The first thing you do when looking for a new house, of course, is to write down all the features you want. And then divide these into categories of "must haves" and "would be nice." It's important to be realistic here, and recognize that it's unlikely that any house will have everything on your list, and be prepared to compromise. As an example, our original list was probably something like this: MUST HAVES: 1) Single family 2) 4-5 bedrooms, with a spot for an office 3) 2-car garage 4) On a cul de sac 5) Private yard 6) Space for a garden 7) How about a pool? 8) How about a HOT TUB? 9) How about a HOT TUB TIME MACHINE! 10) Sweet-ass kitchen from the future, completely redone, with stupid shit like a sink just for filling up pots of pasta water and fancy moving shelves in the cabinets and I don't know, Bluetooth-enabled microwaves. 11) Also a gas range 12) Sweet-ass master bathroom with a giant jacuzzi tub that I can swim laps in 13) A MILLION CLOSETS! 14) Kids rooms that aren't right by my room 15) Also a door that actually locks 16) New roof, windows,... Read more →

AAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIII So that's like, my primary operating state right now. I'm trying to write and work, keep kids fed and somewhat entertained, get all kinds of paperwork in order for schools and loans and god knows what else. And then the thoughts of I should pack I should pack I should pack creeps in. So I do that thing where you grab a box and are like, I am going to pack up everything in this room right now!, only the first box is full before you've even cleared off a small shelf. So you get another box, and that fills up just as quickly and there's still no visible progress being made and everything that's not a book is awkward and pointy and doesn't fit in the box AAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIII. (The full extent of my packing progress.) (Yes, we are getting estimates for both moving and packing. I have no idea how we'll pay for packing but I'm not really sure it's optional at this point. How much plasma can a human donate in three and a half weeks?) As soon as the home inspection was over* and the house OFFICIALLY did not need to be "show-ready," things immediately devolved... Read more →

So we have some news. We made an offer on a house yesterday morning. (A yellow one, obviously.) It was a lowball offer, but I wrote the sellers a letter, which apparently made a huge difference. (Go meeeeeee!) They countered, we accepted, we close on August 21. (And now you know where we're moving, if you can make it out through all the screaming.) (And yeah, my child is in his underwear because he doesn't have any clean pajamas. Because his parents haven't done a single blessed load of laundry in weeks. That was probably the last time I bothered to makeup on, too. What of it? We found us a house, bitches!) Read more →

This post is sponsored by Blue Apron. If I may brag a little, just for a moment (lolololol), I am pretty proud that in spite of all the bonkers-level craziness of the past month, I've managed to keep life fairly stable and predictable for the kids. True, we weren't able to spring for a ton of camps or trips to the beach this summer, but we had lots of playtime and fun in the backyard, bubbles and running through the sprinkler and making the most out of a $10 inflatable kiddie pool. And family dinners out on the back deck every single night, without fail. Of course you know I had some help with that last part: What's always been a convenience turned into a godsend for us this summer. If I'd been left to menu plan (while my brain short-circuited over all the moving crap) and grocery shop (with all three kids in tow) on my own, I am pretty sure this summer would have been all about lousy delivery pizza and nugget-based food forms and stress-eating on the couch. Instead it's been more like: I will cop to making everybody eat off paper plates for a few days... Read more →

So that's done. Ish. Still have the inspection/appraisal gauntlet to get through (YOU BEST BEHAVE, HOUSE), but we accepted an offer last night. And broke more than a few hearts in the process, unfortunately, including a woman who literally barged into the house with her agent five minutes before our agent arrived with a stack of offers. They insisted that our agent encouraged them to come (a total lie, turned out), then they looked around and wouldn't leave and then the woman started crying when it became clear that no, SERIOUSLY, you do not have a chance at buying this house, please just go, okay? So that was...weird. We close in 30 days, three days before school starts. We're touring 17 goddamn houses tomorrow. (We're moving kind of far away, if you haven't guessed that already. We're staying in Maryland but moving far enough away that driving there is a significant time commitment. Basically cashing out of a crazy inflated low-inventory sellers' market and heading to much calmer, cheaper pastures. IN THEORY, anyway.) I have no idea how or if this is all going to work out, so I'm trying to just not think about it too hard so I... Read more →

On Sunday morning, the day of our Open House, we woke up to a bedroom full of wasps. Wasps. Not hornets. We'd already dealt with the hornets. And now there were dozens of freshly hatched little wasps all over the (Schüco brand, professionally installed in 2007, 10-year warranty transfers to new owner) windows. This shit is getting BIBLICAL. We spent the entire morning smashing wasps with rolled-up magazines and vacuuming up their corpses, then went on a fruitless search for the source of this latest plague. We searched the attic, closets, vents, window frames, roof, gutters, trees, you name it. No nest or hive in sight. The wasps simply appeared out of nowhere, were promptly and violently dealt with, and we haven't seen another one anywhere since. BUT STILL, INTERNET. BUT STILL! WHY IS THIS HAPPENING? I'm sorry we hurt your feelings, Townhouse. It's not you! You're lovely. Everyone who has come to see you thinks you're lovely! It's just us. Please. Stop. You've punished us enough. Please don't fall apart or catch on fire or have a million rats fall out of the ceiling like in Ratatouille. After killing the last wasp, Jason and I just stared at each... Read more →

It happened. It's happening. Sign in the yard, house officially goes on the market in an hour or so. First showing is already booked approximately 15 minutes after that. Me right now: Also me right now: So I just need to sell this house, find a new house, buy a new house, then pack up everything in this house and move it to the new house. And then like, get the kids enrolled in new schools and find someone who can cut my hair. Piece of cake. All of it. I'm sure. Holy fuckballs, what were we thinking? Read more →

The house is getting photographed for our listing this afternoon. It's happening! It's all finally happening! As of yesterday, however, this was all still happening: WELCOME TO OUR HOME! HAVE A BIKE OR SEVEN! I HAVE NO IDEA WHERE TO PUT THIS CRAP! ALL CRAP-STORING OPTIONS ARE CURRENTLY FILLED WITH OTHER CRAP! WHAT, YOU EXPECT THEM TO EAT BREAKFAST WITHOUT BRINGING ALONG A ZOO? *EYELID TWITCH* *WEIRD FOREHEAD VEIN THING* GO HOME, APPLIANCES. YOU'RE DRUNK. AND DON'T FIT ANYWHERE UNTIL I THROW OUT A WAFFLE IRON. AAAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH I JUST CLEANED THIS UP GAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH THIS TOO WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING, STOOL? THIS VACUUM BROKE FIVE YEARS AGO PEOPLE. WHAT IN THE EVER-LOVING FUCK IS WRONG WITH US? STOP. PLZ STOP. STAHHHHHHHHHHP. BLURRY HUMMINGBIRD HANDS IN FULL EFFECT, Y'ALL! ... ... You have got to be literally kidding me. OH HELL TO THE FUCK NO. I CAST THEE OUT STOMACH DEMON I REBUKE THEE I CAPS LOCK YOU FROM ORBIT. (He's fine. Totally fine. A little indigestion from too many snacks at the neighbor's house mixed with some good old-fashioned dramatics. And my brain is slowing resolidifying itself from a melted liquid form! Hooray! EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE OKAY!!!!!!!!) Read more →

Wow. I am so frazzled right now I completely forgot to blogshame my amazing husband about this: While he was away last week, I decided to be SuperNice SuperWife and organize his closet for him. Or maybe for me, and my sanity, because he kept saying he would do it but then wouldn't, even though I was CLEARLY staring at him hard enough to SET HIM ON FIRE. I'd already tackled my closet and shelves, purging mercilessly along the way, in hopes that nosy prospective homebuyers would be wowed by my organizational skills and the illusion that OMG LOOK AT ALL THAT SPACE WE SHALL NEVER EVER OUTGROW ALL THAT SPACE HOORAY! Suckers. Here's all the crap I pulled out: (Okay, so I know it's unwise to be publicly ragging on my house right before we attempt to sell it, but I feel like the closet thing is a trick we all do, we all know we all do it, and yet we all fall for it, every time. The previous homeowners did it. The homeowners of our next house will do it. I'm doing it right fucking now and I still wander around open houses randomly peeking into artfully... Read more →

Hi. I'm a wreck. This moving idea. It's a terrible idea. I think it might be the single worst idea we've ever come up with, and that includes the matching tattoos and that time we went to IKEA just to buy napkins. It's definitely happening though. We just need to shit to STOP BREAKING. The dishwasher managed to turn itself into a Big Whole Saga Thing, because of course it did. The hose-y part took longer to arrive then expected, and on Friday the repairman showed up and was completely unable to pull the dishwasher out, blaming the floors and countertops boxing it in too tightly. His suggestion? Just buy a whole new dishwasher and take a hacksaw to the legs of this one. I managed to not cry in front of him, settling with a long, drawn-out whispered "fuuuuuuck." Jason came home later, and five minutes later had the stupid dishwasher out. It's being repaired, finally and for real, right now. Unless I just jinxed everything by typing that sentence. (CTRL-C-ing that shit, then deleting. I will paste it back in once the repairman leaves and I can confirm that yes, it is working. SUCK IT, UNIVERSE.) (YAAAASSSSS FIXED.)... Read more →