a little of this a little of that

The past few days have been good. We can pretty much start breathing normally until we sign our lives away next week. Our appraisal came in at just what we needed it to and everything is good to go, so far. We are going to close on Tuesday. I am excited to get this over with but even more excited to move in! Too bad that won't be for a little while.

Speaking of houses, Jennie and Dal's house is done and they are going to close on Monday! It's such a fantastic house, I hope Gracie enjoys it and it can be a safe place for her. Both Jennie and I are so done with this apartment nonsense, we want to move in as soon as possible!

Grace's MDCP (Medically Dependent Children's Program, the program that pays for me to care for her) contract was renewed and was approved to receive 1993 hours of respite care this year over last year's 1560. That works out to about 36 hours a week. When Grace goes to school next year full time, I can only work about 30 hours a week so during the summer and vacations I am going to be glued to the Dendy family. At least I'll have a nice second home to go to! I got a raise a few weeks ago so I am overall going to be making more money this summer. Also, at the end of May I get my yearly bonus which we found out is going to be at least $400 more than they had thought. That is a very happy surprise for us!

Last night we bought a couch and a love seat from Christi Taylor, who is a newer sister in our ward. They are very nice couches, I think we will enjoy them very much. I was planning on buying brand-new couches but these are so much nicer than anything we were looking at and at the fraction of the price. She kept them in immaculate condition considering she has 4 young girls! Right now they are in our front room, looking kind of out of place! The love seat is nestled into the sofa. It's only for a few more weeks and then we can actually enjoy them!

What else is going on? I guess that covers it. We are really thankful for everything that we have been given so far this last year. It has been such an eye-opening fantastic year. About 11 months ago Jennie asked me to be Grace's caregiver and I had no idea that by doing this for her Forest and I would be able to buy our own house in less than a year! We're so blessed.

it ours!

My reaction to this should have been posted yesterday, but we were so busy that it completely slipped my mind. On April 29th we will officially be home owners! Our loan was finally totally approved yesterday. After I got off the phone with Karmen, I was basically squeaking to Grace and I said "Gracie, we got it, we got it!" and she got so super excited it just made me laugh. She makes the sad times better and the happy times EVEN better. I can't believe that we are so lucky. It's amazing. I just wanted to let you all know that. I've got to get up early tomorrow, so I'm off to bed! Night!

hamster heaven

I need to update more than once a week! When I don't, my posts are a million miles long. I'll try to keep this one short, I promise.

I'm pretty sure Grace said Mama the other day. We have been working with her to say it and she will, but not meaningfully. I had just fed her and turned around to clean up her bowl and she peeps up and says "Mama?" like it was a question. I turned around and said "Did you just say Mama, Grace?". She got so happy and scooted over to me and was patting my knee! I said, "Can you say Mama again?" and she kept patting my leg. I went "Ohhh, I'm not Mama!" and she just laughed. It was so darn cute. I wish she would do it again. If she could say Mama when she wanted Jennie instead of screaming at her it would make our lives so much easier!

I came home from Jennie's on Saturday and Forest said "I have some sad news for you" and I said "Oh, please don't tell me that Baby died." Well, she had. How strange is it for both of our hamsters to die exactly a week apart? I held Baby Saturday morning and she was acting totally fine. Neither of them looked sick before they died. We weren't planning on getting another one, but decided to anyway. The Dendy girls were over here yesterday and I figured they would be sad hearing about Baby's death, but I think the new hamster made up for that. I let them help us name it and the name we all agreed upon was Madison, or Matty for short. She is a big ball of fluff and so cute!

Our house is clean, for once. Pretty much everything is packed that can be packed, so I'm not sure what to do on my day off. I finally bought a pair of Crocs on Saturday and I LOVE them. I walked around in them all day yesterday and my feet felt like they were on air. I had no idea my feet could feel so comfortable. I get driven nuts by tennis shoes because I feel like my feet are suffocating and flip-flops don't give me any support. Crocs are definitely a happen medium. I'm going to buy a bunch of different colors eventually, hopefully I can get them on sale like I did on Saturday. I just love them! Now that I have great comfy shoes, maybe I'll just walk around outside all day before the dreaded heat and humidity comes...