Spring has Sprung

Please ignore the dead grass, the weeds that need to be pulled and the fact that the flower bed really needs a fresh layer of pine needles.

I took this picture a few days ago, this morning every one of the tulips had bloomed! Tulips are my favorite flower and seeing them bloom just brings a smile to my face!

Sev and I are going to look at more potential homes this weekend. I'm tired of looking, but we can't really stop looking until we find something...though I have threatened to just live in a cardboard box!! It's stressful, but my fingers are crossed that we'll find something soon!!

I met with Marcy yesterday (the lady that does Japanese straightening) and she was GREAT! I'm happy to report I scheduled an appointment with her and my wild hair days will soon come to an end! She was also very professional, very sweet and very reasonably priced! Woohoo!

I stayed up late last night working on my latest cake creation. It was a task that proved to be harder than usual. Matt and I have begun the process of taking all of my kitchen items out and putting his items in. It's a slow process (we both work full-time and only have about 1 hour in the evening to pack and unpack) and therefore we have a lot of items strewn around the kitchen, laid out on the counter tops and sitting in boxes. Basically, I don't know where anything is and I realized just how frustrating not know where anything is can be! I managed to make do and fell asleep around midnight. I've decided to put all cake making on hold until we have found a place to live and I can unpack...I never really thought much about the layout of a kitchen, but that seems to be one thing I'm paying more and more attention to as we house hunt. "Gourmet kitchen" Yes please!

Here is a picture of the cake I made last night:

That's all for now!! Have a great weekend!!

On An Upbeat Note

I realized I've been kind of whiny in my last few posts.
So this post is going to be about the things that are currently making me happy.

Someone please look at my cake blog http://4theluvofcake.blogspot.com/ , notice anything new?! How cute is the new design!! One of my best friends, Kelly, is a graphic designer...and I pretty much adore her work. I finally broke down and asked her to work her magic on my cake blog, I flat gave up! I can design a cake but heaven help me when it comes to computers!! My computer designing skills go as far as the "paint" program that comes standard on any computer...yeah, it's sad.
I love it! Let me know what you think. Also, check out her blog http://www.kellykguk.blogspot.com/ , she can design just about anything for any occasion!

I don't know if any of you have seen me in person lately, but my hair is between "oh my gosh, did you see her hair..that is sad, bless her heart!?" and "runnnnnnnn it's a wild, crazy, hairy thing!!" Uhm, yeah, it's pretty bad. I have had my hair Japanese straightened since...well, since the first year I lived in Hawaii, so almost 5 years now. I can. not. express. how amazing the transformation was! I vowed then to NEVER, EVER, EVER, EVER not get my hair Japanese straightened. It was worth every, single, little, very expensive, penny!! My long time friends and family can vouch for this. When I moved back to Columbia I had a hard time finding a very reputable, professional, years of experience hair stylist, that offered Japanese straightening. I went through two, very sad, process with a hair salon in downtown Columbia, that while they DID straighten my hair, they also managed to break off lots of hair around the nape of my neck and in the bang area. It was sad, but thankfully I have VERY thick hair, and could cover it up easily...so I actually went to the salon twice before I finally decided enough was enough and I NEEDED to find a better salon!! It has taken me months of research but I think I have finally found her! http://www.straightasstring.com/ . I have an appointment with her tomorrow and, fingers crossed, I will FINALLY be on my way to a much calmer, smoother, silkier, non-frightening for small children, hair style!!

My mother bought me a few bags of tulip bulbs last fall and Sevy graciously planted them. Today, we have the most amazing tulips around Matt's mailbox. I LOVE spring, it is my favorite time of the year! I'm ready for green grass, flowers in bloom and birds chirping!! For me, it's the most inspiring time of year!

Just Some Stuff

Tell me that is not cute! That's little man, Ali. He likes to hide under beds and stick only his head (and tongue) out.



Currently I am:


* Uploading cake pictures to my cake blog!

* Hanging on to the last strands of my sanity!

* Drowning in boxes and packing materials.

* Getting sick and tired of looking for a place to call "home".

* Trying to be patient and understand that everything will come and happen when it's suppose to!

* Getting tired of people telling me to be patient, lol.

* Watching mindless TV shows (like Dancing with The Stars, that I'll admit I watched last night and lost 1hr of my life on) just to keep my mind from going crazy with planning...or not planning.

* Designing a cake for a 1 year old, the son of a SMC college friend.

* Going through my camera and uploading, deleting, and storing pictures...I think I just heard a "it's about time" somewhere in the distance.


Here is one of me and the only other female rider, Kellie:

Ohhhh and look at this one!! This is a perfect example of what my world currently looks like!!! (Disclaimer: No furry, long tongued, creatures were harmed in the taking of this photo).

Okay, that's enough random stuff for today!!
Happy Tuesday!!


oh and ps. I'm sick of hearing about the new health care bill...it makes me sad for America :(

Still in the Process of Packing

Sev and I have officially moved out of our old bedroom. We did that this past Saturday. Oh, how weird it is!
We moved all of our bedroom furniture into storage Saturday, along with the rest of our dining room furniture. I managed to minimize my closet down into a small, itsy,bitsy, teeny,weeny space and put the rest of the clothes, shoes, purses, belts...etc.etc. into storage.
I feel like I know the true meaning of "like sardines in a can"! Though, I can't complain. I have a bed to sleep in every night and a roof over my head!
We are still in the process of packing up our kitchen and all of the items we had stored in our attic, garage and office. It's a slow process, mainly because I demand that I have a say in where everything goes, how it is packed and how it is handled...it's the OCD....but the process is slowly coming along.
I have managed to loose my camera in all of the disarray, but I know it's not packed up, just stuck somewhere (presumably in a place that I deemed "safe" at one point) and waiting to be found.
I hope to find it soon, I have pictures I want to take and pictures that I want to post.
Matt is getting the cable and internet hooked up today. We cancelled our service with time warner last week. They came out last night to turn it all off...just to come back out today and turn it back on for Matt. Seemed pointless to me, but whatever.

It is a very weird feeling to no longer be home owners. I feel a bit sad and then again a bit of relief.
This weekend we're taking a break from it all and going to spend some time with my dad.
I'm sick of house hunting...it is seriously, slowly, driving me crazy (and no I wasn't already crazy). So I hope this weekend will help to get us refreshed and ready to start it all over next week.

Happy Wednesday!

Just some things...

I've got that antsy feeling that I get, probably, a little too often.
That feeling that I'm not doing what I'm suppose to be doing and I'm not where I'm suppose to be.
It's really a frustrating feeling.
It's that feeling that has kept me from keeping one job for more than one year at a time. Which, by the way, can I say how excited I was when I realized that I only have one W2 to use when I file taxes for 2009 (yes I said "when". I have yet to do our taxes...please refer to all of the other posts where I mention my slacker tendencies if this bit of information was at all shocking to you). I'm almost embarrassed to admit that my record is 5 W2's in a year (in my defense that was back in my college days when I held multiple part time jobs throughout the semesters).
So I'm starting to get that antsy feeling again...maybe because we sold our house, I feel a bit of "what's next" syndrome...or maybe it's the weather.

I'm pretty exhausted. This whole house selling process was pretty draining. It had not quite hit me, until last night, that we no longer owned our house. We moved all of our furniture out of our bedroom and I was a little bit sad. It is all going into storage until we decide where we'll be living next. I stayed up until midnight packing. Now, don't think that I waited until last night to pack! No, for once I did not slack, I have been packing since we first put our house under contract. However, last night was the big bulk of it and I'm such a perfectionist that it tends to take me a longgg time to get things packed and organized just the way I like it.
I do not like this in between stage feeling...it makes me feel like I'm constantly missing something, and that is not referring to actually loosing stuff in the whole packing process (like Ali or the packing tape when "I JUST had it! Where did it go guys??" or Sevs keys, this morning, when he realized he had laid them on the coffee table...the coffee table that is now covered in 3 feet of stuff to be packed and impossible to even get to from all the boxes stacked around it.) No, it makes me feel like I'm missing a part of me, my home, my place of being. I feel upside down and off my normal everyday course.

I'm also exhausted from house hunting. I have come to despise HGTV "house hunters" or "property virgin"...those people just walk right into a place, two...three tops and find the "perfect place! Oh this is exactly what we're looking for!"....it does NOT happen like that in the Mullen household. Nope. We can't find hide nor hair of our perfect home! **sigh**

I'm tired and I'm ready for this stage to be over with.


Oh look the suns out!! I hope my mood changes :) Have a lovely weekend ya'll and if you feel like packing, head my way! I have a few boxes and some packing tape (somewhere, I'll find it!) that has your name allllll over it ;)

Finally Finished with another First

Sev and I sold our very first house today.
We started talking about putting our house on the market last fall.
We have known since we moved to Columbia that this was not "home". We were aware that the economy would not be in our favor and we thought it might be best if we put our house on the market before the whole "tax credit" program expired. We talked about how the house had a good chance of not selling and being on the market for quite some time. The holidays quickly came and we decided to put off listing our house until after the New Years. We met with the realtor, we had decided to use, on Tuesday, February the 9th and decided on a listing price. I was still unsure of everything, something was telling me to wait, so I asked him to leave the paper work and we would sign it and return it to him on Thursday.
On Wednesday we met Matt for a "welcome to SC" dinner. He told us he had been house hunting all day, was exhausted and had not found a thing.
Of course, the sales person in me jumped straight to "Well, Matt we're selling our house, why don't you check it out?"
I seriously did not expect anything, we were asking a price above what he wanted to spend and really...who gets that lucky?
He agreed to come by the house after dinner "just to see".
We came home and I put every bit of my marketing skills to use, ha...no really.
He left that night after asking if we would wait until Friday to list our house. Who wouldn't agree to that?
I can not even begin to explain the pins and needles I was on until Friday evening. Matt went house hunting all day Thursday and all day Friday. Friday evening he called me and asked if we would meet him for dinner, he wanted to let us know what he had decided.
Can you believe he made us wait until after the appetizer before he said "Hey, let's do this, I want to buy your house!"
I've heard there is no such thing as "luck" only "Gods plan in action"...man did he throw me for a complete loop, that was honestly the last thing I expected.
The following Monday we met and signed the contract.
I refused to tell anyone for fear that it was all too good to be true.

Severyn and I had no clue what to do! Our house was under contract and we had no idea what to do or where to go. We were one month away from being homeless! We fully expected the house to be on the market for awhile, but never for it to sell so quickly.
That's when I had a Eureka! moment...Matt was staying in a hotel until closing...but what if we let him move in with us? Then...when we closed, we could just stay with him until we found a place to go! This would buy us some more time to find a place and give us a month or two to save some money! Matt quickly agreed (who wants to live in a hotel??!!) and the plans were set. Matt moved in with us the week he signed the contract.

We closed on our house today at 2pm. Sev and I are no longer homeowners. We thought we wanted to jump straight into buying another house, but could not find anything that made us want to commit more years to living in Columbia. We are now looking to rent until Sev graduates and then....we'll decide where we want to call home.

We're excited, I was a little sad...it was our very first home! and I keep thinking about all of the fun I had decorating the house and making it into a home. However, I am very ready for the next chapter in our lives.

At 2pm Today

Sev and I will experience another "first" in life.
I will write more on this later.

Currently I am nervous, scared, excited, sad, happy, ready, not so ready, curious, and interested.

It's not a huge deal, but it's fairly big to me and Sev, so if you want to say a quick little prayer we would appreciate it :)

It's been a while...

and I realize that. I actually started a few posts...they are in my drafts to prove it...but then I get distracted, or busy, or bored (it happens,ok) and I never finish them. Which is something I'm GREAT at (hey everyone needs to be good at SOMETHING!). So...forgive me.
Actually...my last post, in my drafts folder, is all about how I can never seem to accomplish anything....which includes the ending of that post, hence the reason you never read it ;)

Onward...

I have been CRAZY BUSY lately. Please note: not just busy but crazy busy, there is a difference!
My house looks like a bomb exploded...and I'm not like my mother when I say that (mom says that when she has a small pile of laundry to put away and maybe a dish in the sink)...I'm being 100% serious, if anyone were to see my house I'm certain a team of search and rescue would be sent in to find missing people! Though, the only family member we have lost was Ali. I really panicked at one point and thought he may have gotten scooped up with the mounds of clothes and thrown into the laundry or tossed in a box along with items that were being donated. I found him outside, apparently someone had let him out and I didn't know it....there is no telling how long he was out there (another reason I don't have kids!).

Why am I on such a cleaning spree? Well, the main reason I'll share tomorrow. However, another reason would be the fact that I'm TIRED of JUNK! I HATE disorganization, it makes me cranky! I hate not being able to find things in my house! I hate things falling out of closets when I open doors (okay, it was never THAT bad...but to me, it was bad!). I start to panic when items are not where they belong. I am a firm believer that everything has a place and it drives me nuts if I don't have a place for something. I get all of this honest. My father is organized to a T and my mother...well, we joke that she keeps her home ready for Better Homes and Garden to come in and start snapping pictures.

Last Friday I pulled up to Goodwill (the location near my work has a drive up drop off!!! really cool and convenient) and unloaded a trunk load of stuff. It. felt. GREAT!
I have not had the urge to buy one item in the past month (or more). All I can see when I step into a store is JUNK.

I don't know how long this current attitude will last, I hope it lasts long enough to actually FINISH the entire organizing/cleaning/purging process!...but we know how that goes ;)