some wonderful friends in Kingman who took all 4 of our kids so we could head to Vegas for the morning!!) and the answer was pretty clear for both of us. I remember discussing it afterwards with Craig and feeling so good that after so many nos we were finally able to say yes- but again that same worry crept up in my mind- where will we live? The house we had in Kingman was nice, but Kingman has very affordable housing- Colorado? Not so much. Immediately I was reminded of the Lord's promise that he houses the sparrows, we will find a home to live in.
I'm so grateful I had that assurance- it got me through a lot of stressful moments while selling our home in Kingman and attempting to purchase one in Montrose. We had TWO WEEKS before Craig had to be in Kingman, which meant another grueling period of separation while Craig started the job in Colorado and I stayed behind to sell the house and pack up. When we moved to Kingman it was 4 weeks, and all we had to do was buy a house as we were renting from Craig's parents in Windsor, we didn't have to sell that one. This time it was 6 weeks- plus we had another kid and a house to sell. Craig's mom Barbara, who has been our savior on countless occasions, once again volunteered to come out and help. She watched our kids in Kingman for a week while I went with Craig to get him settled in Montrose and try to look at housing. We went through and packed up everything we didn't need for day to day functioning while leaving anything that would help the house show. I worked my butt off rearranging furniture, finishing small decorative projects I never got around to in our time there to make the house look nice. I'm glad we did that- within two weeks of putting it on the market we had an offer. Let me just tell you how BIG of a tender mercy that was. That was my biggest fear- that I'd have to stay much longer than 6 weeks because we couldn't sell the house- and we weren't in a great financial position to take much of a hit on the house, so we would just have to wait until we could sell it at the price we needed. But the Lord blessed us with a quick offer, thank goodness...
We found out the news when we were in Montrose, which was a huge relief- I could start looking at houses a little more seriously- however that was a bit of a challenge as we really needed a 4th bedroom and there wasn't a whole lot in our price range that had a 4th bedroom. People just really don't want more than 2 or 3 rooms in a house it seems like, which baffles me. Other priorities were having a decent sized yard for 4 kids and a dog to frolic in, and we really wanted a basement or a second floor if we could find one. I looked at probably a dozen 3 bedroom houses on one floor that had maybe 1500 square feet that were falling apart in many instances. It was discouraging to say the least. Finally we found a house that we thought would work and I fell IN LOVE. It had 4 bedrooms plus an office (BONUS) and a basement, plus a gorgeous giant backyard that was well kept and watered by an irrigation canal that ran along the back of the property. It had a giant driveway- it was older, but in excellent shape and it was just perfect in every way. We bid the night we saw it and she accepted our offer!! I was extatic. I was beyond extatic. Like crying tears of joy we found something extatic. Downsides included a small kitchen and small bedrooms, but I was so in love with that yard I knew it would be fine. So I went back to Kingman hopeful for our future in Montrose. Closing date was set for the day after we closed on our house in Kingman and things seemed like they were clicking along on both ends...
...that is until we hit appraisal time. Can I just say that I hate appraisals with a passion?? I understand why they are necessary for the banks, but they just kill me. KILL ME. The waiting, the hoping, the knowing that you have absolutely NO control over the outcome...it's torture. The appraisal on our house in AZ came in low by about $3000. I was halfway expecting this, we barely lived in the house for two years so I was surprised it increased in value even by that much (it increased by about $7000 in that time, but the rest of that went to realtor fees). We tried to negotiate with the buyer a bit, but prepared to pay it in full, which we ended up doing. Better to take a $3000 hit than not sell the house. On April 1st (April Fools Day) Craig called me and said he had bad news- the appraisal came in and it was low. How low? He said by $25K. I panicked. I was speechless. My perfect house was slipping away from my fingers...
Wait a minute- it's April Fools Day!
"Craig...seriously, please don't play games, just tell me how much the house appraised for."
"I'm not playing games."
"Okay okay, April Fools ha ha, tell me how much it appraised for."
"Chelsea, I know it's April Fools Day, that's how much the house appraised for!!"
He wasn't kidding.
And just like that the house was gone. For a brief hopeful moment we thought maybe the seller would come down in price and we'd get it for way cheaper than we offered, but she decided not to budge. She offered to pay for another appraisal on the house, but we talked with our realtor and we didn't think it was wise to wait. Even if it did appraise for more, there was little chance it would appraise for THAT much more.
So the search continued, this time Craig had to look at the houses without me. Currently on the market there was very very little in our price range for what we wanted, but there were two houses that looked like they might have a little promise. One was more than we could but a bid on, but we thought we might have a chance of bringing it down a bit, and the other looked like it would work, was in our price range, but was in a small cookie cutter type neighborhood and I was less than thrilled about it. Craig looked at both places and gave his input. The first house, we'll call it house A, had 4 bedrooms and two bathrooms, had a front living room, a decent kitchen, and then a bonus sort of finished patio that was carpeted and large that could work as another living area. There was a second floor and it was on a corner-ish lot, so the yard was a good size as well. Downsides included the 4 ft. fence that our super-jumping dog would easily scale and he's very aggressive with other dogs, so we wouldn't be able to let him out back alone, plus there was no master bathroom, so we would have to share one with the house. Also it was more than we could afford, and we weren't sure if the seller would accept a low offer. The second house, house B, was in a small subdivision on the north side of town. We drove through there when we were looking around the town and honestly though the houses would be priced higher there than they are, it was built in 2006. It also had 4 bedrooms and two floors plus a bonus room upstairs with no closet that was fairly large. But the living room downstairs was tiny and the yard was full of weeds. Literally. No grass, full of ALL weeds, only weeds, nothing but weeds.
In the end we decided we had to put a bit on the lower priced house, there was no point in bidding on the higher priced one if they both would work reasonably well. Turns out there were 3 other bids on the house that day, but they accepted ours. Yay!! ....I think....Honestly part of me was hoping the offer would be rejected and we'd have to keep looking, I was still bitter about losing the other house. But the silver lining was that now we had a house cleared to sell in Kingman and after a smooth appraisal and inspection (finally!), a house under contract in Montrose and we were okay to move.
Sorta. The closing date was set for about two weeks after we would need to be out of the house in Kingman, but we were assured that once the appraisal and inspection went through we should be good to bump the date up to our orignal close date on the previous house. We "should" be able to close was the prevailing message, right up until the day we left. We were en route to Montrose still not 100% sure whether we would get in our house or not. Halfway there, with a truck, Barb and her van, and me and the Pilot, we pulled over so Craig could have a conversation with our broker and lender letting us know that we wouldn't be able to get into the house until....??? Who knows. Sometime. I know everyone was doing the best they could, but I was just MAD. I was mad at the system. Who the heck designs a process that requires paperwork to pass through 50 different hands before everything can be cleared and good to go when families have to put their whole lives in the air waiting for it all to go through? Not to mention all the hoops you have to jump through in order to know if it's even possible...I mean I know I live in a fast-food world and you can't just walk into Wal-Mart and buy a house, but I was beyond stressed, I was falling apart at the seams. At least on the inside.
So we rented a hotel for the night. Well, it ended up being a cabin- the lady gave us keys to someone else's room by accident (!!!) and so they let us have the cabin at a discount for their mistake. It could have been a lot worse than it was- I was already on edge and I got Chloe and Wren out of the car and into the room. Wren was beside herself from being in the car for so long, so I asked Chloe if she could hold her for a minute while I took Tuff out to go potty. I threw my purse on the bed and walked out of the room and Chloe sat on the bed with Wren to try to make her happy. I came back in the room when Tuff had done his business and suddenly noticed stuff in the room that seemed out of place. A man's pair of shoes. Keys. A pile of loose change. Shirts hanging in the open closet. Someone else was in this room. I quickly took the girls out of the room and told Craig with alarm that someone else's stuff was in our room. He ran off to take care of it- SO glad the person wasn't there. What if I had walked out of the room and some guy came out of the bathroom while I was out with the girls sitting in there by themselves?? Thankfully the mistake went unnoticed by the tenant and they gave us a 3 bedroom cabin with a kitchen and living room for their blunder. This ended up being a god-send as we stayed there several nights before we had a definite date on when we'd be able to get into the house. It wasn't going to be until the following week. Barb ended up taking Tuff and Odell back to Windsor with her and Craig and I and the kids stayed with a family he worked with who had some extra room in their house they offered to us- bless their hearts! The kids started school that week and so it was nice not to have to live in (and pay for) a hotel for a week until we could get into our house.
After all was said and done, the stress ended and we were finally able to get into our home!
And I have to admit that I think the Lord knew what He was doing all along. I also have to give Craig props for pushing me to bid on this house. I was resistant. I was hanging onto that other house still. But it has ended up being I think MUCH better than the other home we had a bid on. Some major things I ignored because of the nice yard were a) the TEENY kitchen that place had. I would have gone nuts very quickly, probably immediately when I realized that none of our stuff would fit in there, plus there was no pantry either. It would have been rough. b) the TEENY bedrooms. Yes there were four of them plus an office that could have been a bedroom, but they were really small, including the master bedroom, leaving us to fit the rest of our stuff in the living areas, which would have been awkward. c) No master bathroom and only two bathrooms in the house and d) no garage. Our new house has all of these and more. Two sheds in the back (pretty sure one of them was for growing weed from the previous owner, judging from the tables in the shed, the electrical hookup so it could be insulated and have an AC unit in there, weird empty pots and bags of fertilizer for.....?? A yard full of weeds??), big garage, big master bedroom with bathroom and walk in closet, decent sized rooms plus the extra bonus room, and even though I didn't want a cookie cutter house, it's in a nice neighborhood with a small park just down the street from us that the kids can walk to and I don't have to worry about where they're at. It's grown on me. A lot. Particularly because we got to repaint before we started and so now the house is really ours. And I like how it looks on the inside and out.
I really really want to post pictures of the house, but I want to wait until everything is "finished", or at least finished enough, so I can do before and after shots. Then I'll blog about everything we did and all the projects we put together.
And also WE LOVE IT HERE. SOO so much. Big parks. Mountains. Trees. River and creeks everywhere. Running trails. Paved sidewalks. Street lamps. Hiking. Mountain Biking. Swimming. There's so much outside to enjoy here it's ridiculous.
And also they have a Target. 'Nuff said.
That was a long drawn out post, but if you made it to the end, here's the house!
More to follow. :-)
