Addition...Revived.

I'm afraid I've left all of you hanging. I announced the plans for our home addition in the fall and haven't blogged about it since. Allow me to explain...

When my husband and I first purchased our rock house we knew from the beginning that we would need to add on to it. For those of you thinking of purchasing a home, this is not a good thing. Never buy a house that won't meet your needs for at least the next ten years. Our plan was to live in our home until we were desperately cramped and then add on.

At the time, however, we had no idea how difficult it was to build onto a home. It's harder than buying an already built house, by far! We invested nearly $1500 in the process only to be told that in our situation, it couldn't be done. It was more expensive to add on than to buy a new house. Needless to say, we were intensely disappointed.

Six months later,we put our house up for sale. We had several promising showings over the weeks, but the feedback always came back the same. It was too small. Apparently everyone else is a lot smarter than we were.

When you're selling your house you tend to look at it differently. You see it through the potential buyer's eyes and begin to feel a strong attachment to it. We were feeling a budding desire to stay put. We loved our house!

It's so close to the main part of town, which means we can walk to all of Wellsville's fun summer events. It's on a corner across from a picturesque duck pond that we visit daily. We can see open fields out our windows and have amazing neighbors. Not to mention--the Wellsville Founder's Day Parade strolls right past our lot and we don't have to go anywhere to see it!

We talked and prayed about it for about a month and decided to try again. It was crazy, we knew, but we were willing to take the risk. We ordered another appraisal, filled out paperwork AGAIN, and did a lot of praying. We had paid off our second mortgage and saved up some money so the number we needed to hit was (thankfully) much smaller. When we got the results back- we were only $3000 short. Perfect. We could scrounge up $3000 before we started easily enough. I can't tell you how excited we are! It was really going to happen!

And thus, the blog is back. In the wake of disappointment that followed our first adding-on attempt, I had stopped blogging. One of my main motivators (our addition) was gone. Now I'm going to keep it all recorded for whoever may be interested. I imagine I'm not the only one out there obsessed with old houses, additions, and/or Wellsville. I hope you enjoy following the journey!...(again.)

Make Mother's Day Great

Photo courtesy of Captured Moments Photography

Being a mom is the most incredible, rewarding job any woman could ever have. Filling this position requires its workers to experience every emotion--often to extremes. Moms feel everything from the butterflies that come from a child's unexpected hug to the misery that accompanies seeing our kids struggle. I've known many moms (including my own) that dread Mother's Day.

The truth is, our children are human beings. As such, we need to know that they will never be perfect. This also means that we share their every pain. Motherhood is naturally empathetic. When my daughter falls and scrapes her leg (again!) I want nothing more than to fix it. It's for this reason that we have a healthy stock of Disney princess band-aids on hand at all times. (They seem to heal little girls' wounds faster than the regular nude variety.)

Along with feeling our kids' pain, we also feel guilt when our children make mistakes, lose their way, or struggle with any number of difficulties. In a mom's mind, the thought is always there...was it my fault? If I had spent more time with them, been a better example, not been so strict, been more strict...would things have turned out differently?

If we learn anything from our studies of silly Sci-fi movie time travel, it's that you can't change the past. It's funny, while Science Fiction is not an exact, well, science, most writers seem to agree on this concept. Even if you could zoom back in time and give yourself a re-do, nothing would change. It is what it is.

Vernon Law, an former baseball pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates and a pretty cool guy, said that "Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first the lesson afterward."

Life is essentially a barrage of pretests. And if life is anything like school, the pretest is not graded like the post test. We are constantly given challenges before we have the knowledge to meet them. But the knowledge comes when we're ready for it.

Moms, I guess what I'm trying to say is, let's give ourselves a break. Let's make mistakes and look at them for the funny stories that they are. Let's stick up for ourselves against our most critical judger--our own self. Be a little more proud of what you do for those around you. When you feel guilt for things you can't change, resolve to change things as you move forward instead of dwelling on the past.

And on Mother's Day, celebrate how amazing you are by having a good attitude. Don't look at it as a reminder of your flaws and shortcomings. It's a chance to put your nose up in the air a little bit and bask in your own awesomeness.

Photo courtesy of Belinda Olsen Photography

Take advantage! Happy Mother's Day...