Anniversary

No, not our marriage anniversary. It's our 2 year mark together! We began dating July 15, 2007. :) Crazy that we have made it this far and how much things have changed! :)

Quick update on the house. God provided for us yet again. Once we found out yesterday that we had the house, we realized we only have 30 days to get our financing in order. So naturally we went online to our financial institution and tried to apply online.

We got to the end and were quoted an interest rate which we found to be acceptable. However, when we went to lock in that rate at the last screen, it jumped by 1% point. In mortgage speak this is gargantuan. It meant $100 more a month in our mortgage. We decided to wait and call the bank in the morning.

We spent the day worrying. We found out why our interest rate jumped. The home we had been in contract with in April caused our credit rating to go slightly down although it was still really good. Because the title had a legal problem, the seller had had to back out of that contract even though we had already started our loan process.

So we were upset that we couldn't get a lower interest rate. Because we are already in contract with our soon to be home, we have to apply for a loan NOW. We checked around but stayed with the same bank.

The cool thing comes in here. We went to finalize our loan application and take the higher interest rate and God had miraculously lowered our rate to almost as low as the original rate. We have no other idea how else this could have happened, given that the bank had just told us today the cause of the spike. It's not like our circumstances in our credit changed. Wow.

Although this process is very stressful, it is so neat to see how God is working out all the details. Stay tuned for more updates on the house buying process!

Surprise!

As little as 48 hours ago, we had no solid leads on any houses. We were both feeling very discouraged about the whole situation.

Back at the end of June, we were preparing to move in temporarily with Jay's parents. Although I love them, I was discouraged at the course our life had taken. Looking back, it felt like Abraham, being told to move with out an end goal. I did not have too much faith in our situation. I made one request from Jay that I had no idea would have any impact on anything...

So our realtor, Matt Whitman, has been working tirelessly on finding us a home. Since March, I would estimate he has shown us between 50 to 70 houses. Seven of these homes, we put contracts on so that was even more work for him.

On Sunday, I began looking for homes on the internet and we sent off about 8 potential homes to look at to Matt. We've never looked at homes with Matt on Sundays so as to give him some time away from us. However, Jay decided to call Matt and see if we could look at any that day since we are going out of town on Thursday.

Matt went to his office and found two homes still available. Only one was available to look at that Sunday evening so we went. I must admit, I went without thinking we would find something we love or even something that was a viable option.

So when I walked in this regular sale home (all the others have been shorts sales and foreclosures) and fell quickly in love. It is perfect, everything we wanted and more (more on that later).

The sellers realtor met us at the house and told us she had an offer but would wait for ours if we wanted to offer. Which we did of course! So we went back to the office on Sunday night to write a contract, knowing we were in competition for the house. Through some very intense and nerve wracking negotiating, we ended up leaving Matt's office near 11pm after walking away from the wants/needs of the seller.

I thought we were walking away from this home.

I was wrong.

Last night we got a message from the seller's realtor saying they wanted to work with our offer. However, they didn't like the pre-approval loan letter we had and it was all our bank could give us without actually applying for a loan which would take longer than the noon Tuesday deadline the seller had given us to supply this.

We found a lender last night at 8pm who would give us an approval and they verbally accepted our offer last night!!!

I was still nervous though because we had no written ratified contract. After waiting all morning, I just received word about 15 minutes ago that the house indeed is ours.

I'm still just shocked that 48 hours ago we hadn't even heard of this house and it is to be our home in just 30 days. We close on August 14.

This is where my request of Jay comes in and it is amazing that God listens to our 'little' requests and, I think, has a great sense of humor. The night before we moved to his parents, I told him I needed an end date, a date we would give up looking for homes and make arrangements to rent again.

Do you know what that date was?

August 15.

Amazing.

More details to come. Pray the rest of the process goes smoothly and without bumps!

Love

One of the many reasons I love my husband is that although he very much enjoys being on time, he never rushes me even when I am running late. Never once has he ever asked me when I will be ready to leave, even when the time to be there has past. :) What a good hubs. :)

Update on Kate

I found a recent update on Kate McRae, the little girl with the brain tumor. Her parents (her mother was a fellow student at my high school) posted another video on You Tube and I thought I would provide the link for their new video here. At the beginning it shows Kate just before her big surgery last week, being just as cute as possible. :) Please pass this on to anyone who would pray for her.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czK94X9_ebQ

Busy Summer, Just the Way I Like It!

So it appears that our move was just the beginning of our busy summer. In the pipeline for July:

July 16-20: Boston bound to see Jess (& meet Jason!), Holly & Brian, Chris and Gina (and new baby Joey) and Kevin and Jackie. We can't wait for this little get away and to see our fun friends!

July 24: weekend at Lake Anna with small group at Joe and Donna's.

Either August 1 or 8: helping Katie move from Silver Spring, MD back into DC

August 22: trip to WV to see the newly engaged Rob and Christina. Mae might also be going on this trip with us. Can't wait to spend time with the fam and also see the rock Rob got Christina!

August 29: an overnight trip for our 1st anniversary! It is already here, I can't believe it! Location to be determined but most likely it will be to a bed and breakfast or an overnight trip to DC to go on a dinner cruise on the Potomac I've been dying to go on. :)

That's as much as we have planned so far. Hopefully we will buy a home somewhere in there too and include a moving day. Hope you all are having a great summer too!

Happy 4th of July!

This is my second favorite holiday (excluding my birthday of course). Maybe it's summer, maybe it's the watermelon or the grilling or the sunny weather that could make anyone have a lighter step.

I love summer and the 4th is the epitome of this time of year! Today we spent it at our friend's Max and Amanda's parents for a pool party for Max's birthday! Amanda's dad builds pools for a living so needless to say, they have a state of the art pool. We swam and ate to our heart's content in the sun. I had managed earlier to convince Jay I needed a new swim suit so of course I had to put it to good use.

We also grilled out burgers and hotdogs, had some watermelon and some other great summer foods. Because of all this, we are just to tired to go the fireworks downtown....oh well, maybe next year!

Happy 4th of July!

Praying for Kate McRae

For those of you who don't know, I went to a very small high school. It had, during my time, about 200 students total if that. Kate McRae is the daughter of a girl who went to high school with me. I didn't know her personally, however, I feel for her now as she and her husband go through this with their daughter Kate. Please watch the below video and pray for little Kate who was diagnosed with a large brain tumor on Monday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ese3zYZ-NA4