Knees, Knees, Knees!

New knees, old knees, sore knees……feeling better knees.

This has been a week of knees for us at our house.  My husband and I both decided it was time to get back into our Orthopedic surgeon to see what could be done about the knee pain we both had been experiencing.

John hasn’t complained a whole lot about his knee pain, though it’s been there.  Me, on the other hand…… yeah.  I’ve been complaining!  My knees have been so painful since I finished my chemo treatments its been awful.  Sitting for long periods of time, even with my legs elevated was still hard on them.  Walking or standing for any length of time was also painful.  It hasn’t been fun.  The rest of me has recovered really well since the chemo, but the joints have been painful.

John had his left knee replaced about 10 years ago and thought maybe it was time to see if the other one was in need of replacement.  We shared an appointment with the Doctor to have him take X-rays of our knees to see where we were at after 8 years and see what our alternatives were for the pain.

He gave us both choices.  He told John he could try shots but that it wasn’t going to be a long term solution for him for playing ball.  Since it’s off season for Softball he decided he wanted to go for the replacement now so he would have time to recover and get it back in shape for softball in the Spring.

My choices were to try the shots; to try to see if scoping them would help again; but ultimately, the doctor feels that I need both knees replaced.  I’m bone on bone on my right knee (have been for 8 years or better) and my left knee cap is shot.

Since we are trying to sell our condo and move into a home within a month or two…. surgery was not an option for me.  (Silly me…. I was thinking it wasn’t a great time for John either…..)  I decided to give the shots a try, since I’d never done them before and had heard some good results with it.

Wednesday, I had my first shot in my left knee.  My insurance company won’t let me do both knees at once.  I guess they want to know if it’s going to help first before they pay for the other one.  The doctor wanted to use the Euflexxa gel on me but also gave me a little cortisone with the first shot.  Man!  What a difference it has made!  I can’t wait to get the approval to have the other knee done now!  I’ve been surprised at how having less pain in my left knee has helped my right knee feel better.  Even my neck pain has lessened.  I find that quite interesting!

I have two more shots in the series to go in the left knee, then hopefully we can do the other one right away.  I have felt so much better!  It will make trying to move and pack a whole lot easier, for which I am truly grateful!

John had his replaced yesterday.  He is doing remarkably well considering.  He is determined to get it functioning good as soon as possible.  All most to a fault.  I hope he doesn’t push it too hard!  Hopefully 4 or 5 weeks out from surgery, when we are hope to be moving, will be enough time for him to recoup to the point that moving won’t be too much of an issue.  And yes….. I am going to hire movers this time.  Even my boys told me I needed to.  We will still have plenty of work to do even with using the movers.

I’m grateful his surgery went so well and that he will have time to get himself back in shape for softball.  He may not be running the bases next year (they do allow substitute runners in Senior ball), but as long as he can play first base and hit the ball he’ll be happy.

It’s amazing what they can do for your knees now.  I’ll take my temporary solution of shots for now with the hopes that I can hold off a few more years with the surgery.  Maybe by then, they’ll even have better solutions!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

Serving in the Temple

I love serving in the temple!  I’ve always known that, but yesterday was really a reminder of just how much.

John and I have found a home we want to buy.  It’s being built so we won’t be able to move into it till the first of the year.  While we are very excited to make the move back into a house, we are saddened that we will be moving out of the Jordan River Temple district and therefore will need to be released as Ordinance Workers there.

John is having his knee replaced today, so yesterday was his last day.  With the Temple closing in a couple of weeks for cleaning and the Holidays coming up, it worked out to be his last day.  Depending on how things go with him, it may have been my last day too.  Knowing that, I was very melancholy as I performed my duties serving the Patrons.

It hit me the most as I was sitting in the front of the room for the Endowment session.  We had several older Sisters in wheel chairs on that session.  When that happens, it’s usually an opportunity for us to serve them even more than we would a healthier Patron because we are often needed to help them put on their Priesthood robes during the session.  I was lucky enough yesterday to have a Sister to help.  I love doing that.  It endears me to them so much.

As I observed those Sisters during the session, I was touched by what many of them are enduring in their old age.  One of the Sisters had Arthritis so bad in her hands its hard for her to hold her hands straight, which makes part of the ceremony a little more difficult.  Another of the Sisters feet are so twisted that taking off her shoes and putting them back on was a little difficult.  She is stuck in a wheel chair for the remainder of her life.  You could see that the muscles in her legs are disappearing as she is unable to use them.  It broke my heart for her, yet it made me so grateful that I had the chance to help her.

Jordan River Temple
(photo by Kendall Davenport)

I was choking back tears yesterday knowing that it might be my last chance to do that for sometime.  I was also choking back tears regarding everything that has happened to us in the last two weeks (both good and kind of scary)  that makes me very aware that my Heaven Father knows and loves me.  I know that he sent those Sisters to the temple yesterday to be on the session I was helping with, so I could have a reminder of just how much joy I receive doing His work there.  Not going to lie,  I’m not always in tune with the spirit when I work there.  Often I let my mind spin on worldly things and not focus on what I can feel there if I allow myself to do so.  That’s why yesterday was so special to me.  It completely made me focus and realize that it might be the last time for sometime that I will get to help perform those ordinances.  We hope to maybe work in the new Temple district once we get moved and settled, but it may be a while.

Because we work on the early shift on Wednesdays and have to get up so early, often I am tired while I’m there.  And often, I have been known to close my eyes during part of the session and doze off.  I’m not happy to admit that, but it happens more often than not.  Yesterday I was surprised at how I wasn’t tired.  Even though I had forgotten what night it was when I went to bed the night before and didn’t get to bed till 11 pm.  I was surprised at how much energy I had.  Again…. I think it was The Lords way of reminding me what joy I have had serving Him.

I’m so grateful for the blessing of working the The Lord’s House.  I have many sweet memories and have gained some wonderful friendships both with fellow workers and with Patrons who come so often.  What a blessing it is to do His work!  I guess I will have to settle for just being a Patron myself for a while.  I can always attend during the hours that we worked and hopefully be able to say “Hi” to some of those friends while we are there.  Being a Patron is a blessing too.  One I haven’t taken as much advantage of as I should.  Now I will have a chance to finish up those Family File cards a distant relative gave me to do.  And that….. will be a blessing too!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

We Three Amigos

I love spending time with good friends.  An occasional Girl’s Night Out (GNO) is great fun.

The other day, my good friends and I took the opportunity to go and listen to a presentation by another friend of mine called: Understanding, Appreciating and Supporting the Men in Our Lives.  I knew that we wouldn’t have as much time to visit with each other doing this, but I also knew it was good information we all could use to help better our relationship with our husbands.

We enjoyed the presentation a lot and each learned things that will help us.  As we were leaving that night, we stopped to thank the presenter, Ramona Zabriskie, who is a friend of mine.  I was telling Ramona that these are my good friends, the ones I have been singing with for years.  Of course, being a musical person herself, she asked us to sing.

Myself, Nila and Laurie at Nila’s wedding
Love these ladies!

We don’t really do a cappella.  Everything we do is with a live band or recorded music.  But I figured we knew the harmonies to Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy well enough to get through a verse or so a cappella.   So we did and Ramona loved it.  It makes me very happy to be singing with these ladies.

Whether we are singing or not, I just enjoy spending time with them!  This was the first chance we had had to get together since Nila got married.  It was fun to catch up with her and see how she is doing in her new marriage.  It’s so wonderful to see her happy after being alone for so many years.

One of the things we learned in Ramona’s presentation is that women use LOTS more words in a day than men do.  That’s one of the reasons we are such social people!  I truly believe that women need women as friends because we understand that part of being female and we relish talking with someone who understand and thrives on that too.  And I seem to have a lot to say!

I’m grateful that even with our busy lives, that my friends and I can make time to get together and just enjoy each other’s company.  And if we get a chance to sing while we are doing it…. that’s even better!  Love you ladies!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

Timing Is Everything

Last Sunday our Bishop gave a talk on timing.  He started off the talk by saying that it isn’t the kind of topic that you would think to give a talk on in Sacrament meeting, but that after he related the things in his talk, we would see how it applies to gospel principles.

As he spoke… my husband and I kept glancing at each other.  I know the talk was for me/us.  I’m sure many others in the congregation gained a lot from it too, but it was very ‘timely’ for us.

I was trying to decide if the talk was to tell me to be patient, it’s coming,  or if it was a confirmation that all the things that had happened that week were happening at the right time.

Since Sunday, things have continued to happen that now makes me know it was the Lord’a way of letting me know that the ‘timing’ for our move was finally right and that where we are going is where he wants us to be.

We’ve wanted to move for quite some time.  Not because we don’t like our condo, because we do…. we just don’t like living in such a strict HOA community.  At least, too strict for our taste.  Plus, we just need more room in the garage for my hubbies stuff and he wants to be able to tinker out there.  And we wanted everything we needed on one level so we didn’t have to deal with stairs.  And a place for the dogs.

We put our condo on the market at the end of September.  I had been frustrated all Summer long that we couldn’t seem to make the time to get it ready to list.  But again…. timing.

We had a lot of interest in our condo that first few weeks, but no one moved forward with an offer.  In the meantime, we had found a home that we wanted to buy and put in an offer contingent on the sale of our home.  Because our offer on the other home was contingent on our sale, the Seller opted to keep their home on the market, but we would have first right to continue with our offer if we could remove the contingency should they receive another offer.

Well…. after several weeks on the market, we still had not received a offer, though I had recently had people through looking at it that sounded like they might be making one.  Unfortunately, (or fortunately depending on how you look at it) the Seller  on the home we had offered on received another offer on their home and we were not in a position to remove the contingency, so we lost the home to another Buyer.

I was so frustrated because I knew we were so close to getting an offer, but I wasn’t positive so we had to back out.  I had spent time in my mind dreaming about where I would put things and what we would do to make the space our own.  We were so excited about moving further North to be a little closer to our kids.  I was very disappointed when we lost the house.  Then about two hours after our deadline to remove the contingency on it, an offer DID com in on our condo.  Crazy!

We started on the hunt again for a home to put under contract.  We looked at several existing homes and even went through some new construction.  There was a home in a subdivision we had looked at earlier in the year that I wanted to see.  It had pretty much all the things on my list that I wanted other than it was a 2 story, but with the Master is on the main.   I loved the kitchen and family room area in that thing.  The pantry was to die for big.  But the thought of having to do stairs to get to the office or craft room was a little worrisome to me.  My husband and I both have knee problems and have recently been told we need knee replacements…. so stairs is becoming more of an issue.  However, we hope after knee surgery they will be just like new.

We kept looking because of the 2 story thing.  Then a couple of days later, we went back over to the same subdivision to look at a rambler that had just come up on the market.  Though we like most things about it… again… it was lacking in some areas and I wasn’t stoked about it.   The listing Agent had mentioned that they were framing another rambler right around the corner that would be available the end of December.

After walking through the finished rambler we walked down the street to see if we could find the one he was talking bout.  There were about 5 homes under construction on that street.  We started walking through all of them.  We found some we kind of liked on the East side of the street, but didn’t know which was his.   A couple buying one of the homes under construction came to see how it was going as we were walking through theirs.  They told us that they thought that most of those on the East side of the street were already sold.

There was one under construction on the west side so we walked across the street and walked through it.  We really liked what we saw, so I called the Realtor back to ask him which one they were building and that was the one!  I told him we were very interested in the home.  He got my email info and said he would email me the floor plan and we could talk on Monday.  Yesterday we signed the papers and are now Under Contract on it.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch….  we had more people interested in seeing our condo.  Since the offer we accepted on it was an offer contingent on the sale of their home (sound familiar?), we had opted to keep it on the market also.  I had three more showings after we went under contract with this Buyer.  One of them is very interested and her Realtor said she was probably going to make an offer on it without contingencies.  Though we have not seen one yet.  Perhaps because the Realtor asked me what the chances would be of our current Buyer being able to remove the contingency on ours.  I told her I wasn’t sure, but that she could possibly do it.  She had two homes on the market she was trying to sell and only needs one of them to sell to close our deal.  So she could possibly take out an Equity line if necessary to close on ours if she had too.  I think that may be why we haven’t received another offer.  She didn’t want to get her clients hopes up.  But you just never know!

So it’s been a CRAZY couple of weeks with things going in directions that I never thought they would!  And it’s all because the timing was right.  Had we not been Under Contract on the first home to keep us occupied till this other home under construction became available, we wouldn’t have been over there looking at the right time.  And why didn’t a Buyer for my condo come along sooner?  After all, we had had over 17.000 hits on the listing!  You’d think ONE person would come from that, right?  It’s just a confirmation to me that the Lord knew what needed to happen in order for all the ducks to be in a row.  TIMING!

The best part about the timing of finding this house, is that we caught it in time to make some of the decisions on colors and such.  I was too late for the kitchen cabinet color, but it was the color I wanted anyway, so that worked out great!  But now I can choose flooring and paint and countertops, and a few other upgrades, etc.  Plus, we got in in time that I am having the laundry room expanded a little into the garage (which is MUCH bigger than what we have).  I know I will like it much better.  I’m pretty excited about it.  So not only are we getting a nicer more updated home than we would have…. but I also have a say in the choices and we won’t have to go in and remodel anything in an older home!  NEVER owned a brand new home.  This is exciting.

Although we are moving even further South from where we are, which puts us further away from the kids…. the access to the neighborhood is quite convenient, and time wise not a lot different for our kids to get to us.

I just keep thinking that there’s a reason we are headed over there.  I’m sure we will figure out why someday.  In the meantime…. I’m grateful the timing has worked out for us and for the Bishop’s talk to be a reminder that things happen in the Lord’s time, not ours.  And, in most cases, it’s always the best for us.

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

UPDATE — December 16, 2014

As a continuation of the above story….. the Buyer that I mentioned above backed out of the contract with us about 3 weeks later leaving us with NO BUYER! By that time, we were well underway on making changes to this new home we we under contract for and had put lots of money down on, but we needed a Buyer to be able to purchase the new house.

Again…. timing….. We just had faith it would all work out the way it was suppose to. It took until the first part of January to find another Buyer but they couldn’t close on the purchase of our condo till March and our Builder wanted to finish and close on our home in February. Luckily, my husbands Dad was in a position that he could temporally loan us the money we needed in order to purchase our home and we paid him back as soon as we closed on selling the condo. So…. the timing was amazing on all of it. We’ve been in our new home since February 23, 2014. We love it here and have already found reasons why we should be here. Too many to name here… but we feel that Heavenly Father knew where we were needed more than we did!

I Am Still Grateful! How Are You?

Miss Lyn

It’s been two years.  Two LONG years I might add!

For many reasons, I have not been able to see my dear friend Lyn for the last few years.  I won’t go into the reasons here…. that’s not important.  What IS important is that she was able to make a trip to Utah to visit her Mom.  Luckily, she asked me to pick her up at the airport and drive her to her Mom’s so we could have some time to visit.  Then…. she even invited me to stay over night so we’d have even more time!

Sometimes…  people and personalities just click.  And we did.  Once we got to know each other, we have just become good close friends.  Unfortunately we live in different states so we don’t get to see each other often.  Usually, it’s at least once a year at the Senior Games in St. George, but the last two years she hasn’t been able to come.  So this visit to Utah was a welcome and fun surprise!

My crazy talented friend, Lyn surrounded by the quilts she made for her grandkids

It was a delight to meet her Mom and her sister and brother in law.  We had such fun talking and catching up.  She always makes me happy!  I just wish we would have had more time.  We both know that if we lived closer together ‘we’d get in so much trouble’, as Lyn puts it.  Not bad trouble….  just little trouble.  

Well… I had a brilliant thought today on the way back home from her Mom’s house.  How about I go get her a day early (late in the day, of course), and we drive back to my house.  On the way back,  we can stop and see some other friends we know from the Senior Games, then,   she can come stay over night with me and I will take her to the airport the next day!  

I’m so excited that after discussing it with her Mom she is going to do that.  It will be fun, once again!  But I better get out my crochet hook in the meantime….. time to make more hats…. for friends this time!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

Auditioning– What Fun!

Even though auditioning for a show can be nerve wracking……  I’m still grateful for them.  And on many different levels.

First, because I always run into fellow performers.  It’s always fun to see those you know through the theater world.  We’re such an odd species!  <grin>

Second, if you are open and aware you can make new friends.  That usually always happens when doing a show, but making friends can happen anywhere if you are just….. well…. friendly!

Third, if you are lucky like I am, you have talented children you can hang around and eavesdrop in on their auditions.  Which can make a Mom proud.

Fourth, it always stretches me out of my comfort zone which is always a good thing.  There’s nothing wrong with a little growth.

Now is everything associated with auditions fun? NO!   But I’m still grateful that I occasionally go through them…. even if I don’t get cast. You never know….   You just might!

I believe it was Wayne Gretzky who said: “You miss 100% percent of the shots you don’t take!

Well….Here’s to this shot! Break a Leg, y’all!

I Am Grateful! How Are You?

No Better Day to Say Thanks!

Today, of all days, I suppose that it’s most appropriate for me to take a few minutes and express my gratitude for my country and the men and women who have fought to keep it free.

I sometimes wonder if we are teaching our youth the patriotism we should.  They aren’t allowed to recite the pledge of allegiance in school anymore…. where are they learning love for country?  Maybe I’m just out of the loop because I don’t have kids anymore…. but it’s a concern I have.

I remember patriotism being instilled in me as a child and then again when I reached college.   I was a member of a performing group called SOUNDS OF FREEDOM.  We sang a lot of patriotic songs and also sang other music that represented our country.  I was able to travel through a lot of the USA with them, including a tour back East of many of our country’s historical sites during our country’s Bicentennial in 1976.   It was a wonderful experience and only gave me more love of country.

I hope that my children have learned a little of that through being a part of a performing group that I co-directed.  We tried to give them a little experience of Patriotism in a few songs.  Probably not enough, but hopefully a little.

And then there’s our Service Men and Women…..  How can we ever thank them for keeping our country safe?  My Dad was in the US Navy and now I have a nephew and his son who both serve in the US Army.  Both have been deployed over seas.  Luckily, both have returned safely.  At least for now.

There are so many who have sadly lost their life for our country.  How can we ever thank them and even their families for their sacrifice?  And for those who are serving now, words can’t really express my gratitude.  Thank you for doing your job willingly and for fighting for all of our freedoms.

God bless you all!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

I love this!  I hope you enjoy it too….  Wouldn’t be awesome if we all learned to recite it this way?  And how sad is it that his foresight at the end has come true!

A Spiritual Feast Day

I am so grateful that I can go to church on Sunday a be Spiritually fed.  Some Sunday’s I must be hungrier than others (or should I say more in tune….?).  Today was such a day.

In all three meetings today I was touched by the Spirit and felt that the Lord was speaking to me through his servants.  Right to me in some cases.  This has been an interesting week of things happening in a way that I didn’t expect…. but as our Bishop talked about today in Sacrament meeting… “Timing is everything”.  That is…. the Lord’s timing.

This has been a week of trying to feel good about the way things have gone in respect to us purchasing a home.  Even amidst the disappointment we had at the first of the week… the week has ended with an affirmation that what he has in store for us is even better than I imagined.  Though it’s not in an area that I at first thought I wanted to be, we have decided that it’s not so bad after all.  In fact, we quite like it.

Then there was more spiritual feasting with the lesson in Sunday school. It was such a beautiful testament of what Joseph Smith did to help bring forth the fullness of the gospel and the benefits and blessings we now have because of that.  Great lesson.

Then Relief Society.  Again, another great important message about loving and strengthening others, no matter who they are.  It’s been a very fulfilling day.  I’m so grateful that my ‘cup runneth over’ with spiritual fulfillment.  I truly don’t know how people make it from week to week without feeding their spirit .  No matter what your religion…. our spirits starve to be fed good up lifting things.  Things that bring us joy!

Today I am joyful and full.

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

Almost Gone….

You know the feeling of not always appreciating something till it’s gone?  Or in this case, almost gone….

We have been wanting to get out of our condo and back into a home now for a few years.  We have great neighbors…. we really do, but we have decided that we are NOT suited to be in an HOA (Home Owners Association) where the rules are a little too strict.

Don’t get me wrong…. I don’t mind some restrictive covenants to make sure the neighbors home and yard stay in good shape, etc….. but telling me that I can’t paint my door any color I want or that my husband can’t work on our car inside the garage is a little too strict for us.   Those are only just a few of the rules we find a little too strict for our taste here in this community.

However…. in all honesty, it’s a wonderful community!  There’s so much that is good about it. But, we have decided that it’s time to move on.  The timing has worked out good for us this year to do that.  Though it’s been a little stressful in ways to get this ball rolling, we have finally reached the point where we can make plans for a new home.  Though signatures are not yet complete and delivered at this time, we are about to go Under Contract with a Buyer to purchase our condo.

It’s funny…. but I didn’t realize just how much I really loved my condo till the process of getting it ready to put on the market began.  We have completely updated the upstairs and finished off the basement since we moved in.  And we did it with the pretense that we were going to stay here for good.  In other words…. at the time we started the remodeling, we thought we’d be OK living in the condo for a long time.  (And, yes, we knew the rules and at the time thought we’d be OK with them.)  Even though the condo was initially purchased as an investment property, and we knew we would have to live in it for at least 2 years to lose the Capital gains tax and didn’t thing we’d be staying, once we got here, we decided we liked it.  Therefore…. we put a lot of money into updating the upstairs and finishing the basement because I wanted it nice.  But, after so many HOA decisions that have rubbed us wrong, and the fact that we realized we do need a bigger garage, and a doggie door, and a bigger gathering area, and…. Well, you get the picture.  We just want to get back into a house.

Our Condo

While we were cleaning and de-cluttering a few weeks ago I had a little bit of a melt down.  I was in the basement in the second kitchen/ crafting area that I designed.  I realized how nice it really was and knew there was a very good chance that I might not have that same kind of area in a new home.  I got a little emotional and started thinking about all the other things we’ve done here that I love and wondered how am I ever going to get what I really want in a home and stay within a price range that would work for us?

After a little crying and praying, I had a feeling come over me that everything would be OK.  I needed that reassurance.  It may take a while for what we buy to become completely what we want…. but I know it will get there.

It’s going to be a little hard to say goodbye to this place when the time comes, even though we’ve only been here 6 years.  I’m just grateful that I’ve realized how much I have loved it and will miss it AND the neighborhood!  I’m also grateful that we seemed to have found a Buyer that will love what we have done just as much as we have!  Like the song says: “Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.”  That’s life I guess…..  Here’s to the future…. whatever it holds!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?

Been There, Done That!

I think I’ve discovered that I really do enjoy Real Estate.

I’ve been out of the loop for a couple of years, but last Spring I decided to reinstate my license.  I knew that my husband and I wanted to sell our condo and buy a house again and I thought this would be a good time to get back into it.

Since then, I can’t even tell you how many homes he and I have looked at for ourselves!  We thought we had a home Under Contract to buy and then another buyer came along and was able to get it instead because we couldn’t remove the contingency we had on it in time.  Ironically, we received an offer on our condo about 2 hours later!  

I’ve learned a lot about respecting and understanding the Buyers viewpoint through all this.  Not that I didn’t before, but it’s so much easier to relate to the emotions they go through when you have actually experienced them yourself!

For instance…. since we lost the home we had the contract on, we are on the prowl again for another one to offer on.  I went through a lot of disappointment when we lost that contract.  I had envisioned and dreamed about what I wanted to do to that house.  We really liked the area, etc..  Experiencing that disappointment will help me help my clients deal with it if it should happen to them.

After looking at homes today and getting completely emotional and excited about one we went through, I can understand how easy it is to overlook things that you felt we so important.  A lot of homes are bought on the fly through emotions.  Thankfully, I had created a spread sheet with all the things that are important to me in a home so I was able to make myself go through and check off what it had and what it didn’t have.  In the process, there were a few things that I discovered that were missing that I most likely would have missed because I was so in love with the kitchen, that I was having a hard time seeing what wasn’t there.

Now, don’t get me wrong…. I’ve also discovered in this process that unless I want to build a home that I design myself, I’m most likely not going to find a home that has everything on that list.  My dream home list is pretty extensive after all.

Now that we have checked off the list of haves and have nots on that home,  we need to determine which of those things on that list are the most important features and which I can live without.  That way, we can decide if we want to make an offer without letting emotions take completely over. This is a practice I would recommend all Buyers do.  Make a list and take it with you every time you look at a home you are considering buying.  Don’t let your emotions over ride the things that are important and/or necessary to you in a new home.   Sometimes you just need to sleep on it!

I’m grateful for that list today.  I’m grateful that it was there to keep my emotions in check.  That’s not to say that I still don’t love that house, because I do.  But at least I know what it’s missing and can now decide if I can live without those features.

And from a Seller’s point of view?  Yeah…. I can relate to that too.  The inconvenience of always having to have your home show ready (which is actually a good thing in the long run….) and having to ‘get lost’ during showings, etc..  Been there, done that!

Now, when I’m working with Buyers and Sellers, I’ll have a better understanding of the exact emotions they are going through.  I guess I can say that I’ve walked a mile in their shoes!  I think that will make me a better Agent for my clients.  And in all honesty…. I do love helping Buyers find just the right home and Sellers be ready to list their homes to Sell!

I Am Grateful!  How Are You?