We loaded up this morning: bikes, boys, backpacks, and heebie-jeebie masks (or, as some would say, HEPA filters). We opened up the Forever Home and set fans a-goin' in all the rooms. Zorak could not believe the difference. Neither could I, but for completely different reasons. He was astounded at what an improvement the Mold-Be-Gone made on "all the vertical surfaces". I was astounded at all the dead mold on all the... Well, EVERYWHERE. What did it look like yesterday? I don't want to know.
We searched for water problems (identified a few), rounded up the boys and headed out for lunch. Decatur has a little buffet place called Barnhill's that pretty much fries everything it serves. We had the fried ice to drink. I'm serious. It's good, although I'm pretty sure some Association of Cardiac Specialists Somewhere has a hit out on the owner's head. It also has a good variety of non wheat-slathered foods (penance? peace offering? I'm not sure...) Zorak and I always eat enough at a buffet to send ourselves into involuntary hibernation. I finally had to push myself from the trough with the pronouncement that "I have puppy belly" (Our term for being full - ever notice that small children get that same puffed out belly that puppies do when they've eaten their fill? After six years of having it in the house, it's become part of our regular vocabulary.) I leaned back and sighed the sigh of the truly stuffed, when James snickered and said, "Ya know, Mom, you have puppy belly all the time, whether you've eaten or not." Ahhh. The humor in that boy is sharp (and rightfully inherited). Good thing he was smilin'.
When we couldn't talk the boys into going home for a (nap) movie and (nap) popcorn, we headed out to Point Mallard State Park to check out their bike trail. That was fun. It's not nearly as nice as Monte Sano, as far as remote location, varying terrain, and scenery. But it's not chopped liver, either. The path is wide and level, which makes it perfect for beginners (or those *ahem* carrying the beginners). The boys rode for two and a half hours. They had a fantastic time. Zorak thinks *I* need a bike for Christmas. And a trailer.
John's abilities on his bike have far surpassed anything we could have hoped for, and the enjoyment he gets from riding now has more than made up for the frustrations and fears of pushing the issue. That boy is an excellent rider! He's a happy rider.
James stopped his bike once and called back to Zorak for the camera. He'd found a particularly lovely display of mushrooms growing on a fallen log and wanted a photo of it. My heart nearly burst inside my (heaving, oxygen deprived) chest! Just when you think it's *whisper* not working, they go and do something like that and you realize the gentle walks, the whimsical stories, the field guides scattered strategically about... It works, it really, really works!
Smidge and Zorak did a little impromptu study of "vines". Which ones are pokey, which are soft. Which are vines and which are actually long tree limbs. Smidge touched every. single. vine. on. the. path. (Might this have contributed to Zorak's Great Christmas Gift For Mommy Idea mentioned above?)
When we became concerned that we might die on the trail, leaving the boys to figure for themselves how to get our bodies back to the road (or not), we decided to turn back. The official reasoning: we had to close up the house before nightfall. (They bought it. We're still officially immortal to them. *happy sigh*)
The house has been wiped down and closed back up for inspection tomorrow. It's no longer under Eminent Threat of Mold. It will also photograph a wee bit better without the hairy surfaces, and if the Good Lord's willin' we'll have keys on Friday. Weee!
And on a completely different note:
Famous Men of Rome: WOW! Loving this book, and I haven't even shown it to the boys yet!
Drawing With Children: will have to do a full blog entry on this one. It has much, much more than I anticipated. I'm stunned.
Kiss those babies!
~Dy
10 comments:
Hi! I will pray that all goes well tomorrow. Bike and trailer would be great as we could go out together, but it would have to wait until next fall (or whenever the humidity is gone and people can breathe).
Hi there Dy just wanted you to know I finally posted about Tianna's Highland dancing. You can check my blog for the update.
Thanks for being interested. I am still hoping for news on you home? I've been away for 2 days so let me know.
SA
When we were trying to sell our house in OKC, they found not just mold, but Deadly Black Mold in our garage. I'm still not sure what it is, I just know it's a bad thing to have to put in the listing. :P
I'm crossing my fingers and praying for y'all.
We had major trouble with mold the year we discovered that Patrick has asthma. Actually, I think if it wasn't for the mold, we may have not discovered it immediately. I had a dripping sink in the kitchen, and the floor of the sink cupboard was wet and moldy. My poor boy wound up in the hospital a few days later. I guess that was God's way of revealing to us his asthama.
Is your reaction to Drawing With Children good or bad? I remember there being a lot of discussion about it at TWTM a few years ago.
Hey,
I'm sure you have researched this mold thing quite thoroughly. That said...make sure you know what you are dealing with and that it is just a benign mold type. Do you have drywall?
Is it growing up wall,inside insulation?
Unfortunately, our family knows way too much about this from first hand-experience. My mom & dad's house flooded.Wet for 2 days. We cleaned, we ripped out drywall and insulation up to six feet height, we chemically de-molded. We did everything we were instructed to do. Long story short..all three members of household who were in
great health prior to this came down
with a type of cancer within 5 years. Too strange a coincidence for me.
I know what a dream it is to get this house, but please make sure it is a safe house for you and your precious boys. kim
Wow, I am amazed at your husband! I'm glad the mold is gone too--I don't do well with stuff like that! LOL about the "puppy belly"! I'll have to remember that one. I pray everything goes well at the inspection tomorrow. If it passes and you can get the keys on Friday, that will seem so anti-climactic, you'll hardly know what to do with yourselves! : )
Okay, you and Zorak are WAY braver than Marc or I would be. I could deal with repairs, but if an appraiser told me about mold, I'd be outta' there faster than..... well.... pretty fast, anyway.
When we've purchased homes in the past, the *seller* is the one who makes the repairs. How is it that you two have to make all the repairs on a home that you don't even own yet? Is this normal for this part of the country? Is the seller doing *anything?*
I sure hope this is the end of the mold situation in your home. And the snakes. And any other creeping thing that could appear and surprise you in the middle of the night!
WOO-HOO for Friday! I will keep you guys in our prayers.
I second Zorak's idea for the bike and trailer! I received a bike and trailer for my birthday. We love it! Use it all of the time. The boys have a blast in the trailer!
Good luck to you!
Thanks, guys. So far, no word. We're off for a late nap. :-)
Hillary, the sellers had included repairing the HVAC and resolving the driveway issue in their initial listing. But we knew that they would screw it up and we just didn't want to do that. I hate, hate, loathe, detest, and hate heat pumps. That's what it has and that's what they'd have slapped in there. So we wanted to buy it as-is, don't touch anything, just back away slowly and leave us alone. Don't paint. Don't fix. Just leave.
We want to bring in propane b/c we like gas heat (and we're putting in a dual fuel range), so we wanted to do it "the right way, the first time" rather than get stuck w/ a lousy heat pump w/ a 15 yr warranty. We'd have kept it b/c we couldn't justify throwing it out, but we'd have hated it the entire time. And we'd still have had to bring in propane for the range and the new water heater we'll be putting in.
Unfortunately, nobody at any point in the process (until we were ready to close on it), bothered to mention that the feds (who filter all the money for mortgages) won't filter money for a mortgage if the HVAC system isn't in working order at closing. IF we'd known that, we'd have negotiated w/ the sellers to let us coordinate and oversee the fix, they pay for it and we'll reimburse them at closing. But the contract was a done deal by the time any of this came to light. So. We got stuck in this bizarre catch-22. Fun, fun.
The seller is actually a banking company that owns foreclosures. They take a week to answer any and every question. If you ask more than one at at time, you may crash their personnel department, and you will not receive an answer for two weeks. So don't ask more than one. We'd still be in this apartment next summer if we tried to negotiate the whole process along with them. It's scary to think this was the lesser of the hurdles to leap. Ironically, they're in Maryland. It's like that state is trying to kill us just. one. last. time. LOL.
I'm so excited for you. It sounds like you're getting closer to your Forever Home.
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