After a month of crazy changes, life is finally beginning to settle down. Here are just a few things that I did over the past four weeks:
- finished the last course in my management certificate program and submitted my graduation request! I will be graduating with a 4.0 GPA, which I am very pleased with! The grad ceremony isn't until October, but it's a great feeling to know that I'm done, with or without the paper in hand!
- had surgery. A very minor surgery, but surgery that kept me off of work for two weeks. Without going into personal details, I've had surgery for a genetic condition since I was a baby (more than a dozen surgeries in total) and this was the LAST one ever! It's kind of surreal, as I was told "this will be the last one" for a very long time, but this is it for sure now. This was actually on my baby bucket list, as I didn't want to have to go through any more surgeries once we had kids, and I most certainly couldn't do it while pregnant.
- and last, but not least - we moved! We moved out of our apartment on June 30th and into the new house on July 1st. It was actually a very easy move thanks to all our friends and family. We're settling in nicely, but it's a big adjustment. I'll post more on that later!
For now, I'm happy to let life get back to boring. It's nice to not have to pack or study or worry about the move and I can just enjoy the house, husband, cats and life!
Friday, July 13, 2012
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Our house!
I am thrilled to show off our new house! These are images from the real estate listing, so the furnishings are not ours and we will be painting some of the rooms, but you do get a good idea of what it looks like.
From the front:
The porch on the front of the house:
The living room view from the dining room: (that is an area rug, underneath is hardwood floors).
Second picture of the living room: (Through the doorway at the right of the picture, you see another room, which is the entry foyer at the front of the house).
The dining room view from the living room:
Kitchen:
The hallway, which leads to the front door, is behind the camera:
The doorway in the picture below leads out to the mudroom, which leads outside:
Stairs going up:
Master bedroom:
Bathroom:
Spare bedroom:
Spare bedroom #2 (which will become the office).
Off of the second spare bedroom is the sunroom.
And the outside deck: (to the left is the garage, to the right is the house).
The basement is completely unfinished, but we like that we have that blank slate to work with in the future. We may turn it into a rec room and then add a second bathroom. Right now it just has the washer and dryer down there.
All the stainless steel appliances are remaining, as well as the lighting fixtures. We are going to keep the dining room as is, as I love that dark accent wall with the white frames. The bathroom will be painted, as well as the two spare bedrooms. But all in good time! I like that it is essentially move in ready, and it's also to our taste, so we won't want to change much.
We've bought some new bedroom furniture already, which will be delivered to the new house. We also want to get some area rugs - one for the living room and one for our master bedroom for sure. Husband wants one for the dining room, which I'm not too keen on, but we'll see. We might get a few small ones for the spare room and office too, but no rush.
From the front:
The porch on the front of the house:
The living room view from the dining room: (that is an area rug, underneath is hardwood floors).
Second picture of the living room: (Through the doorway at the right of the picture, you see another room, which is the entry foyer at the front of the house).
The dining room view from the living room:
Kitchen:
The hallway, which leads to the front door, is behind the camera:
The doorway in the picture below leads out to the mudroom, which leads outside:
Stairs going up:
Master bedroom:
Bathroom:
Spare bedroom:
Spare bedroom #2 (which will become the office).
Off of the second spare bedroom is the sunroom.
And the outside deck: (to the left is the garage, to the right is the house).
The basement is completely unfinished, but we like that we have that blank slate to work with in the future. We may turn it into a rec room and then add a second bathroom. Right now it just has the washer and dryer down there.
All the stainless steel appliances are remaining, as well as the lighting fixtures. We are going to keep the dining room as is, as I love that dark accent wall with the white frames. The bathroom will be painted, as well as the two spare bedrooms. But all in good time! I like that it is essentially move in ready, and it's also to our taste, so we won't want to change much.
We've bought some new bedroom furniture already, which will be delivered to the new house. We also want to get some area rugs - one for the living room and one for our master bedroom for sure. Husband wants one for the dining room, which I'm not too keen on, but we'll see. We might get a few small ones for the spare room and office too, but no rush.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Weekly Money Check-Up
Weekly Money Check-Up is courtesy of My Pretty Pennies.
1. The most I’ve spent this last week was on assorted bills - parking, pet insurance, cell phone, etc.
2. Today I am thankful for my need to get things done in advance. Thanks to my compulsive nature, we are done half of the packing and I've already started on cleaning parts of the apartment. It's so much easier to do a little bit at a time, so this way we're not scrambling on moving day to finish it all.
3. Money can’t buy happiness. One free thing I did last week that made me happy was go swimming with husband, a couple friends and their little girl. She's so happy to go swimming she literally shakes with excitement and it's contagious!
4. I will consider this week a success if I'm able to get notes made for my exam coming up in a week and a half.
5. I am currently reading Tina Fey's Bossypants. It's a good light read, which is perfect for my life right now - I can read a chapter here and there whenever I have time. Ultimately right now I'm focused on packing, cleaning and class stuff.
Friday, June 8, 2012
We bought a house!
I know I've been MIA lately, but for good reason! We got home from Ottawa on May 13 and the next day, we bought a house!
While husband and I were in Ottawa, we chatted about the house hunting process and how exhausted we were. We had been looking for a couple months and nothing was really right for us. We saw two houses that we considered putting offers in for - one we didn't offer on because a family friend (who is is contracting) came to look at it and told us not to buy it as it had some serious foundation issues; the second one we were going to bid on, but by the time our realtor came over to go through the bidding process, there were 6 or 7 bids already, with several hours to go, so we knew the house would be bid up and go beyond our budget.
So while in Ottawa, we decided we would stop looking for awhile. But, we had already made an appointment to see some more houses on the Monday morning when we returned, so we kept that appointment with our realtor and said after that, we'd take a break and let the bidding war that is called summer go on without us.
We met up with our realtor (actually our realtor was on vacation, so we met with his colleague) and the first house we saw that day was it! We both loved it - the location was ideal (even close enough to my office that I can still walk to work if I want), husband loved the kitchen (his domain, not mine) and I adored that there was an entrance foyer and a mud room at the back, so the cats would have a very difficult time trying to escape.
(Side note: I'm such a worrier when it comes to my fur babies - one major reason why I didn't want to buy a house is because I feared our cats would escape out the door and be lost. Right now if that happens, they can only get out into the apartment hallway. So with this house, there are two doors that we have to go through to enter or exit out the front or back, so you go through one door and have to close the second and walk through the foyer/mud room before you get to the second door. That peace of mind is priceless in my opinion.)
Anyway, so we went and saw the other homes on the list for that day, but we kept going back to the original house. By the time we were done for the morning, we knew we wanted to put in an offer. So we went for lunch while the realtor went back to the office to dig up some information.
After lunch, we went to his office and saw the comparables, chatted about what the listing agent had said and debated our options back and forth. The listing agent had said the couple selling wanted between $20,000-$30,000 more than the original asking price, so we put in a bid that was on the higher end of what they actually wanted, as we knew there would be multiple bids. We also had our family friend, the contractor, come by and take a look at the house and sign off on it.
And then we waited... offers were due at 7 pm that night. That night! So that means we saw the house at 10 am and we would know less than 12 hours later if we owned it! At 7:05, the realtor called us and said there were 7 bids on the house and did we want to change our offer (the message from the listing agent). We said no, as we knew our initial offer was a good one. About an hour later, I got a call - it was down to us and one other couple, and did we want to up our bid. I woke up Mark, who had been sleeping during this time (he had to work that night at 11 pm). He said to up it $3,000 and then went back to sleep. So I phoned my sister and she said that the other couple was probably thinking something similar - increase their bid by $2,000 or $3,000, so if we upped ours by $4,000, we had a better chance to get it. And really, what's another $1,000 when you're spending that much money? So that's what we did. About half an hour later, we got the call that the house was ours!
We are sooooo excited to be homeowners. A couple days after, the nervousness kicked in - so much money and stuff to do! But now I'm back to excited.
We move out of our apartment on June 30th and we get possession of the house on July 1st. We'll be spending the one night at my in-laws and leaving all our belongings in a U-Haul truck.
So, over the past month, I've been calling around for home insurance, getting quotes on some house stuff (we want to replace the furnace as it's old, and potentially the front window, which is the only window that wasn't replaced in 2010), getting mortgage stuff settled, finding someone to sublet our apartment and playing with all the budget numbers.
We've started going through all our stuff and packing the non-essentials. I actually love the whole moving process. Well, not the entire process, but I love the packing and unpacking part as you get to purge your belongings, find old treasures, sell/donate stuff and just 'cleanse'. So we're doing that right now and I am loving it. Not loving the mess though... :P
So hence, I have been rather quiet on blog land. But I will try to post more often now as I think things are settling down a bit.
I will post something about our Ottawa trip soon! And I'll try to get some house pictures up.
While husband and I were in Ottawa, we chatted about the house hunting process and how exhausted we were. We had been looking for a couple months and nothing was really right for us. We saw two houses that we considered putting offers in for - one we didn't offer on because a family friend (who is is contracting) came to look at it and told us not to buy it as it had some serious foundation issues; the second one we were going to bid on, but by the time our realtor came over to go through the bidding process, there were 6 or 7 bids already, with several hours to go, so we knew the house would be bid up and go beyond our budget.
So while in Ottawa, we decided we would stop looking for awhile. But, we had already made an appointment to see some more houses on the Monday morning when we returned, so we kept that appointment with our realtor and said after that, we'd take a break and let the bidding war that is called summer go on without us.
We met up with our realtor (actually our realtor was on vacation, so we met with his colleague) and the first house we saw that day was it! We both loved it - the location was ideal (even close enough to my office that I can still walk to work if I want), husband loved the kitchen (his domain, not mine) and I adored that there was an entrance foyer and a mud room at the back, so the cats would have a very difficult time trying to escape.
(Side note: I'm such a worrier when it comes to my fur babies - one major reason why I didn't want to buy a house is because I feared our cats would escape out the door and be lost. Right now if that happens, they can only get out into the apartment hallway. So with this house, there are two doors that we have to go through to enter or exit out the front or back, so you go through one door and have to close the second and walk through the foyer/mud room before you get to the second door. That peace of mind is priceless in my opinion.)
Anyway, so we went and saw the other homes on the list for that day, but we kept going back to the original house. By the time we were done for the morning, we knew we wanted to put in an offer. So we went for lunch while the realtor went back to the office to dig up some information.
After lunch, we went to his office and saw the comparables, chatted about what the listing agent had said and debated our options back and forth. The listing agent had said the couple selling wanted between $20,000-$30,000 more than the original asking price, so we put in a bid that was on the higher end of what they actually wanted, as we knew there would be multiple bids. We also had our family friend, the contractor, come by and take a look at the house and sign off on it.
And then we waited... offers were due at 7 pm that night. That night! So that means we saw the house at 10 am and we would know less than 12 hours later if we owned it! At 7:05, the realtor called us and said there were 7 bids on the house and did we want to change our offer (the message from the listing agent). We said no, as we knew our initial offer was a good one. About an hour later, I got a call - it was down to us and one other couple, and did we want to up our bid. I woke up Mark, who had been sleeping during this time (he had to work that night at 11 pm). He said to up it $3,000 and then went back to sleep. So I phoned my sister and she said that the other couple was probably thinking something similar - increase their bid by $2,000 or $3,000, so if we upped ours by $4,000, we had a better chance to get it. And really, what's another $1,000 when you're spending that much money? So that's what we did. About half an hour later, we got the call that the house was ours!
We are sooooo excited to be homeowners. A couple days after, the nervousness kicked in - so much money and stuff to do! But now I'm back to excited.
We move out of our apartment on June 30th and we get possession of the house on July 1st. We'll be spending the one night at my in-laws and leaving all our belongings in a U-Haul truck.
So, over the past month, I've been calling around for home insurance, getting quotes on some house stuff (we want to replace the furnace as it's old, and potentially the front window, which is the only window that wasn't replaced in 2010), getting mortgage stuff settled, finding someone to sublet our apartment and playing with all the budget numbers.
We've started going through all our stuff and packing the non-essentials. I actually love the whole moving process. Well, not the entire process, but I love the packing and unpacking part as you get to purge your belongings, find old treasures, sell/donate stuff and just 'cleanse'. So we're doing that right now and I am loving it. Not loving the mess though... :P
So hence, I have been rather quiet on blog land. But I will try to post more often now as I think things are settling down a bit.
I will post something about our Ottawa trip soon! And I'll try to get some house pictures up.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Weekly Money Check-Up
Weekly Money Check-Up courtesy of My Pretty Pennies
1. The most I’ve spent this last week was on our rent.
2. Today I am thankful for my husband. I had a horrible migraine last night and he went to the store to get Gravol for me and cleaned up the vomit bucket. :(
3. Money can’t buy happiness. One free thing I did last week that made me happy was cleaning up our balcony. I didn't realize how much I hated looking at it until it was nice to look at again!
4. I will consider this week a success if I spend less than $400 in Ottawa this weekend.
5. The most delicious things I ate all week was a Wolseley bar from Stella's! It's a delicious oatmeal/granola bar with chocolate chips, sunflower seeds and dried food. Delish!
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
May Goals
Ah, May! I am loving the warmer weather, the greenery and being able to wear flats without socks again! I'm hoping I can get some motivation this month to get out for some walks more and use the warm weather to my advantage!
Financial Goals
Household Goals
Personal Goals
Financial Goals
- Spend less than $400 in Ottawa (meals, outings and any shopping).
- Save $750 towards the house down payment fund.
- Limit eating out to $150.
Household Goals
- Clear out my closet. This has been on my weekend to do list's for weeks now, so I must get this done!
- Spring clean the kitchen. (It's one of the few spots that hasn't been done yet this spring).
- Clean up our balcony and prep for the summer.
Personal Goals
- Work out 4x a week.
- Get an A on my mid-term
- Get outside at least once a week for a walk
April Spending Recap
I'm finally back on the wagon when it comes to tracking our spending. Since we were away on vacation in February, I got a bit sidetracked, but here is our April spending report..
*this does not include my pension, which is taken directly off my paycheque.
Food is crazy high and we need to get better about not eating out or ordering in so much. I think we need to start going to the grocery store more often. If we have food that I want in the house, I am not as tempted. It's when we're low on snacks or easy-to-make meals that I get lazy and just go and buy something or order in. If we go more often and stock up, maybe this will ease up.
But what really surprised me was how high the misc. and household category was. I can't even remember what some of that stuff was. I know we bought a closet organizer, some vitamins, and that's about it... So I really have to start tracking where that misc. money is going better.
|
Item
|
Spent
|
Breakdown
|
|
Rent
|
$1,122
|
Rent – ‘nuff said
|
|
Food
|
$969.01
|
$663.72 – groceries
$305.29 – eating out or snacks at work
|
|
Car
|
$838.01
|
$99.75 – parking
$500 – two car payments
$150 – two transfers to our car fund (for insurance, oil changes and
future repairs)
$88.26 – gas
|
|
Savings
|
$400.00
|
$300 – RRSPs*
$100 – vacation fund
|
|
Misc. and household
|
$273.08
|
Various drugstore purchases, household items.
|
|
Gifts
|
$126.69
|
Gift for my MIL’s birthday (This also includes my BIL’s gift for his
mom and he paid me back)
|
|
Cats
|
$54.68
|
Pet insurance (we include their food and litter in the groceries
amount)
|
|
Entertainment
|
$35.00
|
We went to a play starring a friend ($15 per person, plus the cost of
a drink for husband)
|
|
Clothing
|
$33.05
|
One new summer top for me
|
|
Health
|
$15.30
|
10% of my 6-month dental check-up
|
|
Bank fees
|
$10.95
|
Monthly fee
|
Now that I'm back on the wagon, I'll try to keep better tabs on what was actually purchased instead of just the category and amount.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)