Mustaine Family: Update

Here is to trying to keep up with the blog. So I am hoping that the pictures will tell most of what we have been up to, but I did mention at one point I wanted to tell about how we ended up in the house we are in. It was a crazy series of events that helped us recognize God's plan in it all and we are so thankful for where we are today.

As we started looking for homes, once we knew that we were moving here, we quickly found out from our lender that we would probably not be able to buy until our home in fort myers sold or Chris was at least pulling a paycheck, which would not begin until the school year. We had pretty much thought we would have to rent until one of those two things happened, which would have meant moving twice and a lot more of a headache than what we had hoped for. That being said there was one house we looked at that was for sale by owner and it was a bank owned home with a bank owner who happened to be familiar with Young Life and was excited, for some reason, about us living in this house. It was in the PERFECT neighborhood, right where we wanted to live, by a lot of friends, great babysitters and best yet, across the street from St. Stephens. It all seemed to good to be true. I saw the house before we went to camp over the summer and the seller said he would wait for Chris to see it---3 weeks from then, to sell it to anyone else----mind you the house was in great shape and probably could have sold in a day or so if the guy wanted to just get rid of it. I was a bit concerned about putting an offer in, mainly because it seemed like it may be a bit small and I wanted Chris to be ok with it.

We get back and Chris likes it, and we proceed to try and figure out how we could make it work. The bank owner says that they will do our financing---which again was a miracle cause like I said we could not get financed otherwise----AND he says that we only have to put 10% down to avoid PMI----this was a HUGE selling point for us----now mind you we are still a bit leary because we are risking having 2 mortgages for who knows how long, but we feel as though this is where God wants us to be and we will trust Him and go from there. We make the official offer on a Tuesday----We get an inspection done the following Tuesday and everything checks out ok, except that there are termites----the seller agrees to have the house tented that Thursday and we CLOSE on the house on Friday----we are CLOSED on the house and on Saturday the seller has all new appliances brought into the house, all new light fixtures and gets a cleaning service to come in and clean because he is worried we will have to move into a house with dead bugs in it----oh and he has the lawn service come one last time----ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? We felt so blessed. We painted that day and night---moved all our things in on Sunday and MaryCate and Chris started school on Monday!!! No joke----best part of the story is that this past Thursday we CLOSED on our house in Fort Myers and I only had to pay 2 mortgages for one month!!! We did end up selling one of our cars, mainly because there was no need for it. Chris can walk or bike to work every day and the civic was just sitting in our driveway most of the time. We were about a day away from putting the fort myers house up for rent and we got an offer---our appraisal came back less than the offer and we still got what we needed.

Just wanted everyone to see how blessed we feel and thankful we are to be where we are. We have a simple home, one car, two beautiful girls and I get to stay home with them every day. Chris gets to work right across the street and we get to see him so much more than we otherwise would if we were living anywhere else. It feels like it has been a long road to get to where we are, but I do feel like we have some room to breathe now, and we are living in an amazing community.....now if we could only get a little fall and winter down here, as well as my family from Wisconsin, I would call it PERFECT. Thanks to all who prayed for us, It kind of feels like we are starting a new chapter and we are excited to see what God has next----we will keep you posted, and always keep it exciting!!! Enjoy the pics and sorry for the long post. I included some pics of the house for our family to see---only room I did not post is the guest room, but it is open for business if anyone wants to come visit:)

I love these mornings

Maggie LOVES to snuggle on the couch and watch cartoons with her Daddy

Maybe a little Dangerous, but pretty cute alright

She's is sneaky

Prob should have out the camera down at this point

Packer Fan

Bubble baths--can't tell their sisters at all can you??

Mixing up some b-day cake for Auntie trista

Happy B-day Auntie Trista

Our bedroom, it was debatable whether we would be able to fit our King size bed in and sure enough, it fits perfectly!!

Our closet---which is HUGE for us, much bigger than anything we have ever had before

View from the head of the bed---we love the vaulted ceilings

View into our bathroom, which is small but it meets our needs

Dining room area

Kitchen---what I love most about our house is that it works great for now, but has SOOO much potential, we are excited to do some projects and really make it our own, slowly but surely

Family room

View from the kitchen---we love how it is all open to everything so when I am cooking I can either watch the kids playing in the backyard or watch TV

The girls room---I love that they are sharing and they love it too

Girls room

Girls closet

I have a laundry room that leads back to a 4th bedroom, which we have made into a toy room----probably my favorite part of the house--all the toys are not in the front room and the girls LOVE to play in there

Toy room

It's actually a lot bigger than it looks in these pictures and we spend most of our days back here, although now that the weather is cooling down a bit, we are in the backyard--which also has so much potential!!