A Few New & BIG Happenings

Well, I took a little hiatus because the Lacey household got a little busy the past month or two. I know I still wrote a couple posts regarding food recipes but I never shared any of the exciting news! So here we go from March! (Told you I am behind.. I'll try to make it quick)

In March we went to Florida for a visit with family, a birthday party…. and to house hunt. Yes, you read that correctly. Matt decided he wants to retire from the military so we can start our lives together, build a family, and focus on what he wants to do in life outside of the military. While the military has provided us a great beginning to our future, it just felt like the right thing to do at the time (and still does even at times it is a little nerve-wracking).  Well, we quickly got ahold of an AWESOME  broker through the VA to help us along on our first-time home buyer experience. He set us up with a relator in the area of Florida where we were looking to buy. We looked at a total of 7 homes.  The 6th home we looked at, felt so right. It was close to both of our parents and other family members, in a good school district (thinking about that future, ha ha), good size house - not to mention MOVE-IN READY!! Scary, we took the plunge and told our relator we want to put an offer in. It was a foreclosure so we were hoping to get lower than asking price. Offer came back, they hardly budge. So, again - another offer. Hardly budge again.. we weighed our options and discussed what we could afford, and decided to say okay to their second offer. WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!  From there on, there were a lot of papers to be signed, documents to be read, papers to be faxed, money to be sent.. but about 30 days later, we were signing the official documents out in California (we flew back) on April 24, 2013. We were then new homeowners. It felt so great to have a house of our own that we could call a home. A home that will have our future pet and kids. A home where family can come over and celebrations can happen. A home where we will always be together! It seriously is still one of the best decisions I think we have made as a couple thus far.

Our last month, May, in the house on base felt like it dragged by. During that month: We ordered a fridge for the new house, I quit my job, I sorted out items for a yard sale, We both enrolled in school in Florida, and we started to prepare for our move by canceling services.
Yard sale day came the weekend prior to us moving.. it wasn't that huge of a success as I thought it would be, so I ended up packing it away for a yard sale in Florida.

and relaxed a bit

Moved out of base housing and began our move on Fri, May 31. Along the way we stopped and stayed with my sister, nieces/nephews 1 night. We arrived at our home on Mon, June 3. We made really good timing, and again - it was a nice road trip but we were so happy it was over too, haha.

Matt has not retired yet from the Marines, so he was on leave for a couple weeks to help with the moving process. During his time, he helped unpack boxes once the movers arrived, fixed the hose connection to the fridge, fixed the dryer connection to the wall, installed a garage door opener, fixed the  dishwasher and sink.  We went to get office furniture and set that up, as well as a few items for our home and set up all of our services. He really did help out a lot. I wanted him to stay because we just moved in but he had to go back to California for 3 more weeks (he will be back in 4 days now).

So, since my husband has been gone from June 10 until now June 28 I have been busy doing something every day. It has been exhausting but since he's left: Our fridge arrived, I bought and installed blinds, decorated the house, organized the bedrooms, bought a china hutch, changed the layout of the living room, sprayed the yard to start killing all the weeds for removal, and ordered curtains to hopefully have up before he comes home. I do have the picture frames laid out for him to hang when he returns! Haha, what a fun project (rolls eyes)

Not only the house stuff was accomplished. I managed to apply at 5 nursing facilities for a CNA position. I went on one interview, got hired on the spot but after further thought and research, I declined and decided I would rather take my chances to keep looking elsewhere.  Then just the other day, I got called in for an interview. I got hired on the spot, again. I accepted and so far I am happy with the decision I made. I will go in for orientation sometime soon and then start work.