Lightening Up (Or Trying To)

Well, m’peeps.

Where to begin???

I suppose, I shall start by giving you a much-needed home-selling update, since I’ve alluded to some progress but haven’t had time to share the deets!

The headline: about ten days ago, we received an offer on our house, and we’re now 24 hours from the end of the option period for the buyer, so if all goes according to plan (and I think it’s gonna, because one of the buyers is coming tomorrow to take measurements for furniture, ha), then we can officially slap that SALE PENDING sign out front.

But, now. Ugly truth time.

This is going to make me sound heinous and ungrateful and ridiculous, especially since the timing has worked out so brilliantly, but I really wanted to have this incandescent, Disney-princess, break-out-in-song, gratitude moment when we finally got that offer we’d been anxiously awaiting. But the process didn’t exactly fill me with warm fuzzies and relief.

First—the negotiation has been less than smooth, and our respective realtors have been through many battles of the wills over the past week or so. Call me crazy, but I wanted the new buyer(s) to love and want this house so badly that nothing seemed too contentious, but there were several times I thought one or both parties might walk away.

And, second—my not-exactly-warm fuzzies turned to completely sour grapes when the buyers came back with a list of amended requests following the inspection (totally normal) that was far too lengthy for my liking, and for a five-year-old home, and included—I kid you not—that we remove mulch from the front, right, flower bed so that 4-6 inches of the brick line is visible.

I mean...say, WHAT????!!!

Okay, so yeah, sure, I’m a little emotional and territorial about this house that I’ve loved and nurtured and don’t want to leave, but if you make a pretentious and idiotic request like that, you’re just asking for me to take my gardening rake and shove it where the sun don’t shine.

Pick your battles, peeps. And the mulch level sure as shite shouldn’t be one of them.

Can you tell this Mama is a little over it at the moment???

So on top of all of this unnecessary mental yuck involved with giving up a house I’ve loved to people who don’t seem as lovey as I want them to be (although, to be fair and rational, perhaps some of that is just their realtor and not them, personally), this last week involved...

• A broken dishwasher installation (and bill).
• A leaking faucet installation (a bill).
• A home inspection (on a wildly inconvenient day and time).
• A home appraisal (with a teeny-tiny window of notice).
• A moving estimate with one great company.
• A moving estimate with another that made me want to stab my eyeballs with toothpicks.
• A vomiting child (who had to be dragged away from the house for said home inspection).
• A Mama whose bronchitis is trying to resurface.
• A Valentine’s Day and ALL the school responsibilities associated with it.
• A slew of registration for Chica’s new school

And on top of all those randoms, the hubby isn’t here during the week, and there is an ongoing list of items to order and organize for the ongoing renovations of the new casa. Not to mention, an official move now happening in two weeks and five days. 

I mean, to say that I am overloaded at the moment would be a MASSIVE, wild understatement. I mean, I’m making bullet-point to-do lists in my sleep.

Deep sigh.

Alas, there is not much to be done to alleviate all this stress. It’s just life. And gazillions of people who’ve been through gazillions of moves have survived it and probably handled it far better than I.

But I am going to attempt to give myself an attitude adjustment since I had more Hulk-like outbursts (and four-letter word appearances; though not around tiny ears) than I would like this weekend.

And part of that attitude adjustment involves taking the time to really appreciate the fun and creativity of the nesting for the new casa.

I completely recognize and appreciate how fortunate we are to be renovating this house in a manner that will make it ours. And I’m also ridiculously grateful that we’ve been able to siphon off a tiny bit of the equity we built in our current home to invest in some fun design flair for the new one.

So in keeping with this attitude adjustment theme I’m trying to end this post with (sooooo sorry for all the whining), and to throw a bit of pun in there...I’ll share a slew of our recent lighting fixture selections tonight, in the hope that it will help lighten my mood and keep me focused on something bright (literally, hehe), happy and positive. :) 

Oh, and it is of WILD importance to note that it only took sixteen years of marriage to win the hubby over to my love of lighting fixtures and their importance in design. And now, he’s all over it. (And, also, so busy that I suspect he sometimes agrees to things quickly, just to get through our massive lists, ha).

If you’re still with me at this point in this very self-indulgent post...enjoy these pics, and I promise to post something happier mañana!