the offer is in

We went out to take some second-looks today and decided that we found the house for us. Now we wait to hear back from the sellers.

My head is feeling even more like it is about to explode today, but not because I am stressed about buying the home. Of course I am excited about it and am imagining all of the ways that we will furnish it and decorate, but I am also calm about the whole thing. If it doesn't work out then we will find something that does. I simply have what is shaping up to be a terrible sinus cold. Oh, and yesterday I took my last anxiety pill so that probably isn't helping anything. On the other hand, having a bad cold might be a very good way to mask the withdrawal symptoms from the anxiety medication. When things were really bad with my anxiety this summer, right before I went on the medication, I wasn't able to eat much for a few weeks. Once I was feeling better I realized that I was over my caffeine addiction. Always look at the bright side:)

The other day when I made the label my head felt like it was going to explode because I was so busy/tired.

I almost posted 10 days ago to say that I was breathing a huge sigh of relief. Finally, the day that had been looming pretty much since we moved here in October had come and gone with the best possible outcome. The Adult Family Home Licensor came for our inspection and after an extremely thorough three hours, she told us that she liked what she saw. The rules and regulations that must be followed for every aspect of running one of these homes literally fills a large book, which is revised by the state legislature every year, so this is no mean feat. And it is not uncommon to have to repeat the initial inspection before the license is granted. Fortunately we were given the green light to move forward. The feeling of relief was intense, but not followed by any down-time to savor it because Christmas was only a few days away and none of us had been able to do any preparation for it.

Shopping for gifts and whatnot was a lot of fun-- being out among the last-minute-shopping chaos wasn't as bad as I had anticipated--and on Christmas Eve I spent pretty much the whole day in the kitchen. Being able to do that was wonderful, as I've been eating on the run most of the time lately. On Christmas day I didn't even get out of my jam jams and I was in heaven, an entire day of puttering around and doing nothing. But every day since then has been action, action, action as we have been house-hunting and I have been touring families of prospective residents through this Home.

We are moving out of here next week and soon this place will be full of residents and staff. We will be staying with Mothership and Pops until we are able to move into our new home. If all moves forward with the house we are hoping for then we will be living in it by the end of January at the latest.

While we have been extremely busy since we got here it has been the best kind of busy. I love it here and I love what we are doing. Besides loving the work with the residents and all of the other people that I come in contact with, I love that we are calling the shots here. We work long hours because it is what we want to be doing and we know what needs to be done. At the same time, we can sleep-in when we don't have meetings or appointments early, or we can take lunch when we want to. And whenever I start to get tired when I am out and about running errands and such the voice of my sister Lara comes into my head saying "Your job includes shopping, decorating, and visiting with people--you are so lucky." She has never actually said that to me, but she definitely would if I complained of being tired.

And before I stop writing, a little bit about the house we are hoping to buy...

It is move-in ready and has everything from our "must have" list and many of the items from our "would love to have" list. This is a relief to me since I have completely painted and decorated both this Home and the new office for the business. The office ended up being far more work than I had initially anticipated because there were so many surfaces to refinish (wood paneling, bare sheet rock, cinder block, and this awful paneling in the bathroom). The idea that we can move in and I can do things as I feel like it or am up to it, rather than needing to do it in order to make the home livable, is quite attractive to me right now.

We should know by tomorrow where things stand.