SOLD!!!

I hesitate to write this post because of the uncertainty of this whole process, but as of right now, our house is

SOLD!!!

We got an offer this morning, we countered once and the buyer accepted it. Easy cheesy! Chris and I will be signing the papers in the next hour or two and then we'll be on to the next crazy phases - appraisal, inspections, moving arrangments.

We are still contingent with the house we've been loving so we'll be working to make that contract official. Closing date is set for Monday July 27th!!!!!

AHHHHHHHH! A bit of relief!

Seriously!?!

Last night, while looking at houses, we found out that we'd run out of our 48 hours to either buy or release the house we wanted. I was bummed after the rush of thinking we might still be able to make it work. We also didn't find another house we liked as much.

This morning we had to sign the release papers for the other guy to buy the house we wanted. That really stunk! We spent the morning trying to decide whether to just take our house off the market - certainly don't want to sell it and have nowhere we really want to go!

About an hour after we got home from church, our realtor called and said that the buyers of the house we want BACKED OUT!!! I could have cried. Seriously, this is a nut-so process.

We have 3 people who are seriously considering offering on our house. And we're back in our contingent contract with the union station house. So...we'll see what develops tomorrow.

continue following our saga - who knows where it will lead!

And the drama continues...

I had NO idea that we'd be stepping into drama when we embarked upon selling our home and buying another. Chris and I aren't much for drama so this roller coaster is a little crazy for us :) Ok here's the latest...

Another buyer placed an offer on the house we wanted to purchase and he doesn't have a house to sell, so his offer sort of trumps ours. In our contingency contract, we have 48 hours to either buy the house or release it to be sold. Our 48 hours ends tomorrow (Sunday) morning.

We just found out that there is a man who is interested in buying our house! Strange deal though. There was another house for sale in our neighborhood and he had placed a contract on it. But somehow while that house was listed in real estate, it was also foreclosed on and sold in an auction. So he has earnest money and a contract sitting on a home that was sold out from under him. He's trying to get out of the tangled mess of that deal and wants to buy our place now. IF we can come to an agreement on the price of our house and get a contract signed by tomorrow morning, we have first rights to the house we want to buy. So we're down to the wire people!

My sister Chrissy is coming in town this afternoon and we're going out to look at a few more places tonight (we already had this scheduled because we'd given up hope that we could still buy the one we wanted). We'll let you know what happens but wanted you to know that we're not out of the running yet!

Jen

House Update

We found out this morning that another buyer put in an offer on the home we want to buy. UGH! We have 48 hours to decide whether to release our contingency contract so he can sell it or buy it. BUT we still have no buyer for our home.

This is all such a strange process. We've been marveling at how, just when we decide that it's not going to work out and we should just wait to move until next spring, we get a flood of action. On Sunday this week, we were thinking we're probably done. Then Monday a couple came to visit and on Tuesday we had 4 showings. One man is very interested in our home but is stuck in another strange predicament so he hasn't been able submit his offer to us yet. I just don't know where we're going. Part of me wants to just let it all go now and rest where we are. Our house is cute, we've made some improvements to it through this process and we have a VERY low house payment. We could stay here comfortably and have some financial wiggle room. But the thought of having a new home with space for us to entertain and grow and being closer to all that we do is SO appealing. So if you've been praying, I don't know what specifically to ask you to pray for...just ask that we'll sense God's direction and be content in what ever He prompts us to do.

We'll keep you posted!
Next post will be Hannah's 2 year announcement!! :) YAY!!!

Water fun

Madeline LOVES to help me water our gardens, as long as she's allowed to be soaking wet in the process. Hannah hasn't enjoyed the hose showers in the past. But tonight, we brought out a couple of cups and she was so motivated to fill the cups with water that she was soaked before she even knew it. We all had a great time.

I was able to snap some cool pics. Madeline was spraying the hose in the air and noticed that it made a HUGE rainbow. We've talked several times about Noah. Madeline knows that God told Noah to build an ark and then God flooded the earth. At the end of the story, God sent a rainbow to show his love and to promise never to flood the entire earth again. Madeline was so cute when she saw the rainbow. She started giggling and said "look there's a rainbow! That makes me feel special because God is playing with me!" LOVE IT!

Love Bugs

Silly sisters

Madeline giving herself a shower

Hannah Sopping Wet!

God playing with Madeline!

The Lord in it all...

The other day, when Chris called to tell me that our buyers had backed out, one of the first things he said was "I hope you haven't updated your facebook status!". We laughed about it b/c for once I hadn't updated the status but I HAD just posted to our blog. Ah well, such is life!

I'm interested to see where the Lord takes this whole house deal. So I thought I'd try to document the happenings as we go along and see how the pieces fit together later. Our buyers have officially backed out - we signed their release papers today and they got their earnest money back. We'd only had a contract with them for 3 days. They said that they were unable to obtain a lender for the loan on this house.

We are in love with the home we had hoped to purchase. Since we had Just come to an agreement in price over the phone before our buyers backed out, we decided to ask the owner to consider a contingency contract. A contingency poses no risk to us but it makes his home less likely to be viewed by others. And his home is gorgeous and priced VERY well, in fact he had just lowered his price $5000 last Friday. We were shocked that he agreed to a contingency!! We've learned of a loss that he's suffered and our hearts are so tender toward his situation. In fact, on the way to work yesterday, I was in tears praying for him and this process. I pray that he will experience peace and that we can somehow be a blessing to him in the sale of his house. I believe that God is working in his heart and ours. Our realtor mentioned that he "likes" us, even though he's never met us. That through the way that we negotiated without being pushy and the few details that he knows about our family, he would like to see us in his home. I really think that in the same way that God is causing a tenderness in me for this man, God is causing a tenderness for us in him. It's neat to sense some sort of connection with a person we've never met. I don't know how this will turn out, maybe we'll never own his home, maybe this period of time is just God's way of bringing our family to pray for this man, maybe it's just a period of increasing our faith and contentment with what ever circumstances we face. But I'm grateful for every bit of it.

Now if we can just find another buyer for our house, we'll be moving in the direction that I hope for!! :)

STINK!

Ugh, we just found out that the buyers of our house backed out. I'm in shock. We had just accepted the counter offer on the house that we wanted to buy. Will keep you all posted. Please pray with us... Jen

House Update!!

The house deals are moving along quickly!!
We had a young couple with two little girls come to our open house on Sunday (they actually came back 3 times during the 4 hours that our realtor was there!) and they put in an offer the same night! After a couple of counters, we settled on a great deal! They are paying full price for our house and we're helping them with some closing costs. YAY!! We have a tentative closing date of 7/9 but we're fortunate that they are currently renting from family so they can be very flexible with closing and moving dates.
On Monday, we went for a 2nd view of the house that we hope to buy. We brought my dad, Chris' mom and his sister Manda along for their opinions too. We still LOVE the home. So we put in an offer Tuesday morning, we've contered a few times and it looks now like we're coming to a great meeting point. I'm posting a link of the virtual tour in case you want to see what we're looking at. All bedrooms and 2 full baths are upstairs. There are 2 family rooms, a dining room, kitchen, laundry room and 1/2 bath on the first floor. We'll eventually replace the kitchen appliances with black and redo the kitchen lighting. But otherwise, we love the place and it's in great shape! The subdivision has a really nice park and sand volleyball court. Here's your peek...
http://homesite.obeo.com/viewer/unbranded.aspx?tourid=531773&refURL=http://tulsalistings.marketlinx.com/Portal/publicmedia.aspx?LID=415870&PID=181776&MID=155073&locale=en-US

Hannah Counting

I've told this story to several of you already...feel free to skip to the video if you've already heard the text :) In the past few months, I've tried to be intentional about counting to 3 or 5 or sometimes even 10 so she can learn to count in a fun, interactive way. We usually practice counting while she's jumping to me off of the changing table. I thought it was great that she could say "one...two...three...jump!". Well, about a week ago we were all driving in the car and Hannah was jabbering constantly (as she is in the habit of doing these days). All of a sudden Chris looked at me and asked "did you hear Hannah?" She had counted to FIFTEEN with only one missed number! We couldn't believe it. Silly mom for trying to teach my child below her ability. I was able to capture a video of her doing it the other day. Yes, she is standing on her changing table. It's so cute. Please excuse the ragamuffin hair do - she'd just gotten up from nap and we were headed outside to play in dirt and water - no need for brushes right?!