But closing on the house was only one tiny part of the day's excitement. I rushed out the door at 7am to deliver the two youngest to the babysitters while my husband took Jacob to school. An hour later I discovered, via text from my husband, that Jacob had cried again at drop off. On the drive to school he kept saying that he didn't feel good. As soon as they got to the classroom, he froze, covered his face, and started to cry. He choked out between sobs "I don't want to go to school."
20 miles away from Jacob's classroom, I sat at my desk while my heart broke for him. This is such unusual behavior. He's always loved school. He makes friends so easily. He excels in both reading and math. His teacher is young and very sweet. He loves to learn. So, why? I've tried to pry it out of him, I've subtly combed for clues. He is uncrackable. I have no idea why he gets so upset at the classroom doorway. I'm hoping this is just a short phase and he starts to love school again. (His new school is awesome).
I pushed my worries aside and got some work done. But right before my 2pm conference call, the babysitter called to say that Jon was puking again. I rushed through the conference call, packed my stuff and headed out to pick up the boys. My husband and I were supposed to meet our realtor at the new house at 3:30 to go over the inspection report. Stopping to pick up the kids had me pushing it really close. Somehow we got there only slightly late. We walked through the new house (omg, I'll have a dishwasher!!!) and then packed up the kids to our 4pm meeting with the title company to sign our closing documents.
We sat in the waiting room for twenty minutes and Jon was fussy the entire time. He was clearly tired and still not feeling well. He wailed and cried whenever I put him down. I tried my best to console him but it's kind of hard to hold a baby while you're wiping your three year old's butt, opening your three year old's snacks, and washing your three year old's hands.
They finally called us in to sign the closing documents and Jon decided it was not cool at all. He started to cry and fidget and squirm. I had the brilliant idea of giving him a lollipop to hold. He sucked on it just long enough to get it sticky and then he fidgeted and squirmed some more, this time with sticky hands, in my lap. Six hours later, I'm STILL trying to pull apart sticky strands of my own hair. I'm pretty sure my sweater can only be saved with dry cleaning. And Jon only stopped crying as he crawled out of my lap onto the table for the fifth time.
"Hey you got some important documents to sign? I can help with that!
We affixed our formal signatures to about 349 pieces of paper, emptied out our entire savings, and voila! New home! It's ours! And we will be eating hot dogs for the next three years. Except Ryan. He will be eating cold dogs. Because if I call them hot dogs, he refuses to eat them because (OBVIOUSLY) they are too hot.
After we signed our lives away, I took the two younger kids home while my husband picked up Jacob. Twenty minutes into the commute, and ten minutes from our home, I got a call from my husband. His car broke down. MULTIPLE EXPLETIVES. So I turned around and drove another 20 minutes to save them from the side of the road. When thirty minutes had passed and the tow truck had not arrived, we left for some fast food. As we were pulling into the Dairy Queen drive thru Jacob read their sign and corrected me, "Mom, it's NOT fast food. The sign even says." This proved to be very foretelling.
We waited behind several cars in the drive thru line only to find out when it was finally our turn that they only take cash. It took all I could muster not to throw a dirty diaper in frustration. We zipped out of line, got some cash, and returned to the back of the line once again. It took another thirty minutes to put in our order and get our food. Meanwhile we were trapped in a drive thru line with a crying baby, a hungry three year old, and a seven year old who asks too many questions.
Eventually, we returned to our broken down dinosaur of a Subaru (it has almost 300K miles on it) and ate a luxurious lunch in our minivan in some random middle school parking lot. Another forty minutes and the tow truck had finally arrived.
Because I'm totally insane, after we got home at 8pm and put the kids to bed (an hour long process), I spent the next 1.5 hours in the kitchen making tomorrow's dinner (it was supposed to be tonight's dinner and we were supposed to eat the leftovers tomorrow). Now I'm exhausted and my back hurts and I'm out of chocolate.
But we did it! We bought a house! And Monday evening, I will be loading gazillion dishes into a DISHWASHER instead of scrubbing them all by hand. It's totally about the little things.
You got through it! The next time you buy a house, ask the title officer to come to you. I had a big capital markets closing that I had to manage on the same day (and unfortunately the same time) that my house was closing. My realtor, lender and title officer came to my office, we sat in a conference room, and I signed the papers while I was on a client conference call. Not what I had envisioned, but admittedly easier than what you went through. Enjoy the new place. When is moving day?
ReplyDeleteCongrats! your new house looks BIG and AWESOME!
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