LIFE: Last Year I ...

It's weird to think that 2014 is already last year. Hey I even struggle to think that 2000 rolled around 15 years ago. 2014 was a pretty awesome year, perhaps not so much for the blog, I've had my struggles with that, especially recently but personally, even with the insomnia and all the stress, it turned out pretty well. 

I'm taking inspiration from Dainty Squid's (a favorite blog of mine to read) visual documentation of the year - so here is mine, here was my 2014. 

Experienced and survived a polar vortex and the great flood 

Explored and fell more in love with Detroit and experience some of the awesome local food places the city has to offer - the Grand Trunk Pub, The Mercury Bar, McShanes, MexicanTown Bakery and Slows are all new favorites.

Went to my first basketball game, granted it was the Harlem Globetrotters, but still 

Re-found my passion for cross stitching and started designing some of my own pieces - from record players to VW Bugs and the Angel of the North

To a map of Michigan in blackwork

Finally explored the Eastern Market

Saw one of my favorite bands, Clairy Browne, live in Ann Arbor 

Saw random roadside attractions - like the worlds largest tire

Reached the 5th birthday of this very blog and shared my wisdom

Brought our very first house and tried to tame a garden, somewhat successfully 

Fell in love with purple buildings in Bay City

and old houses

at 28, carved my very first pumpkin

Had another fly by visit to Pittsburgh 

And you know what, that all probably sums up both me and my blog pretty well. I have high hopes for making 2015 super crafty, creative and green fingered in various ways and means.

Thanks to all of you - for all your supports, comments, likes, shares throughout the year. I hope you stick around and follow whatever adventures and things that come my way in the next year. I've realised in the last couple of months that this blog is never going to be big, it hurt a little, but in turn it makes you remember that for me, blogging is just a hobby, it's just a small part of who I am, that I shouldn't stress about it as much as I sometimes do. I can't glamourse living in Michigan, or make Detroit sound the most hip happening place, nor can I make the life of an expat sound incredible. But I can try and share what my life is all about and whatever makes me tick, even if that isn't always the most exciting hobbies and things that make up a person.

I wish you all the best as we start a brand new year. 

LIFE: Autumnal Days

Autumn makes me homely, it makes me want to draw the curtains tight, crawl under a blanket, pour a huge hot chocolate and watch TV, read a little more. More so now we own a house, a house that's ours, there's space to decorate, to celebrate the seasons, a bird feeder in front of the living room window that entertains me as much as the cats. I've been working away with vinyl records playing again, feeling a little braver about sharing our collection on instagram.

Suffering from stress, anxiety, buying a house and the process of buying one, for me was awful. I lost sleep, so much sleep, it wore me down, it drained me. But in the end it was worth eating up all of our savings, the last couple of months have been hard money wise, my stress levels dip and flow but i'm looking forward to the last couple of months 2014 has in store, as we finally return to our normal routine. 

November marks the third year of calling the US home, yet another year has passed by in a heartbeat. America has given me opportunities, experiences, a way of life I never thought I would experience for myself. With Halloween us passing by and Thanksgiving on the horizon, these holidays that Americans embrace, take to heart remind me why I love this country. It sure likes to celebrate.

Happiness has been:

Reading comics (Ms Marvel, Hellblazer, Cpt Marvel) // joe spoiling me with dutch girl donuts and roses // american candy - the tootsie rolls, almond joy and reeses <3 // kitty snuggles // instagram for helping me capture those little moments // sweet potato curry // autumn colours // watching constantine // vintage penguin mugs // reeses puffs cereals

LIFE: On Moving In and Calling Somewhere Home

Oh my what a crazy couple of weeks that was. Remember when I hoped July would be a better month than June? Well, it's certainly been trying that's for sure. But, we are all moved into our first house, even if it didn't go as planned.

Being a holiday weekend (we moved over the 4th July weekend) most people already had plans, so we were left moving everything pretty much alone. That was until Joe took a tumble and landed all funky on his ankle which hit a concrete barrier for good measure - as you do. After bravery soldiering on for the afternoon, we ended up going to ER which resulted in taking home a pair of crutches and Joe being off work for the next two weeks.

In the end we had to hire in some help to shift the heavier pieces of furniture (we used College Hunks Hauling Junk which i'd highly recommend) and after four days of trying, numerous trips back and forth, attempting to clean our old apartment and handing in the keys, we were all moved.

The house itself is marvelous. It's so nice having space - so much space I'm not sure were to put everything. It's quiet, we have raspberry and blackberry bushes in the garden in addition to sweet peas and so many pretty lilies. It's quiet, it's peaceful and it's starting to feel like home even if I felt overwhelmed at how much stuff we had to unpack many a time.

Over a week in and we're still unpacking - it's pretty much endless, or just endlessly moving boxes around until they find a new home - the basement works well for that challenge at least. The garden (pictured above - well the deck part is) is a little unruly - i'm longing for a somewhat cooler day to really get to grips with it all. It's nice to have yet another reason to go to estate sales (like we needed another reason) but it's a great way of picking up garden equipment on the cheap - like a $2 spade. Sorted!

In fact the move seems to have been the right thing for the kitties too - they seem so much more at peace with each other and happier in themselves, perhaps it's because there's three kitties over the road that they can glare at and a couple of friendly looking squirrels that run up and down the magnolia tree throughout the day.

Either way, I'm glad we managed to find this house, for us all. We're still somewhat in the midst of unpacking, but I can't wait to share some more photographs of the place once everything is more in place!

Home ownership suits us.

LIFE: House Keys and a [Blog] Break

Source

The papers are all signed.

The keys are in hand.

The mountain of boxes to be moved keeps piling up.

But .... finally, finally, finally we have our house. 

Our very first home.

No more renting - yeeey. 

The keys, the walls, the front door, our garden are the results of two years of improving credit scores and saving, of messing up with the first house we tried to buy and getting it just right the second time. We signed the papers a mere six weeks after viewing the house - which when you consider all the paperwork is very quick. 

So before I leave y'all for a short July break during our move and settling in, I'd take a look back at a post I did in March. 

Back in March I outlined our four main must haves, we pretty much hit the nail on the head;

1. 3 bedrooms - yeap it has that, granted one is a walk through but that's perfect for converting it into our vinyl room. 
2. Basement - it has one and it's 3/4 finished which is a big deal and a big help
3. A decent garden - possibly a teeny tiny bit smaller than what I would have liked but it has a wonderful deck, a great old tree and a magnolia tree in the front, and it has been cared for over the years - I can't grumble too much
4. At least 1000 sq feet - I don't remember what it is bang on, but it's certainly larger than 1000, has a huge kitchen, two living rooms and with the basement, plenty of room to grow into

Over the next couple of years the house will be our project, things here and there need updating, some redecorating, one bathroom is stuck in the 50's the other in the 70's although saying that the 70's wallpaper is really funky, funky enough I want to save some of it. There's the American love for wood panelling in places, it needs some new windows and such but it's bones are sound.

Oh and it has a fireplace, for an actual proper wood fire although it probably needs a date with a chimney sweep.

I was expecting to be internetless for weeks (as is often in the case in the UK when you move) but actually the cable guys coming the day after the moving day - which is grand by me. While I plan to have the next two weeks off this blog - from the publishing part at least, you'll most likely still see me commenting and certainly still tweeting. I just need a break from the publishing - we all do at times. Hopefully I can come back refocused and revived for the 5th birthday of this space without the stress of stats and numbers.

So enjoy the next two weeks - get outside in the sun, have some summer shandy's, start up the barbecue and relax.

LIFE: When Everything Seems to Happen at Once

Source.

Talk about everything happening at once.

Last week was a crazy week I will be honest. What with two trips to ER (kidney stones on the OHs part), waiting to hear about the lenders appraisal on the house and a crazy busy week with work alongside approval on my greencard paperwork well I would welcome a break and a quieter week but that's not on the radar any time soon.

If everything goes to plan *fingers crossed* we should be moving into the house at the start of July yey! It amazes me how quickly the house buying process runs in the US - we're currently five weeks in with an estimate of a week and a bit left for all the paperwork to be sorted. Which in theory means operation packing overdrive will be going into full throttle in the coming week and trying to have a thorough sort out in the process, or at least attempting too.

To say i'm feeling overwhelmed with all the packing is a bit of an understatement.

It doesn't help that I hate, hate, hate having blank walls, and nothing around me. I guess i'm a bit clingy when it comes to stuff, it makes somewhere homey. My home (well apartment) is just packed to the ceiling with brown boxes.

Ah well be worth it in the end.

Unlike the first house, this one seems to be pretty sound and doesn't call for any major improvements - fixing a gutter here, lifting up some concrete there and updating old fixtures as and when. The gardens excites me immensely and I'll certainly be enjoying it during my blog break, plus there's going to be a room for all our vinyl. A WHOLE ROOM. Plus it has some great original fittings like a laundry shoot and tie holders - it's the little things.

That or i'm easily impressed.

As for the greencard approval, well the US and Joe is stuck with me being here until 2024. The background to removing the conditions and about the paperwork I explained back in March with my case of proving my marriage legit. In all the paperwork in all took three months, which is actually half of the currently waiting time on the I-751 form working through the California office. So now i'm a nice lawful permanent resident. Again, it's all about the little things.

It feels right calling America home and I love being here and all the opportunities it's given me from my job to buying a house (could never afford buying one in the UK lets be honest) to all the amazing food to try and places to visit. South East Michigan, and well particular Detroit isn't on many peoples radars, people in the UK questioned why I'd even think of wanting to move somewhere near Detroit, but the city has always impressed me. It's gritty, life is tough there but it's changing, there's improvements, it's all exciting.

Here's to another ten years and whatever else the future has to hold (although it'll be interesting to see if I'm still blogging in another 10 years that's for sure). 

LIFE: Things ... Currently

Lists, lists, lists.

Lists are helping me focus right now. While I wish I could grab my hands on a magical watch like Bernard (American kids you were missing out not growing up with Bernard's Watch, a show about a kid that had a watch that stopped time). We have an offer on a house that's working through the system, works picking up, i'm packing like there's no tomorrow, trying to find that spare out to craft, get out into the sunshine, my blogs feeling a bit neglected. My blog reading list, more so. 

So it's been a while since i've done one of my life/things posts, I thought I'd combine it with a currently kinda tag and throw it out there, so we all feel a little more grounded.

• Reading - great positive articles about Detroit, like the awesome street art boom in the city
• Watching - Lots of marathons - well Bar Rescue and NCIS LA for hours on end. Niceeee.
• Trying - to relax and not be overly stressy about everything
• Eating - these chocolate cupcakes with this vanilla butter cream frosting, I just had to bake something on Tuesday (or it might have been Monday, I forget), these fit the bill.
• Pinning - lots of ideas and wishes from my office come craft room to finally having that garden
• Crafting - everything between a Red Sky at Night cross stitch to a cute little birdie that'll be turned into a thank you card, alongside finally working on a blanket, crocheted from a huge granny square (you can always keep up with my craft adventures ya know on my Hook Stitch Hook blog)
• Going - to lots of flea markets but not really finding much
• Loving - finally being acclimatised (somewhat) to the American summer, finally
• Hoping - that this house doesn't fall through
• Thinking - my British accent made a barista's day yesterday, she was very happy hearing it that's for sure
• Enjoying - going to some yardsales for a change, great place for cheap vinyl we're finding
• Listening (to) - my Billie Holiday boxset and Simply Red - growing up with my mam listening to Simply Red rather often, I finally found a $1 vinyl copy of a New Flame, yeah that was coming home with me. That and Skid Row, lots of Skid Row.
• Finishing - not enough packing as a I probably should to be that's for sure.

While i'm not one to apologise for life happening, for not posting as often, or as well or whatever as normal, it's probably kind to give you a heads up and all. Whatever happens with this house, good or bad i'll be taking a little break once July rolls around, just to catch up with myself and ya know, enjoy summer. As ever you can always follow me on Twitter if that's your thing.

Hows things with you?

HOME BUYING: 5 Home Buying Tips

House buying can be a scary thing for any buyer, yet alone a couple of first time buyers out of their depth and pretty much on their own both financially and with regards to knowing what the hell goes on with trying to buy a house. Granted out first attempt was a bit of a fail we kind of learnt things the hard way, but we learnt a lot of things to take forward.

1 // Relationships
Whether it's your mortgage adviser or your relator/estate agent work with people you can get on with, that you can bounce ideas off, who are willing to give you their full attention and won't mind you ringing them with a random question at 9.30PM. It's their job to work for you. You don't need to be best friends but it certainly pays off to have people that you get on with that's for sure.

2// Home Inspections
You might remember my post about our home inspection - but they are key in giving that extra insight into a home you've stuck your bid on. Skipping a house inspection may risk you buying a money pit that leaks money rather than enjoyment and can get you in a better position for adjusting the buying price.

3 // Conditional offers
Make sure all your offers are condition - conditional upon the mortgage being approved, conditional on the home inspection and upon the appraisal. Unconditional offers can put you in a tricky corner if things don't work out and luckily helped us get out of our contract.

4 // Buy an electrical ground tester
If you're planning at looking and buying an older home, often electric switches aren't grounded which for some can be a deal breaker (it won't fail a house/FHA inspection it's more down to preferences especially if you have a lot of high end appliances). Joe spotted our home inspector using one and for our second and third round of looking for a house we decided to purchase one - they cost like $11 from Home Depot. While it's not a deal breaker for us, it's nice knowing which rooms are/aren't grounded.

5 // Pay attention
It's a bit of a novel feeling looking around houses but I admit to not paying enough attention on the houses we were looking at, like not noticing the lack of gutters, or there being a hole in the ceiling of the garage to how messy the hardwood flooring was on the first floor. Print off your house viewing scheduling, take notes, take photographs to write your first impressions, the pros and cons.

What would be your house buying tips?

LIFE: Packing and More Packing

There's currently a human life size game of tertis going on in what was our dining space, what with piles of boxes and bags for moving. I actually didn't think we had that much stuff, apparently most of it's been hiding in cupboards and closets and is only just coming to life. It's actually got to the point of having to break down the next three or so weeks down with tasks to have achieved to feel like i'm getting somewhere with the packing, it's slow work!

You start on a mission to fill up every inch of a box, you come up with random code letters for the final dumping ground, and you realise you never ever have enough boxes. Cats start to think your piling up all these boxes just so they have a new kitty tower. One kitty Ed, being perfectly happy just to make the large box at the bottom her new sleeping and sitting ground, the other - Smokey a nosey tiny kitty loving the challenge of being able to sleep up high. Stacking even more boxes doesn't deter her nosiness, she just loves to sleep even higher.

And don't get me started on packing up the vinyl. 800 plus vinyl aren't the easiest thing to move when you're pretty short on boxes. Inventive we must become methinks. The dinning room table has been taken apart, all my vintage compacts are safety piled away and the nails are being pulled out of the wall - although my embroidery hoop collection will be one of the last things to be taken down, I hate how stark the walls look without them.

It's not that we even particularly know when we're moving per say, although we do have a closing date of mid May. After the home inspection not going as well as we hoped, we came up with the list of the items (major issues) that needed fixing - all 14 of them (electrical, gutters, raising concrete, fixing the garage etc), the seller actually agreed - even though it took them over a week to think about it. There's still a bit of a way to go, the closing date is in a little under three weeks but there are still some hurdles for the house and paperwork to jump though, but maybe, just maybe everything is working out!

If you have any packing tips - I'm all ears!

HOME BUYING: What I've Learnt So Far

Source

We're about a month into our full ongoing first home search and it's probably about time for an update. I've learnt a lot, both about myself, and the process of buying your first house. It's all been about home buying classes, mortgages, visiting places and waiting.

So what have we learnt and what you don't see on home buying shows;

• I have zero patience, like none whatsoever
• Joe is as cool as a cucumber 
• I get too emotionally attached to a house but then I struggle with the concept of not having any attachment when you're going to be spending so much money and will be living in said home for an extended period
• Insomnia is a regular occurrence, although it's been getting better
• Try and attend a home buying course - you might think you know everything about home buying or mortgages, you probably don't
• Black mold of doom really is a thing and mortgage lenders don't like mold
• There's more to just "sticking in an offer on a house" dam you TV house buying shows - they never show you all the paperwork - like 20 pages of contracts to sign
• Basements seem to leak, quite often and mortgage lenders don't like that either
• Don't assume a house has gutters - oops
• Some houses have really odd layouts
• Some houses are missing their basements, they had them once, you can still see the original windows, yet you can't find the way to get into them .... are their bodies hidden inside?!
• Bungalows with tight, steep spiral staircases are scary to get down
• Hardwood floors are the in thing right now
• Oh and I have lots of blog posts about home buying lined up - but I a) feel like it's tempting fate to publish them and b) that they won't be of interest to people - le sigh!

So we found a house, it had a great living space, was one short on the number of bedrooms we wanted but it had an open "living" space upstairs so it was workable. It's basically been a flip house, it's had some work to it but there's a lot of things that could be added to, a project house but it looked okay and okay enough for us to tackle. The way things work in Michigan is that you see a house stick a bid in and then do the home inspection but the contracts are written in a way that you see the results of the inspection and then ask the seller to fix them, ask for a lower price or walk away.   

I guess we weren't expecting there to be so many issues. Like big electrical safely hazard kind of issues, like exposed wires, and missing circuit breakers and ungrounded plugs in the kitchen of all places. So we sent off a list of 14 things that need fixing before we'd consider moving forward.

This is where home inspections are worth their money in gold (ours cost around $350), I was a little on the fence about them prior to this I will admit. We went through the Buyer Projection Group (who were recommended to us through a lady at the home buyers course and who we'll certainly be using again if the occasion arises) who offer a really thorough attic to basement plus exterior inspection and you'll end up with a number of reports filled with advice, photographs and actions that should be taken or considered. Big tip is to always tag along and attend the inspection too (although I was out with the lurgy so only Joe attending ours).

So here is a snap shot taken from our home report which was comprised of two thorough room by room inspection reports, this part being from the electric panels inspection which as you can see, has some rather interesting issues.

The home inspection was especially helpful for us as we're inexperienced first time buyers doing this alone, I wouldn't have known the fume was missing a screw or to have looked that the bedroom ceiling fan was incorrectly fitted. To be honest I'm glad we didn't even touch let alone look inside the electric box after seeing how dangerous it is as it currently stands.

So the inspection helps you the buyer know what to do next - to carry on with the sale, back out or ask for changes. For us, right now it's in the sellers hands, we've sent what we want changing, it's up to them. Nevertheless with the majority of the issues being dangerous and electrical all these concerns are going to come up again with another buyer if we back out, it's probably in their own interests to get it fixed. Also as a side note, any buyer that backs out of a sale, this report has to be passed on to any future buyer by the seller.

This whole house buying malarkey is certainly a huge learning curve. If things don't work out with this house, knowing what we know now about the process of sticking in bid and all the paperwork that goes into it alongside what we should look out more for from doing this inspection it will have been worth it.

Every had a home inspection turn up anything funky? What did you learn when you were buying a house?

LIFE: Things #6

So the task for this part of the 2014 blogger challenge is something photography based. Which ya know sounds really fun unless you're like me and have already failed at the monthly photo an hour challenge in the last two week. Granted I was at a home buyers course for the day and six hours of the same pieces of paper at the same desk wouldn't have been that thrilling to view. Life has been a little hectic of late, you might remember me talking about renewing my green card and buying our first house both of which are finally getting somewhere but there's still a way to go, particularly with the house side of things at least.

So yey for having loads of blog posts in my draft folder because I'm so behind on finding that odd couple of hours just to sit and type a post or three out. So for this challenge, I'm basically relying on my 365ish photo challenge I set myself just to convince myself that there is more to my life than houses and packing up our one bed apartment (man do we own a tonne of stuff).

So life has pretty much been made up of;

• Seeing far too many pretty houses suffering with the black mold of doom in their basements
• Playing life size tertis games in the dining room with boxes of stuff
• Eating far too many doughnuts nom
• Finding my happy place lost in cross stitching and then playing around on Stitch Board designing some of my own from photographs (you can loose hours doing this)
• Finally getting around to finding Pinterest useful
• Buying an egg cup in the US (probably easier to find the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow)
• Having the lurgy aka a cold
• Trying to catalog all the vinyl on discogs and feeling overwhelmed at just how many we own 
• It's taken two years but I finally found a Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers music sheet at an estate sale 
• Going a whole week without snow - score!
• And now being able to go outside without having to wear two layers of gloves and feeling "warm" in a cardigan and scarf
• Saying that with how cold out winter has been in Michigan, 4C degrees feels really warm, my inner thermostat is really screwed up.

How are things with you?

This is post #7 in the #2014bloggerchallenge

HOUSE BUYING: The Beginning

"Front Door Flowers" by LongitudeLatitude is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Growing up, at least during my university years I had my heart set on buying a little terraced house that lined the streets of Newcastle. It'd be filled with period features - everything from the original brass door knobs, cast iron fireplaces to grand old staircases, much like the house I lived in for three years in Heaton (but it would be warmer and not have mold on the walls or be filled with students that didn't clean up). With a bright red wooden door, a terraced house in Newcastle would be home. 

It's funny how life turns out.

There aren't too many terraced houses in these parts of the Mid West and wooden doors seem very few and far between. American streets of Metro Detroit are predominately filled with detached homes with porches to the infamous post box by the curb side with retro bars in the basement. Streets are tree lined (so many trees) and you'll even come across a dirt track or two. A year ago we started properly saving, working on our credit to buy our first very house, a small piece of America, now we're ready to buy.

So this post marks the start of a new adventure - one I hope to share on my blog in a mini series across the forthcoming weeks and months covering everything from mortgage pre approval, mistakes first time buyers make to home buyers classes and the like. An increasing pet hate is coming across blog posts that claim buying a house is easy - and while I hope my posts don't scare people, I do want them to reflect the experiences and advice we've come across. We're doing all this by ourselves (literally and financially), we're learning as we do this. Hopefully this series will provide a realistic glimpse at house buying and whether your in the UK or the US I'm sure many of the tips are international and helpful. Granted we are buying in the US market  and we are really lucky to be able to apply for a particular government loan (which requires only a 1% down payment - more of this to come) and while yes we live just outside bankrupt Detroit, we actually live in one of the richest county's in the US.

Luckily me and Joe are on the same page with what we want out of a house - while we're approved for a lot higher, we're trying to stick well under the $70k max (yes you can buy a house that cheaply here) aside from being in the couple of cities we have our eyes on, they basically boil down to;

• 3 bedrooms (one to be converted into my office come store space/craft room)
• A basement 
• Decent sized garden (pretty much standard in these parts)
• At least 1000 square feet (that might sound small but basements without full windows and attic space which is often a room rather than an attic in the English sense of a home generally aren't included in the space measurements). 

Yeah we're that easily pleased. It'll be interesting how this list relates to what we finally buy.

Seeing as we're all mortgage approved and the house viewing is beginning this weekend I thought it would be high time I actually blogged about it (I always thought it was tempting fate too much to talk and share prior to having things sorted - trust me we've been working on this for over a year).

So first things first, what kind house would you be after? What would be on your must have house list? Did you ever imagine where and how your first house would be growing up?

LIFE: Thirty Seven Down ...

It felt like we've just come through one of those weekends. One of those two steps forward, one step back kind of days. Sushi and take out pizza, met with a flat tire, finishing and starting our taxes and then not being to upload them, Joe having a four day weekend met with more snowy and freezing cold weather (back down to -15C) meant too cold to visit the zoo, the list goes on. 

They say buying a house is one of the most stressful things you can ever do, I'm starting to think they were right, but it's more of the mortgage pre-approval than the house finding lark (well we haven't really got that far yet). Hopefully the tide is turning and once our taxes have been filled with the IRS we can try and apply for a government loan for down payment and we can finally get somewhere. Our apartment lease runs out in May, we've started putting stuff away in boxes, we're ready to be out of here. So if buying a house alone is stressful, throw on top greencard renewl and it's all fun and games. 

I did score a huge bag of vintage wool at an estate sale for five bucks which added some new colour into my pile and pretty much crocheted to my hearts content for the rest of the long weekend (Monday being Presidents Day and all). Grand total of 37 motifs for the crochet afghan project now complete, save being outlined in a final shade because I didn't haven't figured out on what colour to use as a border. Head in sand with big decisions like that. It's nice though, to have something you can just do without thinking, while watching the tv, listening to music. It just happens, it's certainly helping to chill me out a little. Just a little.

What do you do to relax?