MIL took the girls yesterday afternoon. I met up with D at her old house that they are getting ready to put on the market. The house looks great as they’ve moved out but all their furniture is still there since they are using his grandmother’s existing furniture in their new (but older) house. It looks like a model house. They seriously might make 40K out of that house that they’ve only been in for like 4 years. Unbelievable. Anyway, we sat there for over an hour talking about their upgrade plans for their house and possibilities we have with the land and MaMaw’s old house. Scott went to talk to his uncle who is power of attorney for her about the price because there was some other guy who hasn’t gotten back with them yet that might buy it. He was actually going to give him more than we wanted to give for it but his uncle said he had wanted to get x amount for her out of the house so she had enough to live off of until they passed on. Which I can’t blame him but I don’t think we’ll make enough off of it to buy the land we want. Of course, the way I see it, even if we get half of what the land is, we could pay off our van if nothing else and then use that to make payments on the land until we are ready to build. For some reason neither Scott nor I feel an extreme pressure to get the land right now but I do feel a need to get MaMaw’s house. Scott just hasn’t gotten the bug yet. I think it would take an appraiser coming in to say it’s worth X now and could be worth Y if you made these changes and if that Y was high enough, he’d be all over it. But I don’t think he wants to spend hundreds of dollars getting appraisals done if it doesn’t pan out. We still haven’t shelved the idea but we just have to make sure the numbers work. I don’t want it to be a close call by any means. I would want worse case cost scenario + buying price and the selling price to be way apart from each other. Especially on our first house we re-do. I have no doubt Scott can do the work and it would sell, it’s just a matter of the numbers. And if we come out with enough, I think that’s the only way we’ll be buying any land.
Archives for 2006
OK, so I haven’t posted a thing about the finale last week. I know, I’m a little late. Just a few comments. Of course we all knew Taylor was going to win. Dialidol had him way out front after Tuesday’s vote. And apparently Taylor was in the top spot since the Top 24. I’d like to see his total number of votes since Top 12 to see how far ahead he was and how much Chris lost by. So the finale was much better than Tuesday’s show. Best finale ever, that’s for sure. I thought Chris sounded better than Live’s singer and could have done without him. I thought Meatloaf was acting very odd and sang not so well but I heard he was extremely nervous and actually cried after the performance. I thought Katharine did great with it and if Meatloaf hadn’t been so nervous, it could have been really, really cool. Mary J. Blige was a bit hyper and made Elliott seem secondhand although I thought he sounded fine. Poor Taylor. I think Toni Braxton was horrible. The notes were too low, the dress was too little, her moves were too suggestive. Poor Taylor. He seemed uncomfortable and for goodness sakes, they were singing about THE GHETTO! Prince’s performance was great. The group performances were bearable, if not good. The awards were a little cheesy but bearable. Clay Aiken REALLY needs a new hair cut. Dave still needs some Prozac. Chris’s wife still needs to spiff it up a little if she’s going to be his man in the spotlight. Fine for McLeansville, not fine for Chris Daughtry, the wildly popular entertaining heartthrob. Ok, I’m only mildly joking but I do think other styles would suit her better and look more up to date. So I think Taylor handled the announcement well. You know, the more I see him, the more attractive he seems. I think he is losing weight and gaining a George Clooney look for himself there. This definitely was the best season ever. I can’t imagine a better season next year.
Somebody, quick! Tell me I’m crazy for thinking of driving to Greensboro to see Chris Daughtry’s homecoming Saturday.
Man, what a weekend. The lack of posts should give proof to the insanity from this weekend. We left Wednesday for Maryland about 3:45 and got there at 11:45. Which means yes, I MISSED AI FINALE!!! Thankfully my aunt recorded it for me (she already had planned to) and we watched it on Thursday. Which was our first order of business after finally getting ready about lunchtime on Thursday. Next on the list was going to out to eat with my grandmother and other aunt and uncle and then going to see my very sick grandfather in a nursing home. Honestly, we thought he might be dead when we saw him. He was asleep apparently and looked horrible. The kids even got kind of scared. That sounds horrible but that’s how bad he looked. So I took the kids out and came back a little later. We were there for about an hour and I kept the kids busy in the yard outside. That was a lot of work. The agreement was Pap only has days to live. My mom said he seemed very peaceful about the whole thing and said he was in his last days and working on going to heaven. So I think we all feel ready for it. So after THAT we went to my aunt’s house and stayed until Lexi about lost it. I think it was after 9 by the time we left. Lexi also burnt her finger on one of her spotlights in the front yard. So the kids FINALLY got to sleep I think at 11 or 12 or something. I fell into bed as soon as they did. The rest of the days went very similar to that one. The fridge was broken at the house so we had to go out for every meal. I think Friday we did some shopping and went out to eat. Saturday we went up to my great-grandmother’s grave and ended up having a small reunion with other family members that were there. Then went to see my cousin’s new house they are building. This is the same cousin whose wedding I went to last September. The house is two-story. Open kitchen, fireplace in the bedroom, several nozzle thingies in their shower, basement. It’s very nice. Saturday night we had my mom’s whole family over for some fried chicken. Sunday we actually went to church. Me and my mom and the girls went. They actually stayed with us in the pews and were good. The guy that is the preacher is a son of an old family friend of my mom’s. We are very near the same age and he is cousins with my mom’s son who is one year younger than me and sometimes when we up to Maryland when we were younger, we would hang out together. Now to see him as an (excellent) preacher is sort of odd but good. Anyway, we had to leave early because we had to be at a Memorial Day cookout with my dad’s family. Emma played with my two younger cousins that are 4 and 5. They had a GREAT time. They played on the swingset, played dress-up, played with the water hose. Lexi got a small nap while we were there. We stayed until 5:00 when we had to go to dinner with my mom’s dad and his wife and my mom’s brother and his family. Lexi was a handFUL. I barely ate and followed her around the front of the restaurant and outside. We left Monday morning about 11, stopped at my mom’s brother’s to eat some pizza and then headed home. The trip was a whirlwind to say the least. I was bone tired yesterday on the way home. The kids were really, really good the entire trip but that only meant that momma worked hard to keep them entertained, fed and rested.
As for G and MD, we didn’t talk at all this weekend. Which back at our Christmas visit is where things kind of spiralled out of hand. It was somewhat cleansing this time. The ground was covered with snow at Christmas and we were huddled up in the house most of the visit. Made a great background to let your mind create a fairytale world. This time the clear ground almost provided a physical sort of clearing of my brain. I was scared I’d get up there and have all the old feelings come up. But it sort of served as a proof of the changes I’ve made. Did some of the memories come up? Of course they did, but not with the emotional attachment they once had.
So I’m back working today. Only a few days this week and then next week is youth camp which I believe will be a little less tiring but no less a whirlwind of activity. Scott will be there and Carla will be there to help specifically with the kids and I expect that some of the youth girls will end up helping out some. The only thing I’m concerned about is bed time seeing that the evening worship service is smack dab during bed time and they won’t allow the kids in the service. I’m not sure if Carla and I will take turns getting them to bed or what. I’m going to have to play it by ear.
Lexi started saying a bunch of new stuff this weekend. None very clear at all but you knew what she was saying. Hello, cars, I don’t know, ma (for Grandma and Momma), baby, bottle, no, bye, dog. I can’t think of any others but it seems there were several times we were like, did you hear that??
Scott and I are also debating whether to buy some land near us. We’re not sure how to figure it out how to afford it but it would be nice to get some as land is getting pretty scarce around here. Even if we never built on it I think we would be smart to buy it as an investment property. Speaking of investment property, I still haven’t ruled out the idea of buying his grandmother’s house, fixing it up and using that money to buy the land with. But I’m not sure that would happen until the fall and who knows when we would actually sell the house.
I’m SO disappointed in AI last night. Very anti-climatic and the new songs were HORRIBLE songs. Kat went pitchy at the end which I couldn’t understand why no one called her out on that. I really hope to not hear either one on the radio any time soon. If Taylor doesn’t win tonight something is terribly wrong.
I’m not quite sure what happened last night except to say now me, Scott, Emma AND Lexi are going to youth camp in two weeks. S&S came over last night (why do all my friends have the same initials. it makes things quite confusing) with their two kids J&J (geez, ok, their kids have the same initials too–one is 7 year old girl and the other is 4 year old boy). We had a great dinner. I made a roast and potatoes and they brought mac & cheese and green beans. Lexi slept through dinner which made it even easier and the other kids sat at our coffee table and took care of themselves. Emma had SO much fun with them. She almost literally passed out after I got her pajamas on and had her sit with me in the recliner after the left. So we had some church talk and we realized Scott and I are sort of their sounding board. Which is cool because they don’t have that with many people from the church. I’m glad they feel comfortable enough with us and trust us enough to talk about stuff. We had another camp leader come over after dinner to go over camp stuff. In the meantime, I STILL really want to go. And they REALLY need people to go. 40 kids and only 4 adults going with them. So by the end of it, I had agreed to go and bring Carla with me to watch the kids which surprisingly agreed to do. Which I’m actually really excited about. I have to call up to the camp today to find out details to see if it makes sense to take kids up there. I don’t want to take them if they’re just going to end up stuck in the room. Definitely don’t want that. But if they are able to go to a playground and have somewhere to watch some tv, then it will be good I think. Like a mini-vacation.
So Saturday turned out really good I think. Seemed like a lot of people got fired up to do something from it. Several people did not want it to “end” on Saturday and wanted something to come from it. Which is pretty cool. Lexi ended up with a nap. Yay! Why I worry about these things, I’m not sure. I took Lexi with me for the morning but found out MIL stayed home with the Emma and Skyler. So I asked her to meet me at my house and stay there while Lexi napped. Which Lexi actually went down as soon as we got home and before MIL got there with the kids so that really worked out. What I found out when I got back to the church is SIL heard some of us talking about going to AI and she felt left out because no one invited her. Which I did feel bad because she felt left out but I sort of didn’t in a way because she has never said one word about the show, whether liking it or not. I had no clue I even needed to ask her. Anyway, I think that is smoothed over.
Sunday I left after Sunday school and got Lexi a short nap. We went to Dora Live. It was a pretty cute show but I wasn’t prepared for how short it would be. It started a few minutes after 2 and by 2:30 we were taking a “potty break”. But Lexi stayed in my lap the whole time and was a little angel. So was Emma. All the girls were good. Made for a very stress-free afternoon. Emma seemed to like when Diego came out and when Swiper said Ah, Man! I think Swiper was actually the closest-to-real-cartoon-life character.
I accidentally double-booked myself for this evening. I forgot I had bible study tonight and then invited the youth pastor and his family over for dinner. It could have worked out because he had to leave for a meeting and I could have just been a little late but then he said he wanted to meet with Scott about youth camp instead of going to his meeting. So now I don’t have anyone to watch the girls while I go to bible study.
D&D moved this weekend to D’s grandmother’s old house. They are going to re-do the whole house and end up with more land and in a good school district. It just seems surreal to me that they are not living in their old house and are now living in a 2 bd 1 bath 50 year old house. I know the house will be SO awesome when they get it done but gosh, it will take some umph to get through the construction.
Wow, in two more days I’ll be headed up to Maryland. Yay, vacation!! I really am looking forward to it, especially after this busy weekend.
It’s 12:46 and very unlike me to be up. Tonight we had our planning meeting for the Place training we’re doing tomorrow. We were there for over 3 hours and it was actually a really good time. We had dinner at one of the leaders houses and then went over the schedule and material. I realized once again how well I get along with our youth pastor’s wife. We got on the topic of American Idol and realized how we are both addicted to Chris Daughtry who strangely reminds us of her husband who looks a little like Chris and also formerly was a “rocker”. Needless to say we have really good music at church which has nothing to do with the fact that he looks like Chris Daughtry only the fact that he was formerly a musician. Ok, it is really late isn’t it cause I’m kind of just spewing at the mouth at the moment. ANYWAY. Scott graciously stayed home with the very tired kids. Got them a bath and everything. Emma did go spend the night with MIL. Word is she may be a no-show for the training tomorrow. Which may be a bad thing or a good thing. Bad because I really want everyone that signed up to come and good because that means she may be able to stay with Lexi while she naps tomorrow. That is the ONLY thing I’m worried about for tomorrow and I don’t know why I’m so anal about my kids getting naps. I mean, if she’s sleepy, she’ll nap at the church right? You would think. I guess we’ll see if MIL doesn’t end up keeping her.