The Toman Family's Tidbits: June 2009

Here are a few pictures--at the request of a few of the ladies of Long Industries--that have been taken during the past few weeks...

Eating Ritz crackers w/ cream cheese as an afternoon snack...

...and being a goof-ball.

Pestering...err, I mean 'studying' A'Pexi while she is trying to nap.

"Uhhh....I wasn't doing anything Mom."

Watching Daddy grill chicken for supper...

...and being a cutie pie!

Daddy reading "Panda Bear" after he came home from work yesterday evening.

Our home-schooling lessons are paying off! Brinley recognizes over two dozen animals by pointing when you ask her where a particular one is AND recognizes several letters of the alphabet as well as various objects around the home. We are so proud of her!

As I know y'all are dying to know the whole story of how this happened so quickly, here goes...

This past Saturday, Bruce and I received an e-mail notice for a home that just went on the market. After looking at pictures of the home together, we realized that it was the same exact floor plan of a brand-new home that we had recently walked-through and loved but had went off the market very quickly. Infact, the new home that we walked through first is almost directly behind the home that Bruce and I accepted an offer on today. The only differences are (and most of them are great differences) the lot of the home we will own is over half of an acre versus the third of an acre lot that the new home is on; the garage doesn't face the street but has been turned 90 degrees to face the side unlike the new home; the current owners JUST added a fence to the enormous tree-filled backyard which the new home doesn't have AND it already has a security system and wood blinds installed--both things that the new home doesn't have or wouldn't typically come with if we were to have the builder build us one. The only negative, which really isn't that big of a deal when you consider all the positives, is that the home we are planning to close on before the end of the month is four years old.

Like I've mentioned, Bruce and I fell in love with the home immediately. It is a little smaller than some of the homes we've been looking at, but we absolutely love the layout of the rooms and openess of the floor plan. Anyway, we actually ended up putting an offer through our real estate agent before we even left the house Sunday afternoon. On Monday, we received news that the current owners made a counter-offer, so we put a counter-offer in that evening. On Tuesday, we received news that the current owners counter-offered our counter-offer (if that makes any sense). Initially, Bruce and I weren't exactly ecstatic over their counter-offer, but the more we thought about it and slept on it, we realized (for many reasons) that we should accept their offer...so we did!

As much as I would love to give each and every one of you an actual tour of 'our' new home, I know that's just not possible. But here is a brief virtual tour...Enjoy!