We are Moving {part 2}

She knew what we wanted and she knew it was a "Yes" from us.  It was an offer we couldn't even argue with and justify a way to stay in our beloved home.

All this time, I had my eye on a house "in the country" that kept me motivated to keep my house on the market.  I thought that as soon as I had an offer, I would make an offer on that house.  Babe finally agreed to go see it with me and on closer inspection, we both decided against it.  It was a fabulous house, but it needed some love and for the price they were asking, we weren't close in what we thought we needed to do to make it ours.  It was also not in the school district I wanted to be in.

When we decided against that house, my heart sank.  I was motivated to sell because I had a place I wanted to land.  Now, I sold my home that was fully mine and built with my taste and I had no idea where we were going.  We started to look at rentals which became complex and completely discouraging because I still have to have space to run Write Away...and run Write Away during the holiday season at that!  We were moving, in part, to get a bigger space, not smaller.  I had MAJOR sellers remorse.  Please can we take our house back?  But I kept reminding myself that we prayed ourselves into this situation and if God did what he did the way he did it, including the hot pink license plate, then he would see us through this to the end.  Even if I was a nester.

Down here we all search HAR.com for houses.  Its the Houston Area way to find houses.  I was scrolling thru HAR and seeing all the same old houses when I saw that the only other house that interested me was amazingly still on the market!  It had a huge barn, a 4 car garage with a long driveway and 2.5 acres!  I started to get excited.  My parents were in town, so I scheduled a showing so they could come.  I would have Grammy's opinion of vision and taste and Big Daddy's opinion of safety, quality, and practicality.  Upon my second viewing, I LOVED IT!  I had to look past the ugly tile and the bad paint and light fixtures, but I could see myself making this house my home.  Grammy and Big Daddy both agreed.  The most important....Babe loved it.  Really, I think he just loved the 4 car garage and workshop.  Whatever it takes!  It is ALSO in the right school district :)

We are closing on both houses in 2 weeks.  They last two weeks have been completely out of control.  I have been running Write Away, finding a house, selling a house, planning for Holiday Market {yes...no small feat in the midst of moving}, and now getting quotes and hiring contractors to get in my house ASAP so we can move in.  Oh...and raising a family, playing tennis, going to baseball, kid tennis, parent nights, guitar lessons and attempting to sleep at some point.  I forgot to mention I happen to be the logo lady at our small school of 1200 kids.  Passing out t-shirt orders has been my activity of choice the last week, too!  I can't complain.  It is all good, but WHY oh WHY do I do this to myself?  There is always way TOO much going on in my life.  I look forward to sitting down to watch TV or actually enjoying the beautiful pool and backyard and I am, sadly, about to leave.  I am afraid I am going to wish it all back.  Every morning, I just focus on one foot in front of the other.

Despite being sad to leave our friends and neighbors, we are really SO excited about our new house.  After watching the boys running and playing in the barn and yard and hearing JLS in his sweet little voice say, "Dis is da best yawd eva, mom!"  That is all I wanted.  That was the icing on the cake.  My entire motivation is for my kids.  We are going to land on our feet.

The funny part is, if you aren't from around here, as a crow flies, we are probably no more than 2-3 miles from our new house.  To drive it, it takes about 8 minutes.  However, we are moving to a new town, a new school system and my hope, moving to a simpler life.  I still plan on functioning entirely out of The Woodlands.  WHS will still go to preschool here, I will still play tennis here, go to church here.  My life isn't changing...just our location.

We are SO excited to see what God has in store for us.  It is an amazing place to be to know that you have prayed so fully and completely about something and to see the fruit of those prayers.  We KNOW we are doing the right thing.  The minute we gave up on selling, it sold...

We are ready for the ride of our lives!  Can't wait to post you soon.  Pictures to come.  For the record, we will be homeless for 2 weeks while we get the old floors removed, new floors, carpet and paint completed.  Yep.  A 2 bedroom apartment for the 5 of us for 2 weeks.  And you think I am crazy now...

We are Moving.

I don't really want to shout it from the mountain top, as my feelings are mixed.  Babe and I have always talked about having land and room for the boys to run and play.  After testing the waters and looking around over the summer to see exactly where I would like to settle, I met a new realtor.  I met her because I called about one of her properties and it turned into a day of house-hunting.

Let me tell you why she was a rock star.  She didn't know me and in the summer....I have 3 boys!  I showed up to follow her with my posse in the car behind her  and she insisted I move my car seats to her truck (she had the boys at "truck") and she literally hauled us all over kingdom come that day. I had no idea she was giving us her day or that she was taking on 4/5 of my family.  She was a saint!

In that day, I kept looking at lake houses that were more like a first home than a second.  I told her we couldn't do that and she said, "Give me a weekend and I can sell your house!"  At that point, I didn't believe it to be true.  I told her I refused to live through showing a house with 3 boys and a business in my back room.  So, we determined that she would have a weekend when we were planning to be out of town.

We cleaned and prepped and left town so she could do her magic.  We had an offer in the first 24 hours.  It wasn't what we wanted, we didn't HAVE to sell, so we turned it down.  When we returned, Babe said, "Well that was a good try!"  But I worked hard to clean it up and wasn't put out yet by showing it. So....we hung with it.

I LOVE my house, my neighbors...I love all of it.  I have just had an itching for more land, and also a smaller high school.  I thought when we built and moved in this house almost exactly five years ago, this was our forever house.  Running a business out of my home is starting to demand more space, wanting more land, smaller high school....it all just started giving us the itch.

When I say Babe and I prayed HARD about this decision, I mean we prayed HARD.  Every day, together, apart, all day long.  Please LORD let this be the right decision for the kids, for the finances...it's such a hard decision to CHOOSE to move.  No one is making us move.  We really felt lead to do so.  So I ,who am usually the nester, forged away.  I know it was the Lord's leading because even 3 months ago, I couldn't stand the thought to sell my house.

After 4 weeks, I was done.  It really hadn't been a bother until school started and we were busy and needing to be in and out and harder to keep the house clean.  One morning I left the house thinking, "Oh, how I hope no one wants to look today!"  Not 2 minutes after I pulled out to take WHS to school and myself to Bible Study I received a request to show it in 2 hours.  NO.  For the first time I declined a showing.  I felt terrible and called my realtor to explain.  As I was talking to her, the realtor called HER to insist upon getting in.  UGH.  I agreed to let her in later, but I had to go to Bible Study...I wasn't ditching to show my house.

After Bible Study, I rushed home to clean and tidy and I really didn't care.  My intentions were to throw in the towel.  We love it here and today was the last showing.  I looked at my work room and threw my hands in the air. I put an apology note on the door and explained I had a stationery business and I just couldn't keep it clean.  As I was rushing out the door to meet a friend for lunch {that I had to rearrange}, the kitchen light bulb went out.  ARGH!  So, I zipped to Home Depot to grab a light bulb.  as I was turning into the parking lot, I was texting my realtor to take it off the market.  Today was the last day because it was the first day a realtor was ruling my life.

In that moment, a car cut me off the parking lot.  Not rude, but in my face.  And IN MY FACE was a hot pink license tag that said "SELLING".  In that moment, I knew my house was going to sell.  I half panicked because I wasn't really sure I wanted to sell it.  I called my mom and said, "Mom!  God speaks thru license plates!  I think my house is going to sell today!"  Of course, she gave me the "Ok Penny, that's nice dear response."  I felt it in my bones.

The appointment at my house was at 1:15pm.  At 1:18pm I was finally sitting down with my friend to celebrate her birthday over lunch and I received a text..."Can you be out in 30 days?"  My response: "Bring it."  I still wasn't convinced this was going to be a done deal because to get me out in 30 days, it better be a good offer....a GREAT offer.

My next text from my realtor, "You better get ready to move."

Proud Proud Boy!

For WHS's birthday, he received a Build-a-Bear Gift Card plus birthday money from various loved ones.  {Darn it!  We still haven't written our Thank You Notes!  Forgive us!}  This is exactly what WHS wanted and he could NOT wait to head to Build-a-Bear for the FULL event.

Heading into the mall in his favorite spot...on his Daddy's shoulders.  Daddy had NOT a clue what he was about to endure.  {hee hee}

This sweet child continues to ask for "a puppy that moves."  Yes...a REAL puppy.  When Toley died almost two years ago, we considered ourselves done with animals secondary to the cat AND dog allergies in our family.  Just because they are allergic, though, doesn't mean they don't love animals.  So, WHS got the next best thing:  a Build-a-Puppy....with a real bark, a heart beat and a smelly insert.  He got the works!  Truly an amazing person who thought this place up.

After his puppy was brought into being, he headed straight to the bath tub to give him a good wash.

We got the birth certificate and the clothes and every other item needed to make WHS's birthday complete.  THANK YOU Aunt Wynne and grandparents for the gift card and birthday money!  

We walked through the entire mall and WHS refused to let anyone carry his new puppy box that was at least half his size.  He grunted and groaned, but by golly, WHS is a really good pet owner.  He took care of his puppy all the way!

My Baby Had Surgery

My sweet JBS had surgery the first week of school.  It was a bummer to have to schedule it then, but they only do surgeries on Thursday's and there were none free from when we saw the doctor at the beginning of August.  The good part was that it was Labor Day weekend, so we got an extra day of recovery, which it turns out, we needed.

JBS has struggled his entire 9 years of life with the allergies and sinuses.  God bless him.  We have done everything there is to do...shots, nose sprays, oral medication, inhalers, sinu-rinses, breathing treatments....and we always end up putting him on steroids to finally kick "it".  Our allergist finally said,  "Let's do an X-ray to see if there is something else going on."  As it turned out, there was.  He said his adenoids were enormous. And that all his sinuses were so inflamed that they weren't draining.  That was no surprise to us, so the recommendation for surgery was bittersweet.  We hated for him to go through surgery, but we were SO hopeful that things would be better for him on the other side.

In addition to removing his adenoids, he always "root-rootered" his sinuses, which wasn't pleasant.  I think the adenoids were not so bad, but he did some work on his sinuses in order to help open them up and hopefully not close up again.  We prayed, prayed, prayed for this surgery.  Jake and I prayed every night for great results and for him to have peace and no fear.  Babe and I for Jake to heal.  Bless this child that is chronically congested.  Oh, how we want him to feel good!

The surgery took longer than I expected and I really started to get anxious.  The doctor finally came out and told us it went well...no surprises, etc.  Forty-five minutes later I still hadn't seen JBS, so I asked the desk.  As it turns out, the plugs they put in his nose after surgery came out.  It was quite a mess, so they were cleaning him up before inviting me back.

When I finally got back there, he was still looped.  We took some videos, but they were so sad.  Before the surgery, we talked about how he might be angry and belligerent coming out of the anesthesia and I just knew he would.  He had dental work done when he was itty bitty and he was furious when he was coming out.  So, I told JBS ahead of time...."Please don't be upset.  If I tell you that you are being difficult, remember that we talked about this.  You are too strong and I won't be able to hold you if you are fighting us."  My sweet baby was the FARTHEST thing from belligerent.  He was whimpering like a little puppy.  The first thing he said was, "Where is Daddy?"  Of course....Babe sat there for the entire surgery and when the doctor finally came out to say he did great, he had to get back to work.  Jake was so tearful and kept asking for "Daddy"...so I texted Babe to come back quick.  "He wants you!"

Before they rolled him away, the hospital gave him this tiny little Teddy Bear and I can't say how much he loved that bear.  It really provided so much comfort to him.  I knew he was nervous, but he didn't show it....but he was clenching that Teddy Bear as they rolled him away.

JBS kept grabbing me over the bed rails trying to hold me and hug me into his bed and he was lifting me off the ground.  (He is SO strong!)  He was in and out of coming out, but it seemed to be taking him a very long time to come out.  The nurse was packing him up to release him when Babe asked why his O2 sats were so low.  She NEVER noticed.  His 02 sats were in the low 80s.  With an asthmatic, this is something we watch!  Sure enough.  They put oxygen back on him and he improved.  Took it off, they dropped.  The anesthesiologist kept coming to check on him and kept mentioning that he gave him A LOT of sedation.  (Not sure why...maybe he was fighting it?)  Finally, when the ENT came back, he listened and he was wheezing.  Breathing treatments arrived and almost instantly, his O2 sats when up to the mid 90s.  Evidently, when you have asthma, sedation relaxes your lungs as well.  For a quick surgery that was supposed to put us home by noon....we didn't get discharged until 5pm.

It was a long day.  We were more than happy to sit there and let him be monitored while he came out of sedation.

My Little Cub Scouts

JLS was ecstatic to FINALLY be in 1st grade so he could be a Cub Scout.  He has been tagging along for cub scout events and projects since G2 was first a cub scout.  So, JLS has DONE all that JBS and G2 have done to complete badges.  It is about time he gets to earn the badges and awards for his efforts.  His first question was, "When do I get all the belt loops like JBS?"  It's so fun to see how cool he thinks he is now that he is starting to be able to do all the things his big brother does.

I had to put two pics here b.c. in the first one JLS looks like something just bit him :)  And in this one, JBS is blinking.  So one of each smiling right....very rare!

We are so excited to have a couple of JLS' best buddies in our Den.  We look forward to lots of fun times with friends and families!

The Destroyer

We call him "The Destroyer."  He had no idea he had chocolate on his face.  

He ate one of these....and looked like THAT!

How can one little 30 pound ball of cuteness wreak so much havoc?