"So, how's the house coming?"

The THING that consumed us since July of 2010.
The question that was asked by all we came in contact with.
The question we knew would be asked every week on Sunday or anytime we saw someone we hadn't seen in a couple weeks.
The question we dreaded. We'd secretly roll our eyes and give a short, vague answer and smile.
It wasn't anybodies fault. We have so many really great friends and family who just wanted to know, as did we, what was going on with the house stuff. And, we love you all. I know there are a couple of you out there who listened to me pour my heart out in heartbreak and mourning and had just the right words to say when I truly needed them. I am so extremely thankful for you, and you know who you are.

So. What really IS going on with the house stuff? Well, now I have ALL of the answers, and now I can tell you.

When I last posted, you read my "Tuesday Letters". To continue on from there, builder #2 NEVER called back. To this day. Disappeared. Then I met with a realtor at a new development where a TON of my friends are building. She was great. She showed me around and I saw the floor plans. They were really great. I took all of the information with me and told her I'd probably be back with my husband later in the week. Don;t get me wrong, the houses were awesome, it just didn't feel like that was where we were suppose to be.  I still wasn't ready to give up on our dream of owning a little more land with lots of room to grow and play.
Our last efforts to build on that piece of land went to looking at having a builder do it for us instead of trying to do it all ourselves. I have been a fan of this NEW builder (#3, for those of you keeping track) for many years. I really love his floor plans and he and his company are super great. Kevin took him down to the land and he said that, yes, he could build it. We had to take the plan we had, which was his plan just modified to begin with, and make it smaller. That was fine but also hard. The house had no options, no bells and whistles, but I thought, "No big deal. We can add those later." We were able to make all of the adjustments and things seemed to be working out. We got all of the final numbers. Contracts were drawn up. Things were looking good. It was Monday, December 6, and we had an appointment with a really great mortgage guy at the bank. Our loan had been approved and all we had to do was sign. Boy were we excited!! Then, we looked at the final number of what our monthly mortgage would be for the next 30 years. Talk about feeling like the wind had just been let out of your sails. It was $400 MORE than we were originally told by the Big Banks. What?! Mr. Nice Mortgage guy went through all the numbers with us and it all made sense. Someone somewhere had given us wrong information about what the monthly payment on a house that costs "X" amount of dollars would be. Kevin and I stared at each other. Silent. For. Ever. I think we made Mr. Nice Mortgage guy uncomfortable. We knew without speaking, there was No Way this was going to work.
All we had to do was sign. We were approved. We could get started. But what would that mean for our family? I might have to go back to work, which isn't a bad thing seeing as how our kids are older. But me going back to work right now wasn't in our plan just yet. We could change the house again. Make a smaller house on a nice big piece of land. But we really need a bigger house. That's why we sold our in the first place.
We both stood up and thanked Mr. Mortgage guy and told him we'd let him know in the morning. What a LONG night that was. We knew what the answer was. We knew what we had to do. But it was hard to finally admit to it. For months now we had gone down every avenue we could think of to make this work. We were trying to force it to work however we could. We wanted that rural atmosphere, like where we grew up, with the convenience of the city. There was no sleeping for either one of us that night. As much as it broke my husbands heart, he made the call the next morning that we were in fact walking away from the land and the house. I literally mourned that whole day-week actually.
So now what? Where do we go from here? We need a house! I am feeling claustrophobic in my cozy little rental.
It's Thursday, December 9, and my favorite builder calls us and says we should go down to the office and discuss our options. At this point, I am still mourning and being very stubborn. We go down to meet with him and he tells us that he can build that same house plan for us with all of the bells and whistles and options that we want on one of his available lots for LOTS less money. We're listening. We go through the options and I'm getting excited just thinking about all of these cool options in the house. He tells us to go look at the available lots, so we do. Here comes stubborn Amy again. I start to pout and say things like, "It doesn't matter, just pick one!" I know, so mature of me. So we choose a lot that's really nice. It's close to the huge neighborhood park, we have friends within walking distance, the lot is bigger than our old house was on, it's in a nice neighborhood, we are near my parents which is great for babysitting, we will be in a great church ward where there are tons of friends and people we know.
Everything is great. So what's my problem? I think I just needed time to mourn my dream. My dream of acreage and that country feel. My dream of a nice big shop for my husband to tinker in and tons of land for my children to run and have a dog. It's a nice dream. A dream I still have.
Everything just feel into place in two days. The plans were finalized. The loans were approved. Permits requested. It all happened so fast and so smoothly. Like it was meant to be. I can honestly say this. My mourning is over and I am totally and completely excited for our new home to be built on the great lot that we chose in an awesome neighborhood. We drive by it every day. We talk about it every day. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. There is a smile in my heart and on my face. I don't look at it as settling for something at all. I look at it as finally listening to what my Heavenly Father had been trying to tell me for months. There was a reason that all of our other plans fell through. A reason it was so hard. All of that lead us to here, and this is where we are suppose to be. We will have a great house and I won't have to go back to work sooner than planned and we can still have our same comfortable lifestyle. Sounds like my own perfect piece of heaven to me.

From now on you can all bet that you will see lots of pictures and updates like the one below.



 
Day 1.  Estimated Date of Completion: End of March 2011

Yaaaayy us!