100 Happy Days Challenge: Day 35

I forgot to post my three positives from yesterday. Do we see a theme of forgetfulness emerging here?

1. Having a long, warm bath at the end of the day. There is something about a bath that makes a woman feel pampered, and let me tell ya’ll, it’s been too long since I’ve been pampered!

2. Hearing how much Carter’s speech has improved in the last month. People are commenting on it. The last appointment at speech therapy went really well and she said she’s really happy with where he’s at.

3. I can’t think of anything in specific that happened during the day to post about, so I will just generally say: our house. I LOVE our house. A lot. We have been in it since the summer of 2010 and though there are a couple things I would change, it feels “us” and has since the moment we stepped inside of it. It was – I think – the 14^th house we looked at when we were house-hunting and though there were a couple other houses that we had thought might work, we weren’t really “in love.” To be honest, though, I didn’t expect to get an overwhelming since of “this is the one.” Boy, was I wrong.

At a fitting.

I remember, when I got engaged, people telling me that when it came to finding the right wedding dress, I would know “the one” when I put it on. Pffft. Are you effing kidding me? I had favourites, of course, but I loved a bunch of them. There was no “the one.” Nothing more than a process of ruthless elimination finally brought me to a decision.

The big day.

Anyway, I specifically remember the night we looked at our house for the first time. We met the realtor at one of the houses we were looking at and she gave us the list of houses we would be viewing that night. This house wasn’t on our list, but she handed the sheet over to us saying that, just this morning, the owner dropped the price down and it was now within our price range. The outside, which is outdated looking, didn’t impress me, so I’m sure I made a spoiled *ugh, fine – I guess I’ll look* face. We got to the house and walking up the driveway, I’m pretty sure I was still giving the outside the stink eye.

Then we walked inside.

I swear, I must have looked like a kid in a candy store. Not that our house is amazing, by any stretch, but something about it instantly felt like home. Before we moved from the landing I said “Oh my God” out loud. I couldn’t tell you what it was about the house, but I was immediately sold.

As our walk through the house concluded, I stood in the dining room and said, “I can picture Christmas in this house.” I hadn't been able to picture our future in any of the previous houses we had looked at. I remember looking at the landing and thinking that, maybe someday, I would be helping our child put his or her backpack on there and walking them to the school that’s just down the block. I kept that little tidbit to myself.

We made an offer and it was accepted that night. It was one of the happiest nights of my life.

So many people are buying these brand new houses, or are building, and there’s a part of me that feels lame for not participating in the “keeping up with the Jones.” But, honestly, I don’t know that we’ll ever move. Maybe it’s dumb to feel blessed at how much I love having the house that we do, but it’s my truth.

Dumb or not, I’m just going to relish in it J