It’s Christmas every day!

Today we got a phone call from our buyers’ agent– a big box from Macy’s had been delivered to our old house.  This was surprising, since we hadn’t ordered anything, but we arranged that I’d stop by to pick it up today.

I went by around 12:30.  I met Laura, one of the buyers, and we chatted while she showed me the bedrooms that they’d just had painted (the master is a nice teal, it’s really pretty, and the other two bedrooms are still yellow and blue, but more muted than we’d had them).  I noticed a picture we’d failed to take off the wall, and she (very nicely) let me take it.  And I picked up the big Macy’s box and wrestled it into my very full car.  There was also a decent amount of mail still being delivered for us, despite my forwarding request to the post office.

I called the post office; the forwarding is set up all right, but they have a sub on the route right now, who may have missed a few pieces.  The Macy’s box contained a Cuisinart; I believe it’s a very late wedding present, and it was sent to our old address because that’s the one listed on our wedding registry (I just updated it, in case someone else tries to use it).  I don’t recall putting a Cuisinart on our registry, but I’m sure not going to argue– it looks like a nice one!  Watermelon soup, here we come!

A last minute phone call prompted us to return to the house this afternoon to remove all the old paint from the garage. Since our cars were full, Rowan rented a UHaul van for a dump run. And since we had a whole van, we figured we’d clean out a bunch of other random stuff too.

Weed control and other chemicals went to the hazmat site, and tabletop and wood and cardboard went to the dump, but you have to dry out latex paint before you can dispose of it, so the 27 cans of paint (some were there when we bought the place) are now lining Todd & Ara’s driveway, and will come to our new house to get dried out and tossed.

Next week is closing week.  Our house sale closes on Tuesday, June 30, and our house purchase closes on Thursday, July 2.  We’ve decided to hire movers to put all our stuff in a truck, store it for a few days, and then move it all into our new house.  That takes care of our things… we haven’t yet worked out all the details on where we’ll be putting ourselves and the cats.  We have several options, we just have to pursue them to see which one will work out.

We’re looking forward to moving into our new house!  But we have a lot of packing, cleaning, and garden cleanup to do between now and then.  I’m also not looking forward to the cats’ reaction to all of this… Spodi’s never had another home, and Archie’s been here long enough that a trip to the vet was somewhat traumatizing (he doesn’t like his carrier at all, given the woeful rowls he made).

The house has been inspected.  There was an electrical problem that shouldn’t be too hard to resolve, but is somewhat urgent (the lights in the master bedroom and both bathrooms don’t work).  The crawlspace needs to be cleaned out, rodent entries properly blocked, and reinsulated and have new vapor barrier, since it’s full of rat pee and other leavings.

I took a few pics with my phone, for those who want more than the listing gives.

The backyard is gorgeous:

There’s a little shrine:

Lots of huge peonies:

The laundry room has a peek view of the water.

The main bathroom has a handicap shower rather than a bathtub (something we’ll remedy eventually):

It also has lots of pink flowers on the tile:

The master bath is dark, but I like the tile:

Master bedroom has a nice view to the back yard.

The kitchen is “country”:

Nice view from the living room:

The entryway has the awesome combo of purple tinted glass and shiny wallpaper:

Our offer was accepted!  Now we’ve got inspections and insurance and financing to work out.  If all goes well, we close July 2, and have a new house!  We’re excited, but it’s going to be a busy month.