We Bought A House + My Home Depot Meltdown
As I sit here typing away in the sea of pillows that I bought today at Homegoods for our new bedroom, it's hard for me to believe that all of this, any of this, is ours! To be honest, I keep finding myself almost tippy-toeing around like I'm a guest, eating someone else's food, and sitting on someone else's furniture. A little over a month ago today we closed on our beautiful new home and HIT. THE. GROUND. RUNNING. Picking paint colors, new furniture, kitchen renovations, and planning new projects...it's been a whirlwind. Truth is, it hasn't been all fun and games which leads us to my home depot meltdown.
A few days before Thanksgiving, Home Depot released their Black Friday deals....lucky for us because the previous owners took their fridge with them so we were on the market for one. For those of you who have bought a major appliance before, you can appreciate that it's no joke. For those of you who haven't, let me tell you, there is a secret to doing this whole thing. I can honestly say that buying a new house during the peak holiday season has it's pros and cons. Pro: solid deals on some of the big item purchases you'll need to make Con: ALLLLLLL the stress. {On that note, I also don't suggest buying a house 5 months before your wedding but thats life!} Back to our fridge...We'd done the research, finally settled on a model and color and off to Home Depot I went...I very specific Home Depot in fact because the taxes are lower in Missouri than in Kansas {every dollar counts guys!} Brad had already headed home to Wisconsin for the holiday so I was flying solo. I'd found an online article that said when you change your address through the US Postal Service, you receive all sorts of coupons {p.s. It's true!} In said packet, we received a 10% off Lowe's coupon which the article said would also be honored at Home Depot {p.s. not true} which I didn't find out until I was already at the store mid order. I kindly asked if I could make a call to buy myself time to track down another coupon. Thankfully the article had also shared that Home Depot coupons can be purchased on Ebay {who knew!?} So I quickly hit the order button and started roaming the various isles waiting for the email to come through...and waiting...and waiting. After so long, I started to get frustrated as my patience wore thin and my fatigue settled in. It didn't help that my mom was very concerned I had fallen into a complete scam and had just thrown away $20 on a fake coupon. It was at that point after weeks of inspections, extra fees, ENDLESS paperwork, shuffling and reshuffling finances {on top of the normal 9-5 shenanigans} to see the sale of our home through that I found myself in the tile aisle at Home Depot crying...
The good news is that about 15 minutes later, my eBay purchased coupon came through and saved us nearly $200 on our fridge! But I'm here to tell you guys that as fun and exciting and as big of a blessing as buying a house is, it's also stressful and challenging and trying at times and its OKAY if you happen to find yourself shedding a few tears in the tile aisle at Home Depot. In fact, I picked out our backsplash tile that same night! We'll chalk that up as a small win! We are always so anxious to conquer these huge life milestones and it's so easy to get caught up in who is buying houses, getting married, or having babies but I'm here to share the reality of it all...the grass isn't always greener y'all!! With every new milestone comes new challenges and new surprises! I want to remind you guys to stop in the simplest, in between, moments. In those moments is when you find yourself sitting back and taking in your newest accomplishment, when the challenges and surprises are still ahead of you but you've already accomplished SO much. That's why I was so insistant on having this photoshoot in the empty house, right in our in between moment. On this day, most of the rooms had been painted thanks to the ENORMOUS help from B's parents who had left just the day before, it was our first weekend alone with the house, we hadn't moved in yet, and my parents would be heading up the following weekend to help with more projects as the house would become full of all of our belongings. Thanks to Mika's beautiful images, we got to capture our in between moment and they will forever be some of my favorites. Don't forget to stop for the in between y'all! You'll only ever have the moment once and it will really make you realize that all the things like paperwork, finances, and a home depot meltdown were worth it. To say we are excited to be Midwest locals (see what I did there) is just the tip of the iceberg and I am SO excited to share this journey with you guys!
Our beautiful photos were taken by Mika at Mika Jade Photography.