How Well Do You Know Andrew?

Can you name these looks? Can you tell what Andrew is thinking in these photos?

If you guess right, you will get a prize. (o: (And yes, I do know what both the looks mean)

Prices

Here are the actual prices of the homes from my last post:

Austin Home: $175k

Redwood City Home: $1.415 Million

Can you see why real estate prices in the area can get me down? I don't know a single person who could afford a newer 2900 sq ft home in the area. Not ONE person!

Name That Price

I know you've missed these exciting games of guessing home prices, right? Here's your opportunity again to join in the fun. Today I am going to show you two "comparable" houses and you get to name their price.

House # 1
Specs: 2900 sq ft., 1/4 acre lot, built in 2006, 4 Bedrooms, 2.5 baths
Location: A suburb of Austin, TX
Nearby Schools: Great

Backyard

Master Bedroom
Kitchen
Large Kitchen Pantry

Home #2
Specs: 2900 sq ft, 6500 sq ft lot, Built in 2009, 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms
Location: Redwood City, CA (suburb of San Francisco)
Nearby Schools: Great

So, what are your guesses?

Happiness

Since I promised I would have a happy post soon, here it is. I am happy because...

...I have a gym membership and the gym has a great child watch

...My house is cleaner than it was yesterday and all my laundry is done

...Tom got to spend 2 minutes with Madeline for the first time all week this morning before he left for work

...Madeline takes a nap every single day

...we have a washer and dryer in our house

...it's partly sunny today

...all my favorite shows are on TV right now ("Chuck" is my favorite show. It's way funnier than "The Office", in my opinion. "Psych" is super funny too. )

...we are in a position to buy a house when the time comes

...we don't have to take care of the mold problem in our house, our landlord does

...my kids are healthy and strong

...my kids are very energetic and have fun personalities

...Madeline is normally very cute and well behaved

...Andrew loves math and is good at it

...Tom loves me even when I have really bad days

...Tom has a good job and just received a great review

...I have wonderful friends who wanted to help me through the day

...my life is really awesome even when I have occasional bad days (and yesterday was truly not as bad as my post may have sounded)

Thanks for reading and may you have a wonderful week!

Anger

I've been dealing with anger issues the last couple days and I'm tired of it. I would like to vent in the hopes it will make me feel a little more calm.

I am angry because...

...somebody inadvertently insulted me on Sunday and I can't get over it (no, it was not anyone reading this!!)

...it takes so much effort to not be enormously huge

...it is so easy for other people to stay thin

....my house is a huge mess and I don't want to clean it.

...I haven't gotten an ounce of help around the house in a couple weeks.

...Andrew woke Madeline up from her nap early then locked her in her room. I had to take off her door handle in order to get her out. She screamed nonstop for an hour after being woke up, but wouldn't go back to sleep.

...Andrew destroyed his room while in timeout over the above offense.

...my laundry room is in a closet in my main hallway, therefore anytime my clothes start to pile up the whole world knows it. (thank goodness visitors are rare)

...it's been raining almost non-stop for 2 straight weeks.

...houses are so stinkin expensive in this part of California and while the whole rest of the country saw real estate prices decrease significantly, this area keeps holding on with ridiculously high prices.

...it seems that every house built in this area was built very cheaply and with no insulation

...our house is starting to get mold by the floorboards AGAIN (apparently our old roof wasn't the problem)

...constant demands from my children

...that Madeline can be a bully.

OK, I am getting carried away. I'm not near an angry as this post makes me sound. I really do hate PMS, which I think is most of the cause of my bitterness this fine day.

Don't worry I'll do a follow up post soon with all the things that make me happy. (o:

Preparation

The sun finally came out today and we headed straight to the park. My kids played and had a great time:

Then my kids discovered the puddles and just had to go play in them. No problem, I'm a super prepared mom and had brought their rain boots, just in case:



But I wasn't prepared for this:

Oops! Did she care? No. She kept playing.

Madeline covered in mud

On a side note, as we were leaving for the park, I noticed a very dark, ominous cloud off to the East of us. I thought to myself, "Man, if I lived anywhere else in the country, I would be really worried about that cloud. It looks a lot like a wall cloud that produces tornadoes."

This is not an actual picture of the cloud I saw

Then we left for the park. On the way home I heard on the radio that there was a TORNADO WARNING in the East Bay this afternoon. A tornado in Northern California? Are you kidding me?

Play Time

We've been feeling a little couped up the last few days and decided it was time to get out. The kiddos thought my idea of walking around the block in the rain was the best idea ever. They jumped in puddles, raced each other, and giggled nonstop. We only decided to come home after their hands got too cold to hold their umbrellas anymore. I think we all needed the fresh air!

Crazy Weather

You know how I mentioned that we never have thunderstorms here in California, well we definitely never see this either:

Can you tell what it is? It's hail and this picture was taken right outside our front door. I love this crazy weather!

Rain, Rain, Rain

The rain isn't supposed to end until Sunday and a nearby road already looks like this:

I may need one of these soon:

Anyone know how to build one or have Steve Carell's number?

Thunderstorm??

There is a huge thunderstorm right now here in NorCal. Do you know how unusual that is? I am so unused to hearing thunder that I can't sleep because of the noise. How sad is that?

Proud Moment

For the first time in my life one of the deals I posted on slickdeals.net made it to the front page. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, just know that it means I am super duper cool.

Happy 2nd Birthday to the World's Sweetest Little Girl

Happy Birthday Madeline!

We love you!

Sad State

I've been cleaning all afternoon. Andrew keeps asking me who's coming over to which I have repeatedly answered, "no one". Does he really think I only clean when people are coming over? Hmmmm...that's pretty sad!

Anything new?

There's nothing interesting to write about this fine day. I've been stuck at home all week, since Andrew has been running a fever. Still not sure what's ailing him though. Here are some pictures from the last week. Enjoy!

Andrew's been doing a lot of this.

Madeline having a bonding moment with Tom.

We had a New Year's Day Party at our home, which was a lot of fun for us. This picture is taken during the jeopoardy style 2009 trivia Game.

Putting away all our Christmas decorations is always so sad. After Tom took all the lights off the tree, we realized we had more than 2000 lights on our tree.

And finally, my favorite house in the area went "pending" today. Wahhh. It's literally the only house we've seen in our price range that actually meets our size criteria. I guess that means we'll have to move out of the area. LOL (o: