Still no heat (but there is red wine)

And it does wonders for keeping warm!! Unlike the rest of the US, it is cold in Seattle. Well, cold for me, at least. Most days are in the 50s-60s sometimes rainy. When it's not rainy, everyone takes full advantage of being outside. I'm not getting nearly enough unpacking/organizing done due to this fact. Walks around the lake have become my sanity! Our furnace won't be replaced for another 10 days so we've managed to lose electricity twice from the space heater which requires a trip to the scary basement to flip the circuit breaker. Ok, so Ryan did it once and then he dragged me into the scary basement to show me what to do. Doesn't he realize I could suffer from post-traumatic stress??!!

The house is slowly coming together. We rearranged our living room furniture a few times and Ryan has still managed to keep the awful reclincer. But if I get my way eventually it will be in the trash along with our overstuffed couch that takes up far too much of our precious living room space. I've already made a trip to the thrift store, so far 4 boxes and counting of stuff I don't need. I've realized I have enough kitchenware, pictures, and "trinkets" as Ryan calls it to last the rest of my life. And bathroom stuff. There is no place to put all of this stuff!! I don't need to ever buy anything again!!! Simplicity is fast becoming my mantra....

Locked out (again)

I do this every single time I move into a new place. I got locked out with no cell phone and barely knowing anybody. It was not as if I had planned to go out and forgot my keys. No, I was just stepping into the laundry room when the door that had been kept open with all of the boxes closed on me since there are no longer any boxes in the kitchen!! Thankfully, I was dressed to venture outside except for shoes....but Ryan left some (huge) football shoes so out I tramped to the local coffee shop, Cafe Lulu. Our neighbor owns it and was gracious enough to let me use her phone and hang out there while I waited for Ryan to save me! I better get some extra keys made and soon....

Unpacking is slow going....the only boxes left are in the 2nd bedroom which is going to be about as much fun to go through as a visit to the dentist. I've dawdled over organizing the kitchen and bedroom long enough I think. Even with all the unpacking, I am bored! We don't have cable so all day long I only have the radio/cd's for company as well as the occasional phone call. However, I've managed to take walk breaks to explore the neighborhood and bump into people to make random conversations to appease my social side. I need to start work to meet some more people!!

Boxes, boxes everywhere!

It's like Christmas here, haven't seen this stuff for 4 months!! There are not many places to put these boxes as the house seems small with so many of them....so our basement is doubling as empty box storage. Our 2nd bedroom became the catch-all for the stuff we don't know what to do with yet. So far everything is here and accounted for. Only damage is our step tansu has deep scratches so we will be filing a claim but hopefully we can touch it up without too much notice! The packers put such random things together, it's always a joy to find your bathroom towels in a kitchen box, ha.

Our movers show up with this huge truck for our 6500 pounds! So huge that there is not ample parking on the street so we met the neighbors right away knocking on doors and asking if they could move their car. Finally the truck fit and only a tree branch got knocked down. And Ryan saved the driver from a ticket. People complained about blocking the street! What are they supposed to do? I guess if the street's blocked for only a morning or afternoon it's ok but not the entire day. We enjoyed our movers, they were a husband and wife team in their 50s so he did most of the lifting. Oh yeah, and they loved the steep steps and the many trips for all of our boxes! The lady is also a seamstress and so made a makeshift curtain out of a sheet for our bedroom and our living room (to block the view of the beer cans from our neighbors!). She gave me her cell number:-) Back to the grind....

Closing day is finally here!

This little house has been a struggle since we placed an offer on it more than a month ago. The last few days especially have been incredibly stressful, but we get the keys tonight!! And amazingly enough, the movers come tomorrow!! I don't know how all of this worked out as we had a major scare yesterday (Ryan and I both tried to wire money to our escrow company, yikes!) and even today our broker told us we might not be able to close today.

The first picture is our old 2 galley kitchen. A LOT of work is planned for this so consider it a before picture. The second picture is the master bedroom which is a chocolate brown color. It's a decent sized bedroom and we love the French doors leading to the back garden/yard!! And you wouldn't think it for a house built in 1914 but it has a very large walk-in closet. So Ryan figured out that the closet used to be the 2nd bedroom!!!! And we thought the house was small already! The last pic is of the backyard which has a sweet little garden and feels really private even smack dab in the middle of Seattle. There's even sage, rosemary, thyme, and rosebushes! As you can see, there's not much grass so hopefully it'll be fairly low-maintenance. We're happy to have a home of our own and I can't wait to move out of the hotel!!! Check your email for contact info..... And keep checking this blog, I'm sure I'll have interesting moving stories! Moving should be a breeze after all of this!

No closing date yet but....

...our loan documents went through! We should close by Thursday of this week so thought I'd continue to post some more pictures of the house!! The first one is of the dining room. I love this paint color on the wall so much I'm hoping to paint the 2nd bedroom with it. I think it looks great with the white trim, coved ceilings, and hardwoods. And the second picture is more of the living room with the big windows. I'll post the last couple of pictures over the next few days....

BTW, did you know it's National Punctuation Day!?@!!!,, I would've added some expletives if I didn't have good news about the house!!:-)

...and Continues....

Closing date has come and gone and we still don't have a new date yet!! Our mortgage broker keeps telling us it should be soon and we continue to not believe him, ha. Best case scenario is now next Wednesday. I'm anxious to know a date. This waiting is even worse than the Air Force!

Things on the job front are much better. I received an offer for the clinical dietitian position! It's on call until November which is really flexible with the house stuff going on. So they call when they need someone and I can even say no. The hospital is in a great location, you can see the hospital where Grey's Anatomy is set. The cafeteria looks like a restaurant and guess what? There is even a Starbucks right in the hospital!! How quintessential Seattle!!

And the wait continues...

We're definitely not closing this Friday. We'll know more by Thursday but it should be next week sometime Mon-Wednesday. So many unknowns! And we have to pay $100 a day past our original close date which sucks as it wasn't our fault in the first place. Hopefully the military movers will wait until the last possible day to deliver our stuff and we might actually be in the house after all. Also, the fed's decision to drop interest rates today will help us get a lower rate than we would've had the original closing date worked out. I'm trying to think optimistically!! Do you see why I've been reading books lately? Have to get my mind off of all this stuff or I'll go crazy.

I feel the need to elaborate more on our hotel life. Contrary to popular belief, we do NOT receive daily housekeeping service. In fact, our weekly service is pretty basic. I've been doing the dusting!! I would not recommend this particular hotel as it feels dingy, carpets seem dirty, etc. Not to mention a very unpleasant fire alarm that went off at 3:30 am a few weeks ago not once, not twice, but at least 3 times and this thing was LOUD!!! And it would go off at random times over the next week or so. Plus, whenever we enter the hotel, we smell certain ethnic smells emanating from others' rooms. Have I mentioned that Microsoft is only a 10 minute drive? Anyway, the room has a microwave and a stove top but no oven so we've been eating as many meals here to save money which is mostly sandwiches or frozen meals. However, the most irritating thing of living here are our very loud neighbors. And the later it gets, the louder they seem to get. In fact, it sounds like they make furniture in there, I'm not kidding. Who knows what they are banging on at all hours?! The weirdest thing is that we can hear them coughing up a lung or maybe puking, we can't figure it out. Are these people sick? Or bulimic?? Who knows? I guess this is city living but now I'm glad that we won't be living in an apartment or a shared wall living arrangement because my sound machine would get so much use......

On to some good news. That per diem job that I mentioned before will actually be turning into more permanent work in November. So if I decide to take the per diem job, it'll be like deciding on the job if I like it and can then determine if I want permanent work there. Anyway, I have an interview Thursday morning!!