My Niece and Nephew

Ok so I have not posted their pictures in while so I am being the good Aunt and doing it now. I adore these two and could not love them anymore if they were my own. My new house has kept me away a but this year but as soon as it is done there will be some great sleep overs trust me!

My newphew is potty trained at 2. He decided on his own he did not want to want to wear diapers anymore. My SIL was great to pick up on his clues that he was done with diapers. It is so funny to see him running around in his underwear. Buz Lightyear AWAY!
Josie was Wonder Woman for Halloween this year! She love her cape and boots!

Surprise Baby Shower

I got an invite to my best friend's baby sister's baby shower recently. Krissy holds a special place in my heart because I remember when she was in he her Mom's womb and when my best friend told me she was born. I also remember the fun 6 months we spent living together when she was 13 and alone living her her Mom's house in Plano. I was 23 and had fun playing big sister/friend/room mate to her and her friends. I got a taste for what it is like to raise a 13 year for a few months. We had fin together and I cherish those months we spent together. Krissy is married and now living in Scottsdale Arizona. Another wonderful friend to spend time with the next time I am out that way. Hey Kim she wants some pregnancy pictures taken and I am sending her your way! She is having a baby boy! Her shower was very fun and I do not think I have ever seen anyone so emotional and truly surprised at a party before in my life! Her mom is one tricky mom! Flying her out to Texas for a shower and her none the wiser! I can't believe she is going to be a mother! I am so happy for her! I can't wait to see little Dominic!

My best friend's baby sister Krissy ( in middle) at her Surprise baby Shower! - Isn't she just beautiful! And I remember her being a twirling bumble bee years ago! 

12-10-05 - View of Front of house with new roof and windows 

12-10-05 - View from sitting room in Master bedroom - Electrical work has begun - I just happened to capture the view from my sitting room window.  

12-10-05 - my new fireplace! - And the doorway I thought of closing off a little too late. They want to charge me $980.00 to make the change to move my bedroom door. Oh well a future project after I move in. 

12-2-05 - Mom took photo- I'm standing outside of my front door porch area. Just tilt your head a little then you get the same viewpoint my Mom had. 

12-2-05 framing complete! - Isn't this the perfect Shotgun house so to speak. No walls to stop anything 

So I went at lunch and caught them at work for once! Framing nearing completion 12-1-05 

Bottom Framing complete 11-29-05 - to the left is the garage - right is the kitchen 

Inside of my Great Room - Gotta love all of the fresh air! 

It really is SOLD! And all MINE! That is as soon as it is finished and I sign my life away along with my first born 

Back of house bottom framing only completed 11-29-05 

Future Living Arrangements

I have been a very poor blogger. But a friend of mine encouraged me to post pics of my soon to be new living domicle on here so here it goes. After months of delays 3 to be exact, my house i well under way. I can hardly believe . People ask me everday if I am excited and to be honest I am scared spitless. Petrfied would be more like it. Buying a used car has always been a huge decison for me and now I am buying a new HOUSE! Am I crazy?? I do not know but ask me in 2 months and I will let you know.

My SIL told me the other day I have gotten forgetfull ever since I stared building this new house and she is right! It all seems a blur. I went through many frustrating discussions with the VP of marketing and sales for my builder. After so many delays and being told so many different things why it was being delayed, I did manage to get the full sprinkler system thrown in for free. The one upgrade splurge I wanted but could not afford. So I guess the delays were well worth it. But geez louise the frustration alone was worth the $3000 sprinkler system.

So I am taking photos of my house in progress.
It is a small home but it will be all mine and I can hardly wait!

11-25-05 House before Foundation with plumbing 

Oh where has the Summer Gone?

It is September and I realized today I have not posted since July. I am going to be more faithful to post here this month. I enjoy reading all of my friends Blog sites so I guess I should try to keep mine updated just the same. Now if I could figure out how to post pics like they do all would be right for me. The few I posted were by shear luck and took lots of clicking. How can I possibly do it the again? Especially after all of these months away?

I am going to start tracking the building of my home on here. I am told they should start the foundation next week some time if things go well. I have been driving by on Fridays after work to get the updates on the retaining walls. I never knew how exciting it is to see walls go up? Let alone I never knew how excited I would be to see walls go up. I need to go take some pictures of this neighborhood before all the homes go up. Lots of empty lots with these beautiful stone walls going up. No walls on my sight yet. From what I can tell they are doing the longest and hardest ones first, and from what I see my lot will have very small walls on either side. But the realtor called me last week and she said they are to be finished with the walls sometime this week and since I have all the upgrades and selections picked out on my new home my builder will be good to go as soon as the walls are done.

What else have I been up to? Hmmm. Not much. Window shopping and end of season sales shopping for the new house. Just small items as I find them at great prices. I purchased more silverware. I never thought buying silverware would be fun, but since I have never gotten married I have to do this on my own. I found a beautiful Oneida flatware set. Well lucky me got three for the price of one a few weeks ago. So yesterday I decide to go to an outlet mall to check out the prices at the Oneida factory outlet. Well low and behind they are going out of business and they were selling my set for 50% off of their discounted price. Woohoo! I splurges and bought 5 more sets for less than what I would have paid for 2 sets. I was so doing the happy dance! I now have 8 - 5 piece place settings! And I got them all on supper deal sales! Ok so mo more shopping for antigen for the house until after I close. I have to save up for a fridge. Anyone else out their love the bottom freezer French door styles? That is what I want more than anything! Ok so I am off to scrap. Forget trying to organize that is a lost cause.

Ok I will have pics to post of my lot and walls soon!

Soon to be New home owner!
Valita

My Life July 2005

Ok so I have been bad and I have not updated this in a while. So what has happened since June. Well I am buying a new home in the same community I loved that I thought I could not afford. My builder is Coleman homes and the community is www.bozmanfarms.com and my realtor Kristina Bell rocks! She is just the greatest and has helped me out so much so far and they have not even started building my new home yet. Right now I am waiting for retaining walls to be built on my street. I am not sure if my house gets one or not but if the stakes I saw were any indication one side of my lot will need a retaining. Not a big one, but before the city will release any building permits the walls must go up.
It was pretty cool to go out there this past week and see a sold sign on my lot. Gotta love that. I was by myself so no pics, but the next time I go out I will make sure I get some sort of picture one way or another of me standing next to the sign. Now it is all a waiting game. I am also waiting to hear back from the underwriters to see if I get on this first time home owners special program that few people fit into. My mortgage rep does not think it will be an issue at all. But who knows we shall see. All of the approval papers are filled out and I am waiting to hear back the good news!

I am now going throug boxes to clean out and declutter before I move. I spent all day yesterday going through every inch of one closet. It still appears I have saved to much but I will go through the boxes again in a month or so. My scrap booking room is next on my list. That as well as taking pictures of all of my Mary Engelbreit kitchen ware to sell on Ebay. I have tons to sell. I want a whole new look for my kitchen when I move into my new home. I need to earn teh maximum amount from everything I have to buy the new dishes. I picked out a set my Mikasa called italian country side. It is all white and I just love it. I can mix an any other color I want to make it all pop. And lucky me there is a Mikasa outlet less than a mile away from my apartment.

I have also decided on the type of fridge I want. I want a botton pull out tilt freezer drawer with double top doors. I will say black for now but I flip flop in the stainless look right now that is so popular. Will I hate the stainless in a year after constantly having to wipe it down to get the finger prints off of it? I am going gas on the stove. I have never cooked on a gas stove but I think it will be cool.

My life has been all about my home lately. No time for anything else between work and that. I do need to get a life and start going out again, but now who has the money? LOL.

Ok I am off to take a break. I wil post a picture tomorrow of my lot.

Things May be Looking Up for Me!

I love my friend Donna. She will not let me give on buying a "new" home so quickly. I fell in love with this community called http://www.bozmanfarms.com. It is not far from work, and out in the country. A beatiful sprawling new community. I fell in love with this home floor planhttp://www.bozmanfarms.com/frame_builder_coleman01.html .
Click on the home called "Trinity"
I love the oversized master bedroom option, the great room, and the two walk in closets. It is nearly the same floor plan of the house last weekend I realized could not afford but for much less. I am pretty sure I can afford this house. So I am excited again to go looking. I love the idea of building my own home from the ground up.
I am going to go back out there tomorrow or Sunday to view this home. My friend met a lady who is buying this same house out there and she is also single like myself.
This builder totally worked with her to get her in a home in the community. So I am going to ask for this same realtor.

I told my mom what I was doing and I love her but she can never be excited for me about anything. I called her to tell her I was looking, and that I realized I could not afford a certain priced house that I thought I could. (Well I can if I want to be tied to my mortgage.) I then explain to her that I could afford this other builder in the same development with almost the same floor plan. She tells me well look at older homes. I was like why would I want to buy an older home for the same price of a brand new home where I can pick out all the details? Flooring lighting, tiles, etc.. Plus being single the idea of a home under warranty sounds right up my alley. I can hardly wait! I want this house. I want to buy a new home! But my Mom is like well you do whatever you want to do. UGH! I am 38 almost 39 yrs old. I think I can buy a new home if I want and can afford one! She treats me like a kid instead of a grown woman. She was married with 4 kids at my age. Teen age kids at that! It's a different world and life for me. I will buy a new home this year! I am going to stay positive! maybe I can't meet a man but I can buy a house! So things just may be looking up for me this weekend.

House Hunting

So one of my dreams and goals this year was to buy a house. I live in what is called an equity rents apartment complex which states if I buy a specific type of home I will get free money. For the past 5 years I have lived here thinking I was earning up to 20% each month towards a down payment, closing costs and/or upgrades on a new home. The thought of finally owning my own home and painting walls excites me. So my friend Donna and I went out shopping for me a new home this weekend.

If you have ever lived inTexas you would know it is very easy to find new home builders by all of the signs on the road. I had done my research online to find the builder but I had forgotten the exact turn off to where we needed to go. No problem we shall find it by the signs. So we set off at 11:30 am to find 2 new home builders. We drove and drove and drove. We could not understand why there weren't any signs anywhere. We saw signs for every other known builder but the two we were looking for. So we decide to drive back to her house to get on the internet to look up the builders. Never once thinking or remembering that I had a cell phone on me!
So we finally call her daughter to ask her to look them up on the internet. Busy. What else is to be expected of a teenager home alone on a Sunday afternoon? We drove another 30 min or so before we got a clue! We could buy a paper! better yet in our area there are free new home builder mags at any grocery store. Boy did I feel really blonde at this moment. ( no offense since my friend is blonde) We laughed and laughed. We stop for lunch or shall I say they stop for lunch I was not hungry. We search the paper and I swear it just wasn't my day. I looked and looked for a number to call to get directions, no luck. If the ad was a snake it would have bitten me! I was reading articles not looking at the ads. Where was my brain?! It was all muddled from som other things going on in my life right now! Come to find out we had drove past the road several times!
We look at houses and I find one I really want! So I sit down to run the numbers to see if it is even viable for me. I instantly grew depressed when I realized the amount of house I thought I could afford I probably can't without getting a room mate for a few years. The place was amazing! The house is perfect for me. The complex incredible. I could proabbly swing it but I would be tied to a mortage payment for a few years. I got very depressed thinking about it.

We drive to the other complex we finally found 4 or 5 hours later mind you from we we started out. It just did not compare. I walked in one house and the first words out of my mouth were it felt like my apartment, plus the yard was way to large for me, the girl who has never cut a lawn in her life and alarge yard like that would not be a good fit at all. I want a house with a yard just not a big yard. I love gardening, but not with that huge yard I wouldn't love it.

I was already down about some other things going on in my life so this did not make me happy at all. I have been working so hard to get debt free to be able to buy a house this year and then to find out what I make would keep from doing so made me really depressed. I so want to buy a house. I want a yard, a craft room, and a dog. I want to paint and decorate. I just felt like my day went from bad to worse in a few hours. My friend told me to not give up.

Oh then to top it off what I thought I would get for living in what is called an equity rents apartment and the 20% I have been earning towards a down payent on a new home is all bunk! They tell me I have $10,000 to use but the catch is I can only get up to 3% of the purchase price on my new home! What sort of crap is that! Here I thought I had $10,000 towards new home, but in reality it is more like $3,000.

I can afford a home if I drive an hour from where I live now and buy a new home. My friend told me to not give up just yet. Now that I know I won't get as much as I thought for buying that specific type of new home I need to look at other builders. Thank God for friends. She and Tanya were my lifesaver's this weekend. When I needed a shoulder to cry on this weekend they were both their for me. Now if I just can stop crying. Every have one of those days where you just can't stop?

Oh well, such is my life. Something has got to give and get better for me right?

Random Act of Kindness

I was treated to a "Random Act of Kindness" on Sunday morning. I hit the grocery store first thing before it got too crowded. (I hate grocery shopping can someone please bring back groceryworks.com) I noticed the place was pretty empty and a fire truck was in the parking lot. Not to many other people were around. And I have to admit, I was not looking my best. A little make up, my hair was in a clip and I called it okay to proceed to the grocery store. I hit the outside aisles of the store and called it done.

I walk out to my car and spot something struck inside my drivers side door. I thought it was some sort of ad. Low and behind it was a $5 bill. I thought it was a copy at first and some sort of new advertisement, until I flipped it over to see that it was real. Now why would anyone leave my a $5 bill? As I drove away, my first thought was, I guess I didn't look as good as I thought I had because someone thought I needed $5.

The funny thing was while I was shopping for myself I was also buying disposable cameras for a former co worker that quit his high paying job where I work to go back into the Army. He is now in Afghanistan and emails on occasion to a group of us at work. I wrote back last week and asked him if he needed anything. He stated he only gets a box every now and them from his Mom. No one else every sends him anything. So of course I said I would and asked him what he needed. He told me about how he used up the last of his cameras while in a cave setting up explosives in a mountain. (And I thought I had rough days at work!) He got picked to go down this dark tunnel because of his small size. When they realized it was a tunnel that lead to more caves and more tunnels they decided to blow it up. I guess Osama won't be hiding in those caves anytime in the near future.

So there I was buying someone disposable cameras with my own money, and then someone leaves me $5 tucked in my car door. I spent $12.00 on 4 cameras. (They were on sale and had coupons on them. Not on sale- 4 would have cost me over $30.00) I guess it was a "Random Act of Kindness" kind of day

Me at 38 

My Dancing Niece 

My Darling Nephew 

Ok I give in to Peer pressure

Yes, I did it and gave in to my scrapper friend's peer pressure and created my own blog site. Thanks Kim, Cori, Chris, Shawn, Flo and Tanya! I said I wasn't going to do it because I didn't have the time, but here I am creating my own blog site. I can't say it will be all that interesting. My life is pretty boring at the moment. I don't have any kids so you won't find me telling any cute kid stories. I'm not married so there go the amusing doings of a husband. I'm currently not dating anyone so there go those lovey dovey stories. So what do I have to offer here, well not a whole lot. Just myself and my random thoughts running around in a single girl's head. I do like to journal and have kept one on and off for most of my life.

I had a diary has a preteen, then quit journaling when I filled that little brown diary, with that not so private lock and key, up. Looking back now why do they even place those locks that all use the same key or can be picked my any nosy Mom in a second, on those cute little girl diaries anyway? Like they ever kept anyone out that really wanted to read the goings on of any pre teen girl? I am sure mine was picked a time or two and I never knew it.

So I quit journaling when it was used up, but then in high school as a theatre arts assignment I had to keep a journal for an entire semester. I started off as a timid writer knowing my teacher would be reading what I wrote, but as time went by I eventually got painfully honest with my thoughts and found it very therapeutic. By the end of the semester I was hooked. I found an outlet to release my soul. I didn't have many close friends in high school and because of some painful past experiences with girls my own age, I found it difficult to tell them about my life or my thoughts so I wrote, and wrote and wrote. I have both those diaries to this day and every one I wrote in afterwards.

So now it is 2005 and here I am typing my thoughts away for the whole world to read. Imagine that! Who knew? Certainly not private me. Well I am sure there are things that will still remain private but everything else will be game.

Work is extremely busy right now and only going to get busier. But I love what I do. It's strange I never thought I would enjoy paperwork, and sitting behind a desk all day long, but I do. It is challenging and fun all at the same time. A world away from that costume designing job in Hollywood that I dreamed about when I was in high school and College, but then again I never thought I would be 38 and still single either. Oh well. Maybe I am meant to be single forever, who knows? Certainly not me. Kind of a heart breaking thought, but one I must face at this age in life. Lately the thought has gotten me into a funk and a little depressed. I see these married people around me with their perfect little families in their warm inviting homes, and I admit I am jealous. I wanted that life, I want that life. I want all of those loving family moments and all of the heartbreaks that go with it. I want a family of my own, and as I face the thought of living the rest of my life out like I am now and it does not make me very happy. It just makes me sad and a little more lonely every day. Maybe its just this time of year, when all my friends seem to be going on family vacations, having family cook outs, and looking forward to spending the summer doing wonderful things with their kids, and I still just have me and my 4 cats that I am extremely allergic to. I always dreamed of quitting my job and being a stay at home Mom. But it appears I will spend the rest of my life working and coming home to an empty apartment.

Heck I found out this week my best friend's little sister who was born when we were in 8th grade and who is now married is pregnant. I am happy for her, but sad for me. I remember when she was 13 and in 8th grade herself, I lived with her for most of that year and loved every minute I got to play "mom" with her and her friends. I knew after that I would be a great mom one day, but who knew that one day would never happen for me? Who knew that kid would go on to get married and pregnant before I did? Not me. Everyone's life seems to grow and change around me, and I find myself stuck in this proverbial life holding pattern. Knowing I must face the fact I may never find my one true love. Why is that? What do I do to drive men away, or keep them away? It must be something I do. It must be the way I look, act, dress, something! I wish I knew. I wish I could get passed this unhappiness that eats away at my heart right now. I wish I could find a way to quit looking at what everyone has and what I don't and be happy again.