No Man's Land

After several attempts to purchase homes we finally circled back to a home we called, "the blue house".  Although small, it has over an acre of property and who am I to stop the dream of land for my husband just as Joseph needed to have his land in Far and Away, Dwayne felt the same compelling nature.  I showed the pictures to my dad and he laughed and said, well it's got a low maintenance yard.  (complete dirt).

When push came to shove for a variety of reasons our offer was once again rejected leaving us feeling aggravated, disheartened, and hopeless.  With feelings of sadness for my husband who is now stuck in a position of having to figure out a way to support our family in our expensive home on one and a half incomes surely poses a shitload of stress for a man who already does too much.  I have made spread sheet after spread sheet trying to finagle numbers to work and somehow our lives will now take a financial stress we have never faced before.  We live in a great home, in a great neighborhood, this I do not deny.  Unfortunately, Dwayne bought at the top of the market back when he was making the big bucks as a landscape contractor.  Now, years later, his current S.W.A.T. K-9 job doesn't pay nearly as well but he loves his work and that is more important than money (for the most part).  So again my job now is to figure out how to live happily ever after in this financial disaster with a man with no land.  Wish me luck.

Whispering

Thanks to my dad renting this awesome cabin for two nights and three days we were all able to get away from the Arizona heat while relaxing and having fun. This cabin was incredible, complete with a trampoline, a treehouse, a great swing, fooseball, board games and a pingpong table. Although I was sad that Andrea and Brandon weren't able to come I saw Dwayne and my kids spend some time bonding together. We went on two hikes and I was happy and that both of my kids were real troopers hiking over 3 miles. Too many pictures to post so please go to this link to see more.
Whispering Pines
http://www.flickr.com/photos/63500790@N02/
  Whispering PInes Vacation

Nachoridnary BOY

Unless you have a child with ADHD you will never understand the excessive amount of time, attention and patience a child with this diagnosis needs. Although Dwayne and I have 4 kids combined and one with mental and physical disabilities, they combined do not equal the time it takes to raise Aiden. He is exhausting to no end. So much in fact, I have just quit my job in order to better serve this child's needs. After being diagnosed with ADHD this year we decided to put Aiden on Ritalin. Aiden had been having huge behavior and school work issues since beginning the second grade. After only two weeks on the medication we received good reports from his teacher letting us know he was now able to settle down and pay attention in the classroom and started getting better grades on his assignments. The medication is taken twice at day. 6:30am and 11:30 am. The effects of the pill unfortunately wears off prior to me picking him up from the sitters at 6:00pm so the hours I see him, there is no difference. Homework and spelling has become the biggest battle sometimes taking over 2 hours a night to complete. This leaves me exhausted and frustrated and leaves me spending only 10 minutes a night with the other kids. To make things worse my work schedule combined with Dwayne's had left little consistency in Aiden's life which is one of the most important things a child with ADHD needs. It's sad that every day my kids have to ask who is picking them up from the sitters, what time, and where will they be eating. Sometimes I worked till 8, sometimes till 7, sometimes till 5, all depending on the day of the week.

 Dwayne's schedule is even worse since he works a late day shift combined with call outs, the ability for him to partake in the child rearing schedule has become obsolete. After months of consideration, it has been determined that the only way this family is going to stop the bounce around schedule is for one parent to be at home. The obvious choice is me since Dwayne loves his job and it is my kids that are home 90% of the time. Things at my work had become more and more stressful leaving me spent by the time I get home each night so actually quitting is a sigh of relief although with it comes the stress of a greatly reduced income. I have chosen to work part time for Uhaul as a reservation agent from home. The pay is less than half of what I made before (hourly) but with some serious cutbacks and Dwayne's ability to make additional income working overtime, I am ready to take on the challenge in order to get some consistency in our hectic and stressed out lives. I am hoping that I can provide additional attention to the three other kids while helping Aiden to be successful in school with a very regiment homework schedule. If it doesn't work, we will reevaluate and make more life evolving changes as needed.

Last September Dwayne received tickets for our family to visit Out of Africa Wildlife Zoo located near Camp Verde from his sister Jackie. It was like a pregnancy because it took 9 months for us to finally be able to all go minus Dwayne who was working. One child (not singling him/her out) decided they didn't want to go and ran away from home prior to the trip but that was short lived as eventually we were able to coax the child into the car and I assure you they had a wonderful time. The zoo was definitely much different from the World Wildlife Zoo or the Phoenix Zoo. What made this zoo special is it includes a bus tour right in with the animals which come right up to the bus. The kids all got to feed the giraffe right from the bus and aunt Jackie took it a step further using her skills to feed the giraffe right from her mouth. (see picture below) There was also a pretty cool show with tigers running and jumping in the water trying to get their "toys". It was hot but the kids didn't complain at all. Saige and Andrea even got to feed the tiger. I give Out of Africa Wildlife Zoo 3 thumbs up.

To Downsize or not to Downsize,That is the Question

With eyes of delusion we began our home hunting excursion in February with dreams of living in a home on the range with expansive mountain views, our own well, a large home, and acreage.  (well mostly this was Dwayne’s dream but I stick by his side during his illusions of grandeur)  As the housing market tightened our stress levels increased we found ourselves changing gears as home prices began to surge and the home supply dwindled.  We asked ourselves what do we really need verses what we wanted. 

1.    A less expensive home that isn’t upside down $75,000

2.   A place for Dwayne’s precious boat

3.   A pool

4.   A good neighborhood that people still have pride in ownership

5.   No HOA fees

6.   Location that is reasonable located between our families and ex’s

So we searched high and low.  And then we searched some more with all the searching leaving us irritable and drained.  We realized that with less price means less house.  Our Anthem home is about 1900 square feet and now we are looking at homes in the 1500 square feet range. I haven’t lived in anything that small in over 10 years.  Space wise, my first townhome on 43^rd and Northern was just 1100 square feet, then there was the house in El Mirage which was 1900 square feet, then the house in Waddell which was over 3500 square feet and now the Anthem home.  What I’ve learned is BIGGER is not better.  Bigger means working yourself do death to pay for a space you are never home to enjoy.  Bigger means your family is disconnected.  Bigger means more home to clean.  Bigger means you buy more stuff you don’t need.  Bigger just isn’t better, it’s a waste.  It took me about 10 years to realize this and now we are getting back to basics.  When I recall my years I spent growing up, the memories were not about how big my bedroom was (10x9 feet), it was about family vacations or playing in our backyard, swimming in our doe boy pool and riding my bike up and down our cul-de-sac street with all my friends.

This brings me back to our current situation, another offer on the board with hopes it will beat out the dozen other offers made on this modest 1547 square foot home on 39^th ave. and Union hills with a pool and a RV gate.  The home is a short sell which means we wait, and wait, then wait a bit more.  We are both utterly exhausted from the emotional roller coaster and just want it to be over so we can move on with our lives (literally).