A couple quick touches

Home Sense is a dangerous, dangerous place.

The new store opened in Ottawa October 1st. I've already been twice. And I don't go shopping very often.

Last weekend with my younger sis who I totally got hooked on the place as it was her first visit.

This past weekend with my older sis who is also not totally hooked after it being only her second visit.

I picked up a couple random things, despite going in with the intention of doing a return only. But...isn't that always the way.

Excuse the crummy colour in the pics-camera's being hormonal again.

First in the main floor powder room:

Cute, non?

And also in the ensuite. The monogram hand towels I got for my birthday , so not totally vain. The brown bath towel I found in the almost exact-matching colour as the monogram thread and, I gotta say-the towel is pretty much the softest towel I've ever felt.

A bit fromage, I acknowledge, but also (I think) pretty cute. It is our master bath afterall, so other than house showings, we're the only ones who see them, and it feels pretty posh.

Thanksgiving Weekend

A few days late, I realize, but as much as I love 4 day weeks, they are bizaaaaayyyy!

So this past weekend was Thanksgiving weekend for my fellow Canucks. Hubs and I offered to host our family dinner on Sunday night with our new place and gigantico dining room. Plus I love hosting and figure my mom's dang tired of it. So the immediate family that was in town joined us Sunday afternoon-7 of us in total, although we easily had food for 12+.

I was pretty much filled up until Wednesday from all the food & treats that we consumed. The menu was:

Appetizers:
Cranberry pinwheels
Cream Cheese w Red Pepper Jelly spread
Pumpernickle bread & spinach dip
Cheese & deli platter

Main:
Turkey (but of course)
Stuffing
Mashed Potatoes
Baked butternut squash
Flat beans
Garden salad
Homemade rolls
Gravy, cranberry sauce, apple sauce

Desert:
Homemade Pecan Pie
Homemade Pumpkin Pie
Homemade Apple Pie
Homemade personalized sugar cookies

Whew! I'm full just writing it all! Of course I can't take credit for it all-it was somewhat of a potluck, so everyone contributed at least one dish.

Friday night prior, I spent many more hours than I a) expected b) care to share creating a pinecone wreath I found on U Create.

For a little extra seasonal decor. There were many more pinecones than I needed, so I glued some hemp around a vase Thrifty Decor Chick -styleand tossed in the extras for a little fall in the main bathroom.
My younger sister has a bit of extra time on her hands lately and felt motivated to share some table setting ideas with me, namely, this one:

Which we slightly adapted from the LCBO magazine.

All in all, we were definitely try-hards with the table setting, but I think it looked great for our first big holiday family dinner:

To end the night off, and to help digest a bit of the massive quantities of poultry and sides consumed, we played a little Guesstures (fave game of all time), and of course some Beatles Rock Band:

Overall a very exhausting, but very nice and fun day!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving!!!

Update

So, it's fair to say that it's been an anxiety-ridden week. To say the least.

After Mondays heartbreaking e-mail (and I'm not being dramatic), we've waited impatiently through that entire day and Tuesday. Both of which were among the top 20 longest days of my life. We were supposed to hear by sometime on Tuesday, but hadn't.

So, Wednesday morning, I call P&K at 10:15 or so. I wanted to make it clear that we were interested in selling to them, but also not be a pain in the ass, so made 1 call at a reasonable time with enough time after we were supposed to have heard back from them that I wasn't being pushy or annoying. I leave a message-clear and concise.

All day yesterday I hear nothing back. I hadn't expected to as I suspected it was their home number they gave me and they'd likely be out working all day.

At home with hubs that evening, I was getting beyond anxious, so I checked our e-mail account for about the billionth time that day. There was a new e-mail. From P&K.

Now, let me point out-I'd had my phone with me basically 24/7 since Monday in case they called. I figured a call is the most direct way to update us and the least passive way too. Also, I figured if they called, it's more likely to be better news, and an e-mail likely meant bad.

So we stared at the computer screen for a few minutes, not really wanting to open it-fearing the worst. It wasn't the worst, but it wasn't good news either.

The jist: The guy they're dealing with had his inspection pushed back until Thursday (today), and he lost his phone so couldn't get the calls and couldn't call them. So they got his e-mail when they got home last night. The inspection should be going down today, and they should know at some point today what's going on.

GAH!

A couple things:

1-It sounds like the other seller is full of excuses. It almost sounds like he's reluctant to sell. Probably knows he has to, but doesn't want to. Self-sabotage if you ask me.
2-I'm clearly incredibly biased in this specific situation, but why would you make such an important purchase from someone so clearly unreliable. I acknowledge that a little hassle up front is worth a dream home in the long run, but...if he's this wishy-washy and inconsistent when he's trying to sell his home, doesn't that make you wonder how well he's maintained said home?
3-It doesn't take a genius to figure out they love that house more. Why would you put up with all this BS if you didn't. That's kind of upsetting for obvious reasons. I, of course, want to sell, but I almost don't want it to be to someone who's 'settling'.
4- And I'm just dang tired of waiting! I'm tired of selling (although it's only been a month), and I'm tired of being a prisoner to strangers' whims and times of day wanting to come see the house. And I'm SOOOO tired of the relentless agent calls!

And yes, I am being a whiney brat...so what?!

So that's what's up. Whatever happens, we're taking this weekend off from open houses & showings to enjoy Thanksgiving and an actual weekend, so that will be a nice break no matter what.

So I'm still on pins & needles, filled with anxiety and waiting for some guy to get his act together or not.

Sunk

That's how I feel this morning.

After an exhausting, yet incredibly eventful and exciting weekend. I arrived this morning to an e-mail that's made me feel heartbroken and sunk.

First, let me give the gist of the e-mail I would have written 40 minutes ago:

Thisclose!

Wow---what an awesome weekend. Non-stop and didn't have a second to rest, but worth every moment.

Got a call Friday afternoon asking about our house for sale and when this couple could come see it. Informed them we were having an open house Saturday & Sunday, but they were busy, so asked if they could come by earlier. I offered up 9:30. Done.

So after a dinner party Friday night and going to see Fame with the ladies (so cheesy, yet so us and thus quite enjoyable), I came home, cleaned up the dinner mess and went to bed. Woke up early enough for the final touches and met P&K to show our home. It's not an overstatement to say that they loved it. The showing went really well in my opinion and they were clearly not 'just looking', they were ready to buy. K went around for another look of the house while P stayed in the kitchen with me. K said to P "yeah, I know-you're already sold". !!!!!!! Yeeeeeeeeeeee! OK-heart, slow down.

So K finishes the second tour and comes down. After a bit of conversation and small talk we decide to do this thing and write up the offer. Excellent! A price we're both happy with, no conditions (Tarion does the work of the inspection), and a closing date of November 20th. Super excellent!! So I make a copy and they go on their way to enjoy the weekend and take the paperwork to their lawyer first thing Monday to get this thing official.

Open house Saturday afternoon. No one comes except one group. That group is P&K with another couple to 'show off their new home'. Seriously-they love it. It makes me so happy, relieved and truly warms my heart because you always want the person/people who buy your home to love it as much as you do. Like I did with our last house, I WANT P&K to have this house. I'm sentimental, so sue me.

Anyways, the weekend progresses. Another open house Sunday and it's more successful, but my heart's just totally not in it.

Hubs and I are SO excited and happy, yet still somewhat cautious because we know nothing's signed yet. We agree that P&K don't seem the type to just leave us hanging, so we're a bit more assured.
-------------------------------

Enter Monday. Demon of days that it is.

I'm exhausted, but have a long to do list that includes scouring MLS and Grapevine for our next home.

I check the e-mail account we've set up for the sale...and my heart drops.

There's an e-mail from P&K saying that they got a call this weekend from another person they'd been negotiating with saying he was ready to accept their offer. *Gulp* The deadline has expired, so it's not as if they're legally bound to this agreement (I believe), I just don't know if they love that house more. :(

In their defence, the e-mail sounded quite apologetic. It's not a done deal one way or another and the other party has until tomorrow (Tuesday) to let P&K know what their lawyer says.

In the meantime, our hearts are troubled, my mind's going a mile a minute and I'm on pins & needles. I just hope to hear back ASAP (in the most ASAP way you can ask for).

October Goals

I think this month, it's clear where my goals lie. I'd like to do a lot more Suzy-Homemaker-y stuff, but for now, I'm going to try to focus on selling our house. If we don't sell it in the next couple weeks we'll un-list it in order to enjoy the holidays, so I'll give it one final push, and if it doesn't sell, at least we didn't already buy a new place!

1. Send cards
2. Have a real date night with hubs (it's anniversary month afterall)
3. Sell house
4. Sell house (Twice for good measure)
5. Buy house
6. Enjoy Thanksgiving
7. Make at least 2 decent meals a week (I have been sooo supremely lazy/unmotivated to do any kind of meal planning or cooking in the last several weeks. Time to remedy that)
8. Bake something (besides bread) at least once a week
9. Go apple picking
10. Get to work on time 2x this month

September Goals-Judgement Day

As I mentioned earlier this week, overall I don't think I did too bad this month. Let's see:

1. Send cards Completed
2. Have a real date night with hubs Completed
3. Finish organizing the basement Completed
4. Stage 2 spare bedrooms Completed
5. Hit up an antique store or auction Completed (see review here)
6. Make cinnamon rolls w breadmaker Compeleted (and deeeelicious-recipe here)
7. Get to work on time at least 1x per week Haha--massive FAIL. I got to work on time ONCE. All month.
8. Organize our closet Completed
9. Host at least 1 open house Completed several times over
10. List & sell our house Partially Completed. It's listed, it's just not yet sold.

Me thinks that may be my most successful monthly list to date! Unfortunately the one that would make me the happiest, is the one that's only partially completed. Oh well, soon-I can feel it.

Goal numero 5

Wow---I'm not doing too bad on my goals this month! What's up with that??? (Although, we'll see about # 7 in a couple of days)

So my older sister and I hit up a few antique places this weekend, something I've been meaning & wanting to do for a while.

We started by going to the Fall Flea Market at Landsdowne, which was sold to me as an antiques show. Nah-it was definitely a flea market, and borderline a room of a bunch of garage sales (which I suppose are almost the same).

I certainly didn't find anything of substance, but I did manage to pick up several children's books for a future collection that I remember from my childhood
Remember these books? Wow--they used to have a lot more imagination built into them back then. I always loved these guys:
And classic 70's & 80's children books-the Beatrix Potter Peter Rabbit series: (sorry, I don't know why it keeps rotating)
And of course...a start of a Dr. Seuss collection:
After that, we went further down Bank St on a hunt for the Ottawa Antique Market. We didn't remember the exact address, but about where we thought it was we saw a big old "Antiques" sign, so figured that must be it. It wasn't. It had some neat stuff, but it wasn't super well organized, it was incredibly expensive and it was very dusty.

On the walk back to the car, we slipped into Found Design, which was definitely neat. Total blast from the past (literally, like the movie...it was before my time) and made us wonder how much similar stuff our parents would have had 30 years ago (or even 10-15!).

And eventually, we did accidentally come across the Ottawa Antique Market, which was definitely better than the other place. Far better layout, much better prices and much cleaner. Lived up to the hype, and my sister almost walked out of there with a buffet.

Overall, I think a pretty well accomplished goal considering I didn't actually buy any antiques...