see this guy, maybe you know who he is, look how excited he is about his brand new neighbors!!

That is us! set to close on December 2nd on 26 acres and a house just (okay maybe not just but closer than I am now) around the corner from our soon to be best friend Brett. Not sure about getting past those gates and surveillance... Good thing I have a lot of practice stalking from my college days (Kara, Lily, Vinnie do you remember those Nashville Scott twins?).

no more paying a mortgage on a house we don't live in!!
Yippee!! today was settlement.

Only TEN days until we close on our house!! Yippee!! I am fairly confident it is a sure thing, but you never know. Since my better half caved and got cable...I am hooked on that HGTV, I love that Real Estate Intervention show. Our second realtor Rose, was like that guy Mike...we hoped we would make some money on our first home and were emotionally tied to it. She said if you want it sold, lower the price. It worked.

We bought it at the height of the real estate bubble...put a lot of money into it, but selling it after the bubble burst. Well, I am thinking in most cases people are sometimes even lucky to sell their home (we have friends who have had a house on the market for over 1 year), and to break even that would be lucky too, but just not the case :(!!! So many people have loved to share their real estate experiences and all I am thinking if it was not in this market then ZIP IT UP!!!

On the other hand, it is possible for us to get a great deal on something now. We are not ready to commit to that now, though I hate renting a home. I do not like anything out there . Needs to be PERFECT to spend good money on. SO we are looking for land and will build unless we find something close to perfection.

Maggie got her first tooth two days ago!! She finally crawls like a real baby, no more army crawl. She is cruising around the walls and tables and gets so amused by her big brothers.
The kids are getting more adjusted to things, as I am. Think we are getting into the groove of the never ending chaos of taxing around to different activities, homework, playdates, etc etc. Having a lot of kids is BUSY!!! BUSY! BUSY! BUSY!!

I went to lovely Hobby Lobby and got a bunch of art supplies... paper, charcoal pencils, gummy erasers, pastels, colored pencils, blenders, etc. I love to draw, but have not done any real drawing since well I cannot even remember. college?? when Anna was a baby I was still in school, then we had Emma, and then Chris went to med school, and then I Had a boat load more kids and I have NOT DONE Anything for myself. no time, no money for a sitter. I am pretty much a mom, but who is Nikki??? I am not sure anymore.
I enjoy reading and read a book probably once a month, but mostly just brain candy.
I enjoy sewing, kind of...more now that I have a better sewing machine.
I love to bake, and cook with my kids
I don't love laundry and cleaning but I do a lot of that.
Where is my passion??
I used to draw as an escape from reality, and go into my own little world. Kind of as therapy. I probably should have been doing this the last 11 years.
I am committed to finding out who I am now, if there is any of the artist Nikki left in me. My first attempts were not exactly fabulous.

and I am wondering who has some great lunch ideas for kids??? something funner than a wrap, pinwheel, or sandwich?? by the way if you have not tried Horizon organic strawberry milk, it is great!!! I am also wondering why I ALWAYS misspell have ahve????

(this picture has absolutely nothing to do with this post)

I really would love it if someone would buy my house, so then I would not have to worry about it when we move.

When we put it up with a realtor, I was not happy about paying her 6% and then another 1% to Derry Township. (she was so encouraging though and we thought our house would sell fairly quickly) However I do not have time to sell a home on my own...or do I? At this point the realtor says people are offering $a certain amount less than the list price. If we take $that certain amount less we will not even cover what is owed on our mortgage, after we pay the fees. We have given up on getting back what we put into the house. Apparently the advice of you will get back the money you spent on a kitchen and bath is not true in "this economy" (I am a wee bit tired of hearing that phrase everywhere).

If we would have rented a house we would not have gotten our great tax refunds for the last few years though and would have had to worry about the kids breaking things. When you own the home if your kids break it you can choose to ignore it and paint it however you want. We did paint our rental house living room RED in our last house, it was worth not getting our deposit back.

enough of the negative nonsense... the little monsters are playing nicely together. baby Maggie is so much fun now, she is kind of on a schedule and sleeps nicely in her crib for most of the night, and she giggles and it is very very precious (and now I sound like one of those annoying bragger moms, but she is cute). I have gotten rid of a bunch of stuff that I will not need to move. Today is the day for my weekly philosophy microdermabrasion, the kids are having less homework as the school year ends so they can just play outside, Sam's skin icky gross stuff is getting kind of better, and until tonight I am caught up on the laundry.