Let's get the ball rollin'

Can't you see David and I being awesome homeowners? I sure can.

It's consumed me and until recently I've tried to hide m craziness about it. I keep telling myself "not everyone wants to hear about your future bungalow Chelsey." But, like I said, I've decided to let out my crazy obsession and share it with the world.

So for today's post I want to tell you what we're looking for in a house. At least the abbreviated version.

1. We want a hunk of land. No, not acreage but something to call 'our dirt.' I'm tired of having "shared" areas. It's uncomfortable, crowded, not very private, and not to mention I don't want to raise apartment kids. If you don't understand that term you obviously didn't live across the street from apartments your whole childhood. (*Please don't take that offensive anyone, not all kids fit into that stereotype.)

2. We want a fixer-upper. Not only can we not afford a shiny new house, we don't really want one! I love reading Better Homes and Gardens to see all the fabulous remodels and up-do's people perform on houses! I'd feel guilty replace the brand new carpet in a brand new house to put in my beloved hardwoods but in a fixer-upper? Guilt free because let's face it, it'll need to be done! We also like to work together. It's such a bonding experience to work toward a common goal and get to see the end result of your labor.

3.(Secretly) We(and I really mean I on this one) don't want it to have a washer and dryer. Well that seems dumb doesn't it? I want an excuse to buy my idea of a housewife's naughty dream. That's right, a front loading RED washer and dryer set. David thinks I'm silly but boy do I want them. I'm normally not really a pick it before you have to(get that?) kind of person but these bad boys I've drooled over for years. Once again, I'm tired of apartment(condo right now) bottom of the barrel washer and dryer. I hate that it take 3 times for my towels to dry, and yes we have cleaned out all the ducts, some dryers just naturally suck.

4. We want a dining room. If you've been over to my house you know that our dining room consists of my college table that has been converted into a front door/foyer table. We have no chairs (because they all broke) and we never eat there. We sit on the floor to eat. Unconventional, I know but still pretty awesome, right? I already have my dining room designed. David, who I have learned is quite the craftsman, has agreed to make/build me a booth style, breakfast nook type dining room. No matter what kind of house we live in formal dining just isn't our thing. This cafe style will be the perfect fit to our life.

5. We want a garage. The main reason we want a garage is why? David wants to prove to both our families that garages are for cars, not everything else. It's rather hilarious to listen to him "discuss" his future plans for his/my cars garage.I guess if I can have my red washer and dryer he can have his clean garage. Most people say "yeah, we'll see if you can actually do that when you have a house," my argument: I hate junk. If it has no purpose just get rid of it.

But Chelsey, what about specifics? How many bedrooms, bathrooms, square footage, and all the like? Where are you wanting to move? We'll my friends, I want to leave a little bit to a surprise. I'm convincing my mom that we're moving to Montana, and if someone wants to hire me in Spokane, why the heck not?

P.S.  Remember this cutie? He turned one on April 8th. Yeah, he still sleeps like a porn star...dirty dog.

The new purpose of my blog

As you may remember back in January I posted about taxes and how much I hate them.
I had three options, remember what they were?
1. Baby.
2. House.
3. Africian Clicky Language.

I can't have 1 without first having 2 and once again I'm kinda scared of 3, so 2 it is.

David and I had our "come to Jesus" moment about our finances and decided it was time to do a 180. We realized we should be saving over a grand a month...and we are now trying (being the key word) to do that.

What does that have to do with my bloggy-mc-blog? Well, my blog is now going to be the adventure of bringing us home...or to our home for that matter. We are not debt-ridden or credit-slaves but on the other hand we aren't home-buying savvy knee deep in the "know" of what to do with thousands of dollars put away. We are just a young couple trying to get home in the WORST housing market since the depression and boy do we want it bad!

So I invite you along on our really crazy journey to buying our first home. We are trying to do it alone (aka no government second loans or friends co-signing) and the right way. We want to be 100% happy with what we buy and we want it to be long term. We've seen quite a few of our friends buy "what they can" just so they can...and you know what? They want out already. It's scary to see that and I don't want to be that way. I want to love my house, work on my house, and eventually start growing our family in that house. I'm so excited that this process has begun that it is literally consuming me day in and day out (don't worry, David supports it!).

Anyway, the market is scary right now for homeowners but great for David and I. We hope to be starting the "buying process" <-whatever that is, at the end of summer/early fall. The third quarter is when the market is supposed to have fallen extremely low which means more types of houses for us to look at assuming banks are terrified to let go of some money. It's kind of scary if you are at the other end of the spectrum. Just the other day I was looking at our condo complex and we have 9, yes you read that right, 9 condos for sale! That number may not be gigantic but in a complex of under 70(ish) thats over ten percent!

If you ever feel like giving us, or me specifically, advice feel free! I love talking to anyone about this and feel like everyone has some sort of input that may help us on our journey. And just so you know I'll try not to make it too boring and still show the cutest pictures of my ridiculously handsome puppy (who is a year old on April 8th!).

Here are the two articles in which I was reading about 2011 housing forecast.

Housing Market Outlook 2011: Unsettled, Underwater, and Unsold

2011 Housing Market Forecast

My Wild West

The quickest update in the wild west:

• I have only one class after then one (15 class session all together! WOOOO) and then I will be a employable ASL teacher. If you know anyone who's hiring send it my way.
• There is less than 3 1/2 months left until glorious glorious summer time for me! AKA NO work and still paid!
• David is going to be taking a class to get his national welding certification soon! Holla'!
• Puppy is the most amazing creature to walk Lakeland Hills. We are currently trying to teach him how to "pound it." I'm sure if we tried a little bit harder than we are he'd have it. He's a really quick learner but his momma is being lazy bout the whole thing.
• We went camping last month with John, Moriah, and thier cute pooches. It was super windy but we still had an awesome time watching b-rated movies in the camper and sitting 'round the fire. We can't wait to do it again, hopefully when it's warmer and less windy!
• Our new favorite XBOX game is Borderlands. With over a million different gun combo's, how could it not be? I want to move to the planet Pandora just so I can snipe some skags!
• We finally got around to actually playing the Kinect and it was A LOT of fun.
• The Jarvis family is on a VERY strict budget system these days. Remember me talking about taxes and if we should have a baby, buy a house, or learn a clicky language? Well no matter which we choose we need a financial backer and since no one is really willing to invest it has to be us.
• Just kidding, the budget is strictly for a house, not the other two...seriously, no babies, and the clicky language I'm just going to learn off YouTube.
• David is going to Colorado to help his brother and wifey move back to Warshington. I'm so excited to have them close...even if they will still be 5 hours away! YAY!
• I'm interpreting TWO that's right TWO Pacific Northwest History classes this semester. Remember at my work the classes are 90 minutes long? Well that pans out to be 3 oh so long hours of all about PNW fun...Yeah, I'm basically a genius when it comes to this area. By June you'll be able to ask me anything onthe topic and I'll not only tell you but probably recite a Native American poem about it. <- this is my my title is the west of the wild!
• And now for the best part, pictures.

Okay I lied...sorry....the server isn't allowing it. I promise I have some awesome ones. If you'd like to see them be my FB friend and go look at my album.

Miss eb

Well my post was going to be titled Miss February but every time I typed the F it wouldn't happen. So I'll take it as a cue that it wasn't meant to be.

Why Miss eb?

I hate January.

I know, I know it's the month of my hubb's b-day and it's the month that everyone pretends to make goals and then breaks them. New life's, new hopes, BLAH BLAH BLAH! I hate it. Why? It's the month I always seem to be the brokest and the month I am always the sickest!

So here's to February. I love February. Why? Because it officially marks January as being OVER! I was thinking about it today, on the first day of this glorious month and I already am feeling sentimental about missing it. Weird, right? I love February and for no reason. Hub's and I are not Valentine's-esk people at all. It doesn't even have very many awesome days off (even though I do get a four day weekend because of the President's- God Bless America!!). But, alas, it's a rockin' awesome month and I plan on loving every 28 days of it.

What am I most excited for?

CAMPING ON THE COAST!
Feb. 11-13
With hubby and my fav. married couple friends
Ocean Shores
LOVE LOVE LOVE!

Have you ever had one of those days that when you're done getting ready you think to yourself "wow, I'm ready to go back to bed?" I'm having one of those days. Let me explain.

As you may know, I've been sick since hubby's birthday on Thursday. My weekend to say the least was uneventful. It involved a lot of couch time, honey, and a few rolls of toilet paper on the back of my couch.

So last night, even though I still wasn't up to par I convinced myself that I wanted to work today. That I could endure the day with high school teens even though I'm among the living dead just so I would have to use one of my coveted sick days (even though I have plenty).

I crawled into bed at nine and snuggled up to David (because he so wonderfully goes to bed at the same time I do even if he isn't tired just so we can be together). As I stared off at my wall I could hear myself trying to choke down air through my clogged nose, sore throat, and mucus coated tonsils I thought about how proud I was that I got everything ready for the morning before I went to bed. My lunch was made, my clothes (down to my skivvy's) were set out, my saltwater, emergen-c, and drugs were ready for me to take. I knew it was going to be a rough morning so I prepared.

I wasn't prepared for my 1am wake up however. I woke up feeling miserable. More so than the 4 days that I had already endured. I was now hacking up a lung, nasal dripping grossness, and my sore throat was raging on. I rolled over thinking, "I'll fall asleep,no biggy."

2 am "It'll happen"

3 am "Any moment now..."

Finally at 3:30 I decided to call in to our sub system and text my boss (I waited till 4). David woke up so many times to ask if I was ok in mid-cough. I felt the worst for him. His sleep I'm sure was just as bad as mine, but he still went to work today.

At 4 I rolled out of bed to try and give David a little undisturbed sleep. I put in my sub notice, texted my boss, then curled up on the couch.

What did I think about for the next two hours waiting for David to wake?

"What witty thing should I put on facebook about my sickness? "(<---I'm not big into updates, but I wanted one)

"Dear Facebook friends, Chelsey is currently unable to preform any tasks required of her because she is now among the living dead, aka undead, aka, night walkers, aka zombies. If you would like to send your regards she would appreciate it if no zombie hunters came after her as she hopes to one day return to a living state. Sincerely, The Zombie formerly known as Chelsey Lynn"

"I wonder who leaves for work at 430, that must suck?"- as I heard a car drive past

"Hmmm would my best friend be mad if I texted her a joke right now?"

"Dear Facebook friends, why must none of you be awake to listen to me whine at 4am? I thought FB ruled the world, and yet no one is here?"

This kept up until 5:45 when my work alarm goes off (don't worry I don't get up until 6:05 normally). At that point I decided it was an adequate enough time from my last dose of medicine that I could take something else. Benadryl it was, down the hatch. Followed by a reluctant piece of plain ole' bread to make sure nothing got upset. It still did..I'm sure from my IV type drip coming out of my nose...

Finally as David left at 6:45 I crawled back into our bed with puppy in tow. I got 3 hours of decent sleep.

My question is: how do mothers do it?

Off the wall I know. I whined so much in the past 24 hours. I felt, and still feel, like I can barely lift my head. I took a shower only to end up right back here on my couch. As a woman who someday wants kids I want an answer. I know that moms have days exactly like this, and yet they still work as mommy. How do you do it? I can barely take care of myself!

Anyway, I just took a shower (it took me an hour and a half to go through the whole process because i was so slow) and it is now 3:08pm. I'm fully dressed for no reason. I'm sure the hubby won't let me go anywhere. And the only thing I can think about? Going back to bed. Getting dressed was a lot of work today.

Because I'm still sick and David is still taking care of me this love-ditty will be nice, short, and of course SWEET!

Dashboard is a big deal to us. We listened to it ALL the time together in high school. In summer time we'd drive at night in the Jeep with its top of, heater cranks, practically screaming this guys stuff! When we broke up we both listened to this guys work day in and day out thinking about each other. It was the very first concert where we went together. We played some (being the key word) of his love songs at our wedding. And of course every now and again we get sentimental and rock out to his very emo love songs.

Do you and you love have music that brought you together?

And of course David had stolen my heart from day one, even if I didn't know it then.

Thursday

It's pretty simple. Week of Love Thursday was skipped for two reasons, which ironically fits with what we're discussing.

1. It was the hubby's 24th birthday yesterday. So afterwork I rushed to get a cake and a balloon and then came home to spruce up the house and get his presents out from under our bed. Then hub's came home and we celebrated.

2. I was sick. It was/is so gross! My throat feels like it's on fine and my 'noids are all swollen. Other than that I fee pretty great, a little tired I guess?

How in the world does this fit in with love?

...Simple...

I was willing to run errands and clean because hubs birthday is more important than me crawling into bed.
AND even BIGGER and WAAAY more giving/loving than what I did is what David did. He allowed me to lay on the couch with three giant blankets the rest of the evening. He cooked dinner, he waited on me, and he listened to me sob about how much I hated being sick...ON HIS BIRTHDAY! That ladies and gentlemen is true love.