Georgia update

Since we have moved to Georgia Avery has been on a roll with crazy, funny sayings. We have forgotten most of them but we thought it was worth writing down a few.

While on a walk in an exasperated voice out of nowhere he says "mom, I really need a house!"
When driving by McDonald's Avery says "Mom, is there a farm in there?" (I guess he was remembering the song Old McDonald)
"I have my ninjas, now we can go to Georgia." (We have miniature ninjas that we put in our geocaches. He must have taken a few of them while we were packing up the house because I later found a few in the front pocket of our suitcase)
"I can't get in the tub, there are too many ninjas in there."
"I'm a piece of dirt." He wanted Brandee to pretend to push him around (she was the dozer)
"I'm too shy to say hi to her." (He was referring to the receptionist at the front desk of our hotel)

Things are going well in Georgia. We really enjoy it here so far and that says a lot considering we've been in a hotel for over a week and still have a few more days in one. The town is beautiful and we've enjoyed all of the golf cart paths. The people here are really friendly- Brandee has already met a few moms at local parks who have given her their numbers. She was even invited to Bunco by a woman in our hotel who just happens to live in our neighborhood but is staying here while her house is under construction. We both like the climate so far even though it is a bit sticky at times. Avery has enjoyed the newness of things and keeps asking to go "suplore" which is explore. Alia has been great as well. She especially loves watching Avery and belly laughing at him when he does silly things.

We had to post a classic picture that represents the number of golf carts in this town from the local Walmart. They actually have an entire parking lot for golf carts only.




Us having fun in the pool.

On our way....

We've begun the journey to GA. We have completed 2/3 of the trip and are scheduled to arrive tomorrow afternoon. The kids have been excellent in the car traveling so far. We were able to stop and visit Laura on the way which was a nice treat, especially since she made us brownies. We appreciated those several hours into the trip when we were in the middle of nowhere and starving! Our diets have been less than desirable. Avery's going to start thinking it's normal to have ice cream and brownies for dinner! Here are random pictures....

Homeless with sweet shoes

We packed our suitcase for Georgia and later learned that we couldn't close on time so we decided to stay in WI. Our packed clothes were for 2 days of traveling only and for temps in the 80's. Also, due to the delays in our housing I will have to start work prior to moving in. Since we can't get our stuff until we find a place to put it, I didn't want to show up at work wearing shorts and flip flops so I visited the local Goodwill and got some dress clothes (I am particularly fond of my new plastic dress loafers)



For those of you that haven't been updated on our recent housing troubles here is a history of what has happened.

1. In preparation for possible house buying I decide to call a bank to get pre approved for a loan on March 1^st
2. NWA told me to use Wells Fargo since we get special rates and our closing costs will be covered
3. Find out they won’t cover my closing costs
4. Start looking at homes on the internet
5. Fly to Atlanta to look at homes
6. Looked at 25 homes over two days (rained the whole time)
7. Couldn’t fly home since the flights were full so we rented a car and drove 19 hrs through the night
8. Made our first offer
9. Spent 4 days negotiating ultimately ending at a stalemate
10. Made our 2^nd offer
11. Spent 2 days negotiating and then got outbid
12. Made our 3^rd offer, got outbid
13. Made our 4^th offer, got outbid
14. Made our 5^th, 6^th and 7^th offer all at the same time
15. On our 5^th offer, got no response (it was way overpriced and we lowballed them)
16. On our 6^th offer, which was actually on the first house again, got outbid
17. Our 7^th offer was accepted
18. Realized 3 days later that we both didn’t like the house or the location so we terminated the contract
19. Flew back down to look at some more homes
20. Looked at several more homes and made offers on two
21. One was on a basement and one was on a slab - we continued negotiating on the basement one.
22. Came to an agreement to purchase the house – YES!
23. Called my mortgage broker to finalize the deal and get the following message “I will be out of the office on a special project for the next 4 months with no email or cell phone service.”
24. Found a new mortgage broker not with Wells Fargo
25. Got the inspection
26. Inspection items were fixed
27. Closing set for May 5^th
28. Movers take our stuff to Georgia
29. Ordered appraisal and 2 days later it came back $40,000 under purchase price
30. Sellers said the appraisal wasn’t accurate and they wouldn’t sell for that price
31. Order a second appraisal this time with Wells Fargo
32. Moved into Brandee’s Parents house and all four of us packed into one room
33. Took a week to get appraiser to come out but only waited 20 min to get into the house. Left and drove 3 hrs home.
34. Appraiser came back (driving 3 hrs again) and finished appraisal.
35. 4 days later he finished the report and was $50k higher than first appraisal
36. Appraiser doubled the size of the basement and doubled the adjustment on the basement (no wonder it was high).
37. Many days passed fighting to get the errors corrected. Appraiser refused.
38. After many more days the appraiser was fired for preparing a fraudulent appraisal and we would have to file an appeal with Wells Fargo’s appraisal management company (estimated to take at least a month)
39. Contacted the sellers and had the purchase price lowered $20k
40. Rather than getting a third appraisal we decided to try to use the fraudulent appraisal to get our loan

At this point we felt like we were done (or at least very close) all we had left was underwriting and we sigh a little as we are almost done.

41. Underwriting gave us a 1-3 weeks estimate for closing (good to know we can plan)
42. Found out the bank changed the rules and our broker no longer can do our loan, we would have to go through a bank’s broker
43. Bank’s broker told us we would need another appraisal
44. Since our appraisal contingency was done we couldn’t use the bank
45. Decided to switch our loan to a FHA loan and start over and hopefully use the fraudulent appraisal

That was yesterday, we will keep you posted

Enjoying the Mississippi

For Mother's Day this year we enjoyed a Mother's Day Buffet on a cruise boat.

Alia and Banana 3 months

Alia continues to attack the banana. At two months she mearly fell into it. Now she is throwing herself at it. Oh and she rolled over for the first time yesterday (back to front)


Alia


Alia happy to have taken banana out.


And of course to compare, Avery at 3 months


Avery

This one's for you Grandpa

Avery's thoughts are always entertaining and good for a laugh. I'm not sure why this thought came up because we weren't discussing raisins, but with Avery you never know where's his thoughts are coming from. Today while I was feeding Alia, this is what he says:
Avery: What doesn't Grandpa Davis like raisins?
Me: Some people just don't like them.
Avery: Oh actually it's cause he's just weird or something.
Lately everything he says has the "or something" at the end.

May 2002- April 2009

Sadly, Jade passed away tonight. He will be missed. He was the most gentle ferret I've ever known. I always called him my lap ferret because he was most content laying curled up in my lap.

September 2000 - April 2009

Blue died sometime last night with Jade at her side.

We will miss you Blue, you left us with so many fond memories.
1. You could jump so high- not normal for a ferret. We had to build our bed extra high because of you. I still have a hard time getting in it! We had to put furniture on bricks, put rocks in our plants,and cover baby gates with cardboard all because of your amazing jumping abilities.
2. You could drag things 3 times your size across the room. I remember when you were dragging grandpa's boots across the room.
3. You had an amazing ability to hide things on us. You hid Laura's Christmas gift and we didn't realize it until Christmas was over and Laura had no gift. You hid Scott's wallet and often stole socks that were left on the floor. At night I would always have to check your cubbie hole to see what new things you had acquired.
4. You let Jade know who the alpha ferret was from the moment he came home by dragging him around by his scruff for days. He saw you as his mother and is missing you!
5. You gave lots of kisses
6. You learned how to come when we clapped and called you.
7. You would roll over for a raisin.
8. You chased around and scared Venus even though she is an 85 pound black lab.
9. You managed to escape from your cage many times. The most recent being a month ago. I went to get Alia's car seat and screamed when I looked in it because I thought some animal had gotten into our home at night. I laughed when I saw it was you curled up sleeping.
10. You left us laughing so many times. Once we put tape over your cubbie hole and we chased you. You went running into your hole only to be stopped by tape!
11. You hid Venus' rope every time you came out to play.
12. Whenever we had guests you would climb through their things or try to climb up their pant legs.
13. You loved going for walks but hating being on the leash so I would carry you in my sleeve and you would poke your head out to look around.
14. You wore a diaper even though you looked ridiculous.

Happy 30th Birthday Scott!

Not so crafty

So here it goes, I have to admit it's a hard fact to swallow- Avery doesn't really like crafts. sigh. I LOVE crafts and he is less than fond of them. He will eventually do them, but they only hold his interest for a few minutes. Well, I think I found a way to hold his interest for a little longer, I just have to include outside elements.

We planted cat grass to help welcome spring


and learn to use scissors


Instead of a glitter craft, I used sand outside to make pictures with glue.


This is hanging on our fridge to help Avery to recognize his own name in print.

Easter

Avery was showing Alia some of the easter candy he found from his Easter egg hunt at Mom's


Easter egg hunt with our playgroup


Aunt Cassie


Great Grandpa Wunderlin


Mom and Joe and family


Dad and Deb and family


Aunt Amanda


Flying kites

Finally caught it....

Alia and I have many conversations and we share many smiles however it's so hard to catch these moments on camera. I finally caught her smile tonight...


And here is a video, sorry it's so long I was trying to get her to talk more.

Alia and Banana 2 months

Alia and Banana at 2 months


This picture shows her fun spunk. She kept using her head to knock herself over into Banana and then she would laugh.


Avery and Banana at 2 months. They are starting to look a little different now.

This could come in handy years down the road.....

Yes, that is my son sitting there trying to use my pump. I was nursing Alia and went to find him. When I saw him, I immediately started laughing. However he was quite frustrated because as he put it, "there's no milk in there Momma. I can't get any milk!"

They should get an award for patience

I have to take a moment to brag. My children are soooooo patient. I had no idea they would be so good this last week. We had to fly down to Georgia to find a home on Wednesday. For two days we looked at well over 25 homes. Now normally with a 2 year old and a 8 week old, this would be a huge feat but Avery and Alia were amazing. Avery enjoyed seeing each home and Alia either slept through most of it or sat quietly. If that isn't enough, they were even patient at the airport when we spent well over five hours looking for a flight. We fly stand-by and all flights home on Sunday were full. We couldn't get on any flight on Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday because they were all booked. Since we had to be home on Monday that left one option- drive 17+ hours with them. I really thought we were pushing our luck, but once again they both surprised us and did amazing! We left the airport yesterday at 3 pm and drove through the night and made it home by 9:00 am today. Ahh, the joys of flying stand-by. Avery is great at entertaining himself and I'm always impressed with the creative games he comes up with. It's great not needing toys. This is what he played with for an hour....

it's a wet wipe. He twisted it to look like a dog. When I took the picture he said, "I can't smile because I have a crazy dog with a tail." As for the house, we made an offer on one. I'll keep you posted.

They were flushed.....

This weekend we spent a fun day in Eau Claire at the Children's Museum with the Wangs.


There was a really cool exhibit showing how your body works from the time you eat the food until it ends up in the toilet. Here the kids were flushed out and are laying in the toilet water.


This was the beginning of the exhibit. Avery is climbing up the mouth toward Isaac.


Dining in the diner with Joe, Layna, Sarah and Isaac.

Snapshots of our monkeys

I guess she didn't like the bear.


The dragon and the princess


This is what Avery was doing when I was feeding Alia. He said he was spinning a web. He managed to unravel an entire roll of yarn.


Alia at 6 weeks

A house full of visitors....

We've had lots of visitors over the past 6 weeks, welcoming Alia to our family. Our home has been full of laughter, shared meals, rowdy boys, and lots of ooohs and aahhs. It's been a great 6 weeks. I can't believe the time has gone by so quickly. Thank you to everyone who has called, sent cards and gifts, brought over meals, and welcomed Alia in various other ways.


This is a picture of me holding the spoon Mom and I have passed back and forth since October 2006. Scott and I were at a friends wedding when Avery was 3 months old. I handed him a spoon to hold at the reception and we ended up taking the spoon home because it got lost under his blankets in his car seat. Since we were staying at Mom's I left it there, under her pillow. Since then, we have hidden it on one another over the years. This time Mom gave it to me with new spoons for Alia.


We enjoyed a few hours at the Mall of America. The boys loved meeting Diego.


Bama and her grandkids


Amanda's family and my family together


Grandpa and Grandma Davis with Avery and Alia

Aunt Laura