We put in an offer on a house yesterday. Life has been a whirlwind the last couple weeks. There have been the many people looking at our house, the offer on our house and signing the purchase agreement papers for selling our house keeping us busy. Then, the frantic searching for a new house picked up. I think this last Monday we looked at 6 or more houses in one day. Yesterday was a busy day, too. We looked at one more house, put an offer in on one and went to a party - then off to work.
We were looking for houses west of Minnetonka - specifically in the Delano, Rockford, Watertown, Independence and Buffalo area. I wanted to stay out of Hennepin county if possible, and wasn’t excited about spending a lot of time and money fixing up another house. Well, we found one that does not need much for updates - just removing some wallpaper and putting on some paint, and maybe some new carpet in bedrooms. The house is just west of Buffalo on 2.4 acres by a small lake. HERE is a link to the listing.
Searching for a house is a major undertaking. Each of us had things that were important to us, some things more than others - and we had to put all that together to settle on a house could agree on. I’m not sure it was fair to all, but hopefully in the end, we’ll all be OK with the choice. We were originally looking for more land - (5+ acres for me) and a little closer to the metro area. I think this house will be just fine - that’s if our offer (or possible future counter-offers) is accepted. So, it’s not official - it’s just an offer to buy the house.
The party we went to today was put on by Holly’s Toastmaster leader. He planned a whole day’s worth of events of skill, endurance, chance and a lot of fun. There was a nice meal, too. He really went to way too much trouble, but it seemed like he enjoyed it a lot. We saw one of Jessica and Erika’s brothers at the party. We’ve seen both of their brothers a couple times this summer, and probably will more in the future. I miss Jessica and Erika.
We had another offer on our house - the same people as before. There was an inspection on Monday and we heard on Tuesday that everything went OK with the inspection. No issues, well almost no issues. The inspector went into the shop and flipped the circuit breaker for the lights (the lights were already on) and the breaker wouldn’t reset. All I had to do was replace the breaker and it’s working again. The closing date is July 27th. That gives us just over a month to find a house. Fat chance of that….us agreeing on a house….and moving in….in 37 days.
We’re looking for houses west of the cities - preferably in Wright or Carver county. There were more to choose from in that area just 6 months ago. There are not as many meeting our criteria now. I’d like 5+ acres (heavy on the +) with some trees and water. The house is more important to Brenda. We did come up with a list of 10 or so houses to look at, and will get started today.
Holly started the classroom portion of driver’s training. It’s her 3rd of 10 days today. When she’s done, she will be able to get her driving permit. Wow, the years have flown by.
Mitch is in Civil Air Patrol. Meetings are every Tuesday night at the Crystal Airport, which, by the way had an airplane crash last night after their meeting ended. The plane crashed, exploded and the pilot died. Did I mention that Mitch will be flying at times and may get a pilot’s license?
We celebrated Holly and Mitch’s birthday last Saturday and had a small party. The weather was fantastic.
You know our house is for sale, right? We have 2 showings later today. A new couple will be looking at it at 11am. Another couple that has been through our house 2 or 3 times already is coming again today with parents. They gave us an offer, but too low for us to accept. I think they’re showing parents to help sell them on the idea of them loaning some money to help with the down payment. We’re thinking that this is our opportunity to get the house sold. It’s too bad I started scraping some peeling paint on the outside of the house and didn’t get it re-painted before the rain came yesterday. Well, if it’s supposed to sell, it will. Right?
Work has been busy lately. There are even two job openings in my department. For all the public’s negative talk about Qwest over the past 5+ years, we’re doing pretty good. Our department is getting new customers nearly every day. I’m not sure how much money we’re making on them, but we’re nearing 10,000 devices monitored mark, and should/could reach that mark in 3-6 months.
I’m nearing the end of constructing the FM transmitter for the light show. I had to order some more parts from mouser.com so I can complete all the projects I’m working on. Once the transmitter is built, I’ll have to set it up and tune it and also try to figure out how all the boards get powered and interconnect to each other. There’s a transmitter board, a limiter/compressor board, a stereo encoder board and an RDM module. They all have to get mounted in a housing of some sort, too. I’ll need to get some housings for the Renard SS24 light controller boards also. They’re about $9 each online. The last part of the project will be building displays, buying lights, setting it all up and sequencing the show. It sounds like a lot of work, but it’s really going to be triple what it sounds like.
Mitch and his friend, Sam made a very simple, short movie yesterday. There’s not much of a plot to it, but you can tell they did put some thought behind it and the movie, though simple turned out really nice. What impressed me is the lighting. I’m not sure if they really pictured the end result, but what they did worked. Mitch has a 93LED flashlight (we call it the 93 horsepower flashlight) that they used to simulate a streetlight. The movie was converted to black & white in Sony Vegas (editing software) and the music they added seemed to fit pretty nice, too. I’m trying to get it uploaded to the web and when I do, will post a link (or will just put it on this website).
We still have our house up for sale…..sort of. We’re still not listed on the MLS, but have been getting people look at it. We’ve even had an offer on the house. Since there are other homes in our neighborhood for sale, people driving by call us to see ours, too. The offer we had was pretty close to our bottom line, but not quite. We heard back from their realtor that they’re trying to put together another, bigger, better offer. We’ll see what happens before we take the plunge and get on the MLS service.
Since we’ve been had people looking at the house, that means spur of the moment cleaning and gathering the dog and cat and hanging out in the van for up to an hour. Jubilee, the cat does not like being in the van, or even outside the house too much. It’s funny to watch her. She knows something is up before people look at the house and she hides.
Holly and Mitch were in a play that ended Memorial Day weekend. The play was called “The Adventures of Mottel” and all the kids did a great job. I helped with the sound, lights and a little on the set again. All that’s left is to take the time to edit the video and put together a DVD. Watch for it in your local Blockbuster soon. Go to the picture section for some pictures of the play.
I’m still working on building an FM transmitter, stereo encoder, clipper/compressor and RDM module for the Christmas light show. See a couple posts ago. That FM transmitter and related boards are taking much longer than the light controllers, but the documentation is much better for the controllers. Even though the light boards are physically bigger, the FM transmitter has a bigger variety of parts. I’ll try to get some pictures of the boards posted, too.
Holly is going to start playing the bagpipes, or actually just the chanter for now. Don’t ask me what a chanter is because I really don’t know. I think it’s part of the bagpipe, or it may be instead of a bagpipe. Anyway, when the bagpipe guy gets some more chanters from Scotland in a couple weeks we can pick it up. I was looking for a ‘cheaper’ soprano saxophone (it’s like a metal clarinet - like Kenny G plays) for Mitch (and me) to play but they don’t exist - at least not in a decent quality. I did pick up an alto for $50 which does play OK, but should be pretty nice after we get a new mouthpiece.
We’ve all heard it many times. We’ve all said it many times. It’s that phrase, usually used in a greeting that people don’t usually want the answer to - or not a full, truthful answer. Can you guess what that phrase is? ”How’s it going?” or “How are you doing?”
When people ask me how I’m doing, I really do think about what they’re asking and wonder if they’d sit and listen for a full explanation, likely taking an hour of their time. I’m sure some people really do care how I am (or we are) doing. Sometimes, I consider telling them how things are, but then realize that putting my troubles on them would probably be the low point of their day and not make me feel any better. Since Jessica and Erika have been gone I’ve been more moody (usually on the down side) and could give someone a real earful of complaints and sorrow. So, I usually just tell them that things are going pretty good, or just say OK.
If you’re reading this and wonder what I’m talking about - Jessica and Erika being gone… I’ve “unpublished” a number of blog entries about that whole unbelievable chain of events. I’ve been told that what I wrote put blame on people and made me sound angry towards them. I disagree with that, but I suppose it’s because I know the feelings behind what I wrote. I thought that just “unpublishing” them for now would be a good solution. I haven’t changed any of the words, nor will I. It’s all there behind the scenes of the website, just as it is in real life. I’m going to do my best to move on, especially since I just learned that Jessica and Erika have been officially adopted by a family in a different state. For me, moving on may not mean much, and will probably look different every day. I will never be the same person I was before. Part of my family is gone forever.
There is no shortage of projects I’m working on. It’s too bad they’re not related to our adopted children…..
I received all four of the lighting controller boards. Now, I’m waiting for the electronic components needed for populating the boards. If I don’t watch it, these could end up consuming a small fortune. The boards and components aren’t going to be outrageously expensive. There are also wood, wire, metal, plastic and other parts to build displays for over 100 strings of Christmas lights that will be controlled by these boards. If I do it right, the supplies needed will be scrounged up from the twincitiesfreemarket org or craigslist.com websites. This project is going to be fun to do, and hopefully worth it in the end. For an example of what it ‘may’ look like:
Click on the link above to go Richard Holdman’s other videos. You’ll be impressed. I like the 2007 videos, when the lights were on his house better than the 2008, when he put them up at a vacant lot in town.
OK, so this guy has 80 more channels of lights than I will have, his house is nicer and he is obviously more experienced at this than I am - but you get the idea. I’m also going to try to build an FM transmitter to get the music out in the airwaves around our house. The FM transmitter may be the tricky part. I’ve heard that they can be finicky when it comes to staying locked exactly on a frequency, without drifting. I may have to buy one if I can’t build a satisfactory home-made version.
Other projects include building guitar effects pedals. So far, finished is a digital delay and a mild distortion. I’m currently working on a chorus pedal. After the chorus, I’ll work on a tremolo and a couple more. I’ve been trying to get a depth of field adaptor made for my video camera for some time. There hasn’t been a lot of work done on it because I’m waiting for a friend to get a CNC machine finished so I can get a part milled for the adaptor. I’ve also been building remote controllers (LANC on a pro video camera) for the Canon HV20 video camera and selling them. I’m trying to get Mitch to help out building them, but I’ve still been in the designing and tweaking stage. The design should be fixed now, so he can help build them and make some money. We’ve sold a few so far.
I think I’ve bitten off more than I can chew! This remote control thing is getting bigger than I thought. We’ve sold a few of them, but now we’re offering options (which means more parts to have on hand). Now, you can get the original (permanent LED mount, single length cable) or a removable LED (which I recommend for most people) and either the permanent or removable LED mount with an extendable cable. The remotes are on backorder from Canon right now, though we should get a few within a week. Hopefully Mitch will show some more interest in making these things (maybe making the money is more of an incentive) and this venture will be worthwhile (profitable).
Holly and Mitch have started in another play that our homeschool group is putting on. Wayne Matthews is directing again. The play is The Adventures of Mottel which is a comedy about Jewish immigration from Russia to USA. I haven’t seen the script, but I guess it’s supposed to be pretty funny.
Yes, I’m still thinking about Jessica and Erika a lot. Yes, I still ask God for a miracle, that they return home to us. We still don’t talk about them at home. I still miss them and cry.