quit work make crafts

Today: greasy spoon breakfast (mmmmmmmm, pancakes), mini real-estate adventure with my mom, and partay.

Real estate adventuring is likely to be a more frequent occurrence in the next while. Apparently I should have a letter on Tuesday (!!!!!!) and according to the bank we don't have to have all our ducks in a row right this second in order to be all pre-approved, so long as we can see our way clear to it by closing time. I expect it will take about 3 months to have said financial ducks all lined up, and that leaves plenty of room for a fairly standard closing date, even were we to stumble across Teh Dream House tomorrow.

And in any case, I doubt that will happen. Judging by the bank's little online calculator, we should have a pretty decent budget, but there's actually not a lot within that budget that's both inside the greenbelt and in decent shape...to say nothing of anything in Britannia Village, where we'd really prefer to stay. We could buy a very nice house in Barrhaven or Kanata with the same money, except that I categorically refuse to live in either of those neighbourhoods, kthxbai.

***

Well, mini real-estate adventure is concluded. Place was not thrilling - nice enough, but location (one block north of Carling, facing an office building) was bleah, closet space was nonexistent, basement renovation was weird, and sump pump had water standing in it, which is not what I'd call a good sign. There were enough little things awry that I would not be surprised if closer inspection unearthed problems on the Mike Holmes scale. Definitely not worth the asking price. And in any case, outside of Britannia I'm inclined to be very picky.

Hmm, been a couple years since THAT subject header came up. Tomorrow we meet up with teh real estate agent (who is, freakishly, the husband of one of my bosses - holy small world, batman!) to see the house. Apparently there are no structural issues, but several major upgrades to be done in fairly short order: the roof needs replacing in 3-4 years, and the wiring has been partly upgraded but still needs work. (Roaming the internets for information about this last has actually been pretty interesting.) Well, whatever, it will be a fun real estate adventure and good practice, if nothing else.

...

Right, so in the middle of poking at this entry and reading about rewiring old houses, I got a call from arndis, result of which was that instead of bumming around the house by myself while Corey went off to poker, I spent a lovely evening at George's place chillin with old friends, met a couple of incredibly cool people, and rolled back home around midnight. Certainly an auspicious start to the weekend! Supervising kitties' dinner just now (with three different prescription diets, you have to police them to make sure they don't eat each other's food) but must get to bed soon so as to have wits about me for tomorrow's real estate madness.

And just because everyone needs another meme in their life:

Lets101 - Free Online Dating

Not very productive today, for all that I've been trying. Had enough solder to do the outside seams on one candleholder, but got a goddamn heat crack for my trouble; poked at painting one suncatcher, but screwed it up and ended up washing it all off. At least I finished attaching the jewels to the trees, which are looking pretty cute. I will go back later and cut/grind that other tree I've been meaning to do, and then I will polish the lot of them later tonight. Other than that...bleah. Having trouble staying motivated. This stupid show has really taken it out of me. I think I will finish my neighbour's lamp in the next 10 days or so and then take a couple weeks off before launching into christmas projects.

In other news, we will be telling our landlord when we go pay the rent that we will be switching to month-to-month in order to hopefully buy a house in the coming year...how freaky is that, I ask you. Technically speaking we could start shopping now, since closing dates are already into February and March judging by what I see on Grapevine. It just wouldn't really be the path of wisdom. There's always the chance we may have to haul ass to some other city for Corey to find work, and even if we stay here both our salaries will hopefully be going up substantially in the next 6-8 months (which makes a big difference to what and where we can buy).

I dunno. Much like thinking about having kids, thinking about this makes me feel dumb. Like I'm playing house or something. I'm not sure what to make of that. Do I feel ill-prepared? Am I just self-conscious because so few other people seem to be making the same plans? Am I defensive because I expect other people to think I can't handle it?

Well, regardless, one of the things I got to thinking about while puttering around this morning is what kooky projects I could get up to in a house of our own. I could make an honest-to-god stained glass window, fer instance. Or transom/sidelights around the door. Or put stained glass in all the cabinet doors and add backlighting. I would love - LOVE - to have a suitably period house to do such messing around in, like that gorgeous little arts and crafts cottage on Britannia Road that backs onto the conservation area. God only knows how much that thing would sell for, even if its current owners did have a fit of insanity and put it on the market.

I adore arts and crafts architecture, it strikes this beautiful chord between rusticity, elegance, and warmth. E.g.:




If I couldn't track down and purchase such a thing, given dream house funds, I would track down some period plans and build it from scratch.