House for Sale.

Our house is still for sale. I knew it might take a while and in all honesty I didn't think it would sell quickly, I  knew it would be a while before someone would buy our house - what I didn't anticipate is how taxing it is to consistently have the house spotless and how accommodating we would have to be for people who call and say that they are sitting outside and want to see the house in five minutes. "Sure, I'd love to inhale whatever food is on my plate or take my plate with me - throw some dishes in the dishwasher - grab my dog and get out of my house for an hour while you walk through and then proceed to chit chat with your Realtor in my yard."

It will sell. I know it will. I am also beginning to believe it will sell in January in the dead of winter so that we have to move in the midst of ice, snow, and probably a blizzard. Okay, so currently I just have a sour taste in my mouth for all this house showing stuff and the house not selling. Not to mention a couple people have posted how their house went on the market and sold less than a week later (color me jealous). I also have watched a couple of great houses sell while waiting for ours to get a good offer so we can get onto something else. Blah.

I actually don't dread the actual packing up of stuff and moving it process (thanks seminary for training me well) (also I say this now when I don't actually have to pack stuff). I look forward to finding places for everything to go and to sorting through all my stuff and donating and pitching stuff we don't need.

Have you ever sold a house?
How do you feel about moving?

Back in the saddle

Summer has been crazy to say the least.

• I got married
• took 5 trips for work
• had my colleague on vacation for a month
• put my house on the market
• had a full ministry schedule
• co-directed a camp
• and a few more things here and there

I am thankful fall is around the corner (the kids are going back to school...whoooooop whooooooooop) and I am staying home for a while. I love being out and about. I love traveling for work and the opportunities it provides. I love my call. I also love being home and the routine of fall. I love knowing what is coming next and how things will flow. I love that people are around and the tourists are gone. I now am looking forward to the normalcy (as much as my job ever has) for the rest of the month. I think towards the end of the month I have several days of comp time that I am hoping to sneak away for a few days to go to Boundary Waters Canoe Area, but we'll see how that all plays out.

Our house is sort of going to be a revolving door for the next month and a half or so. We have Dakota's best friends, Gus and Luther, until Sunday. Oskar the wonderbernard comes on Saturday until the 21st of August. Then on August 20, Kevin, Martha, and Petzl (the black lab), are coming to stay until mid-September while life is in transition for them. It will be crazy but ridiculously fun month. Bring on dog-a-palooza and other such madness. Truthfully though we are blessed by having friends come and stay with us and we are thrilled to watch friend's dogs, we love them and Dakota thinks she has died and gone to heaven.

In the mean time we continue to have our house on the market - I am becoming less and less optimistic it is going to sell any time soon. Our showings have become much less frequent and we seem to be stuck at square one. Who knows. We continue to pray it sells and try to not look at houses online. I have found a couple that I am interested in but they have all sold and are now off the market. I have decided to not look at houses online again until our house at least gets an offer that we can even mildly consider. 

Goals for the rest of August:

1. Get ready for fall at work
2. Go through 4 boxes in the attic
3. Get spare bedroom cleaned out so our month long guests have plenty of space
4. don't get behind on Wine and Dine Training
5. Finish summer ministries photobook
6. kayak 4 more times
7. apply for my new passport
• I find it ridiculous that you have to pay a crap ton to replace your passport - which is still valid. blah blah blah. I am over this name change crap and companies that make it ridiculously hard to change my name. 
8. clean out bedroom closet
• Donate clothes that I don't need
• move some of the excess things that don't necessarily belong in my closet to the attic space

     ***Bonus goals*** 

• finish part 1 of our honeymoon photobook
• crochet a hat
• make a baby gift for a friend
• write three letters just because I can
• send a care package to someone for no reason
• try a couple new recipes
• finish a pinterest project I started last May

What is on your list of goals for the rest of the month?

Are you traveling anywhere fun the rest of August?

Do you use pinterest? love it or hate it?

On Selling Our House.....

Dear potential buyers,
    Thank you for considering our house as your future house. It really is a great house and there is a piece of me that is really sad to have it for sale. We have a wide variety of reasons that we have the house for sale. A few things I would like to note while you tour my house. First, we live there, all the time, we make it work for you to come and tour our house whenever you want: meal times, early morning, late evenings, over our lunch break, and whenever else you have decided to come. We make it work when you give us twenty four hours notice and five minutes. When you give us a little bit of notice: our bed is made, the house is picked up, the dishes are put away (or in the dishwasher), the kitchen is clean, we have probably even swept up the dog hair, and Dakota is in her kennel outside. When you give us five minutes notice chances are: there maybe dishes in the sink, our bed will probably be made (we do make it about 85% of the time), the kitchen will be relatively clean, and Dakota will most likely bark at you as she lives in the kennel in the house unless it is a beautiful day outside. It is what happens, we can't always run home to clean up quick and move the dog, we have full time jobs, we have lives, sometimes we are even out of town. We try. Honest. We want our house to sell.
    When you give us your response on our house through your Realtor please do not make comments about the bed not being made, the dog in her kennel, and the dishes in the sink (it was two cereal bowls - did that seriously effect your decision). If you buy our house those things will all be gone and you are free to do with the house as you'd like. If you decide you are going to make an offer on our house (my heart will skip a beat and rejoice) please make it reasonable, your offer at less than a third of the asking price won't even be considered. We have a mortgage we have to pay off. We have put a ton of work into that house to make it what it is, we aren't even going to take you seriously if you give us a ridiculous offer, offer us something we can work with, please.
    I pray this house will be filled with wonderful memories for you as it has been for us. I pray you will gather at your kitchen table and laugh and tell stories with your family, I pray life will be good to you and that you will paint the walls to your liking and you will transform the house into a home for your family as well. I pray that you will have more laughter than tears and that when you lay your heads down at night you will find great rest. I pray that you will find friends in the community and that you will love each and every day in that house, currently our home.

Love,
  the people living in the home currently