House Update

OK, so we heard back today that we've been approved for our home equity line of credit on our current house - which means that we have enough dough now to put down a 20% downpayment on our new house -- thanks in large part to parental figures on both sides of the Mississippi floating us temp. loans. The loan approval also means that we can now put our current house on the market. The sign is in the yard starting today. The economy is terrible, but our Oakley neighborhood is apparently the best one in Cincy for real estate, so we're hopeful it won't sit on the market for too long. If you know anybody who wants to buy a sweet house in a cool neighborhood in Cincy send them our way. The new house is pretty cool. A good mixture of things done nicely, ready to move in, and future projects to make it more personalized and homey. Blowing in insulation in the walls, re-siding the house, and finishing the basement will be some of the major projects over the next few years. A big basement playroom and sleep over area! There's lots of room, and lots of bedrooms (5), so come visit often and bring a friend, or your children. We're pretty sure we aint having any more of those anytime soon, except for this September. We close on the new house March 16th. We're moving on the 17th. Abbie leaves for Dominican on the 18th. I'm taking vacation starting the 19th and going to do some work on the house to help us move in (needs lots of shelves in different places). The new address is 4321 Brownway. This whole experience feels like 4-3-2-1 Blastoff. Quite a ride.

Oscar night...

Jai ho! (click here to watch)

Overheard

Sam: Grandma, let's play Fierce Dinosaurs. Ollie and me are the daddy T. Rexes, and you're the mama T. Rex. The daddies are going to go hunt for meat.

Grandma Beth: Okay ... So what does the mama T. Rex do?

Sam: You stay home and clean the house.

Question of the week #3

Two questions for this week:

1.) Did you make any New Year's resolutions or something along those lines (or in general start anything new recently)? How have they been going?

2.) What are/were your Valentine's Day weekend plans? (whether related to Valentine's Day or not)

Questions for this week #2

It's so frickin' cold here in Chicago and winter seems so endless, I thought I'd put in winter-related questions (answer any or all):

1.) Favorite way to warm up/cozy up when it's really cold.
2.) Your escaping-winter fantasy
3.) Funny/fun winter-related anecdote.

(My answers in the comments)