We have pictures!

Last weekend we got all the nephews together to get their picture taken together. Mom's sweet friends to Cooper's offered their beautiful backyard. It was perfect. They have a great little pond with neat fish in it. The boys loved it.

Click here is the link for the preview.

The boys look adorable.

He's Baaaack

Last night Mr. Genius got back from new hire orientation in CA.

I do have to say that Apple has a lot of perks and is a great company to work for.

Mr. Genius is completely beside himself with excitement.

He was like a little kid showing me all the things that he received by now being an employee of the beloved Apple.

Like one thing he got was a shirt that has the Apple emblem on it and across the chest has the date of his start day with the company.

Isn't that crazy?

To further understand the excitement that Mr. Genius is feeling I have 2 stories to tell you...

The first takes place about 8 years ago.

Oh my goodness, I can't believe it has been that long ago.

I had just graduated from college and Mr. Genius was still in school.

Mr. Genius planned a day trip for us.

Our first outing.

I was so excited when he first told me that he was planning an outing.

Where could we go?

The Lake?

Chattanooga?

I knew it wasn't too far because we were both broke as a joke.

Then he told me where we were going.

To Memphis...

to graceland?


to mud island?


Nope. To the new Apple retail store that just opened.

That is right people we drove 3 and a half hours for Mr. Genius to buy the cheapest item he could find, just so he could say he bought something there and so that he could get a back with the Apple logo on it.

And then we drove right back.


I am pretty sure I got some brownie points from this trip.

Now fast forward to 2004.

We are married and we decided to go on a small vacation together.

(Pre kids)

I am not a huge beach fan, due to my skin scalding at the thought of the sun. So we looked at alternative places that were cheap.

Mr. Genius found an awesome deal to Chicago.

Isn't that ironic.

Can you guess why he came up with that city?

If you guessed to see an Apple retail store... you guessed right.

Of the 5 days that we were in Chicago. We went to the retail store at least 3 times.

2 of those times we sat in front of the store and waited for them to open.

*****
With all that said, can you get a glimpse of how excited Mr. Genius is about working for this company?

I am very proud of him of making a goal and reaching it.

But there is one problem...

He is trying to convert the boys.

He went to the store inside Apple (where only Apple employees can shop) and bought the boys some jackets for the windy Chicago weather.










Seriously don't they look cultish?

So far, so good

The house has been on the market for a week.

All I have to say is that people that live in a "perfect" house with kids...can not be happy people.

Of course I want to sell my house fast so we will not have to be paying for Mr. Genius to be flying back and forth, but I would like to sell soon so I don't have to stress out every time the boys are eating and I internally freak out every time the look like they are going to throw their food or just have finger prints on the walls.

I have to admit I am a much more fun mom when I don't have the stress of having the house on the market.

We have had good traffic in the house and even last weekend we got an offer! It was a really good offer but it was contingent that their house would sell. As excited as I was that we got an offer after only 3 days we just can't wait for them to sell their house. There are some factors about their house that will make it hard to sell.

We do hope that they come back when their house does sell.

We have had some good traffic. Although we had one couple come look at the house and the comments that they left were that they loved the house but it was out of their price range.

Ummm... don't you know the price before you come into the house?

I don't know, call me crazy, but that is a factor I look at BEFORE I even go into a house.

Whatever.

Anywho... Mr. Genius and I have been looking at houses up in Chicago. I have been quite surprised at how people decorate up there.

Totally old school country.

I am talking wallpaper, lace curtains, unpainted wood panelling. The whole bit.

Now to be living in Tennessee and to be shocked at how macy country decorations there are I think is saying something.

I guess I was just expecting more modern decor with it being in a big city.

For example there was one house that had a bath tub in the Master bedroom.

Yes IN it.

No, not in the bathroom.

Which was the door to the right of it.

But in the bedroom.

Seriously.

Then there is another that as soon as you walk out of the shower there is a HUGE full length mirror looking back at you.

If that doesn't get you motivated to go run a marathon or 2 I don't know what would.

It is hard to pick out houses when you don't really know the areas and you can't walk into them. I probably won't go up there until we have a contract on the house. Lord willing that will be really soon.

Mr. Genius flies to California to the mothership (AKA Apple headquarters) on Sunday for training. He will get an Iphone and a laptop. As you can imagine he is walking around on cloud 9.

We have another showing tomorrow and hopefully some more will come by this weekend.

Thank you everyone for all of your prayers a support. We really appreciate it.

It has begun...

Our house is officially on the market as of today.

Here is the website.

http://tinyurl.com/cputps.

This process is a little overwhelming.

Not to mention this weekend with the tornadoes didn't help at all.

I plan on taking some pictures of the damage and post them. The tornadoes started in the Blackman area. Which is about 3 to 4 miles from my house. We were very lucky.

By the way old roomies it started right around the Miranda house (AKA cat pee house). I want to go back there to see if it is still standing but they have closed the road.

So this weekend we have been working our booties off to get the house picture perfect.

Let me tell you it is nearly impossible with my two boys. I may lose my mind in this process.

Due to our realtor's house getting hit with the tornado, she wasn't able to make it out to our house til last night.

After looking around the house and us showing her all the extra projects we have done to the house (cabinets in laundry, garage, and playroom, hardwood floors,etc...). She told us the price that she thinks with help up to sell fast but be a fair price.

Now I have not been living in a hole. I know that our economy is in the crapper, but seriously I am shocked at the price we are having to sell our house.

9 months to a year ago we could have sold it for nearly 20k more.

20k more!!!

And 2 years ago 50k more!

We were really counting on the extra money to get a halfway decent house in Chicago.

Don't get me wrong, I know that God is in total control and he has the right house up there waiting on us, and the right buyer is out there that is about to get a really good deal on this house.

It is very discouraging. I honestly feel as though we are giving our house away. Especially with all the hard work we have put into it.

So for those of you out there who are thinking of doing projects to add value to your house... DON'T DO IT!!! Do it for you to enjoy, or just to have that extra feature that other houses will not have to get it sold. But right now you will not get the money back you put into it.

Sorry I had to rant about that. If you can't tell, Mr. Genius and I are still in shock over this and I know our neighbors are not going to be happy with us. But we gotta do what we gotta do so we won't be stuck with two mortgage payments.

The lady that came out today to take the pictures mentioned she has some clients to call to mention about our house. So she thinks we will start showing tomorrow! I hope she is right.

I will keep you guys posted as the process gets moving.

Thanks for letting me rant! ;)

FINALLY I was about to burst!

As most of you know now... we are moving to Chicago!

I can finally say it on here!

Mr. Genius has been interviewing for this position since January! This has been a very long and drawn out process. An emotional roller coaster for sure.

That is one reason I haven't been posting much lately.

Remember when I said that my news years resolution was to organize the house in a year?

Well I actually finished one of my resolutions!

In 3 months.

We had our garage sale last weekend (which was a huge success). So we are free from all that clutter. Not saying we don't have anymore clutter here.

Anyone that knows Mr. Genius knows that he has a passion for Apple Computers.

That I loving refer to as "the cult".

But all kidding aside, he truly has a God giving talent on the knowledge with these computers. So it has been a dream of his to work for them since he was in elementary school.

Yes I am serious... since elementary school.

So marrying him I knew that we would have to move to where ever Apple called us to when the opportunity came.

Well this time God flung the door wide open for us. So there is no doubt that Chicago is where we need to be.

Mr. Genius has interviewed with Apple for at least 15 positions, and it most certainly wasn't because he was not qualified for the jobs that he did not get them, it was obvious that it was God that closed the door.

This time last year Mr. Genius was starting to interview for a job with Apple in Charlotte when the economy went kaput and Apple went on a hiring freeze.

So a year later Apple called him to see if he was interested in the job in Chicago. He went ahead and said yes before talking to me (which is unusual). When he called and told me what he did, I had an overwhelming feeling that I knew that this was the job that we were going to get. I can't explain the feeling no more then to say it was the Holy Spirit giving me a peace about it.

I am at peace about it but it doesn't mean that I am not sad about moving either.

The funny thing about this is for one is that I said that I would never live in Murfreesboro.

I have been living here for 13 years! Now I am sad to leave it.

I also said that I would NEVER live in the north especially when I have kids.

I think I need to start saying, I will never be a millionaire or I will never have my old prebaby body back.

Maybe I can get this to work to my benefit.

So got sidetrack there.

As far as the job goes (I am sure Mr. Genius will correct me if I am wrong). Mr. Genius title will be Project Manager. He will be working with the Chicago Public School system.

Now I don't understand all the details of his job but what I do understand is that Chicago Public Schools recently converted from Dell computers to Apple computers. Which is a really big order considering how big their school system is. He will mostly be working with the Board members and the IT Managers to make sure they are happy with the computers and work with them when they have problems. But he will not be the typical IT guy that you call when you can't get your computer to turn on, but He will make sure that the Chicago School System IT people can handle that.

One big thing that made Mr. Genius immediately start drooling over the job was that before new software and hardware comes out they will send it to Mr. Genius to play with to see if there will be any kinks in it or if there could be any improvements to it that will benefit the school system.

So they had Mr. Genius at the word prerelease.

When Mr. Genius told me about that part I knew that there would be no turning back with this job. We were in for the long haul.

So he turned in his 2 week notice today and his last day at Flat Earth will be on April 22nd.

He will fly out to Cupertino, CA (AKA the cult headquarters) and get trained on something or other and after 3 days come home. They will then either get him to train more here in Nashville or fly him back and forth to Chicago for about a month. They would like for us to be up there by May 26th (I think).

So I am asking you to join us in praying for 1 for our house to sell quickly and 2 that I would completely loose my mind by trying to keep our house perfect with 2 very messing and crazy boys.

Which one, by the way, is completely potty trained!!!

I think I hear the hallelujah chorus.

Sorry sidetracked again.

We would really appreciate your prayers at this time.

I will be doing my best to keeping the blog updated but I do know that I will be pretty occupied with cleaning hand prints and pee that doesn't seem to make it to the toilet.

So with all that said... Anyone want to buy a house!!