The Polingo Peeps

Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Michael turns 3 (almost 2 months ago)

Hello, all!

As is my usual fashion, I am terribly behind in updating this blog.

So much has happened in the past 9 months!

We are finally homeowners again!

We closed on our new home on December 20, 2013.

What we assumed would be a nice, easy December turned into drama when there were issues with our appraisal that was needed in order for the bank to fund our mortgage.

I am not exaggerating when I say it was down to the wire (literally, the papers came 45 minutes late for closing)!

Finally all the stress of our "homeless" 6 months came to an end!

We took a couple days to move our stuff in and spent our first night at the house on Sunday, December 22nd.

We had lots of helpers, between use of trucks and trailers, heavy lifting and watchers of the little man, we hope they all know how appreciated their help was!

The new house!

Believe it or not, this was after I had been cleaning and organizing for several hours!
Looking into living room from dining room/kitchen.

Even though we moved in just a few days before Christmas, we wanted to celebrate our First Christmas in our new home.

That meant putting up the Christmas Tree!

Shortly after, and by that I mean a couple months, we had the families over to celebrate Michael's Third Birthday on February 15th!

He is completely into Mickey this year and that was his requested theme!

His Mickey cake made by Mommy

Mickey Cookies

Mickey Centerpiece

Michael with Mom and Dad

Blowing out the candle!

M and Godfather Andy

M and Godmother "Jo Jo"

M with Grandma and Grandpa Polingo

M and Godfather Joey

M with Papa and Nanny

After a busy day with no nap, M fell asleep at 5:45. Awake again at 8:45 :(
It was a late night after that!

We finally got around to having M's Third Birthday Pictures taken today!

He did awesome!

I must have been telling him he was very handsome a little too much, cause when someone asked him if he was getting his pictures taken, he said, "Yes. I am very handsome."

I happen to think he's right.

Happy Third Birthday,

my Handsome Michael!

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Playing catch up!

I have officially decided to give up on getting "caught up" on this blog. Let's face it, it's just not gonna happen. So...I am going to post some recent pictures of the fun we've been having lately!

We celebrated Michael's 2nd Birthday in February!

We colored eggs for Easter

We moved out of our townhouse in June!

We welcomed this little man in July!

My newest nephew

We celebrated this lovely lady's birthday

Another one of the newest, simply because he's just so darn cute!

Papa and Nanny with the Grandkids on Nanny's Birthday

The whole family!

We went to a few parades - Michael loved the tractors, fire trucks and horses!

Grandpa joined us for the BBQ Days parade.
He drove to and from the parade on his tricycle!

The Polingo's joined us for the BBQ days parade as well.

Michael and Daddy

We watched some "horsies" race on a beautiful July evening

We celebrated my Grandpa's 92nd Birthday!
(That's him in the middle of the back row!)

Michael and Great-Grandpa Pieper -
M is getting some horseshoe tips from the master!

I told him "If you give me one big smile, I'll leave you alone."
He agreed. Not a fan of the camera, my grandpa!

Well, as you can see, despite the amount of drama that has been going on in our lives, we have managed to have some fun too!

As I was looking through pictures, I have realized how much I have NOT picked up my camera in the past 6 months. Thank goodness for cell phone cameras!

Thanks for checking in! Hopefully we will have better news on the house front soon!

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

I knew I shouldn't get too excited. Right from the start, I had a gut feeling something would go wrong. My mom kept saying "I don't know how you can't be excited about your new house! In just (this many) days we'll be able to see it!"

Something went wrong.

In the purchase agreement, there were 2 lines stating that the financer would send a final letter of mortgage approval by June 24th. The letter was not sent.

The sellers, who had been looking for an "out" since June 7th, finally got their "out." By the lender not sending the letter, it gave them an opportunity to cancel the sale of the house, even though everything was ready to go...financing in place, etc.

All a technicality.

We found out that we were probably not going to get the house on Saturday, June 29th...2 days before we were supposed to close. We had many conversations with our real estate agent, who was trying his hardest to convince the seller's agent and the sellers to continue with the sale.

I cried for 12 hours straight. I'm not exaggerating. I couldn't sleep Saturday night.

Sunday continued with trying to work something out. We spoke with the banker handling our mortgage and he confirmed our worst fear. Not only had he not sent the letter, he informed us that it was not sent because it "slipped his mind." I was furious and let him have a piece of my harshly worded mind.

We were advised by a real estate attorney that our agent had contacted to show up for closing, planning on continuing with the sale. We got our down payment ready to go. M went to daycare. We even drove by the house before closing and had one last glimmer of hope that they would show up because it appeared that they had moved everything out.

We showed up to closing. They didn't.

The kicker is that they HAVE moved out. They are no longer living there.

We don't know what their problem is. Are they being spiteful? Do they have a better offer? What?

Thank goodness for my parents for understanding and continuing to allow us to crash in their basement until we find a new house. M continues to love being at Papa and Nanny's. A cousin of mine had to stay with her parent's for 3 months last winter until they found a new house. She told me that the time her boys had with their grandparents was priceless. I have to agree.

We also found out on Sunday, that my Godfather Keith died in Nevada. He is an over-the-road semi driver and was on his way from Minnesota to California with a load. My dad spoke with him, semi to semi, on his way out on Thursday. Dad called me after they spoke to tell me about their short conversation. "Guess who I just saw? Keith! I saw a shiny semi coming towards me and thought that a semi that shiny had to belong to Keith. Then I heard "Hey, Mike! Is that you over there?" They talked until their CB's went out of range. After we got the call that Keith had passed, Dad said, "The last thing I said to him was 'have a safe trip'." We don't know what happened.

What I do know is that learning of his passing put this whole house thing into perspective. We may not have a house right now. But we do have a lot of other things. We have each other. We have a healthy boy. We have jobs. We have a roof over our head. We are blessed.

May you rest in peace, Keith.

Thursday, June 20, 2013

A Little Bit of Insanity

Hello all!

It has been an insane month! Sorry about the lack of pictures, just wanted to fill you all in on the craziness that is our life!

We decided that it was finally time to put our townhouse in Shakopee on the market earlier this spring. It was a nice house while it lasted, but with having Michael and all the things that go along with both him and the dog, we decided that enough was enough. We slowly began decluttering, got the interior painted and new carpet in the living room and sent Harley off to live with Rob's parents while it was on the market. It went on the market on May 17th. By May 21st, we had an offer. We also learned that the buyers wanted to close on June 13th! Needless to say it was a hectic couple of weeks getting everything packed up, moved into any available space including a storage unit, the calf barn at my mom and dad's, their storage room in their house as well as an enclosed trailer that Rob's sister is letting as use as storage until we close on a new place. On the market to closing in less than one month! It was hectic, but I do not need to be reminded that it was a good problem to have! Closing on our former house is now officially done and all went extremely smoothly!

We moved out all the BIG stuff on June 8th and officially moved in with my parents. Michael LOVES it!!!! He loves the space to run, all the outdoor toys and all the visits from his cousins!

We found a house we love in Belle Plaine. We had the inspection, put down earnest money and were looking forward to our July 1st closing date. Then we got, not one, but 4 phone calls thru our realtor from the sellers asking us if we REALLY wanted to buy their house and if there was anything they could do to convince us not to buy it. SERIOUSLY?!?!?!? No! We love the house! Our purchase agreement is legally binding, so there is nothing that they can do, legally, to back out of the sale. However, something very similar to this recently happened to a co-worker of mine whose seller did back out and she is now renting a townhouse for a year. Ugh!!! We have gotten paperwork recently that is showing signs of promise that they are really letting go of the house and that we should still be able to close on July 1st.

Because of all this drama is why neither Rob nor I have spoken a lot about this new house to anyone other than our immediate family. It's because of all this that I am not showing any pictures or telling anyone the address. Once we have keys in hand and all paperwork is signed, be ready for a ton of fun pictures!

We hope to be making the final move into our "forever house" (seriously, they will be carrying us out in pine boxes - we hate moving!) the weekend after the 4th of July.

In the meantime, we are forever grateful to all those that have physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually helped us thru this on-going journey! Rob's parents - for taking in Harley and helping us clean our townhouse in prep for the sale, Peg (Rob's sister) - for driving down to help us move out the big stuff and the use of the trailer for 3-4 weeks!, Sean -for helping us move out, and last but certainly not least, my wonderful parents!!!! They have not only helped us clean the old townhouse, move out a LOT of stuff, take over a good chunk of their storage areas, taken off work to do all of these things, but they have so graciously taken us in while we are "homeless". Like I said, Michael is loving the extra Papa and Nana time, gives me reports frequently throughout the day reminding me where they are ("Papa at work." "Nanny at work.") and so excitedly announces when they are home for the day. He is also a big fan of being outside, riding his tractor, playing in the cabin and playing on the jungle gym.

Thank you to all!

We look forward, with cautious optimism, the closing of our forever home. Pray for us and that all goes smoothly!

Jen