Things could change mind you, but it seems as though we've bought a house! We sent in the down payment today, and the listing agent has removed the home from the "for sale" ads and the MLS. According to the agent, we could close on it before the month ends, which would be great.

It's only a single wide mobile home, but it sits on 1.6 acres of hilltop beauty. The home is in great condition. The cabinets were just replaced, and with the sale we will be given a new stove and a refrigerator. Heidi would like some more cabinet space, and perhaps one day I can build her some that work better. As it stands right now we have a few more pressing projects planned. Below are pictures of the house now, and what I hope to do to it as time progresses.

These pictures come from the listing, and arent't that great but bear with me here. This is the front of the house. It's only 9 years old, so the vinyl siding is still in great condition. You can barely see that on the left of the house is a nice hill that separates us from our neighbors who are half an acre away anyway. There is a lot of privacy on this piece of land, the area isn't that populated. (It's also only three miles away from the camp that Heidi's brother and sister in law run - which HAS A FISHING LAKE!!!! )

This is a slightly better picture of the front/side. Planned improvements include regrading and properly building the gravel driveway, with a scalping base and two inch deep gravel. We're not sure if we're going to raise the ground up to door height for ease of access, or build a bigger deck in the front. I'd really prefer to have a big deck on the back of the house and having two is just nonsense. I can get good quality fill dirt for free so I might just grade the land up to door height and landscape the front. Eventually we plan to build an asphalt driveway and maybe put a garage off to the right of the driveway as you see it here.

This is the (small but adequate, and gratefully received) living room area. First things first, the carpet and wallpaper are GONE! I like the trim that is on the walls, both at the ceiling joint, 2/3 down and the floor molding. I will probably keep those, but Heidi and I plan to have a tile/wood floor throughout.Neither one of us really like carpet and I know how to do floors so I'm probably headed up there asap to get started on the tile/paint so it can be done before we move in the beginning of September. For colors we'll have to get there, look at it and spend four weeks stopping at Lowe's every time we're in the area, making fools of ourselves in front of the store employees as we argue at the sample counter. Um, I mean - Heidi and I aren't agreed on colors yet...

Here is the Kitchen. The wood floor seems to be fairly new, so it will probably stay but I'm not too hot on tile to wood looks so I might take it up and use it in one of the bedrooms and tile the kitchen. You can't see it here, but left of the dishwasher is a hole for the fridge, and there is a little wall that juts out to cover the other side of the fridge from being seen in the living room. I might extend that to make a breakfast bar, or something. Again, wallpaper GONE!

This is standing in the master bedroom, looking at the door to the master bath. I plan a complete remodel of the master bath, removing the plastic shower/tub stall and replacing it with a Jacuzzi tub and tiled shower. Craigslist is full of Jacuzzi tubs that aren't that expensive and tile is something I am good at and can save a bundle by doing it myself. Also, to give the space the feel of more room, I will most likely knock out a large portion of this wall, (since it's the master bath we don't need as much privacy as the guest bath) and either do some type of archway with saloon style doors or do double french doors in frosted glass or something. Not sure yet.

Well, that's it. That's the tour of our (most likely) new home in wonderful Western N.Y. I'm excited about all the possibilities, I'm thankful for the Lord's provision, and I'm even becoming ok with the thought of living in New York! (Did I mention her brother is only three miles away and his property has a decently stocked fishing pond on it? )

With all the sadness and trauma going on in the world at the moment already, it is with great grief that I report to you the loss of a very important person to American culture. His death has all but gone unnoticed. I intend to make sure he's remembered correctly

Larry La Prise, the man who wrote "The Hokey Pokey," died peacefully in his sleep at the ripe old age of 83. It's reported that before he went to bed that night, his family and he danced one last time to the classic tune. Sadly, the following morning he was found to be passed on by his wife. She said he had a smile on his face.

The most traumatic part of the experience, however, came when it was time to lay him to rest in his coffin. It's reported that they put his left leg in first, and it all went downhill from there.