Johnson Household

When January rolls around every year I get really excited. It’s my month to recuperate from all the activities of the previous months. It’s nice to sit and veg because lets face it there is not much to do. So, with that said, what do we decide to do? We decided to put our house on the market. Sometimes, I really think we are crazy. This just might be enough evidence to prove that.

We met with our awesome Realtor, Sharon Diamond. She basically told us that if we want to take advantage of the tax incentives we need to put our house up on the market in two weeks. I wish I had a photo of our faces, because I am sure they were priceless. In all seriousness, the fact that there are not many houses on the market right now with first time buyers looking and we have lived in this house for more then five years, it’s a good time to sell. Craig and I were planning on selling anyway in the next year or so and move to Brighton. More on that later.

Getting back to the two weeks time frame. I wasn’t too worried about the living space. I am very proud of how we fixed our “fixer upper” up. This house was a mess when we got it, Craig and I fixed it up to be a little gem. What concerned us was the basement. It had (notice the past tense) so much crap down there. Honestly, I think things multiplied on their own. When my Mom moved back from Hungary and when we got new furniture we just put stuff down there, it was the easiest thing to do. I have been planning on cleaning out the basement for a couple of years, but every time I went down, I got overwhelmed and went back upstairs. But, nothing is a greater motivation then wanting to sell your house! So, we rented a big a$$ dumpster and we threw junk away, we donated a lot, and we are in the process of selling stuff off. So, I am proud and excited to announce that our basement is once again a basement and not a maze. It is currently storing what it should be, like the furnace, water heater, washer, dryer, and the boxes we already packed for the move.

We listed our house this past Friday and by Sunday afternoon we had three offers on the house! We weren’t ready for that. We didn’t think it would happen so fast, we honestly thought we would have at least a couple of weeks before any offers would be made. It was a bittersweet moment. We were excited and flattered that people liked our house that much, but with that said we were also bummed. We love our house and reality set in that we were leaving the house that we made into our home.

Umm… so, one small detail is we still don’t have a new house. There is nothing on the market in Brighton. Our Realtor is assuring us that the market is going to be picking up in the next couple of weeks. If we close before we find a house, we will have to get an apartment with a short-term lease. Craig and I decided this is the best route. We will be a stronger candidate when we put an offer down on a house and most importantly we won’t have to settle for a house.

Here is the link to our listing.
And, here it the audio tour of our house.

We all did our share to get our house ready.

helping out

Besides putting our house on the market and selling it (pending inspection) here are some other things going on.

• Dagny went to the dentist for the for first time. I was so impressed and proud of her behavior. All is great with her pearly whites.
• Dagny only speaks in Hungarian to my Mom, English to Craig, and she goes between the two with me.
• Dagny loves to wear Craig’s shoes. I am actually very proud of Little D, she can put her own shoes/boots on without help.

kind of big

• Dagny loves it when we quiz (lack of a better word) her. I finally was able to capture some video. The quality is not the greatest, it was recorded on my iPhone, but you get the idea.

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• I went to my friend Jessica’s baby shower. Baby Mason is scheduled to arrive on February 25th. We can’t wait to meet him.

Jessica and Mason

• And finally we got Dagny’s NYS Birth Certificate! We are so excited that we were able to do this for Dagny.

It’s been a very long month with lots of things going on and I don’t see it calming down anytime soon. I will end this post with a shot of the most important people in my life.

my favorite people

Barbara

As I watched Craig and Dagny dance tonight I couldn’t help but think about Dagny’s wedding day, hopefully without the Elmo T-shirt.

So sweet.

Craig and Dagny

Dagny and Craig

Craig and Dagny

Barbara

It seems like Dagny is getting bigger and I am not talking about size. Sleeping has never been an issue with her, she was/is a great sleeper. What we have noticed since we got back from Ohio is that when we put her down at night she stays lying down. In the past when we would put her down for the night, she would jump right up and start crying after me or Craig and after five minutes (longest five minutes) she would fall asleep. Now, we put her down and we are able to tuck her in without her jumping up. The first time she did this Craig and I looked at each other in amazement. We initially thought this might be because she was home in her own bed after being away for close to a week. But, it keeps on happening. She is growing up. We feel so much more comfortable about transitioning her to a “big girl” bed when the time comes, which we are not rushing to do.

funny girl

In other Dagny news. Her speech is at the next level. You can totally have a mini conversation with her. She is able to put three to four words in a sentence in with her baby language and you can make out what she is trying to convey to you. What is so amazing is that when you answer her back, she then moves forward with the conversation. It’s pretty amazing watching this unfold. She is also starting to talk in Hungarian more and more. She has understood Hungarian for a while now, but now she is using it interchangeably with English.

“It’s Daddy!”

Dagny knows her colors. Some of the colors are green (I think is her favorite), yellow, red, blue, pink, brown, black, white, and purple. When she sees Jeff (the purple Wiggle from The Wiggles), she says “Jeff…purple shirt.”

our little photographer

She loves music and anything to do with it. She will dance and asks us all to join her. I have a dust wand thingy that she plays with all the time. Depending on time of day, that wand turns into a guitar, violin, flute, drumstick, or tickle tool. Her imagination has really taken off. She loves playing with her kitchen. She will say things like. “Dagny making soup.” or “Dagny making coffee.” and then brings it to us for us to eat or drink. The kitchen is a big hit.

I know this sounds like an old record, but she can recognize all her letters, without fail. She can count to 12. She knows more animals by name then I do. To name a few, she knows what a Walrus, Flamingo, Vulture, Nightingale, Quail, Yak, and Jaguar are.

This turned into a longer Dagny post than it started off.

kiss

Barbara