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| Photo Bart captured from the front yard of our home ~ Fall 2013 |
Let's back up to the early 2013. I was pregnant with Elyse with two wild toddler boys running around (at all times). I had more aches and pains this time around and pregnancy overall just felt harder. Our teeny tiny townhome with steep stairs was not helping the situation. I also detested the street of all of our neighbor's garages located directly behind our home and even though there was a shared grassy area, it freely ran into the surrounding roads and the parking lot! :O. So, on a daily basis I was constantly thinking about where we should live next. It was definitely smart for us to rent for as long as we had (at this point we were going on a little over 6 years since we'd been together) but we were now definitely in need of a place we could really settle into. So- while he was finishing up with his last semester of school and working full-time, I was taking care of our two young boys, growing a baby, and researching new jobs/areas for us to move/housing market. Whew- was all of that time consuming!
In early spring of 2013 we came to the decision together that we both really liked Utah and having both sides of our families close is important to us, so we decided to start our job search in Utah. I sent Bart's resumes out to a variety of jobs in or close to SLC since we didn't know of any other software development opportunities for Bart in Logan. Weeks went by without hearing anything and I was getting very discouraged with the housing market quickly back on the rise ....(if you all remember, house prices went waaaaaaay down in 2008 and now at the start of 2013, they were starting to come back up again) and with our baby due soon, I felt like our window of time was closing in on us but I also didn't want to move with a newborn, so in a way we were stuck. No new job for Bart, and a tired, pregnant mama. Bart convinced me to hang tight and no matter what things would work out however they were suppose to....
In June our beautiful baby girl arrived! We were so excited for her to be here as she truly is the perfect ending to our family. I felt so relieved and grateful to have her and unexpectedly was filled with an overwhelming desire for us to just stay put. As in STAY RIGHT HERE IN LOGAN, our home. Life is so stress-free here and we've made so many wonderful friends, established a good network of trusting doctors, awesome community, convenience of so many family necessities close by, USU, mountains, parks, the list really could go on and on....when I shared all of this with Bart he agreed, but coincidentally, was now being pursued by a very prestigious company in SLC for a new job. Shoot. I finally thought I had our life plan all figured out. Nevertheless, I convinced Bart that we should at least start at least checking out some houses in the valley since his current salary had gone up a bit since he graduated and thankfully the cost of living in Cache Valley is relatively low compared to other parts of Utah, so we felt pretty safe to buy our first home here. BUT- even with all the years I'd spent watching numerous house hunting shows, I knew we needed some outside professional help so emailed a realtor who I'd seen yard signs for all around town and before I knew it, we were house hunting!
After a couple of homes, I quickly learned that it was not nearly as fun as I thought it would be. :( The homes in neighborhoods we liked needed work (the ones in our budget anyway) and the newer homes we were being shown were either not made of very good quality, had no landscaping, or were not in the area of town we wanted. We were still very cautious with our budget and were determined to stay in it (which I should note was MUCH LESS than what we were approved for by our bank) and after living through the financial crisis and seeing some of our friends over-pay for their homes, we were well aware of how fickle home values could be as well as all of the additional costs that owning a home incurs. Still, I had in the front of my mind this cute, dreamy home for us all to live happily ever after in....you know the one that you'd see on a cover of a magazine with a nice well kept yard and flowers. Then, one night after once again house hunting on my phone while nursing in bed, I spotted the perfect house. I actually remember telling Bart about it the next morning using these words exactly: I FOUND OUR NEW HOME.
Bart looked at it online and he too thought it had potential. It definitely had curb appeal, 2500 square feet with 5 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms and in our price range. I quickly made plans for us to see it that night (side note: because I get the heebie jeebies very easily with strangers living quarters, Bart and I had worded out a system where I would stay in the van with the kids and he'd tour it, and if it was worth me looking at too, then we'd switch and I'd get out and look at it while he stayed in the van with the kids...this "system" still cracks me up!) Well, with this house, I was so taken by the impeccable look of everything on the outside that I toured the home first while Bart waited in the van with the kids. I couldn't believe how instantly I was again hit with the feeling of THIS IS OUR HOME the minute I stepped in the front door. This is interesting to me since a lot of the decor was not in our style (hello outdoorsy themed wallpaper of moose, birdhouses, AND outhouses! :O), but there was just something about the feeling of it, its quaint and inviting layout that made me never want to leave it....and the backyard truly took my breath away with its brand new full fence, play set, and perfectly kept grass. I think this was apparent to our realtor who was now encouraging me to go and get Bart AND the kids (which we did) and while Bart took a little longer to convince, seeing our boys delightful faces while they played on the backyard play set I think sealed the deal.
So, story over, right? Easy peasy. Have I mentioned yet that this was the only the 4th house that we had seen? Well, it was but the story didn't end so easily for us quite yet....as I mentioned previously Bart was still being pursued by that employer in SLC and he could not commit to making an offer on this perfect family home until he knew how things would play out with the SLC job. I was so devastated. I did not want to walk away from this house- I had already fallen in love! But, he was right, we didn't want to move too quickly if something else was meant to be in SLC. So a couple of weeks passed and I was pretty much freaking out every.single.day by repeatedly checking on it and calling our realtor about it to make sure it hadn't sold yet, or another offer had come in on it. The owners knew we were really interested in it too as we asked our realtor to ask them questions for us such as estimates of what the utility costs are, if they had any moving date parameters, etc.
Finally, after what was truly never-ending torture for me and Bart with me calling him EVERY DAY asking him if he'd heard anything from the job, Bart and I came to a decision to withdrawal his application for the job in SLC and a few weeks later (after we bought the house!) we learned that the filling for the position was put on hold indefinitely....how I wish they could've just told us that sooner! But, alls well that ends well and almost 10 years later we are so happy with our decision to lay down roots here and live in the wonderful home and perfect neighborhood.
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