The Rollins Report

Last night, after we unpacked our car from the trip to Abilene, I went to the store to get supplies for tonight. After returning home from that zoo, we ate dinner and were trying to decide what movie to watch. As we plugged in the movie, David decided that it was time to try out our new fireplace! He turned the key, lit the fire and ta daa! We had a nice fire in our fireplace.

I had surprised David with a copy of A Muppet's Christmas Carol, which I found at Kroger whilst looking for relish tray items. We chose that as the movie to watch, and curled up on the couch, in front of our roaring fire, to watch the movie. After that one, we watched Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas, another Jim Henson classic. It was a very Christmas-y end to a fun weekend!

Friday night, David and I did dinner and a movie! Dinner was at Double Dave's pizza buffet. It had been awhile since we'd eaten there, and I really enjoyed it! We then braved the crowd at the mall to get to the movie theater.

I had chosen the movie Enchanted, we made it just as the previews were starting! We saw some previews that looked promising as well. The movie itself was great! It was Disney making fun of itself. I loved the characters and the storyline was really good. I was also pleased to see Idina Menzel in the film, she originated the role of Elphaba in the musical Wicked. She didn't sing in the movie, though.

It was definitely a Dezi movie, and we left the theatre feeling good. We also ran into our old neighbors, it was neat to see them as well! After the movie, David went to the sporting goods store to get some stuff, while I went to Barnes & Noble. After shopping, we went home. It was a really fun night, and also good to take time just for each other.

Our Advent wreath!


Our tree-in-progress!

We have started our Christmas decorating! After our exciting trip to Garden Ridge, we opened up the tree stuff on Saturday! We got the tree set up and moved into the dining room. I put the tree skirt on and we were both very glad that we picked a pre-lit tree!

Mom is making us a wreath for the door, and we are in the process of putting up our outside decorations. I also bought an Advent wreath for our house, and we lit the first candle yesterday. I am excited about bringing that tradition into our family!

I opened up the ornament box this evening and found that all those beautiful ornaments did not come with hooks to put them on the tree. Oh well. I'll pick up a box of paper clips tomorrow. We were able to put up our Luke and Leia ornaments, as well as a couple of ornaments that we already had. We also put up the garlands as well as the star on the top!

I'll have more decoration updates as they come!

Last Sunday after church, David and I decided to go shopping for Christmas decorations. Mom told us to get a tree from Garden Ridge, so that's where we went. Unfortunately, there isn't one near us, and the closest one was still difficult to find. Mom said it was in an outlet mall, once we got inside, I remembered going there before, but it had been many years.

I think that everyone else had the same idea as us! Garden Ridge was an absolute zoo. I'm so glad we went before Thanksgiving, as opposed to after. Anywho, so we braved the madness and looked around. We were looking at all the trees, trying to decide between the selection. We finally picked a pre-lit seven and a half foot tree, then looked for trimmings.

We found a stand, a tree skirt, a star for the top, and a box of a bunch of ornaments. While looking at the ornaments, David found a display of Star Wars ornaments. I picked Princess Leia, while he looked for Han Solo. Unfortunately, there were no Hans, so we wound up with Luke Skywalker.

We found a Santa hat for me, as well as outdoor lights for the roof, lights to go around the flower beds, and lights to line the sidewalk. Once we got home with everything, we were pooped! I'm glad that we have all of our stuff now. I'm excited about decorating our house for Christmas!

Look at what David put together yesterday! Doesn't it look great?

Yesterday was our first Halloween in our house! I was so excited, I bought four bags of candy last week, I had some fantabulous coupons for candy at Target! I put everything in one of our crystal bowls (mostly because it was the biggest bowl that we had), and also set up a smaller bowl with various nonedible Halloween goodies left over from my class party.

I set the bowls up on our TV tray and put it next to the door. We tidied up a bit in the kitchen, dining room and living room. I was wearing my pumpkin shirt, I put Roxie's Halloween bandanna on her (we got it from the groomer at her last appointment), put her in her leash and harness, and we were ready for business!

Unfortunately, we had a total of about ten children come to our house. Two of the kids were my preschool students. They wanted to come meet Roxie, which I knew and had provided their parents with directions to the house. They both enjoyed meeting her, although they weren't quite sure what they were supposed to say when I opened the door!

We also had our old neighbors come by with their little one. He was so cute in his costume! Well, they all were. Not too many houses on our street had lights on, which was probably why we didn't have many trick or treaters. So now we have a bunch of candy left. Oh well, David and I decided that I'll take it to work, get rid of it that way.

Maybe we'll have more trick or treaters next year!

Last night, David and I went to a costume party hosted by one of his jiu-jitsu friends. I had looked around at costumes, but didn't really find anything that I liked. I searched online and found some cute homemade costume ideas. I decided to go as a tourist, and David decided to do the same. I bought some straw hats, which was the only thing we needed to get to pull it off.

We donned Hawaiian shirts, khaki shorts, straw hats, and paired socks with flip-flops. I threw some maps, my London tube map, my passport in a tote bag, and we borrowed my mom's big camera with a shoulder strap, to wear. We got a lot of compliments on our outfits!

There was a good turnout at the party, lotsa people to talk to! I had some absolutely wonderful Butterfinger cake!! I have to learn how to make it! We watched people try games out on their Wii, which is always entertaining to watch. We also watched some of the UFC fights. Well, the guys did, I had a nice chat with some of the other wives.

It was a fun night and a great ending to a really long week. We did stay up too late, but it was definitely worth it!

Since David starts his new job on Monday, he's been spending the past couple of weekends backing up the data on his laptop, which we thought he had to give back. Last weekend, he decided that he wanted to get a new desktop computer, so he did!

It has a huge screen, twenty-two inches and it's a Dell. It has four GB of RAM, 500 GB hard drive, 2.6 GHz processor and and it is intended for mostly for work-related stuff. He also has the screen on his old desktop set up so he can watch movies or play games on it while working on projects. David says the new computer runs Eclipse very well.

Hooray for new computers!

Yesterday, David and I were discussing various things, one of which is my teaching piano. Right now I am going to my students' homes to teach their lessons, because we currently have two keyboards, but no piano. That may soon change!

We decided that we should get a piano, and I am so excited at the thought! I've really missed having a piano to play on. Yes, my keyboards are fine and I can play on the piano at church, but I want a piano for us. I looked over the classifieds today and found some prospects.

We're thinking to get a used piano, but if we could find a really good deal, we might possibly go for a new one. David thought that we might look at the estate sales in the area, perhaps someone might be getting rid of a piano. I looked for them in the paper today, but it was too late at that point to go to the sales.

I'm also looking online at some of the area piano stores. My dream is to own a Steinway grand piano (or at least a baby grand) someday, but for now I'd be perfectly happy with an upright piano. We shall see! Hopefully we'll find a good deal soon!

Last weekend we went to Lowe's to look at an edger for our yard. We had one given to us by one of David's friends, however, we needed something more. After comparing several of them, David picked out the one he wanted, as well as some other stuff and we left. He was definitely excited about trying them out, and reports that it works very well!

Tonight, he decided he wanted to get a power saw. So we jumped in the car and headed to Home Depot. We found a circular saw that fit our needs and then decided to get a saw horse. After looking them over for a bit and debating the pros and cons, we called the home improvement expert, also known as Dad. I gave the phone to David and Dad put in his recommendation, which is what we went with.

We also got a clamp and a couple of small things. The best part is that I remembered the gift cards this time, so we wound up only paying fifty dollars! Hooray for saving money!

Now David is out in the garage, setting up the sawhorses. He's working on making a new floor for Roxie's crate, since she chewed up the plastic one that it came with. Hooray for power tools!

Last week, I stopped by PetSmart to sign Roxie and I up for beginner dog education. The employee working nearby acted impressed that I knew exactly which class, what time, which instructor I wanted, as well as how to fill out the enrollment form. I didn't think it was that difficult to figure out.

Roxie and I showed up a bit early with vaccination records and a bag of Purina Beggin Strips. We learned about being a good leader. That was obviously more for the humans. We also were all given a clicker and instructed on how to use it. We discussed potty and crate training. The overall theme is showing the dog that we are in control, that we are the boss, not her. That's not too different from teaching three and four year-olds!

Since being home, we demonstrated our knowledge for David, and we gave him a try with the clicker as well. I think with some consistency that this is really going to be a great thing for Roxie, as well as for us. We shall see!

Our anniversary this year fell on a Monday. David and I had been racking our brains trying to figure out what to get for each other. I wanted to stick with the traditional gift for a second anniversary, which is cotton. I found a throw blanket at Things Remembered that I really liked, David and I decided that would be our gift to each other. I was really happy with how it turned out and look forward to using it when the weather gets cooler!

David made reservations at a restaurant, but wanted to surprise me with the location. I was really excited when he pulled up at the Melting Pot! It's hard to believe it has been five years since we met at that restaurant! We had a fabulous dinner! It started off with a cheese fondue, where we dipped bread, carrots, and apples. We then had the salad course, then the main course. David made sure that there were enough non-meat items for me to eat!

Everything was so good, it was hard not to stuff myself! Besides, the best was yet to come. We had something called Ameretto Meltdown for dessert. It was flambee style, so they set it on fire right at our table! That was fun, and absolutely wonderful!

Along with our meal, we received a vase of roses, a card signed by the staff, and our picture taken. During our meal, we reminisced about when we met, the years we'd been together, etc. After we got home, I pulled out our wedding albums, and we looked at our photos. A great ending to a wonderful evening.

Tonight we had our open house. It was a great success! The house looked great, we had worked hard at consolidating our remaining boxes into one room, and those were stacked up neatly. David went to the store last night to get food for the shindig, we didn't have too much to do today.

My parents came early to help with food preparation, which was a big help! People starting coming a little bit after six. A lot of people from church, a lot of family, and some other friends came, too! David was working hard, making fajitas on the grill. People loved the house, the food, everything! Roxie was especially a bit hit!

We had forty people in the house, and while it was certainly crowded, it didn't feel too crowded. We were excited to have people come see our house! We definitely want to have more parties, but not for awhile!

I'd been doing some online research to find a dog to adopt from a shelter. We'd looked online, met some dogs at adoption events, but didn't meet the right one, until today.

David and I drove out to Carrollton, to the Operation Kindness shelter. I'd heard about them on television, and David had heard about them on the radio. As we walked in the door, I was excited about possibly meeting our future dog!

They were very busy today, we were given an application to fill out, which had all sorts of questions on it. Upon turning it in, we waited until we were given a pass to go back and look at the dogs. It was kind of sad, all those dogs in their cages, we wanted to take all of them! We then went to the front and gave them the names of the dogs we wanted to see. I was so smitten with the first dog, we wound up not seeing the second dog.

We took her out to the play area and led her around on the leash, played, petted and talked with her. She was so affectionate and friendly! She's a Silky Terrier, with black and gold hair. She's a year old, and weighs in at fifteen pounds. She'll get fixed on Thursday, then on Friday I get to bring her home!

After leaving the shelter, we went to PetSmart to stock up on all things dog: leash/collar, food, toys, crate, grooming tools, etc. I'm excited about getting her stuff set up and welcoming her to the family! Now we just need to think of a name for her!

Thursday, David and I met up at the title company to sign a mound of papers on our house. After signing our names several times, the house was ours! We met our realtor at the house to check it out, and see if any cleaning needed to be done. The house was left in immaculate condition, everything looked great!

My parents met us up at the house for dinner, where we toasted the house and ate our first meal in our new kitchen! Saturday we moved in, and now here we are, in our very own house! Sunday morning, David and I were so excited, we were dancing around in the kitchen!

We had our locks changed yesterday, our phone/internet/cable installed today, and tomorrow we'll get our dining room furniture. While I know we'll spend awhile getting everything unpacked, we're both so excited about our house!

We have had three people donate boxes to us, which amounts to a bunch of boxes! David cleared out the dining room, and that is where we are putting our boxes as we pack them. We worked the majority of the weekend on packing. I will be very glad when we are actually in the house, I'm ready to be in it already!

There are a couple of comic strips that I read daily. In one of them, a couple is talking about buying a house. They go back and forth discussing it, then the husband comments that buying a house is a huge deal, it's almost as bad as getting married! I was talking to Mom about it, and we see some similarities. I definitely feel nervous/excited like I did in the days before the wedding. However, unlike our wedding day, it'll be cooler, and I'll be wearing jeans!

Last week, I spent an afternoon on the phone, calling various insurance agents. I was trying to get a quote for homeowners insurance. While they asked the same questions for the most part, some of the questions were kind of interesting. For instance, they asked if we had a trampoline. I now understand that it is a liability, but it was an interesting question. Anywho, so after receiving several quotes, David and I have selected an insurance company. I've done some research about them and we feel that we will get a good deal.

Now we're trying to rent a truck, set up our electicity/internet/utilities, etc, and shop for a refrigerator. Have I mentioned how much I'm looking forward to being finished with the whole moving thing?

We are in the process of securing a loan for our house, and if you couldn't guess by the title, I am slightly stressed about it. We were pre-approved without a problem, however, it's a bit daunting! We're in the process of gathering all the necessary paperwork, then we'll send it on later this week. Keep your fingers crossed!

In other news, we had our appraisal inspection today. I arrived at the house right after my piano lesson, and David arrived not too long after that. Overall, the inspector said it was a very good inspection. There were a couple of repairs that needed to be completed, and we notified our realtor about them, and he'll add them to the contract. If the sellers decline to make the repairs, then we'll do them after we move in.

We're within thirty days of closing on our home, it's crunch time!

We put in an offer on a home on Thursday. David actually brought the contract up to me at work, and I signed it while standing in the toddler room! On Friday, we found out that they put in a counter-offer. We then countered their offer. Yesterday, we found out that they came down even more, and threw in the washer and dryer, something that we really need!

After talking it over, David and I decided to accept their offer. Our realtor is now reworking the contract to reflect the current numbers. Then we'll all sign it and begin the whole inspection/loan application/etc process. We're excited!

That's the name of the game in house-hunting! We've gone on three viewing excursions with our realtor. The first one, we found three homes that we really liked. We decided to put an offer in on one of them. It was a great price in a great location. Unfortunately, someone else thought so too! I was disappointed that we didn't get the house, but that's all part of the fun!

Thursday afternoon, we viewed five houses. There were two that I really liked, one that both David and I were interested in. The problem with that house is that it would need some work. However, it was a great floorplan and a nice neighborhood. We could definitely be happy in that house.

Yesterday, we looked at four more homes. Three of them were definite winners! I e-mailed our realtor early this morning, telling him that we wanted to put an offer on one of them immediately. It was a big house for the price, and located in a great neighborhood, very close to an elementary and middle school!
(The middle school has a very good band program, by the way) I know that it was generating a lot of interest from potential buyers, so I'm not holding my breath.

There was another house that we decided to put an offer in as well. It's also in a great location, really close to our church and the Tollway! The lot was big, with a huge backyard! The house wasn't as big as the first house, but it was well maintained and a very good house!

The third house was okay, but seriously paled in comparison with the first two homes. The last house was also a winner! The only issue with it is that it is further out than we would like. However, the layout was great, and the upkeep on it was impressive. We shall see which one of these we wind up with, or if we end up in a totally different house!

One of the youth counselors from David's old church is a realtor in Frisco. David had contacted him, telling him of our home search. I received a message at work on Wednesday saying that David had set up a meeting after I got off work. Since the realty office is around the corner from the preschool, it was very convenient.

I was early, and it was a good thing, because I was there for almost an hour! I told him about what we were looking for, and he ran a search. We have a stack of nearly forty homes for sale in Frisco! I've looked in neighboring cities, but it would really be nice to stay in Frisco.

David and I are now to narrow down the forty homes to our top twenty-five, then we'll start visiting. We'll then pick our top two and start to make an offer! I'm really excited about the whole process! We're going to buy our first house!

I've driven by a few of the listed houses. A couple of them, I liked the outside and neighborhood a lot. The other one, I like the neighborhood, but wasn't real crazy about the location of the house on the street, and the front of the house. Maybe I'm silly for driving by the houses, but I really want to!

More house search updates to come!

I've been scouting out different home builders in the areas of Frisco, McKinney and Little Elm. I really like a couple of the communities that I visited. One is in McKinney, and has Cape Cod-style homes. I loved the look that these had, especially with the big front porches! It's also located in Frisco ISD, which is a big selling point with me. They also have a new neighborhood going in that is going to be brick homes. We'll probably wind up going with a brick home, which is much better on the resale potential.

Another neighborhood in McKinney, also in Frisco ISD, is one that I also liked. They had some standard features that are typically upgrades in other homes. This particular builder also had some really nice incentives for buying a home from them.

Tuesday after my piano lesson, I drove out to a community in Little Elm. I visited with two builders and enjoyed both of them. The first builder was showing me some homes that were already built and for sale. While I like the floor plan and layouts of the homes, the back windows of the house (which happened to be in the family room and kitchen) overlooked a cemetary. I thought that was a bit creepy! I did really like the neighborhood and it looked like a great place to live and start a family.

This weekend, I'm taking David to the communities that I really liked. I'm really getting excited about looking for a house!

Two days after Christmas, David and I, along with Barbara, did something really exciting. We flew to London to celebrate New Year's! It was the first overseas trip for both of us, the first stamp in my passport for me! We had a marvelous time and look forward to our next overseas adventure!