It's been two weeks...

Since we touched down on US soil and I have to say, it's great to be back. We arrived August 8th/9th and luckily didn't suffer any jet-lag. Okay, let me rephrase that: The kids and I didn't suffer any jet-lag. B however slept WAY too much on the long flight over and his internal clock was all sorts of backward. We departed Italy at 10:55am on Thursday morning, landed in San Antonio TX at 8:30pm Thursday night (or what felt like 3am to us). However, I hadn't slept the night before we left so I was up a good solid 24 hours by the time we landed in Texas. The kids napped on the plane, but no longer than 2 hours (long enough for me to watch 'Pitch Perfect' uninterrupted). B however was in a seat all by himself as they couldn't get us grouped together (we were seats A-F on the plane but that left him sitting by a stranger rather than in a set of seats with one of us) and was able to nap much much more than I.

And I'm not gonna lie, I was ticked off. I was doing everything for the kids because a) I am their mom and always the first choice when they need water/potty/break up a fight and b) I was in arm's reach for 3 kids at a time. Every time I looked over and saw B peacefully sleeping I hoped that the person behind him would kick his seat-back. 

But little did I know, this worked out in my favor. Once we got off that last plane and settled into the hotel, I was O-U-T. He however, was restless. And for the first 3 nights we spent in Houston, the kids and I went to bed between 9-10pm and slept soundly all night. B was up at 2am taking Rascal and Lucca outside because they were all awake.

So, the kids and I did fine off the bat. We left San Antonio for Houston, got settled into the hotel here. Now when we landed in Italy, were in the hotel for 7 weeks so we know hotel-living. The room we have here is a suite; a kitchen, living room, one bedroom with 2 queen beds and a bathroom and another bedroom with a king bed and bathroom. It's nice but it's small. And as eager as we may get to leave, we have to wait 6-8 weeks for our household goods to arrive regardless of whether we buy a home or rent. So we unpacked, established some rules (like where toys go) and settled in.

Ron was adjusted by the fourth day which was great because he started work that day too. While he was at work, I was setting up meeting with our Realtor to look at homes. (We did leg work before ever arriving in Texas and knew which school districts we would consider, which towns and we had already been in contact with a mortgage banker and had a pre-qualification letter to buy our first home. Our Realtor already knew our budget and our must-haves so he literally just needed to start showing us homes). It took two days and 12 houses but we found ''the one'' for us and submitted an offer on the 13th. There was a day of negotiations (the biggest issue was the closing date...they wanted to wait until October 8th which just isn't an option for us) and we wanted a standard 30 days. We ended up negotiating to a date of Sept 20th. We set up a date/time for the inspection for that Friday and hunkered down to wait.

It's important to note, we weren't alone. Wednesday afternoon, Nanaw and Papa came to Texas! There was no way my mom was going to missing seeing us now that we were stateside. So we kept very busy. Children's museum, Kemah Boardwalk, Galveston Beach, we did it all and we did it Thursday- Saturday. (Pics to come, I don't have my computer yet obviously). So while we knew the inspection was done, we knew what the report was going to say for the most part...we just stopped and enjoyed the weekend.

Well apparently this made the sellers antsy. They are in contract to buy another home and it's contingent on theirs selling. So when the inspection was through and they received a copy/summary from their agent but didn't hear from us, they started to get concerned that we weren't happy. (We totally were but we just hadn't had time...Ron was back at work and we had planned to get in touch with our agent after he got off work Monday night to discuss what was next). Their agent called ours THREE times on Monday. They were offering to correct things before we could say anything. So we talked with our agent and came up with an amendment...lowering the asking price for a few repairs as well as them fixing two things prior to us moving in). We sent it off and Tuesday morning got word that they agreed. No countering, no negotiating, they gave us just what we wanted. Our agent drew up papers, we signed. Then our lender sent over the final locked in mortgage rate and break down and we signed. We're getting the house!

In addition to all the new house excitement, on Wednesday I got Ryan and Logan enrolled for school. They have their meet and greet tomorrow where they will meet their teachers and see the school. Classes start Monday! So we scrambled and got their school supplies together and they are ready.

So in two weeks we adjusted to jet lag, moved into a hotel, spent 3.5 days with my parents, went sight-seeing, put an offer on a house, enrolled our kids for school, got back to school hair-cuts, and signed the final papers to buy our first home. And we did it all with one vehicle as we still haven't found a beater car for B to use to commute to and from work. But considering all we did get done, It's been a pretty productive two weeks!