Friday
I ended up taking a half a personal day just to make sure everything got done. At noon I met Karen at Kinko's to make sure she got the programs, which were all printed and lovely. At 12:15 I was at the bank, and at 12:30 I was dropping off cash to roomie to pay for the polystyrene plates for my sister's reception. (She wanted to have zero environmental impact, so we used recycled foam plates which I promised to take back to the factory where they would recycle them again.)
Then at 1 p.m. I met with Kay, the realtor, at the house I am considering in Eaton Rapids. I found out that it was built in 1920. On this first visit, I tried to be very critical and looked into every nook and cranny. I wanted to be able to describe everything in detail to my folks and get their opinions. Here: I will describe it to you. The lot is beautiful and full of tall, old, happy trees. There is ivy growing all along the fences, and flowering bushes along the back wall. Before the realtor got there, I prowled the yard, looking at the little details. The garage (Which I think used to be a carriage house) is still full of stuff, it doesn't look like the owners have really moved out yet. It's a one-car, but it has shelves along the back wall, and a doggie-door in the far corner. In back of the garage there is a nice fenced-in kennel, hidden from the rest of the yard by bushes, that would be a great place to pen a dog, should I ever get one. One window on the garage is broken.
There is a little shed next to the garage, which is missing its doors, and contains a lawnmower and a bunch of stuff that I am assuming the owners will take away with them. There is also a rough gazebo-type thing next to that that looks like someone was doing woodworking in it. Very strange. But I could paint it white and put a picnic table in it and it would be a nice shady place for eating.
The back porch looks like a more recent addition to the house. It's fairly sturdy looking, and has a nice modern insulated door, which looks very odd on the otherwise very old-fashioned exterior. There is a shady little screened-in porch that opens into the dining room and provides a lot of privacy, since the mailbox is right there in the screened-in area. Can you imagine getting mail delivered to your door like that? I have always had to go to the curb to get mine.
The real front porch is a wide, roofed veranda with white columns in front, and a porch swing. It has a hole in the corner where is has dry rot, which made me a little bit nervous. The roof of the house is too high off the ground to see very well, but looks like it is nice. The foundation is old stonework, but looks to be very thick and unblemished.
When the realtor arrived we went inside. The front door is lovely carved oak, and when you go inside, you see that all of the original old oak woodwork is unpainted and intact. It's pretty. The living room is half of the front of the house, and the other half is a parlor. I have never in my life had a parlor, so if I get the house it will be an office or something. The parlor also has the pretty woodwork, plus it has a built-in oak hutch on one wall. The realtor points out (and it is obvious even to me) that the interior walls and ceilings all have nice new drywall and paint jobs. We won't get into the nasty color they have been painted, but lets just say that they are in good condition for someone to move in.
Behind the living room is the first floor bedroom, which is in the process of being remodeled. Rather than drywall this, they seem to have put up crappy 1970 paneling, and are in the process of trying to paint over it. Ick. Still, the carpet is new. It's in the throes of getting new windows. The closet is so full of ladders and stuff, I can't tell you how big it is. The windows throughout the first floor are about 6 feet tall, so there is lots of sunshine, which I like.
There's a door in the far corner that opens into the bathroom. The bathroom was added to the house many years after everything else, when indoor plumbing came in style. It's basically an old crawlspace with height where they stuck the plumbing in. It does, however, have a parquet wood floor in a neato pattern, and relatively modern fixtures. It also has a sunshiny window.
On the other side of the bathroom is the dining room. It has another pretty oak built-in hutch, and a really nice window looking out into the pretty tree in the side-yard. It's relatively open to the kitchen, which is very 1985, and looks like it belongs on a different house. The range is 1970 and marigold yellow. The fridge is 1983, white and very loud. The dishwasher looks to be within the last few years and is white, too. It's wierd.
Out the back of the kitchen is the mud room, which is the modern addition that leads onto that newer back porch. The carpet in there is hideous, but it's a mud room, so who cares? It's also the opening to the Michigan basement.
Definition: A Michigan basement is a basement built before 1930, when they would collect all the big rocks out of the fields and toss them in a big hole, and then cement them all together. I'd say the walls in this case are about 3 feet thick, and some of the stones involved are huge. It has hardly settled at all, and the house still sits fairly flat and intact. The floor in the basement is mud/gravel, with some cement platforms here and there. Then we come to the furnace.
If you picture the size of the average hotelroom bathroom, you have the size of this furnace. It is huge and thirty years old and terrifying. I am going to have someone inspect it before I will consider buying the house. The wiring is all relatively modern, though, and everything is 100 Amp, so modern appliances can run anywhere in the house.
Anyway, when you go upstairs, you note that the stairs have beautiful oak woodwork as well, and are lit by a nice (although leaky) window at the top. The ceilings on the top floor are a little lower than is standard, so these are good rooms for kids. The smaller bedroom has no closet, and I think would make a nice guest room. The larger one is sunny and open and airy and perfect for my munchkin.
There's a big closet up there in the hallway and in that bedroom that will need to be finished, because they are very rough inside and kind of creepy.
So that's the tour. I think the porch will be a major expense to replace, and the appliances will have to go shortly after that. On Friday my decision was that I wanted to get a handyman person in to take a look at it, so I set up an appointment with my stepdad (who can build/fix anything) to see it on Sunday. The realtor seemed to think we could make this work, and my gut instinct is to trust her. I have known Kay since I was a little kid, and know she prides herself on her integrity. I don't think she would take me to the cleaners.
After I saw the house I went to my mom's to drop off stuff for the wedding reception and get some work done there. Then I picked up roomie and the kids and we went to the rehearsal. It was stressful, of course, but I must say the kids were better behaved than some of the adults were. There was one bridesmaid who has the poise of a 5-year-old. The minute you say something to her, she is freaking out, even if you were trying to be nice. She's just a hopeless wench. After the rehearsal we went for dinner in a nice restaurant, which was enjoyable. The kids were still being very well behaved, and I got to catch up with my dad and stepmom who I haven't seen since Christmas. We went home around 10 and crashed hard.
Saturday
Wedding day. We woke up before 7 and had the kids ready to go in short order, then packed everything into the car and headed for my mom's. Roomie and the kids stayed there to help set up the reception while I got my hair done.
This hairstyle was torture. The Wench-bridesmaid decided that we would all get our hair done in this new trendy way, and of course be the most spectacular bridal party *ever*. (You have to picture her blondeness and complete idiocy to understand that statement.) These hairstyles entailed the stylist ratting out my hair, then pulling very very hard on every single strand causing me great pain, and twisting it into tiny rows going toward the back. Then, in the back it all goes into a ponytail, and then all gets curled, and then about 75 bobbypins get stuck into it on every angle, and then about a whole can of hairspray is added.
It took her an hour and a half of pulling spraying and pinning to get my hair to do this. It was a true trial of my patience.
I got back from the hairstylist in time to help with the last of the reception setup and take the girls to the campground where the wedding was held.
Now I must say that it was an absolutely beautiful day. It's the sort of thing that makes you believe that there is a loving and caring greater power who smiles down on this sort of occasion. It was 69 degrees and sunshiny with just a slight breeze and a hint of flower-scent in the air. The river at the campground was running clear and clean, and not a single boat went by the entire time we were there.
We all got dressed in the "Grace Hotel" which is an old retreat house for the church nearby. There we had a bit of champagne and got dressed up. I think the dresses turned out to be very nice, and simple and elegant. Karen looked lovely in her gown, too, and instead of a veil wore daisies, which I thought was pretty. I was proud of the girls' hair, too. I made big hand-tied bows for both of them that were pretty and sunshiny and flattering on them both. Poor Kirstin had a runny nose, and Alex was pretty tired, but they were both very well-behaved. True to my family's form, the wedding started late, but the bridal party was in the hotel singing the "Lollipop" song in 5-part harmony, so what did we care?
I will not describe the whole ceremony in depth, but I will say that it was probably the most beautiful wedding I have ever attended. There was a harpist and flautist who were wonderful, and the processional went off without a hitch just the way Karen wanted it. All of the parents on both sides walked the bride and groom down the aisle, and each got a kiss and hug before they were seated. I thought that was a nice touch. My girls were perfect angels, and walked in slowly with big smiles on their faces, and proceeded to sit still and with absolute silence through the rest of the ceremony. The vows were written just for the ceremony, and were very touching and earnest. Karen sang a song that made every single person cry with its beauty and raw emotion:
Make of our hands one hand
make of our lives one life...
Anyway, it was a song from West Side Story, and it was lovely. The bridesmaids sang the benediction, and if I say so myself, it sounded nice.
It couldn't have been more perfect. The reception was in a big tent at my mom's, and was a lot of fun. I got to see a lot of old friends, and was happy to see my sister so happy.
Most of the people left around 6, but my close family stayed around until much later. We cleared off the dance floor and danced with each other, got a little tipsy on champagne together, and had a very relaxing evening. The girls were amazingly well-behaved, but started to get tired, so around 11 roomie and I took them home. They turned into pumpkins a few blocks before the house, and we ended up putting their sleeping bodies in their beds before climbing into our own. It was a very busy day, but very nice, too.
Sunday
We got up and read the Sunday paper. Then I dropped roomie off for a few hours of solitude while Kirstin and I went to a brunch at my mom's. The immediate family was there, and Karen and Jim opened their gifts. I am sickened to say that they got every single thing they registered for, and about $2000 in cash and another $200 in Home Depot gift certificates. They got another $1900 in the mail. So they will be able to get all new appliances and cabinets for their house. And then some.
I sat there thinking that here I was, about to try to move into a new house, and trying to start my life all over again, and I was going about it all wrong. No one is going to help me out, because I am a single person, and insist on doing everything the wrong way. I am really beginning to feel like the black sheep of the family. Because I got married young and without doing all the perfect things first, my family was basically vindictive and didn't provide that sort of support. I feel rather shafted.
Of course, I'm being ungrateful. My dad has helped me out when I begged him. My mom has guilt-tripped me for it, but she helped out a few times too. Fifty dollars here and there. My dad bought some of my college books. My grandma helped me with a down payment for my car. (Though I owe it back to her someday.)
But I can't help but notice that they gave my perfect sister a $10,000 down payment for her house. My dad bought her a 1 month honeymoon in Europe. (Karen has been to Europe 4 times. I have never been out of the U.S.) Her wedding guests bought her everything she asked for and funded her house being competely refurbished. It just doesn't seem very fair to me. But I'm probably not looking at it fairly, either.
Sunday afternoon my mom and Sam and I went out to meet the realtor. Sam pawed around things, and generally didn't say much, and my mom of course asked the realtor all sorts of nosy questions about the terms of the lease option. Mom and Sam care about me, and don't want me to get screwed, which is nice.
We went to my mom's afterward and talked it over with a glass of lemonade. We agreed that the porch was a major cost and that the furnace should be checked. Sam was able to tell me I wouldn't need to worry about the roof for about 20 more years, and that if I put eavestroughs up there I could protect the porches from further damage. He generally had good things to say about it, but warned me of the hidden costs of home ownership, and how everything is always more expensive than you think it will be.
They basically agree with me that the whole thing is equally a good idea and a scary one. So the decision is back in my court. So I am going to have the furnace inspected, and have someone out to look for termites, just in case. Then maybe I will think about seeing a loan officer.
Loan officers scare me silly. I am afraid of outright rejection and terrible interest rates and being screwed, like I am being with my car.
Kay, however, says that what he will do is judge when in the future he thinks I will be "mortgageable", and set the lease option term to that date. Then it is my responsibility to keep a clean credit history between now and then, and to save up a down payment. I'm not responsible for homeowner's insurance or taxes until I excercise the option to buy, which is nice. The only hitch is that if I do a lot of work on the house and then decide I don't want it in two years, I will loose that investment of time and money.
So it's a question of commitment.
Today
I'm back at work, and really tired, and hoping Earl will leave the room so I can call my realtor and set up the inspection. I hope the furnace is okay. I did a tarot reading last night, and really think I should swallow my fear and go for it. Everything will be a juggling act, but it will be good in the end.
