A missing treasure... found!

Well, I guess "treasure" is not quite accurate.

You see, during the course of waiting for our house, we were asked 3 times to get an inspection for wood destroying pests. And all 3 times we came back with, no wood destroying insects were found, inactive (aka dead) ones were found... recommends seasonal spraying.

Well, today, we found the jewel. When the guy who is installing our new bathtub took down the old surround, down with it came a whole slew of carpenter ants!

Turns out the"inactive" carpenter ants were living under the plywood the the yucky bathtub was sitting on. Luckily by the grace of God, they were only destroying the plywood that was attached to the bathtub, and left the rest of the bathroom alone (or so it seems right now). It was odd, because there was also a large amount of concrete also helping support the nasty tub. Needless to say, we are trying to move past this, and head into the wonderfulness of a new bathtub... hopefully that project will be done by tomorrow.

Hammer Wielding Woman

Oh yes! I totally got to knock a wall out at our house. Here are the pictures! I am soo excited about how it all came out. There was even an amazing surprise... under the one wall, is also beautiful hardwood. Where we thought we'd have to have it "fixed"/patched actually looks great! So, it shouldn't be soo bad.

Personally, hammering out the drywall was so much fun. Any frustration or stress I had from this week or moving or whatnot... TOTALLY gone! I am also very pleased with our progress.This is my masterpiece

We recruited my cousin Andrew to take out the 1/2 wall
I think he may have even enjoyed it! (See video below)

My same wonderful cousin pulling out little tiny staples
that once held the carpet pad down to the floor.


We had some visitors come check us out.

Mine! Err... Ours!

This picture says it all! But alas! We are homeowners.... or as I say "mortages assumers."

Thank you to everyone who kept us in their thoughts and prayers over the last 3 months. It has been such a crazy ride. We are really excited about the adventure allowing us to embark on.

Furthermore... anyone want to help, we'll be having all sorts of priming parties, painting parties, moving parties etc. No experience necessary. We will feed anyone who comes to help. It will be loads of fun! The more the merrier!

Lets all go under the limbo stick....

So yeah, we're still in limbo waiting for all the paperwork to go through.

Guess, you'll have to continue to scroll down to see the pictures again. As an update goes, we did have our home inspection. The inspector found nothing new... or nothing that we didn't know about. The VA inspector from what I've been told, didn't stay very long, and asked only a few simple questions of our inspector. (Typically, the perspective buyers do NOT meet the VA inspector... they come when the buyers aren't there..) So, we're just waiting for the VA inspector's report to meet it to the bank... and allow for our closing. So, keep praying. God is moving (and hopefully so will we!)

I'll update when we hear anything.

We've fought the good fight, we've run/won the race....

I've been holding off for a while with posting pictures of the house. But... since I just found out that our bid was accepted... I thought it was safe to do so. Now, the next step is to get a home inspection. (So, put that to the top of your prayer list... the home inspection.)

Obviously, this is the outside.
This is the 1/2 bath.
This is the living room.This is the kitchen. It will need some updating, but
it's workable. :-)

Dining room off living room & kitchen

Bedroom #1

Bedroom #2

Bedroom #3
Bedroom #4
Like the graffiti?Full bath (really, there is a shower to the left.)Basement. There used to be a wood burning fireplace on that slab.
We saw it one day, then the next time... we didn't. It's MIA, so if
anyone sees it... would you kindly return it?m (I suspect the listing agent.)

So that's it. Please join with us and pray that the home inspection goes well. There is one area of concern. As the (angry) evicted residents left their home, they smashed the vanity in the half bath. They have to turn the water on, so we pray that it won't be all crazy, and ruin things. We're just trusting in God to lead us through this. At this point we're looking at moving the week before Christmas (good timing, huh? ), so if anyone wants to help, let me know. (I WILL FEED YOU!) And if anyone needs a place to stay starting in January 2010... let us know.

Have a good one!

~K~

Housing update....

There is really not a lot to be said about our housing update. It's more like a soap opera. I'll post a little update in as cheery attitude as possible.

1 month ago yesterday (September 17) we put a bid in on a house. We heard nothing until last Sunday evening. Last Sunday we were informed that (because the house is bank-owned, and the bank was not moving along at more than a snail's pace that) there was another bid put in on the house. We were less than thrilled. I think livid, is more accurate. We went back to the house on Monday with whole slew of people. We picked over the place with a fine toothed comb, if you will. We re-evaluated our current bid. We submitted another offer (not too far off our first offer), since the bank (which owns it) did pay to clean up the mold that was in the basement (long story, not a concern any more. The basement is dry... it was from the smashed vanity in the bathroom above.) Then we sat and waited some more. On Thursday, our bid was met with a verbal counter offer. (This time, not soo bad.) On Friday, we accepted the counter offer. Now, we're waiting for the official paperwork.

If you're thinking "How can I pray for them, now?" (If you're not, please think that... because we really would appreciate all the prayers we can get at this point.) Because the bank has been dragging their feet, we're pushing awfully close to the "first time homebuyer tax credit" deadline. We should have been fine with the deadline if they would have accepted our bid within the normal 2 week time frame. But now... we're not sure. It will be very, very close. We need to close before November 30. Please join with us in prayer, that we can accomplish this task. It will certainly help out in the future with some repairs we intend to make in the spring.

Other than that, we're still in limbo... waiting.

Thanks for the prayers!!

~K~

Funny observation....

So I just made a funny observation. I have more than 12,000 hits on this blog... yet only 1 follower.

Pam... do you check on me a lot? Sorry you are so often disappointed with no updates. Thanks for checking in on me! :-)