New House

Soooo, Here is my post about our move and our new house, as promised :) You may or may not know this, but when Nick and I got married, we bought a 2 bedroom condo in Superior. It was close to my parents, in the ward we already attended and at the time was a great space for us. The downstairs room we used as a 2nd bedroom/office until I became pregnant with Leah. About half way through my pregnancy, we moved the office up to the corner of our master bedroom and did away with our guest bed, and made the second bedroom into a nursery. The layout of the condo was a little unusual, but we didn't think much of it until after having Leah. When you walked in the front door, you immediately went up a flight of steep stairs into the main living space, where the living room, kitchen, dining room, bedroom and a bathroom where. Then you went up another flight of steep stairs to the master bedroom and bathroom. So, enter Leah, and enter the problems. Two flights of steep stairs and a baby aren't the best combination, neither is that baby's room being on a different floor then yours. Imagine carrying a car seat and groceries up these stairs, and most recently a toddler and groceries, and then hefting them all over the gate at the top of the stairs. Good for keeping off the weight? Maybe. But not super efficient. Then add in a full time job and full time school for Nick, and a tiny little office shoved in the corner of our master bedroom, mixed with all my sewing and craft supplies, doesn't make for the most efficient work space. One thing we were especially tired of was having attached walls. We had some REALLY obnoxious neighbors over the years. The one good thing about that was that Leah learned to sleep through a lot. Once she was asleep, not much would wake her up. The most recent problems we had with our condo were 1. not enough room for Leah. The kid is small, but her things take up an insane amount of space, and she was in desperate need of a yard to run around in. 2. we couldn't see expanding our family in a 2 bedroom place. Yes, I know, lots of people do it, and we could have made it work if we needed to, but it wasn't the most desirable option. (and no, this is not a pregnancy announcement.) So, after a lot of discussions with my uncle (our realtor) and our parents about whether we should keep the condo and use it as a rental, or sell it, we decided to put it on the market. We had been packing away non-essential items over the past few months knowing that one way or another, we wanted to be out of the condo by the end of the year. So when we decided to list we were ready to start having showings. We met with my uncle on a Sunday afternoon, had all the paperwork written up and signed by that Friday and were on the market the following Monday. My uncle came that Monday to put up the for sale sign and to put the lock box on the door and told me that we had a showing scheduled for that Wednesday and Thursday. I was so pumped that we had showings that fast! The next morning I had a phone call that someone wanted to come by and see the place that afternoon (Tuesday). So Leah and I packed up our things and got out of the house. I called Nick to tell him that we had a showing and we talked about how surprised we were to have so many showings that soon. Leah and I got back to the house after the showing, and I remember thinking how weird it was to know that someone had been in our house. I put Leah down for her nap, and a little while later Nick called me. I started to say how excited I was about the showings and he asked me "So, are you really ready to sell our house?" I was a little confused because, duh, that was the idea right? So I said "Um, yeah. Why?" and he told me that the people who had come through that morning had put in an offer! We were both in a bit of shock. We didn't expect it to happen that fast at all! The people who put in the offer wanted to close on the 12th of July, so that gave us about 3 weeks to find a place to rent and to get things wrapped up at the condo.  We had the idea that we couldn't afford the kind of home we wanted in Superior, so we started looking in Broomfield, Westminster, and Erie.  We looked at a few places and were really discouraged about what was out there, especially in the limited time that we had to look.  Then we found a house in Erie that we loved.  Nick went down to their office to turn in an application, but someone had gotten there just before him and they wouldn't process our application until they had run the previous one.  We were really bummed and decided to keep looking.  My Uncle had told us that there was a rental in Superior in our price range, so I made an appointment to go look at it.  I really liked the layout of the house (the inside needed a little TLC however). So I called Nick and told him what I thought and he told me to fill out the application and send it in.  That afternoon I got a call from the owner saying that our application had gone through and the place was ours if we wanted it.  We signed a year lease on a Saturday, and the following Monday, the leasing agent from the Erie house called and said that the application before ours didn't go through and she was wondering if we still wanted her to run our application.  So there are a lot of things that just seemed meant to be and fall into place in this whole situation.  The house in Superior that we ended up getting, just happened to be across the street from our condo (super helpful for moving!) And the owner gave us access on the 1st of July, but didn't start our lease until the 8th. So we had a lot of time to get moved in and organized.  We hand painted the ENTIRE interior of the house ourselves, with some help from Nick's, and my parents. The house was professionally cleaned as well as the carpets.  The other interesting part is that the realtor who's clients bought our condo, is also the owner of the home we are renting. So I think he was extra motivated to make sure that everything went smoothly with the closing on our condo!  At first we were really bummed about the Erie house, but now that everything is said and done, we are really happy here and feel that it was meant to be.  We moved in on July 8th.  That night when I put Leah to bed, as I left her room, I heard her say to her sleeping buddies "this is a really cool room!" She LOVES running around in all the extra living space we have now and has adjusted surprisingly well. She loves her new room and refers to the house as "the new house" She hasn't once mentioned going back to the old house or anything.  We are really happy with our move and know that it  will be a positive change for our family.  

Sorry for the long winded post and no pictures.  As soon as I have a chance to get things a little more organized, I will post pictures :)