Can I get an upgrade?

Well it is official, Andrew and I are not getting the afore blogged about condo. The final reasons have to do with certain ownership percentages. It would appear that if the contractor/developer owns more than 10% (in our case it was 14% - the difference of one more unit being sold) it is near impossible to get financing, and since Andrew and I didn't have the cash to pony up to pay for it out right, we are walking away.
But we are not walking away crestfallen or defeated, we learned a lot through this process, and not just that, we know that God closed this door for a reason.
Due to the weird quirks of condo financing, we decided to take a look at some of our other options - mainly single family houses. At this time we are positive we want to stay in Evanston, which narrows our options. I know it sounds crazy, but sometimes even the dumpiest looking house when placed in the right part of Evanston could sell for $1 million (seriously, what some people wouldn't pay to be in the Willard School District or have a lake view) - but as luck would have it, there are "cheaper" diamonds in the rough.
Andrew and I went to around 10 open houses this afternoon and then met with our boy Barry (our realtor.) We are very encouraged by our initial fact finding missions, and happy to report there are actual houses, that have the same price tag as our condo - and come with a backyard.
So while neither of us know what will come at the end of this journey, we are enjoying it together.

Condo, sweet condo

Well, we had an appraisal of our new place done and he was nice enough to send photos along with the other documents.

So.....if you've been curious about what our new place looks like, or if you've been debating as to whether it's akin to an "imaginary girlfriend", yes, we can prove it, we have pictures.

The appraiser sent eight pictures. enjoy.

The Exterior: Our place is top right. If you were standing here, your back would be facing Ridge Ave. (you are looking east).


The Deck: This also doubles as the fire escape. It is actually much larger than the angle of the picture portrays. Plenty of space for a grill, two chairs and a table. Also, note it has an overhanging covering it. Definitely a big plus.

Dining Room: Here is where the table would go. Note the deck out the window. To get your bearings, you are looking south out the window. The floor is hardwood oak throughout the condo. If you look between the back door and the refrigerator the hallway leads to the guest bed and bathroom and the washer/dryer.

Kitchen: Here is the kitchen. Good times. Good looking cabinets, new appliances, and pretty slick counter tops.

Living Room: The fireplace is gas forced. We are facing west toward a busy street (Ridge Ave.) We really like the crown molding around the fireplace and else were in the place.

Guest Bathroom: shower, sink, toilet. check.

Master Bedroom: We are looking west again. Note the "sun room" within the master bedroom. There is also an additional window looking south.

Master Bathroom: You can't tell, but there is a double vanity.......awesome.

We'll try to post new photos when we get them. Hope you've enjoyed.

- Andrew

When the moon hits your eye like a heart shaped pizza pie...

...that's a Waggoner Valentines' Day tradition. We received a flyer in the mail a few nights ago advertising a special heart shaped pizza. It seems just ridiculous enough to make for a fun Valentine's Day tradition. The plan for Saturday night was to watch a movie, eat some pizza, and exchange small tokens. The night went much as planned (except instead of a movie we watched the Olympics - Moguls seriously, so much fun to watch.) I had been "hinting" (it is still called hinting when you mention outright what you want, right?) that flowers would be nice.

Marriage has brought a lot of adjustments to our lives, most of them good, but one of the hardest adjustments has been trying to "surprise" one another with gifts. Andrew did a nice job with my "little hint." Don't you think? I am not your traditional red rose girl (and heaven help the person that gives me baby's breath! Sorry mom, I know you have a fondness for it!)

This is not your traditional rose bouquet. Does anyone know what this little yellow guy is? It is fascinating and gorgeous.

The best part about flowers is the smell! There is nothing like walking into an apartment with a full floral bouquet. Best air freshener ever!

One last picture for you to enjoy. (In case you are wondering, Andrew picked out and bought his own token - a couple cigars.)

Then Sunday night, came Valentine's Day part two. While grocery shopping, we remembered that we had bough avocados the week before. So we got the rest of the ingredients and made guacamole.

There are few things that Andrew enjoys more in this world then spending time with me. :) One of those things is guacamole. And thanks to the amazing food processor I received as a Christmas gift, I can whip up some of the best guacamole (if I do say so myself) in under 5 minutes.

In response to my gift of guac, Andrew gave the gift of chocolate. Honestly, I think Andrew was craving chocolate, he kept making excuses about needing to get me chocolate for Valentine's Day. I will let you guess whose bar was finished tonight, and which one of us still has half of her bar left.

Another New Year...Another New Post...

We have decided to come back to blogging...at least for the time being. The hard part about being gone so long is that it is hard to know where to begin, but we will try.

First and most exciting, we are hoping to buy our own place in the upcoming year. The extension of the first time home buyers' tax credit in addition to low interest rates and a buyers' housing market, has proved to be the perfect trifecta. The process has been exciting and scary. We narrowed our search down to a 3 bedroom 2 bathroom condo straight south of our current location - put in an offer - and had it accepted. It moved a lot quicker than we had thought it would go, but are very excited. We plan on closing March 26th - if all goes as planned. We had our inspection yesterday morning - there was a little bit of a miscommunication so the place wasn't ready - but we did the walk through anyway. Nothing too major just paint touch-ups and the like. There was a little problem with the shower divertor (it wasn't installed - therefore no way to take a shower in either bathroom) but the developer was very willing to fix everything noted. When we showed up - the developer, contractor and three workers were there, additionally our realtor, both of us and the inspector were roaming around the place. It was a little crowded, to say the least.

Due to the condo not being truly ready and the number of people we felt a little wierd taking pictures. For the people that want to see photos, we promise we will post them as soon as we take them....but it might be a while.

Walking

Andrew and I have decided to join our Church group in a two mile walk to help raise awareness for the problem of child trafficking. The walk will take place this Saturday, September, 26th and is one of many being organized around the country by Stop Child Trafficking Now. Both Andrew and I have decided to try to help raise $100 each for the cause. If you are able and so led please consider helping us financially at:
http://sctnow.donordrive.com/participant/michellewaggoner
http://sctnow.donordrive.com/participant/andrewwaggoner
Regardless, we hope you will take time to pray for those who have found themselves in these unthinkable situations.

Technical Difficulties

Well we are having a few technical difficulties on the home computer, so we have not been able to blog for awhile (or do much of anything from home.) But I promise, when we do get the computer back in line you can look forward to posts about our time in Colorado, my niece's trip to the big city, and Andrew and my first anniversary weekend.

A Very Wet Weekend!

So this weekend we had the pleasure of hosting our second visitors at The W Hotel & Suites. Andrew's sister Betsy and her husband James came to stay with us over the long weekend. Andrew and his sister had been planning this visit for sometime, it was to celebrate them both getting jobs, which we are all very thankful for!
Those who know me well, know that the 4th of July is one of my absolute FAVORITE holidays. This love comes from all my fond childhood memories. Bare with me a moment as I travel down memory lane. As chance would have it, there are a lot of July birthdays in my mom's extended family, also as chance would have it my mom's Aunt Iris and Uncle Stan lived but minutes away from where the Bryan fireworks used to be shot off. So every year Aunt Iris and Uncle Stan would host a 4th of July party. There was always GREAT food, tons of fun family members, and a HUGE cake for all of the July birthdays. The cake would have all the names of the family members with July birthdays - and your piece of cake, assuming you had a July birthday, was always your full name - this is where it REALLY paid to have an eight letter name let me tell you.
Anyway, when it came time for fireworks, all those young enough would make the trek to our annual watching spot. We were always as close to the roped off area as we were allowed to get, and then we would watch the Farkles and Bangs - not sure when that term originated, but that is what we called fireworks. It seems so simple now - but that day every year really brought me so much joy!
All that to say, I really enjoy spending the day with family, so it was SO nice to have Betsy and James there to enjoy it with. It is also nice that we have moved to a town that really appreciates the 4th, even devoting a whole website to the event. Highlight of the day are a 2-3 hour parade and fireworks over Lake Michigan - SO spectacular. Last year we enjoyed the festivities with my parents, sister, brother, and niece - they were all here helping us move. The day was gorgeous and blistering hot - so as not to have a repeat of last years heat wave misery - I packed plenty of water...but no umbrellas. It started sprinkling on our walk to the parade and then continued to sprinkle and rain continuously through out.

Parade highlights:
Illinois Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias - he is known to play hoops with President Obama
Illinois Governor Pat Quinn - took over after Blago was ousted
Old Clown Lady
Library precision cart team
North End Bunco, Parchesi, and Weight Dropping Auxillary

Parade disappointments:
Jesse White tumblers - they just rode past in a van because of the rain, no tumbling
Lack of hand outs - seriously the only hand outs were from the Amy G Salon - and by the time they made it to us they had ONE piece of candy left...they gave it to a kid next to us.
Not taking my camera
Delayed start - we saw -2 go past 4 or 5 times (yes the line up started with -2)
Rain/forgetting umbrellas even after James reminded us
Sitting through the whole thing

Fortunately the rain stopped at the end of the parade and didn't start up again, so the fireworks were not canceled. It was a little disappointing though, because we normally watch the fireworks from the sandy beach, but due to the rain opted for the asphalt trail instead this year. So the normal beauty of seeing the fireworks reflected off the lake was blocked by a pier. But even with all that it was a good show.
Unfortunately, the rain wasn't the only thing that made this weekend wet. For those that don't know Fran is the epitome of a scaredy cat. I mean if Andrew or I sneeze she runs for the hills! Now we are used to her not coming downstairs when we have company, but she will still come down occasionally to eat and do her litter box business.
This weekend was a different story all together! We aren't sure what got into her (our best guess is that she could smell Betsy and James' dog on their stuff) but she didn't come down at all. Which means that at 4:00 am on Saturday AND Sunday morning, Fran decided to relieve herself on our bed. The first night I was awake to catch her in the act. The second night I woke up to Andrew saying "You've got to be kidding, not AGAIN. Michelle turn on your light!" Now I do not like to be woken from a nice sleep, but even less do I enjoy having to change my sheets at 4 in the morning. (It seemed like Andrew enjoyed it even less than I did.)
This is our duvet spread out to dry for the second day in a row. On a positive note, once Betsy and James left, Fran decided she could use her litter box again. Lesson learned, when we have visitors bring the litter box upstairs! While Betsy and James were here we also went to the Evanston Farmers' Market. While there we purchased some peonies.

Aren't they dreamy?

Also over the long weekend I made a pair of bloomers for Lily. They are to go with a cute little dress my sister made her. All in all they came out alright, here's hoping they fit!