The other day I posted what our criteria were in a house and how we’d probably never find one house that had everything so we should just settle for something close enough.

Well I was wrong. We could in fact find 1 house that had everything. And we found that house on Friday.

We had literally almost given up the search and put in a bid on our “85% house”. This was a house that had nearly everything we wanted, but not quite. It was missing about 15%. But I have kept a close eye on the listings for months now and know every house out there in our price range and this seemed to be all there was. We talked it over and something was telling us to wait. Even though we were under some deadlines, because our current house was closing in 6 weeks, it just didn’t feel right. So I said I would do another search, looking only for new listings and see if anything came up. This was our last ditch effort.

Well 2 houses did come up that fit our criteria and price range. So we had our realtor set up the showings for Friday over lunch. When I saw the listings online, something told me one of them would be “the one.” Thursday night before drifting off to sleep I prayed that God would lead us to the right house. The one that had everything we wanted and would be our dream home.

He did.

The first house we saw on Friday wasn’t it. It was a nice house but smaller than we had hoped for and only 3 bedrooms upstairs. The basement was also pretty tiny. CJ liked it a lot but I wanted to wait and see the next one. When we pulled in to the driveway, I knew.

This is what we saw*:

It was elegant and traditional, while also having a modern flair. I love the colors. It also seemed very homey. I can totally picture it with a big wreath on the front door and Christmas candles in the windows. And, it had a huge yard on a corner lot.

With a fence! It seemed pretty perfect just from the outside but I reserved excitement. I didn’t want to jump the gun. For all I knew, we could walk inside and hate it. But we didn’t.

It had everything on our list. It was the first house that we didn’t have to give up one thing in order to get something else.

Here’s our list of must haves:

1. Large, open kitchen
2. Eat-in kitchen and formal dining room
3. Main floor or 2nd floor laundry
4. Storage space
5. Large master bedroom, bathroom
6. Big closets
7. Decent sized basement
8. Fenced yard
9. 4 bedrooms 
10. Convenient location

Here’s the list of nice to haves:

1. 3-car garage
2. Nice landscaping 
3. Modern, neutral colors 
4. Attractive exterior color
5. Whirlpool tub or hot tub 
6. Corner lot 
7. Newer HVAC

Check, check and check! The only item in the list of 17 things above that it doesn’t have is a 3-car garage. BUT it does have a pretty roomy 2-car garage with shelving and storage built in so we’re set there.

Let’s walk through some of the highlights and features that we fell in love with.

Here is the kitchen:

I love the cherry cabinets and solid surface “stone” countertops. There are a ton of cabinets and counter space too. All new stainless steel appliances (which, yes, I know will show fingerprints but gees, they’re just so pretty), tile flooring, large pantry and space for a table. LOVE! The laundry room and main floor bathroom are just behind the kitchen in the little hallway you see in the back corner. That’s also where you come in from the garage.

The rest of the main floor is the dining room, living room (or is it family room? I can never remember which is the more formal one and which is the one you use) and family room.

I love that the fireplace has a unique carving around it and that there is plenty of room for lots of seating. Another bonus: it’s NOT a sunken family room (or is it living room?). I know that sounds odd but we looked at several houses with sunken family rooms and that one little step going down seemed to trip up Isabella and me. Literally. She fell down it in one house and I fell down the step in another. It was really quite embarrassing. I  was talking away to the agent and the next thing I know I’m falling forward. Ha Ha, oops. So anyway, a house without that means less risk of injury for us clumsy Traders.

Heading upstairs, the first room you come to is the master bedroom. It has a double door entrance which feels so Gone with the Wind to me. Fancy! Here it is:

There is enough space in this room for our bed, dressers, etc. AND a cozy chair and lamp in the corner for a little reading nook! The first door on the far left of the pic is the walk-in closet. The open door toward the center is the bathroom.

No, the walls aren’t really curved. The listing agent shot these pics with a fish-eye lens to make the rooms look bigger but he didn’t need to because they are pretty big as they are. Anyway, double sinks, whirlpool tub and shower. CJ and I can actually share a bathroom now! That will be really weird at first…but I think I’ll love it.

There are 3 other bedrooms up there, which are all HUGE! The other cool thing is that this house has a little loft at the end of the hall.

It’s really just some extra space after the stairway but they call it a loft so I will too. We thought this might be a good spot for Samson’s bed kennel. Or maybe a reading nook, like they have it. We’ll see.

It also has a HUGE basement.

This picture just shows one side of it. The other side has a bunch of shelves for storage. Obviously it’s unfinished but the drywall is done which is huge. As you can see, it’s usable right now and could serve its purpose as my workout room quite nicely. We will probably finish it off at some point in the future but there’s no rush.

We only needed the one showing to know this was “the house”. So we talked with our agent about the best offer to make and he set out putting the papers together. We got it all wrapped up and signed by 5:30 that night and the offer was submitted. Now it was just waiting.

Around 10:30 pm that night we got a call from our agent that they had come back with a counter offer. They hadn’t budged much from their asking price and we wanted a better deal. So we thought about it and then offered up our own counter the next morning. They came back 2 hours later with another counter that was only $1000 above our previous offer so we took it. Done and done!

Of course we still have to get through the inspections and other stuff but for all intents and purposes, we are sailing toward home (pun intended). And the best part of the deal – they can be out on the date we need them to be so that we don’t have to find temporary housing in between. Phew!!

We are so excited! This is truly our dream house and something we NEVER thought we’d find. I guess it goes to show you should never give up or lose hope. There’s just might be something waiting for you around the corner!

*Note: all photos were taken from the online listing of the house, courtesy of CBS Home real estate. Obviously none of the furniture or décor is ours.

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Obligatory Resolutions Post

Pack ‘em Up, Move ‘em out!

Master Bedroom

*Note: all photos were taken from the online listing of the house, courtesy of NP Dodge. Obviously none of the furniture is ours.

My brain is maxed out. I constantly think about floor plans, room size, colors, storage space, and landscaping. My mind bounces from house to house to house, reliving our walk throughs. I even dream about them.

We’ve spent the last week visiting about 15 houses. Since ours sold, we’ve been in an accelerated mode to find a new one.

We’re getting closer but haven’t quite found that perfect one.

Sometimes I wonder if we’re being too picky. Do we really need a 3-car garage? No but it would sure be nice.

Here’s what we’re looking for in a house:

Must haves:

1. Large, open kitchen – this is a must! We spend much of our time in the kitchen and I want this to be a space that gives us room to move and be together as a family. It also must have lots of cupboard and counterspace. Newer appliances would be preferred as well.
2. Eat-in kitchen and formal dining room – oddly, this is harder to find than you might think. Newer floor plans are eliminating the formal dining room in favor on a more open floor plan. We have an antique dining room table and I want it to have a special space in the house.
3. Main floor or 2nd floor laundry – we’re looking at 2-stories and I do NOT want to have to trudge down to the basement, lugging a basket full of clothes, every time there’s laundry to be done. Non-negotiable.
4. Storage space – one of the reasons we are moving is because we are cramped for space in our current house. More storage is key.
5. Large master bedroom, bathroom – Our master bathroom right now is tiny. So tiny that only one of us can use it at a time. Hence, I use it while CJ uses the main bathroom. It would be great to have a larger bathroom with lots of counter space, double sinks and room to move. Having a large bedroom would be great too. I’ve always wanted to have a comfy sitting area in my bedroom in which to curl up and read a book.
6. Big closets – I’ve never had a walk-in closet and dammit I deserve one! Would be nice for all the bedrooms to have large closets. Isabella’s is half sized right now and we really have to pair down her clothes as a result.
7. Decent sized basement – at least big enough to have a workout room and some storage
8. Fenced yard – can’t have Samson running away!
9. 4 bedrooms – 1 for me and Ceige, 1 for Isabella, 1 for another child in the future and 1 for Samson (or a guest room or an office). Again, we don’t want to be cramped for space!
10. Convenient location – close to work, shopping, family, etc.

Nice to haves:

1. 3-car garage – obviously this gives us more space and a larger driveway
2. Nice landscaping – we could do this ourselves but it’s nice to have someone start it for you!
3. Modern, neutral colors – sure, we can repaint if we have to but we just did that at our house and would rather not do it again for a while.
4. Attractive exterior color – again, this is something we can change ourselves but who wants to repaint a house as soon as they move in?
5. Whirlpool tub or hot tub – this is CJ’s. Any house listing we see that mentions a hot tub he’s all over. I think it’s a nice bonus feature but I honestly don’t know how often I’d use it.
6. Corner lot – we’ve been spoiled by having one for the last 5 years. Good for privacy and increased yard space.
7. Newer HVAC – when we bought our current house, it had all the original heating, A/C, and water heater. We were worried they would go out at any minute and actually both the water heater and A/C died in the last 2 years. Those are expensive things to replace and I’d rather not worry about that again!

Seems like a lot but I don’t think we’re asking for too much. Yet, we haven’t found a house that has everything. We’ve come close. The one house that’s on the top of our list has all the must haves except 8 (fenced yard), and only 3 of the nice to haves. It’s probably as close as we’re going to get without custom building but we want to look at just a few more before making a decision.

I worry about picking the wrong house. What if we move in there and then hate it? What if we discover that it’s a big money pit? I’m pretty sure that if it meets most of our criteria, we’ll be ok, but still, it’s a big decision.

And one that we have to make soon. Closing on our house happens in about 6 weeks and we need to give the sellers of our “new house” time to find a house and move. It would really suck to have to stay in an apartment, hotel, or crash at someone else’s house for a few weeks.

By the way, our house inspection came back. Not too horrible – only about $1000 worth of stuff to fix. Sounds like a lot but in the grand scheme of things, it could have been much worse. Once we get through all that it’ll be smooth sailing toward close.

Hopefully I’ll have an update soon on a new house for us!

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Officially Official…and Other Stuff

I channeled my inner Nate Berkus and worked on some home projects on Saturday! While CJ lent me a hand here and there, I’m happy to report that I did most of it by myself and it all turned out awesome!

The first project was the easiest. I simply changed out the hardware on our kitchen cabinets. The old handles were brass and well worn.

The new ones are brushed nickel and while the change is small and subtle, I think it really makes a big difference.

It updates it and adds that more modern look. I also put these new handles in my bathroom (we had already updated CJ’s when we redid his bathroom a couple years ago).

The next project was the most labor intensive of the two. I decided to reupholster our dining room chairs. The dining room set we have is over 100 years old and has been handed down over 3 generations. My great-grandparents bought it and then gave is to my grandparents. My grandma gave it to CJ and me when we bought our house 5 years ago.

We really love it but let’s face facts. After 100 years, things are bound to get beat up and worn. At some point I would like to have the whole set refinished and shore up but for now, we settled for changing out the maroonish fabric on the seats to something more modern, that matched better with our house.

Here are the before shots:

This whole project actually turned in to an archeological experiment. See, when we took the seats off the chair, we discovered that it had been reupholstered 4 times already! We had to remove at least one layer before putting the new one on so as to not have it be too thick. We decided that for one of the seats, we would pull all the layers off, just to see what the other fabrics looked like! It was really fun to see each new reveal!

Ok, so, the maroon fabric above is the first layer. Here’s what the second layer looked like:

(Psst, say “hi” to Samson laying in the background!)

Here’s a close-up:

While flowery is generally not my thing, I do think this is a very elegant pattern that matched the set nicely. I try to picture how it all looked and I bet it was very pretty.

The interesting thing about this one is how it looked on the back:

Pretty wild, eh?

Now here’s the 3rd layer!

(And now Samson’s asleep. Guess he wasn’t as excited by this project as we were!)

This one is even more elegant. You can also see how the fabric gets more worn and faded with each layer.

And now for the 4th, and last, layer!

(And Samson’s up again!)

This one is really faded. It’s hard to tell from the pic but it’s a green color with peachy/beige flowers. I think this was the original which means this fabric is over 100 years old. Wow! I think the 2nd layer is my favorite, which is odd given that it’s flowers. There’s just something about it that fits the set!

Here are all of them together:

Apparently my family likes green and maroon since they alternated green, maroon, green, maroon with each change. But now the Trader’s have to mix it up yo!

And the big reveal of the new look! We wanted something brighter and more neutral. A color that would play off our new tablecloth but still work in the new house should we decide to change color schemes. So we went with a silky gold fabric that has a watermark type design (which is hard to see in the pics).

Here’s how it looks with the table:

And here’s how the whole look comes together:

I’m super happy with how it all turned out. I really think it brightens up the room and, like the new cabinet pulls, modernizes it. Now here’s hoping it’s enough to sell the house!

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Crazy Busy

Pack ‘em up Move ‘em Out!

Look out Martha!

By now you probably know how competitive I am. I hate to lose. But more than that, I hate the thought that I might not be as good as someone else.

I know, it’s silly. No one person can be perfect at everything. We all have our strengths. Blah blah whatever.

Ever since putting our house on the market, I’ve been doubting my interior decorating skills. I thought that our house looked pretty good and was well decorated. Then our realtors came in and changed everything. Most of that was less about me and more about what would sell. Ok I get that and was able to not feel bad about changing things up.

But then the open houses started. Before each one, I would meticulously go around the house and make sure everything was in its place. I was just sure the realtors would love it. Yet every time when we come back after it was all done, they’d moved many items around. Don’t get me wrong – everything they move makes total sense. I look at it and think, “Well duh. That looks so much better.” Then get mad at myself for not thinking about it first.

Now it’s become a competition. With every open house, I implement what was changed the last time and adjust a few other things. And each time come back to find more adjustments. It’s getting less and less though. Yesterday, there were only a few things moved, so I’m getting better! My goal is to one day have an open house where they change nothing!

I’m actually learning a lot, like the fine art of grouping objects in just the right way. By the time this is all done, I will be a pro!

Welp, gotta run. The tornado sirens are going off and a storm is a comin’! Time to get everything buttoned up, grab the alcohol family , and head downstairs!

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