Prepping the house and eating jelly beans

 September 2023

The pictures continue to be sparse in September. We began doing a few things around that house that we knew needed to be done before selling the house-like replacing the entryway floors (I so wish we had done that years ago!), finishing putting up and painting baseboards (most of the house was missing baseboards when we moved in) and other, smaller fixes. Then we reached out to a realtor thinking we were just going to get to know someone we could possibly work with and get an idea of the timeline and how much more work needed to be done. She surprised us by saying we needed to get our house on the market ASAP. She is from London and has experience moving abroad and what that timeline and transition is like, so she ended up being the perfect realtor for us. We followed her advice and immediately got to work clearing out furniture, patching holes, painting, doing yardwork, watering the lawn, and whatever else she asked us to do. It was SO much work, and I felt like we were on the edge of our seats when she came back to check our work. Thankfully, she approved and said we had done an amazing job in the two weeks we'd been working. We had cleaning and photos shortly after and then immediately put it on the market the first week of October.  If I remember right, it was on the market for about two weeks. We had 4 days of open houses and lots of showings during the week. It was EXHAUSTING to keep the house "showing ready" at all times and to be out of the house so much, but it ended up working out great for us. We got a lot of offers and a few really great ones that included allowing us to rent back until we were ready to move. Hallelujah!! We wouldn't have to move twice! In hindsight, I am so glad we listened to the timeline and urgency that our realtor suggested. With the good weather and beating the holiday lull, I think we sold much faster and at a higher price than we would have once the rain and the holidays started. Plus, we had no idea what a relief it would be to have our house sold, and one less (giant) detail to worry about. We ended up closing in the middle of November and renting back through the first week of January when we left for Dallas. It all worked out SO well!

Amid all of the work and stress of preparing our house to sell, we were still knee deep in soccer season/coaching, piano lessons, teaching elementary, taking online classes, primary activities, and so on. This was truly the busiest season of life we have ever had. I think we managed to have some fun and down time along the way, and the kids were very good about creatively entertaining themselves and playing together. 

They spent most of a Saturday creating a web in the living room

Andrew being an absolute boss installing the floors in the entry way. He said it went much better this time compared to when he installed the floors in our bathroom. I think it helped that the entry only has two places where it isn't just a rectangle. 

Moving all the furniture away from the walls so that I could caulk and paint the baseboards. It's crazy what a difference it makes in a room to have baseboards installed. 

Birthday party for a friend from church!

Primary activity

First time going on a field trip as a teacher (spoiler, it was exactly like going on a field trip as a parent. I even still had to pay for myself). The boys had a lot of fun at Jelly Belly, and Adaline was very jealous that she didn't get to come. I love watching my kids be curious.

At school this year, Adaline added the saxophone to the list of instruments she is learning how to play. She was kind enough to let her brothers try it too. 

How Adaline spent most soccer games.

I tried to grab a picture of Andrew coaching. This was so fun for him!

Rearranging our house for photos/showings. Even though it objectively looked better when we staged the house, it definitely felt less functional and less cozy. It was amazing to see the listing pictures and think, I can see that this is our house, but also how is this our house? haha It was even crazier to compare them to the listing pictures from when we bought the house. I'll have to include all of those in the next post. 

These creative kids found plenty of uses for the dog poop bags at the park. I tried to limit how many they used, obviously, but one of their games involved wearing them as hats. They're so tight that they hold all of the air in them and stick straight up. lol gets me every time.