Excitement and Exhaustion!

E and I have shared a lot of excitement about this week of house hunting and Richmond exploration... and at this point that excitement has turned to exhaustion! We started the week by meeting our realtor and a mortgage broker, went to the local mall and received a call to go have an impromptu informational interview at a local university. That was a great surprise and even turned into a job interview later in the week... a great feeling to know that there are opportunities in this community and it may be easier than I thought to land on my feet. This is great relative to our house hunt which is contingent on my employment!

Elliott also had the opportunity to meet his new colleagues for the first time. There are a lot of great people in the Richond FHWA Division as well as a lot of opportunities to learn.

We have eaten at and seen a lot of fun places! The best sandwiches are at The Black Sheep it is so yummy and we can't wait to retry it for brunch. The cuban reuban was arguably the best sandwich we've ever tasted. At Acacia you can eat a fine dining meal from their $24 prix-fixe meal, appetizer, entree and dessert- it is a steal and in a great area called Carytown. I love, love, love a great meal and I am so pumped about the concentration of awesome restaurants here. E and I are also the proud members of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts- ha! While at the Picasso exhibit (which was awesome-even E liked it) we realized what a great deal membership was and are looking forward to visiting whenever we want. Plus there is a great restaurant in the musuem that you get 10% off at as members... sold.

We went out to see 6 homes on Thursday morning, we'll have the opportunity to go out again tomorrow morning which we are both looking forward to. There is something special about having the opportunitiy to find a place to call home, a place to cook, a place to share with friends and family, a place to grow together. It is even better that we will be spending our second wedding anniversary looking for a place! It is safe to safe that we want visitors as soon as folks can come see us!

All in all this week has been very productive; house hunting, job interviews, first job impressions, shopping, eating, exploring and celebrating two years of marriage!

Mortgage approvals... Who knew?

I have watched enough episodes of house hunters, property virgins and my first place to make even Sandra Rinomato sick (she's the Property Virgins Guru). Really it just makes E sick, you should hear the groan every time I turn it on and he says in his over dramatized way "If I have to watch one more episode I am going to explode!" That said, I really thought that I knew the ins and outs of the process.

E and I spent 2 1/2 hours on the phone with the approval man and still aren't quite sure what happened.

"Here's your interest rate, but it's not really your interest rate because we will lock you in when you make your offer and fully approval." (Well that seems ridiculous, you are looking to be "pre-approved" so that you know what you can and are willing to spend, isn't the interest rate a big piece of that?  Can't we lock into a rate now so that we know what we're looking at? Whatever...)

"If you lock into a higher rate we can give you incentives on the front end, like $10 K towards closing." (Okay, I am exaggerating a bit, but that seems a little icky. You are putting a gold nugget in front of me so that I get into a higher payment/rate in the long run, I think I'll pass, but thanks for looking out for me.)

"And that's only like a difference of $12/month really." (Dear sir, that $12/month is food for my dog for a month and a half, a haircut for my husband, a bottle of wine, 10 songs on itunes... I could go on."

I digress, this is probably hyper critical but I just felt weird about the whole thing. We will see how it goes next week.

The following picture is of Target Field, the Twins stadium in Minne. A celebration of spring FINALLY arriving and homage to the no hitter thrown last night. Enjoy!

Move countdown: 20 Days

It is hard to believe that we will be moving in 20 days... my (L) last day of work is this Friday and I am slowly transitioning. It has been so hard to leave when every day I hear about all of the great work being done to advance care for children and create extraordinary medical breakthroughs. I have had the opportunity to see the opening of a state of the art children's hospital - University of Minnesota Amplatz Children's Hospital, which has been a wonderful experience full of pride and excitement. I had to share because it opened yesterday and 60 kiddos crossed the river to experience care in a wonderful family focused environment. How fortunate I've been to have this opportunity... I look forward to what is next!

After this last week of work it is on to focusing on our house hunting/ Richmond exploration trip. We are looking forward to meeting with a real estate agent, trying fun restaurants, walking around and getting a feel for where we might want to live. I am also working on a few informational interviews while we are there. I have already scoped out some great restaurants and am excited to try out some new places including Juleps, which is where we will go for our 2nd anniversary meal. I live my life meal to meal... so sue me.

In preparation for our house hunting Elliott and I bought a few pieces of furniture from an estate sale in our hometown this weekend. Many thanks to my mom and dad who scoped everything out and are currently storing it for us!

Also, I have to shout out to my friend Becca for completing her PharmD/MBA this week... she has a yearlong residency ahead of her but I am so proud for her! Congrats Becca!

PS Below is a fun photo from young alumni weekend at the University of Tennessee (Ayres Hall, which has a gorgeous new historical renovation) as well as two of our new estate sale finds!