I Do

It's really been on my heart lately to write a blog about marriage. I know I briefly wrote about how my view of the level of difficulty of marriage has changed since getting married, but I'd like to vent a little about divorce. Why do people think that by getting married their spouse will change or that by getting married their circumstances will improve or that being married will make them happier?? Before Nick and I got married we had lots of discussion about our views on divorce and we came to the agreement that if we have major issues that come up, then we will exhaust every resource and we will both have to work to get out of the marriage. It seems that the seriousness behind the commitment of marriage has been lost. The media has presented marriage as a temporary thing. And it's so funny to watch movies that show a married couple waking up with smiles on their faces and full of passion for 1 another right when they wake up. Reality is that hitting the snooze button or discussing who is going to shower first or what bills need to be put in the mail that day are usually more likely to occur. I think the media has caused lots of people to have this glamorous idea of what marriage and love is about. I wish there were more shows out there that portrayed real couples dealing with everyday life. I am so blessed to have the peace behind my decision to marry Nick. There is no doubt in my mind that God wrote our love story and that He called us to be together. I feel very fortunate to have that assurance, I know not every married couple can say that. I also feel extremely blessed to have my best friend as my husband. Notice that I didn't say, my husband as my best friend. Nick was my best friend first and that is how our love began. I can and do tell him everything. Marriage is not about being in love, you fall in love first and then get married to express your commitment to that love. You may not always experience butterflies in your stomach or have sweet notes in your lunch box (like Nick does for me sometimes) but instead you believe in the love that you share and hold on to it when times get tough. I meant what I said, when I said "I do."

Housing Buying Tips

Since we moved into our house back in June, we've had several friends approach us with questions about our house buying process. So I thought I would share a few of the tips we learned along the way!

1. Get pre-approved before you ever step foot into a potential house. It's very easy and painless to get pre-approved. Pre-approval does not mean loan approval, it means you have a price range to start your house hunt. You can get pre-approved by any bank or lender, it doesn't have to be from the bank or lender you're going to use.

2. Get a full-time realtor! I cannot stress this point enough! Believe me when I say, you want a full-time realtor! Even if your best friend in the whole wide world is a realtor and you want to use them as your realtor, if they're not full-time I would not recommend using them. I also strongly suggest using someone that has at least 2 years of experience in real estate. Our initial realtor was a friend of Nick's and was part-time and she was not dedicated at finding our first house.

3. Do NOT sign "exclusive rights to represent buyer" form. Realtors will try to make you sign this document even before they show you 1 property, but do not sign it! Wait to sign it seconds before you put in your first offer on a place. If you sign this document then you have to stick with that realtor and if you don't then you have to pay them money!

4. Ask the right questions. Don't be afraid to ask your realtor and lender thousands of questions. It's not everyday that you buy your first house so by all means take it seriously and ask every question you can think of! Here are some key questions to ask - what are the terms of my loan?, are there penalties for paying more on my loan from month-to-month?, can I change the term of my loan from 30 years to 15 years, years later?, do I have a transferable mortgage loan?, is it a fixed interest rate?, what are the terms to get out of contract with this property if I decide I no longer want to buy it?, what is earnest money?, and the list goes on and on!

5. Before you even meet with a realtor and after you have been pre-approved, I would highly suggest determining what price range you feel comfortable with. The lender will approve you for waaaay more than what you're comfortable with paying each month. We were approved for $100,000 more than what we ended up buying. It's very important to look at your budget and play around with #s to determine your price range. You also want to determine how much, if any, down payment are you going to put down. Here's a tip from our lender - for every thousand dollars you can account for $6 a month in mortgage costs. So for example, the difference in a $240,000 and a $230,000 house is $60 a month.

6. Once you decide you like a house, it's better than all the other ones you've seen, sleep on it and see the house for a second time, or third time before you put in an offer. I'm always amazed when I hear of people only seeing a house 1 time and before buying it. We saw our house 3 times before we put in an offer. It's also important to see the house at different times of the day. The same house might feel scary or weird at night but look and feel great during the day.

7. Research what future road construction plans are for the surrounding areas. Your realtor can help you find out that information. The first house we were under contract for had plans for 540 to go in at 1/4 a mile from our backyard. The last thing you want is to move in and then find out that a major highway is going in your backyard.

8. Make sure any updates or work that's been done on the house has been permitted and the permits are on file. Also, make sure all work done on the house has been paid. If a contractor has done the work and they have not been paid then you may want to consider walking away. The reason I say this is there could be a lean on the property and if your offer price does not cover the expenses then the contractor could come into your new home and rip out all the work he's done.

9. Put in your lowest offer first. Do not worry about offending the seller, if they are offended then you can always put in a second, higher offer. You can increase your offer but you can never go down in your offer so keep that in mind. You can also change the amount of closing costs your asking for and not go up on your offer price. Before putting in an offer ask your realtor to pull up comps in the area, this will help you determine if the asking price is way too high or just right.

10. Always have an inspection done on the house and be there when the inspection is taking place. Inspections can point out possible repairs or problems with the house. Inspections also allow you to learn about the house you're buying. Our inspector pointed out that we may want to consider putting locks on the crawl spaces for when kids come along. We never would have thought of that. Our inspector also pointed out the main cut off switches for our house.

11. Once you have the inspection report, review it, ask questions if you don't understand something, and negotiate with the sellers to fix all or some of the problems in the report. We asked the sellers of our house to fix 3 out of 5 things that the inspector pointed out. They were easy, very inexpensive repairs, but it saved us the time, trouble, and money to not have to fix it after we moved in.

12. This one may seem like common sense, but make your list of "must haves" and "would be nice but not deal breakers" lists prior to meeting with your realtor. These lists will really help your realtor find potential houses for you to look at.

There are lots of other tips I could share with you, but these are the main tips I think are important when buying a house.

3 Year Anniversary

Yesterday was our 3 year dating anniversary! It was a very chaotic day for both of us. I had to travel to Fayetteville for work and Nick had a job interview from 9:45 until 2. My day did not get off to a great start. The fog was very thick at 6:45 when I left my house so I could hardly see and with battling with my GPS, trying to use windshield wipers and defrost to see, and trying not to crash the State car, I was not positive the day would turn out as planned. After figuring out I was going the wrong way, North instead of South, I was anxious to get to Fayetteville on time. It's amazing to me how a GPS tells you to turn the wrong way when it's suppose to direct you to your destination. I think our GPS frequently does that because it really often loses signal. Moving on to when my day got better - Nick and I met up at Firebirds in North Hills for dinner to celebrate our anniversary! We were both dressed up and relieved and excited to see each other. My day was crazy and not how I had planned the day to go and Nick was relieved to have the interview behind him so when we finally saw each other (1.5 hours after we planned on meeting up) we were excited. Dinner was good. We used a gift card we received as a wedding present. In 3 years of being together I must say I have learned a lot - a lot about life, a lot about myself and about Nick, and a lot about relationships. Here's just a few things I've learned in the last 3 years. 1) Never go to bed angry! This has been a hard lesson for us to learn and we still have not mastered it. When I go to bed angry I always have a bad dream and it usually involves us breaking up or him cheating on me. Needless to say gong to bed angry makes for a very bad morning. After a bad dream like that, I wake up feeling even more angry than the night before. Anger can grow over time if the conflict is not resolved. That brings me to my next lesson. 2) It's important to learn how to settle arguments. Nick likes to retreat and take a breather when he's angry or frustrated. Me on the other hand wants attention to be drawn to the conflict right away. I don't want to retreat, I want to talk it out right then. If I'm upset, frustrated, sad, or angry I want to talk it out and very quickly reach a compromise and feel better. If someone hurts my feelings, I want to be over it really quickly so I want the person that hurt me to apologize right away so I can feel better. Everyone has their own way of resolving conflict. For me it's important that we reach a compromise or agree to disagree. I also need to hear "I'm sorry." 3) It's important to learn your partner's love language. Nick and I both love to receive quality time. At this point with no kids it's easy to make time for one another. We have date nights where we watch a redbox movie, play board games, or go out to eat. We like cooking together and watching movies. I also need to hear words of affirmation to know that I am loved. This can be hard for Nick since it's not natural for a guy to express his feelings. We are really good at telling each other that we appreciate each other and we very often say "I love you." To make it easier on Nick, almost every night before we go to sleep I ask "what was your favorite thing about today?" I ask because usually the answer makes me feel good and it lets me know whether or not he's satisfied with the quality time for the day or if we didn't get to spend any time together. 4) Communication is learned. I thought I knew how to communicate before we got married but now I'm starting to think I had no clue! Looking back now it's kinda funny but when we first got married there were many times our lack of communication was obvious! One day we left the apartment to go see a couch from off Craiglist. We had taken money out of the bank to buy the couch but when we got about 5 miles away, I asked, "did you bring the money?" And Nick answered, "no I thought you grabbed it." I hadn't grabbed the money and I hadn't asked him to bring it. It really made me laugh that neither one of us thought to ask the other about the money until after we left. We are becoming better communicators. I'm learning to never assume that something is a given or of course he would think of that because I would. No, Nick does not think like me and I shouldn't expect him to. And my last lesson to you is pray together. Nick and I were really good about praying together when we first started dating but as time went on and we got busy and more comfortable in our relationship, praying together became less of a priority. I'm ashamed to say that but it's the truth. Since we've been married prayer is a bigger priority for us. We try really hard to do our devotional together and pray together before bed. It doesn't always happen, but we try. The biggest thing is not forgetting and not letting excuses, like I'm too tired, get in the way. Simply by praying together you are brought closer together. Prayer also makes it easier for me to trust God.

I am extremely thankful that God brought us together 3 years ago!

Labor of Love

Yesterday was my first day of my new babysitting job. It went really well! The kids are super sweet and very cute! I was really impressed by their behavior and how well they played together. I'm hoping yesterday was a true representation of how they are and not a false first impression. I am thrilled to have extra money coming in! The money will allow us to buy Christmas presents this year and not feel guilty about it because Nick may or may not have a job lined up by then. And yesterday I had my birth control prescription transferred to Kerr Drug so I now have a $25 gift card for transferring it. I love getting free gift cards! And they have this cool reward program where after you get a prescription filled 10 times you get a free $10 gift card! I imagine I can find a gift or two for Nick for Christmas and use my gift card.

This weekend we worked in our yard for about 3 hours. Nick cut down 3 trees - one in our backyard and two in our side yard. We are slowly making progress in our yard and hopefully one day it will look ten times better than when we moved in. We have found some pretty random stuff in our yard. We have found - pieces of glass, bottle caps, 3 baseballs, broken pieces of toys, a propane tank, an umbrella stand, a basketball goal, a tire, a rusty kick stand off a bike, a silver fork, and I'm sure the list will continue as we continue to work in the yard. My favorite find was the tire and rusty kick stand. It's kind of funny finding stuff that was left behind, however it really proves to us that the previous owners did not take care of their yard, especially the backyard. Just reading that list above, you'd think we live in a trailer park but we don't.

That's all for now! - Mrs. T

Saving for the Future

Our electric bill is $20 less than last month! woohoo!!! I guess not having our AC on upstairs for 3 days and changing out some light bulbs for CFL ones saved us a few bucks! Even though it's only $20, I see it as God's way of looking out for us. We love our house and we don't want to move. We did some major cosmetic improvements inside and now we are trying to improve our yard so with all the time, sweat, and tears that we have put into making our house look better, I don't want to move. Nick has applied for 25 jobs so far. I am so proud of him for getting a jump start on the job hunt. We are really hopeful. Out of the two of us, I am the more positive one, I think Nick will have a job lined up before Thanksgiving, while Nick tends to think in terms of worse case scenario. We are really mindful of our financial situation and what it could be if Nick spends any time being unemployed. The secret behind saving money is making smart choices. We take our lunch to work every day, we don't go out to eat or to the movies, and we don't buy anything we don't need. We enjoy date nights at home with redbox rentals and $4 frozen pizza from Wal-Mart. Last Saturday and Sunday we spent the afternoon working in our backyard and then playing board games. We played Uno and Battleship. We are competitive when we play against each other so it's really fun! I share all this with you to point out that you don't have to spend a lot of money in order to enjoy life. To me saving money is fun! We could go to the movies and spend maybe $7 on gas to get there, $14 on tickets, and $12 on popcorn and drinks, but while we might enjoy the movie, we would spend $32. It's way more appealing to me to spend $2 on gas to drive to redbox, $1.11 on the movie, and $4 on pizza made in our oven, a grand total of $7.11. We also enjoy playing Wii games together. I kick Nick's butt when we play darts and bowling. I grew up watching my parents live pay check to pay check and it always made me sad. I'm hoping that by us saving money and pinching pennies now that our children will not have to see us struggle financially. I want to be able to afford annually family vacations and pay for college tuition without going in debit.

The Shock of A Lifetime

We were just starting to love owning our home and then we found out that Nick will be losing his job as early as December 31st. This was a major shock to us and to everyone that works there. In the weeks that led up to that announcement, we had received very promising news that Nick could see a 5% raise in his annaul salary. So we were all excited about that possibilty and what we could use the extra money on each month. We also were begining to really enjoy our house and the fact that we had everything we needed and could finally go on date nights and not worry about having to save money. We were really looking forward to those date nights. But now, we are trying our best to deal with the shock and emotions that this news brings. Thankfully, I have my job and we are childless and not pregnant. I would be a complete emotional mess right now if I didn't have my job or if we had a baby on the way. I am grateful for the little things that we have, like, the fact that Nick's parents gave us a garden hose, rake, and CFL lght bulbs. Yesterday I changed out some light bulbs in our house and I am amazed when I think about how God had his parents give those to us and now they will help us save money on our electric bill. The box says it saves 10 cents a month and $37 over the lifetime of each bulb. I am also thankful for all the extra household necessities that we have laying around. We have 2 extra boxes of tissue, 3 extra boxes of dryer sheets, 14 paper towel rolls, 35light bulbs, and 2 unopened boxes of trash bags. My family gave us all those items to us at no cost to us and we will save money by not having to buy those items any time soon. That only relieves some stress. I am so thankful. God provided us with lots of extras knowing that Nick's job situation was going to happen and that we would begin to feel the stress of having to save money. We also have a gift card to Firebirds that we received as a wedding gift. We have not used it yet because there's only 2 locations in this area and they are both far from where we live. We plan to use the gift card on our 6 month wedding anniversary so we can celebrate without feeling guilty about spending money. It's hard to believe that next month we'll have been married for 6 months! We know that God has a plan for us that is better than we can imagine or understand right now. We are trusting that God will lead Nick to a job that he will love and that it will be local. I am praying really hard that if we are not meant to stay in this area and live in our dream house that God will close doors here and will make me content with the idea of moving. At this point I find it hard to believe that God would lead us to our house only to have us move. Thank you for praying for us. Please pray for Nick's fellow employees as well, some are single parents, some have babies on the way, some are single, some are living pay check to pay check, and some are the sole providers for their families. We will keep you posted on Nick's job situation.

Blessed

I will say it again & again, we are blessed! I say it a lot because it's true. I had an emotional moment during church on Sunday. I started realizing how much has gone on during the last 6 months. First we bought a used car in January, my first car that is truly mine, well, ours'. Then in March we got married and then in April we started looking at houses. On our first month anniversary we were in Nags Head for our Best Man's wedding and then on our second month anniversary we were signing our loan application for our house and then on our third month anniversary we woke up for the first time in our house. A lot has happened in my life during the last 6 months and I have enjoyed every minute of it! We had our house warming party on Saturday. It went really well. There were so many people in our house, I didn't think we had that many people in our lives that cared about us enough to come to our house. It really meant a lot to us that people drove 20 - 80 miles to see our house and celebrate with us. Throughout the whole searching and buying process of getting our house God was in control and undoubtably with us every step of the way. It amazes me and I'm so thankful that God gave us an unsettling feeling about the first house we were under contract with. We had a lot of restless nights and every time I even thought about buying stuff for that house, I would get nervous and feel uneasy about how expensive living in that house was going to be. Once we decided that we didn't want to proceed in buying that house we were not sure we could move on because we were under contract, a legal bounding document. It was only through God's power that we were able to get out of that contract. It was then that we really started counting our blessings. Our realtor even thought it was impossible to get out of it, but God made it happen. I have always believed Romans 8:28 and it's often been my comfort verse and I'm happy when things happen that prove to non-Christians that the verse is true and God is good, not evil. On Sunday I was emotional because I started reflecting on everything God has done in my life - changing my heart to love Nick and not just as a friend. He wrote an awesome love story for me, giving me a job, blessing me with parents that love my husband and have always been supportive and love me unconditionally, giving me a house that is way beyond what I ever dreamt of for myself, and I have never been without anything I ever needed. Don't get me wrong, there have been struggles along the way, however God has blessed me and given to me beyond measure, more than I could hope for or dream of.