Thinking about hanging our hat...

The answer to the house question is...
I think so?

Tim and my Mom and I went to see the inside of the house on Saturday.
It truly is perfect.
The kitchen is huge with tons of cupboards and gas stove.
There is a washer and dryer in the downstairs bathroom...Yes, downstairs, meaning there is another one upstairs. OH the luxury!

The living room has built in bookcases and there is a dining room!
Yep, a room made for eating...we have spent the last 4 years eating at our coffee table, it may take a little while to adjust to actually having a room for eating!

There are 3 bedrooms upstairs, which means that our guests no longer have to sleep next to our computer. There are lots of closets which is amazing for a house that is over 100 years old!

So, we told the real estate woman, Stephanie, who showed us the house that we absolutely wanted it. Janet, the owner, closed only Friday and needs to get into the house to clean it and replace a bathroom vanity that the previous owners took with them. Who does that by the way? A fancy light fixture in your dining room, okay. Your furniture, certainly. Maybe even your window treatments if they aren't custom made. But, a bathroom vanity??? Really? You left a teapot on the stove and a toaster oven on the counter but couldn't be without a medicine cabinet!?! Bizarre!
So, Janet is supposed to contact us to set up arrangements and, I don't know, MEET US?

Therefore, my answer is "I think so?"

*Yeah, I brought my camera with us when we went to see the inside and in all of my excitement, left it sitting in the car. That's okay...I wouldn't want to get your hopes up if Janet turns out to be a flake. Keep your fingers crossed for us. I am going to try to call her later today...

to be continued...

A place to hang our hat?

As you know, when one moves, one needs a place to move into.
Although my parents have been more than generous in offering their house to us and telling us that we are welcome to stay here as long as we want, we really need our own space.
The two of us really are nesters. We like to make a place our home and frankly, have a lot of stuff. Yes, we could pay to store it some where. But the idea of not having access to our stuff is a bit unnerving. And, the idea of 5 adults (YAY!! Sarah comes home September 15! No really! And she is staying. What do you mean believe it when you see...Hey, she cancelled her return ticket!) As I was saying, one house with 5 adults, 3 businesses and 1 cat is too much.

I have spent quiet some time looking at options for us. Tim has had a chance to see some with me over the weekends. I was a little shocked at the lack of selection out there. Maybe we are too picky, but I think it is more that apartments in Saratoga are currently expensive for what they are. I actually had a real estate agent tell me that okay, so the bedrooms are a little small (full bed was too much and there were 3 of them) but you could put your bedroom in the dining room. Right...in the dining room that is on the street side, basically at the street with great big arched windows and would need to be walked through anytime someone came to the house...um, YOU put your bedroom in a dining room. NEXT!

Thank goodness for a reconnection that I made with a woman who had shown us a possible investment property. I told her that we were on our way back and were looking. A friend of hers is in the midst of closing on a cute house HOUSE!!!! that she wants to rent. Tim and I have seen it from the outside only so far. But, that part looks great. We know that the kitchen and bathroomS have been remodled. It has 3 bedrooms, hardwood floors, IT IS A HOUSE!! Probably completely jinxing ourselves by putting this here...she closes on Friday and we can look at it on Saturday. We have the first pick of renting it. So, if all goes well when we see the inside...things like, if we put a bed in this room, would we have to get to it from the doorway and never make it because it is the only thing in the room?
Anyway, here it is...Will let you know what the inside is like....

Oh the joys of a garage

A full day spent moving things to the new space. Well, actually, it didn't take too long to move Tim's tools; thanks Dad and Koz. What took the longest was going through the garage. The new garage still needs to be organized, but we will get there. It went from empty to having a van, a fridge and lots of job boxes and things in it.

Tim has the two bays on the right side of this photo...here is the inside

The van actually fits inside the garage with room for some shelving behind it. Oh yeah, if you didn't know we got a van, we got a van. A 15 PASSENGER VAN. It is huge. Long story about how we ended up with it, BUT it will make a great job van. Tim is going to pull out most of the seats and we will (we, HA, okay, Tim and John) will put in metal cages to cover the windows and then put job boxes and shelving in the back for tools.

Koz and Tim moving one of several job boxes. Don't know how we would have been able to do this without his help today. What you don't see in the photo are myself and my Dad standing in awe as they lift these things into the truck. We wouldn't have been much help in the heavy lifting department I'm afraid.

Tim and I spent the rest of the day going through all the stuff that was still in my parents garage that wasn't work related. You know...boxes of kitchen stuff, still sealed from when we moved Tim out of his apartment in Layfaette street. Manuals for 8 year old phones that we haven't had for 4 years. The really important stuff. Needless to say, I will add "Go to the Dump" on my list of things to do Monday. It feels so good to get rid of this stuff! Yeah less to move!
Maybe today we will try to organize ALL the stuff in the new shop, whew!

Decisions Made

Well, it looks like the 15th of September will be the day.

It is time to finally move forward with our plan. Two nice college girls will be taking our apartment and even better, they are taking our stuff! Hooray!!
So much of what we have are things that we both came to our relationship with. It is time to move on from that as well. So, we sold the girls our couch, coffee table and end tables, 2 air conditioners, some of our light fixtures. Not only did we get rid of things and get money for them but it also means that we don't have to move these items. So good all around.

The money we made will go into a savings account for now where it will sit until we a.) have decided what we would like to have for furniture and b.) have a stinking home to put it in.
Yes, please do come and visit us but don't be upset if you have to sit on plastic lawn furniture in the living room for a little while.

Today is the day that we start moving all of the tools and equipment that are in my parent's garage into Tim's new work garage. Man, a long day ahead of us. I will post later, hopefully with photos, of the new garage.

First entry - decision time has come

Well, I am really going to give this a try.
Most of you will read this entry, if you read this silly thing at all, somewhat after the fact as I have to figure out WHAT THE HECK I AM DOING!!

Currently, Tim is still in Brooklyn and I am at my parents in Saratoga.
Brooklyn is great, my parents and Saratoga are wonderful and frankly, this sucks!
We know it is only temporary and will end soon...we can't wait.

A real estate agent who showed our apartment said the people wanted the place and that they would like it for Sept. 15, did we know when we were moving yet. So, tomorrow is D Day...the day were we finally make the decision of weither it is a 9.15 move or a 10.01 move. Now some of you out there may look at that and say, "Um, guys, what is the big deal? It is a difference of only 15 days or two weeks or half a month or however you want to look at it." Well, the answer is, it is a big deal. I have nothing better to offer you than that.

We are excited and sad at the same time to be leaving Brooklyn. Both of us fell madly in love with the area, the people (well, except David the YaHoo from the 4th floor of our building) the ease of having so many fantastic shops and shopkeepers all within walking distance. The trees along the street in the spring and summer and the wonderful architecture all around us. However, there were other things that we have decided we aren't willing to give up which we can't have in Brooklyn or anywhere in New York City in general so the time has come to start the next chapter.

Whew...for a first post I just kept going right along. Sort of how I can talk a lot too I guess...here is the good news...you are reading this, if you feel like "enough already Kathleen, take a breath!" You can just walk away from your computer. Can't do that in person! What do you mean sometimes you put the phone down when I get going on one of my tyraids??