Marilyn Monroe Quote

If you can't handle me at my worst, then you don't deserve my best.
- Marilyn Monroe

Fridge Follies

Another highlight/incident from moving day. We love our families, but sometimes planning is not always best and bodies are not at their prime. My father-in-law is in his 60s and isn't in the best shape. I was very concerned when he started huffing and puffing with some of our furniture, and I was very clear to him, and my mother (in her 50s) that they need to take it easy and not strain themselves, and let us younger ones do the heavy stuff. So father-in-law has the truck. Brother-in-law and husband and father-in-law all go to other house to get a fridge and bring it back. Our condo has a staircase to the main apartment on the 2nd floor. It's fine for large pieces of furniture, and manageable, but for a heavy large fridge, that staircase was a very scary place.

Guys like to be guys and like to think pushing objects and brute force will take care of things. I was like "how are you planning to get the fridge out of that corner in the stairwell?". Brother-in-law replied "we'll figure it out when we get up there". Mind you, fridge was LAST on the list of items to get that day, so we were moving it when everyone was worn out and tired from the day's moving. First mistake. Second - everyone helping us move was in the potential path of that fridge falling on them. Third - Thank God we had a Forearm Forklift strap to wrap around the Dolly to move it up, otherwise it would have been impossible to haul it up on the forklift. Fourth - Do not ask retired father-in-law to be one of the main people moving the fridge. Not that he wasn't a good guy or strong, he was very strong. But he started breathing very heavily, obviously straining himself and being crushed by weight or dolly at various times, and I just was not comfortable. And I do not think I was over-reacting.

I think part of the non-concern of everyone else, was the guy factor of "we can do this". I love them, but they need to realize that they shouldn't try to DIY with everything.

So I have some advice for moving large pieces of furniture or appliances. Try doing it in the beginning of your moving day, so all your strength and clear thinking can be used for the largest items. Only people under 40 should really be moving large pieces of furniture. Hire experienced movers or many strong men for large objects. Best yet, if you buy new they'll move it for you. Make sure you have the right tools and a sure gameplan. Using a fridge dolly and/or having a plan before moving up would have made a big difference. We used just a regular dolly and were like "we'll figure it out when we get up there", wasn't the best plan looking back.

After the fridge was moved, there were large scratches and scuffs in the wall and the floor. This may have upset me if I didn't see the whole fridge moving drama unfold. But, with everything that happened, I was just glad no one got hurt. I said a little prayer of Thanks, and will work on getting some touch-ups for the floor and wall. Makes you not sweat the small stuff and appreciate that everything was ok in the end. Be safe out there people!

Under Where?

We moved into our new condo last Saturday. Although I dreaded the amount of work involved in moving, I was also excited to be settling in.

We intended on sleeping-over Saturday night, but our moving plans were fairly ambitious and we didn't get everything done that we had hoped. So we went back to our original location to have dinner, shower and spend the night. There is nothing like showering after a long hard day of work, to find that after the shower, all your clean underwear was moved to the other house.

I sat on the bed in my towel after the shower, too exhausted to move, and very sad I did not have any clean clothes. Luckily I had a stash of clean stuff in a drawer that was left behind. The overly ambitious plans to move everything fail turned to win.

So some advice if you're ever moving and planning on sleeping over. Pack an overnight camping bag or backpack when you're moving. If you can, pack a week's worth of toiletries and necessities, and keep it with you whichever house you go to. Sort of an emergency pack. Luckily our condo and old house was a very short drive away, but it would suck if you found yourself 30 miles away from all your clean underwear and your toothbrush. Buying new from stores are an expensive and not so convenient alternative.

A place to call home

Recently we've been condo hunting - first time home buyers. That's one reason why I haven't blogged at all lately. On April 15 tax day, we closed and finally got a place to call our own. So much goes into a home buying process, and below are some thoughts on the process.

Paperwork: Get ready to read, sign, scan and send more paperwork than you really ever wanted to. The closing documents we signed with a notary was 80 plus pages. That doesn't include all the other documents we had to sign and send before, including the offers, loan approval documents, escrow papers, forms and etc. I read through most of them and tried to get a basic understanding, as I hate signing things I don't understand. Luckily in California home buying goes through Escrow, and we don't have to have lawyers like some other states.

People: We worked with 4 parties - Realtor, Seller, Lender and Escrow. Here's how it worked. We worked a lot with Realtor and Lender. Then we all worked the Seller. Then all 3, plus us, work with Escrow to get everything submitted and finished before closing. I must say - if you ever buy a home, try to make sure everyone you work with is awesome. Our realtor and lender people were fantastic. The seller was on top of her stuff too. Escrow was a bit disorganized but overall came through in the end. Our realtor also worked with the HOA of our new condo - and our new HOA people were fast to reply and quick to act in fixing things, so that made everything work really well. Overall, we were also quick to respond and accessible. So with everyone working together and accessible at all times, it made it a very easy and smooth process to go through. I highly recommend you get great people to be on your team for home buying. You can't always choose them, but if you get them on your side that's really helpful.

Decisions: The other most stressful part is deciding. Deciding location, deciding unit, deciding square footage, renovations, etc. What are you ok with and what are you not ok with. Husband and I had long discussions over what we needed and wanted. We were torn in choosing great units in not so great locations, and great location and a not so great unit.

During our home hunt, we found that we have a lot of the same preferences, Thank Goodness, and it made shopping and deciding a lot easier. Good and bad thing is, we saw a LOT of places we liked. We often got beat-out on time or money for bids, and didn't actually get the first places we bid for. Competition with other buyers was there, even though this was a buyer's market.

Our realtor suggested an 80/20 satisfaction factor. We should be 80% ok/like a place, and 20% compromise. Luckily, I'd say the place we ended up choosing was 90% like. It's got a great location. The area it's in is considered nice and well maintained. It's very close to the freeway, but we don't get freeway or street noise. It's next to amenities like church, grocery store, giant park for walking and overall a very safe and pretty neighborhood. Also there's a bowling alley, gas stations and small businesses within 5 minutes walking distance. It's a condo on the edge of housing development too, so it's not a sprawl of condos/apartments. We plan on getting dogs, so nice area to walk in was important, and safety was very important to me. Our area also has very highly rated schools, and although we don't have kids we know this is important in rent or resale.

The only issues I have, and still have with the place, is the amount of space and perhaps parking/yard. We have no real yard but a balcony and small front porch, and I really want to grow a garden. Also, parking is one half garage and one space outside. Not ideal, but ok. Overall it's got 2 bed 2 bath with only 900 sq feet, which are small rooms by my standards and small closets - Ack! But in the essence of "living with less", we're going to do our best to get rid of non-essentials and live in a smaller space.

Advice: Father-in-Law said this "You will always have buyer's remorse for any place you buy. It's such a huge purchase, and you will always be second-guessing your decision that there might be another place that's better." He didn't give a solution to this problem, just stated that this is most likely to happen. Unfortunately, part of me is always wondering "is there something better out there" and is worried about our decision and choice being the "best" one. But from what i've seen so far, and what i've looked at since, it seems like a good decision. Not the best one, not the greatest deal, just a good solid one.

I've also had a lot of anxiety over the actual place. I suppose it's because we haven't lived there yet, but it's not yet "home". Every day, more and more, it gives me the warm fuzzies, but a lot of times just anxiety. Then I figured out, it's because it's not home yet. We haven't moved in. We haven't made it ours yet. It takes a few months, even a few years, for a place to become home. For years now, I've been in this weird transition place with places. This is the first real permanent place I've had... ever. Every other place has been, "when we get a house", and now that we have one, it won't make all our dreams come true, but hopefully we'll make some of them come to life, and we'll make some great memories. I'm looking forward to making memories in this new place. I think our realtor's congratulations card said it all.

A house is made of walls and beams
A home is made of love and dreams

It's a little more sappy for my taste, but I do like the message. Looking forward to making memories and really making it ours.

And, I come back and think of this. Nothing's perfect. No place is perfect, just like no person is perfect. But you should fall in love anyway.

Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.