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Friday, May 21, 2021

It's a Whole New Week






As is my habit, I try to highlight the joyous things I find each day of the year, because even on the worst day there is something beautiful, joyous or humorous that happens. Sometimes I have to look very hard for it, but it is always there. 
Now here we are with the 21st week of 2021 completed. I would say I can't believe this much time has passed, but our high temps for the weekend are in the 90's, so whether I choose to believe it or not, all I have to do is step outside to find that summer is smacking me in the face.


Friday: I am not exactly sure what happened on Friday during the daytime. I forgot to write anything down and after a couple of days, one day melts into the next. TheHub came home from the office a little early so we could eat quickly before the SEC softball game. Woo hoo Bama won!

Saturday: DIL2 and Son2 came over to have hotdogs and watch the final game in the SEC championship, Bama vs. Florida. Alabama won  and the road to the softball finals is now on.

Sunday: We did stream our church services, but did not participate in our Sunday school class this week. TheHub had some work he needed to do and I prepared for an open house at Mom's. The turnout was a little disappointing but we did get a tentative offer on the house. Still I had a lot of laughs with my sister. Later that night TheHub and I went to the Mexican bakery (I wish they had a name posted above the door and I would start referring to it by name.) for a quick little treat.

Monday: The buyer opted out and some decisions were made for us. Mom's house is a beautiful home, but it looks like an 80+ year old woman lived there. My sister's job disappeared during the quarantine period and though she can, she had not planned on retiring yet. It would help her tremendously for us to max out the purchase price for the house, so we are going to do some quick updates to the house to make it a little more appealing to the younger buyers. We figured the 12K estimate will increase the value by 30K so it is worth the effort.

Tuesday: Met with the guy (my cousin) who will install the countertops at Mom's. The quartz is going to look great and I am ever thankful Mom was J's favorite aunt!  I might have to do some before and after pictures of the kitchen.
My beloved sister found a new landscape guy who did some major work in Mom's backyard. We had been diligent keeping the front of the house perfectly maintained, but the backyard is very private. It slopes to a creek and is a mostly an azalea filled natural area, that was a little (OK a lot) overgrown. After he finished the backyard looked like a perfectly groomed park. 



Three photos of Mom's tidied backyard



   And especially for EC the Creek bed before clean-up



Wednesday: I met a friend at the same Mexican bakery for coffee. They were doing some intense baking and the smell was heavenly. Though they did have sporadic customers the whole time we were in the coffee shop part, I have no idea why people are not beating their door down. Their pastries are absolutely delicious and cost anywhere from 50 cents to 1.99 each. The same thing at Starbucks would be 5 bucks. and would not be nearly as tasty. I decided that there are either too many people who have never noticed it before, or there are just a lot of idiots among us.
After leaving there I went to a local Mexican market. This was not the gigantic Hispanic market I prefer, and the owner will absolutely make sure you understand it is a Mexican market, with products mainly from Mexico. I  found two things I was searching for along with a jar of pickled cabbage that I have never tried before. At best it will be delicious and at worst we will have something interesting and new.

Thursday: This was a red letter day. I had a fun phone conversation with one of my favorite bloggers! Made my day!
I do not know if any of you have TUBI as part of your streaming services. It is free, but you do have to sit through commercials (or go do quick personal business during them). 
I think Son3 may have added TUBI to my Firestick when they were in town and it just languished unused until I noticed they were having a Billy Wilder film festival. After watching The Apartment, Some Like it Hot, Sunset Boulevard, and Sabrina I started scrolling through regularly to see what was available. 
I have been missing theater badly. We go (or at least pre-covid we did) to several plays throughout the year. I did like tons of people did and ordered Disney plus so we could watch Hamilton, but that was not enough to hold me for the year. I crave the sounds of the orchestra and the audience applause.
Thursday night  while scrolling through TUBI's options, I found a 2015 filmed performance from London's Savoy theater of Gypsy starring Imelda Staunton as Rose. We sat and watched, and could at least pretend we were in a theater! It was a wonderful temporary fix. 
I saw that Broadway is set to re-open in September. I think a trip to New York might be much needed!

Hope you have a wonderful week finding joys! 

 

 



26 comments:

  1. Oh please post a few photos of "before" and "after" at your mom's house. It would be so interesting!

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  2. I too would like to see ‘before’ and ‘after’ photos of your mom’s house.

    Just the other day I discovered TUBI. I watched Cast Away again. 😊

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    1. I had never heard of TUBI but I have really enjoyed it. Since covid, watching a show together in the evening has been our entertainment.

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  3. I would love to see before/after pics too! Your Mom's house sounds lovely, and I'm sure you will soon have an offer.
    Now that my son just graduated college, yay no more tuition, I can redo my kitchen. Of course now, everything is more expensive. Do you think quartz is better than granite for countertops?

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    1. My personal house has granite and I love it. Mom's house is located in a much less sunny spot and needs a little brightening so we opted for the quartz. I really don't have a preference other than no marble. I had some marble in a previous house which was stained when we bought the house and nothing would remove the stain.

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  4. Wonderful week! Post before and after shots from your mom's house for us. I want to see the pretty back yard too! :)

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  5. Love your joys (as I always do).
    That bakery sounds dee-licious.
    Good luck with the house updates and yes, some before and after photos would be lovely. I must confess that the before of the back yard sounded most appealing to my overgrown self though.

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    1. The bakery is so good. They make these wonderful sesame cookies that are about as big as a saucer. They are sweet enough without being too sweet and now I regret not buying a half dozen of them to share with friends who have not yet discovered the bakery.

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    2. Huge thanks for the backyard photos. Love that creek bed.

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    3. The creek bed looks a little neater now, but even when I was a kid we did very little to it other than keeping the side closest to the house cleared. It is a good place for critters of all kinds to find a little oasis in the middle of suburbia

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  6. It's a shame that the buyer fell through, but on the other hand if a reasonable investment can reap a higher price, it will definitely be worth it in the end. I know you've heard me say it before, today's buyers have watched too many episodes of house hunters or the like.

    I'd take your 90 degrees at the moment. It's cold, only 4C(40F), with freezing rain in the forecast. :(

    Enjoy your new found channel!

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    1. It is just as well that the sale floundered. We were going to let it go for much less than it is worth because the wife loved it and Mom would want it to go to someone who loves it as much as she did. I think even with the reduction it was more than they could honestly afford. I love house hunters and the exaggerated list of wants. "I want a house with an open concept, stainless steel kitchen, marble waterfall counters, double sinks in all the baths. Yes I want a new house but I don't want to pay new house prices and I surely do not want to fix anything as I can afford to"

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  7. We put about 20,000 into our house before we sold it and I paid over $2000 for new paint which the homeowner immediately painted over. So as hot as this market is I would do very little.

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    1. Mom's house is in a desired area with excellent schools. We just have to do a little catering to the younger crowd who has yet to learn you can buy an imperfect house and fix it up as you can afford to. Our first few houses were total fixer uppers including one with a mural of Hawaii on three walls of the den. Funny how we could live with that for a while!

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  8. I don't really have to look to find joy. It is just all around. I would not invest much in the house! I don't like granite, personally. But, that is probably just me. All the old stuff in my 1902 house were charming...except for paint and the fact the kitchen did not have cabinets and did not have anything that gave you the clue it was a kitchen except for one of those one-piece metal sinks with drainboards. That was not attached to any wall and the men working just carried it out of the house. I do like the backyard after it was cleaned up.

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  9. Old homes can be very charming, especially when they are updated in the period of the construction. But boy that costs a fat lot of money!
    The lot is gorgeous. If it were not so much work to maintain, I would buy my sister out, sell my house and move in it. My parents took very good care of everything and just a few simple cosmetic changes are all that is needed, though I could move in it as is.

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    1. Your local son and DIL not interested? I will say I made a mistake when I moved here- too big of a yard and too many trees. I had 20 cut down immediately and have had several since and need more down! Most are those awful sand pines that spring up quickly with shallow roots. I was smart though to buy a one story- my sister has a 2 story with the bedrooms upstairs and now that she's 64, the steps bother her knees. I always had 2 story homes before this move with big basements.

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    2. Son2 and DIL2 had their own house bought shortly after they married, so they are not in the market for a different house.
      Our next house will be a one story with a finished basement. Maybe!

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  10. The property is lovely. That would be my dream yard! Tho I'd also never be able to maintain it. Celie

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    1. The yard is gorgeous, but requires a lot of maintenance .

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  11. What a beautiful back yard! I do hope you'll post lots of before and after pics of your Mom's home. Hopefully, the right buyer will come along and everything will work out fine.

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  12. The yard looks so good. Here, houses ate in bidding craziness and offers 10-15% over list price. Your mom's will sell quick now.

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    1. Part of our issue is that Zillow has it listed in a different city. Mom's house is literally on the border between 2 different incorporated cities. Her's is the one with the desired school system, but it is a little confusing when you look at the zillow listing.

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