Get It Sold!

13. April 2008 · 2 comments · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,


Need a house?

For those unaware, I’ve been going crazy since early March getting our house ready to sell. Unlike in Florida, where we didn’t have to do jack squat for the house to sell in summer 2005, this time around we’re making this place look like a museum, new paint all around, repairs, powerwashing, new landscaping, as much as we’re willing to budget.

Since we can’t currently guarantee we’re going to make any money on the house, we can’t go too nuts. No new appliances, no new flooring, carpeting, roof, etc. The most we’re investing in is an exterior trim paint job.

But there’s this show on HGTV called “Get It Sold” and we’ve been enjoying learning about these little low-cost tips to “stage” the house. One of the recommendations is that we remove personal pictures and replace those picture frames with more neutral artwork.

Dave and I had prided ourselves in our living room, filled with black-and-white 8 x 10 portraits of the family, with the only color picture being the full-sized family portrait over the fireplace. You can see what I’m talking about in this picture from Easter morning (yes, Dave’s wearing bunny ears, what a trooper!):

We didn’t want to run out to Bed Bath and Beyond or some art store to spend money on neutral stuff that we wouldn’t even want to take to Nebraska.

Dave came up with the idea to make some 8 x 10 black and white prints of some of the less personal photography we might have on our computers. He and I spent the better part of an evening browsing our digital photo collection (about 19,000 pictures, going back to 2002) looking for something worth blowing up and hanging on our wall. Oh yeah, it has to look good in black and white!

After Dave campaigned (and lost) for a picture of a calf, and I campaigned (and lost) for a picture of Mount Washington, NH we settled on 5 very nice pictures, that we had Shutterfly blow up for us for a grand total of $20.02! I’m in the middle of re-framing the black and whites right now and it’s looking very impressive.

The picture of the tall ship goes into our bedroom, while the other 4 pictures will be in the living room, in black “floating” frames.

Seeing the World Through "I’m Moving Soon"-Colored Glasses

12. February 2008 · 1 comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,

As most of my loyal readers know, the Vollmer family has a move coming up. Dave has orders to Offutt AFB, Nebraska, and this week he got the first batch of paperwork verifying things. He had to select what date we want to leave North Carolina…and that resulted in a lot of discussion. It turns out the public schools in Bellevue, NE start on AUGUST 12th!

What???

Who wants to start school that early??? I remember being flabbergasted at how early the kids started in Brevard County, FL, when Dave and I were stationed at Patrick AFB.

Well, for some reason, it’s VERY important to me that if Jake has a chance to start school on the first day of school, he does so. After all, we’re talking about Kindergarten — the most important day of his life…

…well, thus far.

The point is, Jake will have enough other things to worry about with our move…having to single him out as the “new kid” a week after Kindergarten starts? I don’t think that’s cool.

So I convinced Dave to put “August 7th” as the date we’re leaving NC. Yes, it’ll be a fast trip to NE, but for Jake, I think if we can get him into the school routine as soon as he arrives, things will be good for him. The sooner he’ll make friends, establish a routine, and he won’t have to sit around bored while the furniture is being delivered.

Also, the upcoming move has had me looking at everything in my house so I can mentally label it “Should it stay or should it go?” Many things are illegal for the movers to take: candles, lightbulbs, liquids of any kind. Which means if we really want to take it along, we have to find room in our van or car.

This weekend I took a look under my bathroom sink and saw so many Bath and Body Works, Body Shop, and other pretty-smelling lotions, eaus, and body splashes. I thought to myself, “I can’t take all of it with me.”

Infant toys, magazines, clothes that are too small/out of style, pantry foods that I bought then changed my mind about preparing: need to get it squared away before July!

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