Third Times the Charm......Right?

Are we EVER going to get to Chicago?  Well it seems with the events of the past couple weeks we might be a little closer to realizing our dream.  We had three offers and chose one.  If this one falls through, we have a solid back up offer (thank GOD!).  It seems like this has been an ongoing pain for awhile now. I am hoping that we are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.


The inspection is complete.  Contractors have come through to give our buyer bids on doing some things to the house that she wants to do.  Now we wait. 




Our target close date is 12/11 but I think it might be closer to the week of Christmas. 


Below are pictures of the Joffrey Tower where we will be renting our condo for the next year.

This is one of the first places that we are going to visit once we are settled: http://www.frenchmarketchicago.com/

We will be living smack dab in the middle of the theater district!

and right across the street from Macy's 

Please send all of your good thoughts and positive energy towards us in the hope that this buyer actually ends up buying the house!!

BTW...2 things I am going to get once we get to Chicago:  1) a new computer  2) a new camera!!

Fall has come to Portland....and we're still here!! I've lowered the price on the house and we continue to have showings. It's crazy, people are so afraid of making an offer!! I don't ever remember it being like this when I have bought houses in the past so it's very hard for me to understand what's going on! I am currently off work and today was supposed to be Forrest's last day - but unfortunatly or fortunatly (depending on how you look at it) he had to push out his last day because our last buyer didn't pan out. We would have been moving next week.

 I try to be patient but it's hard!!

Even though I am pouting and having a hard time with this stupid market I have taken time to look around and enjoy the beautiful fall colors in our neighborhood. I will need to get out pretty soon and start raking leaves... for the last year - I hope!

It's Been a Bit of a Rollercoaster!!

It's been awhile since I wrote but things have been a little crazy around here!!  I think we're all ready to move now!  


It started with us taking advice from my parents,,, "you need to bury a St. Joseph's statue in front of your house!" and because I always listen to my parent's sage advice we buried the statue in the front yard.  One week later we had two offers!! 

The first offer was for 24k lower than our asking price to which I said a very firm "NO" to!   The 2nd offer was for 10k less but we countered and the final price was a mere 4k from our asking price and we were happy.  

Chicago here we come!!  Right?  WRONG!

They had an inspection of our property and nothing glaring was wrong. Then we had a tank sweep and a radon test (our levels turned out to be low - which is good!).  

While this was all happening my project ended and therefore my job ended. Typical for the jobs I've been getting in the past couple years - you just never know when the project is going to end abruptly.  This is one reason that we are moving to a bigger city.  Better job opportunities - hopefully!

Because I now had the time, I started packing things up for our move.  I was in the garage at this time when a guy stopped by and asked if we were having an open house.  I explained the situation - that we had a buyer and I was packing.  He was very disappointed because our house reminded him so much of the house he just sold in Denver.  He gave me his number and said he'd like to make a "backup" offer. I told him to call my Realtor and get an offer down on paper. Which he actually ended up doing....

Meanwhile - we weren't getting the final report for the inspection that the buyers had done and we were wondering what the hold up was.  Well, they ended up backing out. But lucky for us the backup offer was a full price cash offer!

So... we keep moving ahead with Nik - the new buyer.  I think he's a better fit for our neighbors.  He's a sculptor and he loves the rain!  Go figure!! :-)

Yay Chicago!!  Dang we gotta get there before the snow hits!!

So, hopefully we'll be moving on 10/27. We have a lot of friends to say good-bye too and  a short amount of time to do so.  Let's hope we have smooth sailing from this point forward!!!

D

Saturday September 20th was the Race For the Cure.  The 3rd one that we've walked in.  This year Connor joined us as well as Brianna.

It was Iggy's first time too!  He did so well!!

Here I am - looking a little "plump"!

It was nice to see so many "In Celebration of"!

Even some kitties joined the walkA very successful walk - Thanks to everyone for taking the time to walk with me!!

A Sale, a Birthday and a Family Visit - Who Could Ask for Anything More? =)

Last weekend started with the daunting task of sell all of our "Stuff" - Good grief!!We didn't even know where to start - thank God for Ann!!  She came to the rescue and sorted everything out and gave me some idea of what to sell stuff for! It was a great success.  I made some money, got rid of some stuff, and got to talk to some friends and neighbors!!   I didn't get a lot of pictures because I was too busy making money! :-)

I am TIRED and oh so SORE!!!

Forrest and I - with help from some friends (thanks Ryan,Geneva & Britt) and family (thanks Ann, Mom and Dad) were finally able to complete enough of our house projects to be able to meet our Tuesday deadline for a Broker Open House.

The kitchen didn't take too long...The counter tops sure look nice!

A little staging helped!

Looks very nice!!

Forrest  came up with a great idea of turning one of our small kitchen cabinets into a small bar- you can kind of see it to the left...

and our entry way looks great with the table Forrest built.

We're all exhausted and feeling like we're one step closer to Chicago!! 

Now what you've all been waiting for......

Ahhhhh Chicago!!  What can I say? We had a fantastic time!!  I LOVE IT!  It's everything that Bob Newhart said it would be and more!:-)

The El is a great way to get your excersize in.  It's really funny because you don't really expect to see something look exactly like it does in the movies but the El looks EXACTLY like it does in the movies!

We actually walked the Magnificent Mile - but this is the best picture I could get without getting hit by a crazy taxi driver.

I got a kick out of the fact that there is an "Ashland" and "Cottage Grove" in Chicago!

The bridges are great! The tour boats sqquuueeezzee underneith them.

Here is a picture of the famous Corn Cob tower - built in 1962 - a good year!

So we've narrowed it down to 2 apartments that we like.  One in the South Loop and one in "The Loop" - which is downtown.  Let's hope one of them is still availble after we get the house sold!  ARGH!

Mom & Dad - 50 Years and Still Together! - GOOD GOD!!

August 22, 2009 - 50 years since my parent (Jeri and Tricia) were married - on my Mom's 21st birthday no less (I am sure she is cringing right now that I am revealing her age! :-)).

They will be traveling to Germany for a cruise down the Rhien this month with friends to celebrate. We had a little party for them on their anniversary and we all had quite a good time! Kevin came up from Oakland and Ann and I were able to spend some quality time with him setting up for the party.

Good time was had by all!

Let's see.... where to start....

The house goes was supposed to go on the market this Friday but we decided we needed this three day weekend to get things in order. So... the house will go on the market on Tuesday the 8th. That is a load off our backs as we were really in crunch mode to get everything done!!

I tell you - I can't WAIT till this is all done!!

***Due to my tardiness regarding my posts I am going to post three different ones for different events. I feel that they were each worth their own space! :-)

Paint, Paint and More Paint!!

Please tell me what the hell we were thinking?

"sure we can save some money and paint the house ourselves!"...it didn't seem like it would be all that hard. Boy were we wrong!! We have a new appreciation for professional painters (aka my friend Dan Smith)

It took A LOT of scraping, taping and priming before we even got to the painting part. OMG - it was pure hell!

At least it's now done and we have moved to the inside of the house. With help from Ann and Conner we have gotten the living room painted. We've also finally gotten the flooring order and that should be installed this week.

For some reason I like painting the inside of the house more than painting the outside! Go figure!!

We're one step closer to the windy city!! :-) Just a few more things on the "to do" list.

Today is the First Day... Well at least for my Blog! :-)

I have been taking many pictures of the remodel of our home but have yet to upload the images. I will make an effort to do so within the next couple of days. August has been CRAZY (We had one week of 100 + temps) but then again everything has gotten crazy once Forrest and I decided to get rid of all of our "stuff" and move to Chicago!

We have finally finished painting the outside of our house - that was a big hurdle!! Now we are painting everything on the inside (with the help of my sister and nephew!). We are scheduled to have all the floors installed next week and I am somewhat nervous about the final outcome. I also have the daunting task of sifting through all my "junk" that I have accumulated over the past 6 years. Most of our furniture and junk has been moved into the garage until we sell it, give it to Goodwill or box it up to move it. URGH! what a pain!