Adjusting to the Move

 Prior to the move, it’s pretty clear I was bustling with nerves and excitement, promising to take pictures and post updates and make a few laps around the world.

Clearly, that was too ambitious; let’s face it—I’m pooped.

While my dad was away on his ten-day vacation, the rest of us were chipping away at unpacking our own stuff, ordering new furniture to put together and keeping the mess as manageable as possible. For about a week straight, all I did was all that and sleep. Even when the workload started to slow down, there were still orders trickling in and organizing to do. Every box unpacked looking like a messy explosion was a necessity of seeing everything laid out to then make its place more organized.

In my bedroom, there was the bookshelf, the desk and the bed frame. I also water sealed the desk surface and installed those childproof bumpers (which make excellent wrist rests). I used an extender pole for a duster to hang a couple of tapestries on my tallest wall. There’s still a bit of clutter, but I know that over time, I’ll become more efficient with the space and aesthetic. For now, I’m just glad I can move around the space and find what I need. Moving through a maze of boxes was not as fun as it sounds.

I got bookshelves for both Dameon and Marcus. For Marcus, I got a floor rug and a gaming couch, but gave Dameon my recliner and also bought him a shoe rack. Dameon needs some curtain rods put up and they could both use some stuff put up on their walls, but their rooms were easier to set up.

My sister got a vanity, a storage mirror, a TV stand and a dresser. I had cancelled a bed frame for taking too long to ship, but then it turns out it did ship, so my sister and I just put it together anyway so she could use it. Her room is pretty much done at this point too.

Dad has spent the past few days going through his ridiculous hoard of boxes, but he has that mostly sorted through too. He just keeps way too much that neither gets used or displayed so it ends up just taking up space. I wouldn’t say I’m a minimalist but I’m definitely not that much of a pack rat either. I’m usually the person you can ask for a specific tool and there’s a good chance I have one. 

For the past few days, I’ve really slowed down though. Today, all I did was set up a new Ecotank printer. My Canon decided to hang up on a 5200 error after only two years of use. I said fuck it and bought an Epson with a 4 year warranty. Hopefully I get more mileage on this one. It’s agitating how technology just ‘mysteriously’ stops working after a few years. Even though I find good bargains, it’s still irritating to have to replace things. It feels wasteful to go through appliances and devices so fast.

A couple of rainy days are ahead so I’ll take it as more opportunities to relax. I do have some residual soreness from the weeks of constant moving and carrying. The faster I can heal and function better, the sooner I can start to fully utilize all this wonderful potential space.

It’s actually pretty difficult to relax after working so much. I feel a sort of restless need to ride the momentum, despite my protesting body’s opposite response...

I do look forward to focusing on more creative projects. But I also look forward to exploring the new town and working towards other goals, like improving my health. All in good time!

Closed Home, Opened Future!

 So, yes, everything went well for the closing for our new house on Monday! We’ve been rather busy, packing up more boxes, Dad taking stuff over by the carload, more packing and sorting, more loading, rinse, repeat. It’s been an exhausting but exciting process. We’re almost down to just the big furniture which will need a UHaul to finish up. Not yet sure if we’ll get to that before Dad goes on his trip in a little over a week, but I do think we’re at least getting the beds over there and beginning the unpacking process at least. The closets are fully fitted for filling at least. I can also go ahead and order a bed frame and bookshelf sometime soon. If I need any other furniture, I’ll figure that out along the way.

Unfortunately, I’m exhausted so I’ll leave it at that for now. There will be more pictures/posts ahead, but I’m patient with the process. I’m just glad it’s all moving forward!

Big Days Ahead!

 I have a bit of sorting to do with Dameon still. Just going to bag up the clothes we went through that he doesn’t want and then start going through the toys/collectibles today.

Tomorrow is closing day! Dad will do a walk-through to make sure the house is good to go, sign a giant stack of paperwork and get the keys. We won’t start the moving process until he returns from a trip with friends this month, but that’ll give us some time to do all the final packing and be ready to start the big haul.

Dad said he’s been doing some driving through and around our new town and is already drooling about how beautiful it is. I can’t walk for the walks and drives ahead to familiarize myself with all of it. I even went and added some of the local FaceBook groups to my feed, get a better feel for the bad and the good for people there. Apparently, the worst problem I’ve seen is FedEx’s tendency to deliver to the wrong addresses there. Our house's mailbox is actually on the other side of the street, so I’ll be adding some special delivery instructions to deliver it onto my porch whenever possible. The house number is big and clear on the house, but it’s not super close to the road. 

I constantly daydream about what life will be like there, the way I’ll arrange my room and decorate and make it our own. Nothing too fantastical, but I have snippets of our tour and where we drove in and I’ve pored over maps to see which ways I’d like to explore. I’ve always dreamed about an abstract home, somewhere between rural and suburban life, and this will be a surreal reality to come.

Not to say it won’t come without adjustment. Change is always a little scary too. Some of us live our lives afraid to make change and I can’t say I blame anyone for that. Some changes mean you can’t go back to way things were and, when the new situation is worse, it makes it all the more difficult to trust making big changes again.

Yet I remember how difficult it was to hit ‘publish’ on my first book. I drafted and edited and riddled with the cover and proofing, backed up to make adjustments required, learned all of the pitfalls of word processor formatting. I kept meticulous notes so that future efforts would be more streamlined. Yet as the excitement built, that dread crept in.

What if people hate it?

It wasn’t a dread that I cared to let build so I squeezed my eyes shut and clicked. 

The harsher reality is that most people didn’t care to read it or even know it existed. But I moved on. More books, each coming with some new challenges in the ever-changing processes. I didn’t even get my first review until this year, a very in-depth one, but I lapped it up. Feedback is golden, especially in a time where people consume and move on, rarely ever taking the time to interact with those who made the work they take in. I adored the honesty and the criticism and strive for more of it, good bad and ugly, in the future.

I would still like to organize to get some booths at local conventions, but in light of the pandemic, I’m not certain about making too many plans in an unknown future. Events are still being cancelled these days and I don’t want to accumulate any space-hogging racks or displays too far in advance. I’ve kept many suppliers bookmarked, ready to order when it’s time, but in truth, there’s still much work to be done and my muse is playing hooky these days. I know I’ll have to reread my previous two books in the series and comb over my notes to proceed. It’s too easy to forget when nearly a year has passed without drafting it. When you have a brain constantly processing many ideas, you have to be in a place to discipline it once more.

In any case, this moving adventure takes precedence. I’ll likely be straddling living between this house and the new one until the end of the year, fiddling with nesting in a new room and settling in. It may just be the sort of task that has my muse sniffing around in curiosity once more. There are also plenty of crochet and doll projects in process, so there’s really no telling where I’ll go from here.

Truly, it’s not a bad problem to have.

Some of That Good News!

 So... it’s pretty much final; we ARE getting the house! The appraisal came back higher than our offer so there will be no unforeseen costs to get in the way. The seller has to install railings leading out of the back of the house to be up to code, but it should all be ready to go by the closing date, October 5th. My dad, sister and I are getting on the same phone plan (none of our current services work out there) since we know for sure now.

I can’t tell you what a relief it is. I’ve been on edge and relentlessly researching the whole process, just hoping we wouldn’t end up losing that house. The last real obstacle was whether the loan would cover the cost. In case you missed when I explained it before, the appraisal has to come in at the offer price or above for a lender to cover it. You can still get the loan when it comes in lower, but you have to pay the difference upfront to the seller. This is on top of the down payment for the loan (2-3% of the sale price) and closing costs (vary by house value, but usually between 4-10K).

As much as I’d love to ramble on, I think some video gaming is in order! And tomorrow, definitely a packing day! I’m so motivated again!

Reflection

 My nephew Thomas is coming over so I’ll likely keep this short. (Likely.) However, in this chaos of boxes and anticipation (the house appraisal results come Wednesday), I just felt an odd wave of... gratefulness.

For friends, for family, for the oddball groups I’m in on social media. Dolls. Crochet. Money saved. Projects in waiting. Healthy kitties and their many random cuddles. Daydreams (but not my weird night dreams) and dream goals. Plans, as fickle and unstable as they can be, and prospects.

It could be because I’ve taken a stimulant after days of not taking any (when feeling under the weather, the last thing I want is something keeping me awake). However, the focus without being overwhelmed is always welcomed and carefully used when it does hit.

I do feel better today but since Thomas will be here, I’ll reserve my need to clean and sort for tomorrow. Although it wasn’t above me in the past to invite someone over and restlessly clean in front of them while I talk a mile a minute, most of my nervous energy has become internalized over time. Sometimes it works in my favor, sometimes not at all. So I’ll allow myself another day of relaxing (kind of... I still tend to pace while having conversations).

Really, I want the day to come where I can post ‘yay, we got the house!’ but until we’re holding that key, I just can’t do that. Things can happen and even that moment is the start of another big process. I keep picturing actually being unpacked and settled in as the ultimate finish... but yet another beginning to a chapter I hope will mean flourishing in a new place.

I’ve spent some time adding the new city on FB to see what’s up. I’ve studied the school and the area. Lol their claim to fame is a 1954 sports team that won state champion, a feat because they were a tiny school up against much bigger ones. I’m not really a sports person, but I felt a weird twinge of pride for a city that isn’t really mine... yet. I am eager to explore a new place, learn a new area. It almost feels like planning for a vacation with none of the urgency of fitting everything you want to do within a week or two. It’s the caress of a slow-spreading adventure. 

I want this. I need this. I anticipate it wholeheartedly. Yet still, I feel like I can’t release the leash yet. I’m sadly used to disappointment, of things not happening, of having to pick up the pieces. But for this time, I dare to dream and hope it comes to pass.

Days in a Haze

 I wasn’t exactly feeling terrific once my kitties came home to recover. While She-Ra became an absolute 24/7 cuddler the first few days, Seven remained a loner. Until today. She-Ra is still cuddling but is doing more wandering on her own while Seven actually laid on the end of my bed for a while. Not for too long, since her sister’s attentions make her hiss and growl. Both of them are recovering well though, their incisions looking great. I spent the past few days just taking cat naps and checking on the kitties, so I’m ready for a break in tedium myself.

So tomorrow is the fated appraisal day, which I think will go well. While the static appraisals I found online are about $28K apart, I used a different sort of calculator to get an estimate that actually sits a few thousand above our offer. I’m hoping that one is the most accurate since, as I’ve said, a high appraisal is far better than a low one. I’ve noticed that some of the lower appraisals didn’t factor in the additional bedrooms and bathroom added after 2009, so it seems more likely that the calculator I used is probably the more accurate of the many sources I’ve looked through.

Today, I’m hoping to actually get my ass up and help my nephew sort through his junk. I’m actually typing this in the late night/early morning hours, so I’m also hoping to get a nap in before I get going. Really, I just want to get rid of the anxiety of getting the appraisal out of the way. It’s really the last big step that could make or break this one (and quite frankly, we better damn well make it because I’m ready to get the hell out of here). So I’m likely either going to sleep more or stay busy so I’m not restless. And since my dad is one of those nervous types that never shuts up about how everything can go wrong, moving forward is sorely needed.

Yes, yes, I know. Internally, I’m always thinking worst case scenario myself. I just don’t torture everyone with a fatalistic assurance that everything WILL go wrong. My dad isn’t quite hip to the fact that he’s no prophet and his constant negativity and assurances of everything going wrong are not really all that accurate. I also recall quite a bit of him telling me that working shit jobs would get me somewhere one day and, lucky for me, I stop believing that and have since lived my life according to my own intuition and been much happier. ‘Success’ for my generation is simply managing to find happiness amidst a failing economy and an imbalanced workforce. Some of my generation have been lucky enough to ‘make it’ but more often than not, most of us have to expend a lot of energy adapting to some disappointing realities.

Going a little sideways here, but I’ll likely be chasing a racing brain today and tomorrow. I’m going to err on the side of optimism and keep laboring under the assumption that all will go well. Quite frankly, this year can use a lot of encouragement.

More Down Time

 Sometimes a girl just needs serious healing time... and a couple of female cats to heal with. My girls got spayed a couple of days ago; one is hyper affectionate while the other just wants to be left alone. So every time I get up, I have one following me while I check up on the other. I’m feeling pretty run down but that will pass in a day or two.

Dad was in stress mode over the updates on the new house. The lender was having trouble securing an appraisal so my sister looked up a few numbers and Dad gave those numbers to the lender. Lo and behold, appraisal date will be September 28th. There are two more major steps, post-appraisal, so I figured it’s a good time to run a checklist of the process.

1. Get pre-approved for a loan. Before you do anything, and I’ll assume you’re not dropping cash, you’ll need to do this prior to anything else. Now, you CAN do the next two steps prior to this, but it will put a halt in the process until you secure a lender. You might want to know what your loan limit is with your credit or you’ll have a hard time locking in an offer. Once you’ve done this, then they can later provide an estimate for what your loan will cover once you make an offer.
2. Get a realtor. During our process, this actually came WITH securing our first tour of a house we were interested in, but most will advise you do this next. Most realtors are only licensed in one state, so if you’re looking in multiple states, you might end up needing to work with a few. Each house comes with the seller’s realtor, but you’ll need a sort of ‘buyer’s’ realtor to help you with your own best interests.
3. Go house hunting. My family learned early on; physically go look at the outside of the houses you might be interested in or the neighborhood first. We secured a tour first when we started out but when we got there, we realized that the outside of the house needed work, the yard was smaller than we thought and it wasn’t quite as private as we’d hoped. Pictures can omit a lot of important information before you even set foot in the house, so make sure you like the outside first, THEN schedule a tour for inside.
4. Make an offer! When you find one you like, put in an offer! You’ll usually do best with two figures; an initial offer, then the maximum you’ll allow the realtor to put in on your behalf. You may not need the second figure at all. If the house has been on the market for a while with no competing offers or you think they’re asking for too much and they agree, you may not need a secondary offer. However, it will save you some time. It can take a week to be accepted, especially in a bidding war.
5. Inspection: optional. If you’re unsure about the asking price or condition of the home and your offer has been accepted, and you’ve paid earnest money to secure the offer, this is a step which will provide an acceptable contingency to proceed or back out. If there is anything you would like to see done before agreeing on a final offer, repairs, etc., after the inspection is the best place to either negotiate or back out, if it seems too troublesome. This step will require you to pay out of pocket, but if you’re really unsure your offer will hold up to scrutiny, this is a good step to take.
6. Appraisal. Your lender is responsible for securing this step. They will schedule an appointment for the appraiser as well as the buyer’s and seller’s realtors to be present. What you’ll hope for here is a level or high appraisal. If the appraisal price cones in lower than your offer, the bank will only pay the appraisal cost and you will have to pay the difference in full, along with closing costs and your down payment. A low appraisal can be a huge dealbreaker for most people.
7. Underwriting. Provided your appraisal was favorable, this is likely the most secure step in the process. When you first put in an offer, your lender will have already given an estimate for what is finalized here. This is where you’ll get the actual monthly payment cost, as well as insurance, down payment and closing costs. This is the last opportunity to back out (but if it’s just cold feet, you may not get earnest money back). This one is approximated to take one to four weeks.
8. Closing! This is it! Prepare for hours of paperwork, paying all finalized costs... leave with the key to your new home. It was a pain in the ass, but it’s finally done. If you haven’t done so already, get packing and moving. Look forward to a strenuous haul before you finally get to settle in!

Crossing my fingers the appraisal goes as planned and we can hop on over to the underwriting step. It’s very nerve-wracking, trying to tamper down the excitement just in case something falls through. All the same, I’m keeping my hopes present at least, just hoping I get to celebrate a new home on October 5th!