House Hunting Blues

So the lease at our apartment is up this week but we are staying. blah. When we first started looking for places to live before we got married (almost a YEAR ago...one year anniversary coming up soon!!!) Lucas wanted to live in a house. I said no. Before you think to yourself "is she crazy?" the reason I said no was because I didn't know much about Dallas except how to get to Northpark and La Duni. literally. How would I know what a good area of town to live in would be? But now that we have lived here for almost a year I would consider myself a Dallasite (not a local...i'm proud to say that I will always be from McAllen and that is has an extremely special place in my heart even if some people think it's ghetto) and think I can make an informed decision about where to live and look for a house.

We started looking for a house at the beginning of the new year. Problem #1 aka biggest problem: I am extremely picky and Lucas is not. We were looking for a two or three bedroom house so that we can have a guest room and an office to study in, a big backyard for Bocephus to run in, wood floors, large closets, updated bathrooms and kitchen, in a good part of town, and with an alarm system (Lucas works the night shift at the hospital sometimes so I am most certainly not going to be by myself in a house at night without my hubby...he wouldn't allow it and I would freak out). Phew. Talking about all my "requirements" wore Lucas and our realtor out. They were always asking me if I would be willing to budge on at least one of my "requirements" but the answer was always no because it was a carefully selected list of items that had already been reduced down to my must-haves. I'm not saying I need to have stainless steel appliances and granite counter tops (even though I would definitely not object to it), but I absolutely do NOT do laminite floors, brown carpet, flowered wallpaper, wood paneling, or bathrooms with brightly colored tile straight from the 70's. gross. I would rather stay in our apartment thanks.

Finding a home is hard. We would find a house we liked, but then discovered it was somewhere shady like Oak Cliff. Then we would find something else we liked, but then found out it was built for a stackable washer and dryer, and since we bought brand new side by side front loader washer and dryer (weirdly obsessed with how great they are) right after we got married, that was not an option either. Then we would find something really great again, and realize that it wasn't pet friendly. We started to feel like we were never going to find something. Then we did. We found this adorable two bedroom two bath renovated home in the old Lake Highlands area. It was PERFECTION. It had wood floors, an updated kitchen and bathrooms, a laundry room, large closets, an alarm system, large backyard with a wooden fence and landscaping, two car garage, and an electric gate to get in to the back. It was also near White Rock Lake so Lucas could ride his bike around the lake like he does now, and I could take the pups on walks. And for a great price!

It all seemed too good to be true. It was. Two girls in nursing school had just put in an application. grrrr. So we scurried, got the paper work filled out, and put in our application too. It was going to come down to whoever had the "better" application. Turns out the owner of the home isn't a huge fan of having pets in his rental properties, and since the other girls only had one 10 lb. chihuahua versus our 20 lb. cavalier and 75 lb. german wired haired pointer...the girls got the house over us. ugh. Lesson learned. Next time we put an application in Bocephus will not "exist" until after we have signed a lease. Needless to say we are a little bitter about it, and haven't been able to find something we like as much as the cute little house on Hambrick Road (mostly because we keep comparing everything we find to that house).

       How cute is it?! It even looks like there is a shining light from Heaven casting down on it. tear.

Because we don't want to move just for the sake of moving, and because we don't want to move into a place we don't absolutely love, we decided to extend our lease for three months. In the end it will probably best since we are both really busy right now, and the summer will be a better time to move and hopefully find more homes. Plus side to not having found a place is that we finally got all the junk out of our apartment and into a storage unit. We had my college mattress and box spring, our christmas tree, a bike rack, an ottoman, and boxes of ornaments/decorations in our living room and back patio. We looked like the people from the TV show Hoarders: Buried Alive. It was so ghetto. We didn't want to get a storage unit since we thought we were going to move soon, but since that isn't happening for a couple of more months we moved it all out. Thank the Lord. I was so happy that all the shiz was gone that I decided to "feng shui" our apartment one day when I got home from school while Lucas was out. I moved all our furniture around by myself. bad idea. Lucas got home and was like why didn't you wait for me to help you? Idk. My back hurt for like a week, but whatevs it looks so great now.

Until then we will continue to be in our little one bedroom apartment happy as clams. Even though sometimes we both complain about how "cozy" our apartment is, we wouldn't trade spending our first year of marriage learning to deal with eachothers quirks and building our life together anywhere else for the world. Our first married apartment will always have a place in our hearts, and I am sure 50 years from now we will laugh about how we both couldn't stand in our closet at the same time (mostly because of how many shoes and bags I have. sorry babe.).

Side note: I am obsessed with Downton Abbey. If you haven't seen it, it is a must. I love a good period piece. Kelsey and I went through a phase in college where we rented every period movie at the Blockbuster in Waco and would stay up watching them. The Young Victoria is one of my favorite movies of all time. The next cavalier I get is going to be named Dash. Not after the Kardashian's store Dash, but after Queen Victoria's tri-color cavalier Dash. Needless to say I am anxiously awaiting the third season of Downton Abbey's release in September. Check it out.

Key Players:
Bocephus- aka Bo or Bobo. He is named after the dog in Kenny Chesney's song "Keg In the Closet." Bocephus is Lucas' dog and he is quite the character. Very destructive, lots of energy, doesn't get along with other dogs, and kind of territorial. Sounds bad but he really is the sweetest dog and loves Lucas so much. He currently lives in McAllen with Lucas' parents because he needs a backyard (we learned that lesson after he destroyed Lucas' apartment in college). Lucas misses him everyday and we can't wait to move into a house so that we can bring our "gaurd dog" with us. I can't imagine having to leave Lilly behind because she didn't fit our current lifestyle. poor Lucas and bobo. But that little monster will be in Dallas soon enough!