Where did the month of September go? It didn’t feel much like September here, since we had a very warm spell of weather, and our foliage is just starting to finally change now.
We’ve had a lot of crazy stuff going on, which I guess may be why the month has flown by for us. At the beginning of the month, I bought a new Wag-Woof Mobile (as we call it because of my vanity plate). I’ve been wanting leather interior to make the fur clean up easier, and our local Toyota dealership made me an offer I couldn’t refuse! You may have seen these couple of photos on social media earlier this month.
Not long after that, the Dadz took two weeks off from work, and went away for three days, which is an unusual occurrence! So I had the 4-5 am “wake-up for breakfast” call with the dogs – yikes! It was only for two mornings though, so I survived.
On Labor Day weekend, when we were waiting to pick up my new car, the Dadz and I got talking about something we both had been thinking but kept to ourselves. He had made a comment in passing that I ignored at the time because I needed some more time to stew on the subject.
I’ve been saying for a long time that we are getting older and need to start thinking about how we’re going to stay in our current house, which you can’t get in and out of without climbing a lot of stairs. Which is fine for us now, though it’s already been an issue with our senior dogs at times (and with Luke when his knee was bad). Along with that, things have changed over the years and we’ve gotten to the point where we don’t really use our whole house (we have 3 levels of living). There’s at least 2-3 rooms that get little to no use, and I’m tired of cleaning spaces that do nothing but collect dust and pet hair!
Long story short, we decided to start looking around to see if we could find a ranch style house (in our area – we want to stay close to family), and started talking to a realtor about selling ours. We looked at two different houses, and started doing some serious clean up on ours. Long story short, we’ve put our house on the market and made an offer on another (contingent on selling ours).
So it’s been a busy, stressful time, and I’m glad my hubby was on vacation so he could spend more time with the dogs through all of this craziness. Mostly it’s just been time consuming, but it’s also been a bit stressful for Luke to have a stranger (the realtor) at our house, and we’ve had to manage that situation. He does OK…one thing about Luke is that as soon as the stranger is gone (or even out of his sight), he’s fine. The weather has been nice so we were able to keep the dogs outside. I’ll tell you more about how Luke did on the next Positive Pet Training Hop post, but overall I think he did as well as expected.
Now the dust has settled a bit, and we’re just waiting for the first showing of our house (we will take the dogs for a ride when showings happen), and to see if our offer is accepted on the other.
By the way, both houses we looked at already had fenced in yards, and nice quiet places to walk the dogs. Yes, the dogs are a big consideration in our house hunting! Of course, I’m concerned with how they’ll do with a move. They’ve lived in this house their whole lives. I worry less about Samantha, because I’ve moved with cats many times over the years before we settled here, and they’ve always done fine. I’ve never moved with a dog, because we got our first dog after building this house.
This wasn’t an easy decision for us either. We had this house custom built 22 years ago, and we’ve made a lot of changes and put a lot into it over those years. There’s a lot of happy memories here, but we will take those with us and ultimately I know that a home is where your family is. I think the dogs and Samantha will feel the same way. As long as we are there, they are going to be fine. Plus we’ll do everything we can to make the transition easier for them.
We also know that we may not be able to sell this house for what we feel it is worth, so we may just end up staying here. We believe that everything will work out for the best in the long run.
October is shaping up to be a busy month as well! I think I have something going on at least one day of almost every weekend, but in the middle of all that, we’ll be sticking to our normal routines as much as possible. Plus we’ve got Walk Your Dog Week starting, so the dogs will be getting extra walks, and I know that will be good for all of us.
If you haven’t read our post about the week yet, please read “Coming October 1st: Our Walk Your Dog Week Celebration Begins and hopefully you’ll join us in daily walks for one week and beyond!
I’ve fallen behind in my blog reading again. I’ve been trying to stay busy playing with Shadow and Ducky to ease their heartache as well as my own. Then Shadow tore her toenail and all play in the yard stopped. By the time it grows back, it will be snowing again.
You HAVE been busy haven’t you?! Congrats on the new WAGWOOF mobile! I still want an Equinox (Chevy), but I don’t want the car payments. My Impala and Sam’s truck are both still very comfortable and in excellent condition, despite their age. So, now that Ducky doesn’t need the travel crate any more, and Callie’s in Heaven, we don’t need a larger car any more.
PS. Good luck with selling/buying the houses!! If it’s meant to be, it will be. With both of us retired now, the only way we could afford to move would be if we won the lottery.
Taking care of your girls and yourself is very important, the blogs will always be here when things settle down and you’re all feeling better.
Thanks on the house! We are approaching retirement age now, and that’s one reason I want to move now…if we don’t, we may never be able to. But if we end up staying here, that is OK too. The offer we made on one house was refused, but that’s OK, there’s other houses out there!
Wow!!! You guys have been busy huh?! Good luck with everything, and I love your new wheels!!
ღ husky hugz ღ frum our pack at Love is being owned by a husky!
That sure is a lot to deal with at once, but it sounds like you have a good solid plan in place for either contingency. I grew up in a house with four floors and swore I’d never buy a house with that many levels again, so we bought a ranch house right from the start, and now that I’m dealing with knee pain, I’m still very glad we did! Plus Daisy is a nut and would probably try to jump straight down an entire flight of stairs. Whatever you decide to do in the long run, I’m sure it’ll be the right choice for you all and it’ll work out well. 🙂
Thank you! I do think things will work out one way or another. I had to laugh with what you said about Daisy and the stairs. You should see Luke when he is in a rush sometimes…he doesn’t even hit the bottom two or three stairs half the time! I cringe every time, and feel like we should get him out of here before he damages his already bad knees! Slowing him down is not an easy task!
What an exciting time. Fingers crossed it all works out.
It is funny you wrote this. My Dad turned 86 mid September and we had a belated birthday dinner with him and his wife this past weekend. His house was the topic of conversation. He and his wife live in a city condo which means that it is stacked with 3 levels of living space. They love it because they can walk to restaurants and shops. But as you say they are not getting younger and there are all of those stairs. They were considering buying a detached condo which has a 1st floor bedroom. Most of the living space is all one level but they would give up city living and then there is the move. In the end they decided just to stay where they are steps and all. I guess they were not ready.
Well, I think it’s great if your Dad can deal with all of those stairs at his age….good for him! I think it’s always a trade off when it comes to homes, isn’t it? We never have exactly everything we want in one, and we really have to choose what’s most important to us.
I’m really looking for a place with a pond….now that would be the ultimate for the dogs! 🙂
Wow, lots of changes coming. Good luck…we hope you sell your house and the move goes well. But if not, you have a great house to stay in. 🙂
Thank you! We figure either way, we can’t really lose! 🙂
Congratulations on the house selling! Mom is so jealous she wants to sell and move so bad. You are lucky that it was so easy for you to put it up for sale, it’s a great looking house and place for the dogs. We have too many stairs too and now mom is pretty sure one of her knees is completely gone. We may still be here 2 more years but she doesn’t think she can last that long. We finally got some cooler weather, September was the warmest it has been in 10 years. Love Dolly
Oh no, that is awful about your Mom’s knee, Dolly. Right now we’re OK with all the stairs…but I don’t want to end up in a position where we have to sell and get out quickly because of some health issue. Plus it really is rough for the dogs…they’ve already got their issues.
Maybe something will change and you can get out of there sooner…hope so for your Mom’s sake.
The cooler weather is such a relief, isn’t it?
You have had a very busy month!! Sending you good thoughts on the house hunting. And as you said, it’s where you all are that matters, together :). I totally agree that the dogs are in consideration when buying your house. We think of Cocoa with pretty much all our decisions 🙂
Your September sounds a great deal like my September. The only frustration I felt was in the beginning when people walked through it and we didn’t get an offer. It pissed me off because I kept thinking “why doesn’t anyone like my house enough to make me an offer?” But after the first week, you get used to it and stop worrying about it. There is a buyer out there trust me, and they will find you. Your home is gorgeous to include the land and porch. Best of luck, paws crossed that all your dreams come true. Please keep up posted.
Thank you, Cathy! I know it is hard not to take things personally when it comes to our home! I will have to learn to get over that. My biggest problem might be impatience. When I decide I want to do something, I want to do it NOW. LOL…I’m not sure our house will sell as quickly as yours did!
Selling/buying a house is a LOT of stress. I want to get rid of ours too, but right now it’s just not the right time, plus it needs too much work. And there is NO WAY I want to move all the crap I’ve accumulated. My goal recently has been weeding out stuff. I do a bit at a time and sooner or later, I know I’ll get there.
Best of luck, I’m sure the Universe has a plan for you!
Thank you!
We’re trying to get out of ours before it needs any more work…LOL! I hear you on moving all the crap…that’s the one thing I dread. You should see my office closet, and the hubby’s garage….total nightmares of accumulated crap.
Last winter I started on a tear of cleaning out and reorganizing. Unfortunately, I lost interest after 2 rooms. I’m hoping the prospect of moving will get me back on that tear. Then even if we didn’t end up moving, I’d finally have that done!
Wow, that is a busy month for you all. Since Mom is a realtor, we totally know about selling a home. It is a real pain in the furs keeping it spotless all the time for showings. Good luck to you and with the market getting better, I hope your place sells and you can move on. If it was meant to be, it will work out.
Thank you! I agree…we try not to get our hopes up either way, but to be open to whatever happens. I wonder how long it will take me to get tired of keeping this place clean, especially considering I had become much less interested in housework over the years than I used to be (or the amount of animal fur to keep up with just wore me down..LOL).
I understand you… it’s not only the green papers what are in our houses, there were blood sweat and tears… and it’s full of memories…. I pondered about selling Easy’s crib too (the street became dangerous during the years and I looked for something in the middle of nowhere)… but I haven’t the heart to do it…. and I probably would freak out, if people would come who try to talk it down just to lower the price :o)
Congrats to your fabulous wagwoof mobile, it’s great!!!!… is it a girl, because you wrote “her”?
I think she looks like a girl, don’t you? Although Luke might beg to differ, since she matches him pretty well!
We would love to live in the middle of nowhere, our street has become much busier over the years, but finding something like that is not easy.
I dread the first offer we get on our house (if we get one!) because I know I will be disappointed!! The value to us is usually far more than the value to others.
I love your house and your car!! We get a bug to move every year, but after looking around at what is available, we decide our neighborhood is still perfect for us. It doesn’t hurt that the house is almost paid for either. I think we will probably stay here The thought of packing up a lifetime of stuff is pretty overwhelming! LOL!
I’m with you on that…I dread packing up all the junk we’ve accumulated over the years! We got this same bug 10-15 years ago, and we couldn’t find anything else we liked then, so ended up staying here. So I guess we’ll see what happens this time!