Hotlanta...

I had the opportunity to take a work trip to Atlanta for the day. We had to go visit the company that we were buying and they needed me to tag along to do some training. Although it was a long day it was so worth it for the view. We had to take the company plane which only holds 4 people plus 2 pilot seats. It was such a neat experience even through the big storm we went to. A little turbulence never hurts.

Our New House

Luckily we had plenty of time to look for a house. We started looking in  late April and knew we couldn't move in until August. We had no idea what we wanted which led to house hunting trips almost every weekend in May and some in June. We liked the idea of an older home we could make our own over time with repairs. But after looking and thinking about everything we would want done, we decided to go the safe route and buy a newer move-in ready house. With Hutt's job we knew we needed something we could have people over pretty soon after we moved in. And an older home calls for more money upfront which we didn't feel comfortable with incase something happened and we needed to fork over $$.

To give you an idea of what was on our want/need list in a house:

We really weren't impressed with the houses we were shown. We are somewhat picky and just didn't have any chemistry with any of the houses. There were some houses we found online but by the time we came went to town to see them (sometimes that next day!) they were already taken. Houses were moving FAST! Finally our realtor showed us home that she wasn't listing until the next day. We went to go see it and we loved it! We could really see ourselves in this house and it fit most of our criteria. We decided to think about it for the day before we made up our mind, and we decided we liked it enough that we didn't want it to pass by. So we put in an official offer the next day, the day it went on the market.

After much back and forth we finally decided on price and closing date. August 1st! Since we finally knew where we were going we had a little over a month to get packed. My nephew was due July 27th but since he decided to come 11 days early, that gave us the last week before we moved to really finish packing. The week before we closed we got some news that there was some issues with the paperwork since Hutt is technically self employed as a minister, according to the IRS. So literally 5 days before we were supposed to close we had to switch lenders to someone that could get us into our house and  he did! He was defiantly our hero throughout our moving process. Because of the delay our closing got moved to the 5th which didn't bother us as long as we got our house!

Hutt technically started his job the day before we closed so we stayed with some friends in town before we got to move in Monday.  We closed first thing Monday morning but weren't going to get our key until around 1 because our posponing caused a trickle effect down the line of moves. So I went to work with Hutt and we waited anxiously for THE call. Hutt family was coming in town to help but we went ahead and told them not to come until 5 or 6 so that we could get in there and take pictures, clean etc. Well the clock kept ticking. After some back and forth we found out it may not be until 7 that they are out and technically had until Midnight to be out. YIKES! We finally got the call at 8 that they were wrapping up and we could come on over. We headed that way and when we turned the corner we saw at least 20 people from our new church just waiting to help us move in! We were so surprised! We met the previous owners and said goodbye and the house was ours! The next 30 minutes was a blur. People were everywhere, boxes were everywhere and i am not even sure I actually met the people the were helping us. We had the biggest Uhaul they rented and a trailer and everyone had it unloaded in 30 minutes! It was awesome! Thankfully I had labeled all the boxes with colored tape and made a chart on what color went where. If I hadn't done that, I do not even know how unorganized things would have been. We were so so thankful for all those people who came to help, it made things so much faster. Which was good because I had to wake up and drive to Oklahoma early the next morning so I really had to shower and go to bed ASAP.

It was a whirlwind experience but I am SO thankful we ended up in our home. We are so blessed!

Here are a few pictures of our home from the online listing. We plan on changing a few things, especially paint colors!

Happy New Year

Wish you all the best in 2014!

Well Merry Christmas to us...

Hutt and I were lucky enough to have appliances handed down to us by family members and friends. Appliances can be a huge expense when you are a newlywed or a new homeowner. Or like us, both! We knew our washer and dryer were relatively old, but we could tell the dryer was a lot older. They weren't a matching set. Our dryer always seemed to take a while, usually had to go through 2 cycles to get completely dry. Since we moved, it started taking 4 or 5 cycles to get dry which was really well, annoying. We tried to figure out other possible issues. We got a new vent for the back. We tried to find the vent where lint escaped outside and couldn't find it. It is an interior room so we knew it just had to go through the roof. With no luck we lived with it for a couple of months, until I started smelling something and the clothes were smoking when I got them out. So we started looking at our options.We decided we would just buy a new set, since we didn't know how long our washer would last and it would nice to have a new, matching set. I knew I wanted a front loader. They tend to be nicer but the real reason for me personally is symmetry. I know that sounds stupid but its the truth. It always looks funny to me that one had the opening at the top and one had the opening at the front. Now I am able to have a countertop above the washer and dryer to maximize space. We knew that there was a possible mildew issue with front loaders but after talking to people at Sears, they reassured me  that they have fixed that since the front loaders were first popular. You just have to keep the door open to minimize the risk. There is a magnet piece that keeps it open but it still looks like it is closed.We looked at Home Depot, Lowe's, Best Buy and the Sears outlet right by our house. We met with the people at Sears during a lunch break one day just to ask some questions. They told us that LG is the best brand out there right now so we started there. We still looked at top loaders to see if there was a deal that couldn't be beat. But honestly they weren't that much cheaper and there were quite a few that were a lot more but also had a bigger capacity. One feature we were psyched about was the steam feature. Although it will come in handy more once we have kids, we can still use it now. We asked lots of questions about capacity, time, sales, detergent, etc. so we decided to go eat lunch and talk about our options. We  decided to go back to Sears and get the LG 3.6 cu ft Extra- Large Front-Load Washer and Dryer.I am really excited to finish this room, I have lots of ideas. But I am probably more excited about the fact that my dryer only takes about 45 minutes. Hallelujah!