dolce vita

Tonight's Menu:

Potato Soup with Bacon from the Rock Cafe's cookbook (sent to me today with the Splendid Table newsletter, which you should definitely sign up for).

Broccoli Blasted, as previously discussed, the best damn broccoli you ever did try.

Chicken Piccata with Caper Browned Butter Sauce

I was too hungry to take pictures. Everything came out exquisite. I made lots of extras because I need leftovers for lunch tomorrow and Friday. I'm already excited about eating all of this again.

A very successful meal to finish a truly fabulous day. I went fabric shopping with the amazing designer who is making my wedding dress, and we found everything we wanted and got fantastic deals. We celebrated by shoe shopping. Then I ran into Hatch to get some paper cut and ended up visiting there for almost an hour. I miss that place. When I finally got to work Emily had saved me a delicious sandwich from Sub Stop, and I worked on entering checks the rest of the day, which is always soothing and gratifying. And then home with my Boo for a feast and a roaring fire in the fireplace. This is the sweet life, we're fully aware.

small joys

If I were rich, I'm sure I'd be happy. I've always said I'd make a great rich person; I'm generous to a fault and take great joy in gift-giving and sharing. I would spread my wealth around like Dolly Levi and her manure. I'd probably have nicer clothes, but I also probably wouldn't treat them any better than my current Gap Outlet and TJ Maxx-provided wardrobe. I'd travel more, in short bursts, four days to visit Mom, a long weekend to see Jenny, that trip to Chicago that we keep swearing we'll take.

Otherwise, I don't see how different my life could be. Would I rather live in another house? No. Would I rather have a different car? No. Would I want to stop working? No. Would I spend time with different people? Absolutely not. And I don't think I'd ever voluntarily sign up for the weight that comes along with wealth. Right now I feel like I do what I can for the rest of the world; we've certainly earned our wings in the Stray Animal Adoption heaven, and we send small donations to our favorite charities (particularly Alzheimer's research) when we can. If I were rich, I don't know how I could justify the balance between giving and retaining. It would never be enough.

I'm seriously racking my brain to identify parts of my life I would change if money were no object. Because the only thing that's nagging at me right now is laziness about getting in shape, and that not only doesn't have to do with money but is actually WASTING the $17 a month we spend on a shared Y membership that rarely gets used. I make wishes every time I find an eyelash, and lately I just sit there and stare at the eyelash trying to remember what I need to wish for. And the other morning, I wished I would get into shape before the wedding. Wishes are for magic! Not for things that are perfectly well in my command if I just get off my lazy ass three mornings a week. Honestly. That's embarrassing.

My point here, though, isn't about the way I want to look in our wedding pictures. It's about the joy in my daily life that I never look past. If I won the lottery, would I still be filled with peace after dinner-and-a-movie with my future husband? Maybe. Would I get a rush of pleasure from a day's work done well? Who knows. But am I bursting at the seams with blessings? I am. Coming home to a house that smells like spaghetti in the crock pot, and rushing through my nightly cleansing routine in order to climb into freshly washed sheets... there in my life is joy.

never been better

Tonight I'm knocking around the house, solo for a little while. Austin's playing FIFA Soccer with JB. I had planned to spend the alone time working on the filing drawers in the desk in the office I excavated yesterday. Instead I poked around online, played a game, read some educational wedding-related articles. Then I straightened up the house, put away the remnants of our crackers-and-soda snack from this afternoon, and got out the ingredients for tonight's Mexican pineapple salad. And I realized, while I was moving around the house, going through mindless motions, I was smiling the whole time.

I don't talk about religion, on here or anywhere. I'm not a subscriber of any specific doctrine. We don't go to church, and we don't follow any scriptures. I don't have astral convictions, and I don't miss them. But the only word I can find to describe this feeling, this day, this place I'm at in my life, is blessed. I am saturated by blessings. It washes over me, so many times a day, and I wish there was a better way to express my gratitude.

I love our home. We cleaned it yesterday, got the office near to full function, and made some decorating progress. It is safe and warm and comfortable when it's filled with girls, sprawled on the couch with popcorn and ice cream, or when it's just us and our pets, on quiet tv afternoons, or when it's just me and my iTunes. There literally isn't a day that goes by that I don't think how utterly lucky we are that we found *this* house. It felt like an arduous search, and it turned out exactly right.

I love my job. One of the bigger wedding-related dilemmas I've faced (as with every bride in the history of the world, I know) has been the size of the guest list. And this is complicated by the fact that I have 70+ coworkers who are also friends who I can't imagine not celebrating with. It's probably not going to be realistic to invite every Emma staffer plus one, but right now I'm doing my best to find a way to include as many as we can. I think about the very best days at Hatch, when we all felt like a productive family full of friends, and that's how Emma is too. I love it when I make a breakthrough on a collaborative project, I love it when I've finished processing the daily check run, I love it when the power goes out and I wind up laying on the carpet of the second floor lounge doing half-assed pilates with Brooks and Rami and Rachael's puppy. I think I've said this before, but you don't realize how much of your self-esteem is caught up in the work week until you find a job that fulfills you.

I love our pets. We both do, equally, with an unreasonable fervor. We're those crazy pet people and aren't remotely ashamed. Digby is getting closer and closer to being a good dog, and Bridgette is such a sweet girl. We had a brushing session on the back patio last weekend (shedding time is definitely here) and they were both just inhaling the affection and attention. Mackenzie is completely back to her old self, running the house with her larger-than-life attitude and making sure she gets quality time with us before bed every night. Corvinius is, well, an oddball, but a loveable one, and spent a large portion of this afternoon rubbing his face on the corner of my computer screen over. and over. and over again. Oh buddy. And look, we don't like to play favorites with our pets. But every single day, Mischa and Charlie Murphy fill us up with love. Mischa got a new toy today, and she's currently sacked out on her spot at the end of the couch with this new red stuffy wrapped in her arms like a woobie. I just want to hold her so tight. Charlie Murphy loves weekends, particularly couch weekends like today, and the absolute peace and joy he spreads when he's sleeping leaned up against my lap... it's just the best.

I love my friends. Book club friends, work friends, people who don't fall in either category (there aren't many...), I can't get over the support network that surrounds me. I spent a lot of my adolescence thinking of myself as not a "girlfriend" kind of girl, and I'm so happy that I was totally wrong about that. We threw a surprise bachelorette party for Agnes last night, and the house was about to burst from all the girlie love. Lisa and Jenny were missed, but otherwise it couldn't have gone better and I was so glad we could all spend sweet time with Agnes before she takes off for the Great Alaskan Wedding Adventure.

I love my family. The reason I didn't think of myself as a "girlfriend" kind of girl was, obviously, because I have the best built-in girlfriends on the planet, my sisters. We talk every day and nothing feels complete unless it is shared with them. I'm so glad that we live close enough to my dad that we can just have low-key evenings of ceiling fan installation and (really good) chicken wings with him and Lynn. We're so lucky to have them both nearby. I miss my big crazy California family so badly, and one of my absolute favorite things to imagine about our wedding is having them all here together again. And I am just chomping at the bit to get to Seattle (next weekend!) and give my Mom one gigantic hug, followed by a series of smaller ones. It's been almost a year since we've seen her and I can't wait to spend a week on the lake with her and Kam (and Casey and Trent and a deck of cards!).

And of course you knew this was where I was going, but I love Austin. I'm not going to detail all the reasons that he's the man I'm going to marry (I've done that before and certainly will again) but the place where we are in our life together is just especially good right now. I am excited to see him EVERY DAY. How silly is that? I start to feel restless and shifty if it's been more than a couple of hours since I've checked in with him (thanks to IM and texting for completely spoiling me by having my fiance´ available to me at all times). We're on the same page about all these major decisions we've made in the past year and will be making in the next year. We're not exactly wealthy, but it's been a long while since we've had to look at anything and say, from a financial standpoint, "How are we going to make this work?" We carpool almost every day and talk about the stories we hear on NPR. If it sounds idyllic, it is. I can't think of an aspect of my life that isn't made better by just having him with me. We don't have to do everything together (see: FIFA Soccer) but when I'm walking around our house by myself, smiling, it's mostly because of him.

the art of being flexible

I'm not always the best person at changing The Plan midstream. It's ok, I'm fine with my own borderline OCD-ness. It is the difference between kid Delaney, who used to lose her homework every day, and adult Delaney, who loves filing things. If it takes a near-disorder to help me keep my life straight, that's the way I prefer it.

So I make lists. And schedules. And sometimes I relish in ignoring them (see: yardwork plans for last weekend). But mostly, I have expectations for what the day will bring, the week, the vacation, the renovation, etc. And when Things don't go according to that plan, sometimes it takes me some time to adjust. Sometimes it's as easy as saying, "Ok, no biggie, we'll do lunch next week," and going and picking up a sandwich. Sometimes I have to write everything down and look at the big picture and rearrange some post-its and say, "Alright, so we'll switch the night we're making soup so we can meet Emily and Neil at Trivia Night, but this will only work if you drive and we leave my car at Casey's." Sometimes it's a big change, something I wasn't prepared for, and it can take me months, even years, to get past the regret, that tiny pang that something isn't quite right, and it hurts a bit when I remember what that something is.

But tonight is just a little tipover. I was leaving work a bit late, heading home to start dinner (skillet chicken pot pie). Austin was at a meeting in Cool Springs (horrors!) and I was hoping to try to time everything right so dinner was ready when he got home. But as I was pulling out of the Emma parking lot, my car was making a horrible noise and dragging to the right. I pulled right over and inspected the damage: a very flat tire. I know this is no big deal. But truthfully, I don't know if I've ever had one. Definitely not since I've had this car (almost four years) and probably not since college.

I ran through my options, pleased that my first instinct was not panic. I tried to remember what kinds of roadside assistance we still subscribe to (at one point I think I was covered under three different plans). I considered how long it could be before Austin's undetermined meeting conclusion, and if he could be any help to me. I wondered for a moment where Dad was. And then I came to my senses, backed up, and parked the car in front of Emma. And waved down the next coworker to leave the building, and lucky for me it was Chris Wood. First he waved back at me cheerfully, then realized that I was beckoning and pulled his truck around. We proceeded to unpack the spare tire out of the back of my car (I repeat, this has never been done before) and try to figure out the jack. Some of the fellows from the contractor crew who are working on Emma's third floor stopped to offer advice. Then Chris Nelson, aka Carlos Contusion, came out to help as well.

We got that tire changed (I say "we," ha!) in no time, with no drama. And I just kept thinking, over and over, my coworkers are my family now. If we had ended up living in California instead of Tennessee, I would have been able to call the Pros from Dover any time I had car trouble. As it was, I always called my dad. But now I have this vast group of reliable, brilliant, kind and helpful folks that I'm surrounded by every day, and they've become my support system. In so many different ways. It's not like there aren't bad days at Emma. But there are just good people. As I do at some point every day, I thought, "How lucky am I?"

I figured driving home on a donut tire was unnecessary, so I hightailed it to the other family, my FIRST family, and hung out at Casey and Trent's house while Austin finished up his meeting and headed back from the evilburbs. We can just leave it at Carmax overnight. Now I'm rethinking the plan for tonight and the rest of the week. By the time we get home tonight it will be too late to start dinner. We can make chicken pot pie on Friday. Maybe tonight we can go to PM and have crab wontons and sushi bites. I can be flexible with my food scheduling.

trying to overcome...

...the crippling superstition of talking about things before they are certain. I don't want to jinx this whole deal.

But the day after that last post, we found three new houses that caught our eye. We went the following morning (Saturday) and looked at them all, and two were nothing special, and one on Sandy Drive was pretty great. Great enough that my heart was racing while we walked through it, and we kept just looking at each other and smiling. And our realtor seemed pleased with everything he could see.

So we went back to Sandy on Sunday, in the morning with Casey and Trent, and in the evening with Dad and Richie. And everyone approved. I think Trent and Casey were withholding enthusiasm a little bit, trying to not get too gushy in case everything fell through like last time. They also seem to think this house is in the middle of nowhere, as well as "too big," as if that exists for a family with six pets. But I think they can see all the things we love about it (I'll detail below, even if I'm nervous to talk about it too much), and when Trent saw the 30 x 15 foot "man room" in the basement, he yelled, "We're moving in!" Dad was leaping about in joy and detailing the treehouses he will build for his grandchildren at this house (uh, Dad? Why not harass my MARRIED sisters about this topic?). Richie also kept stomping his foot like Elijah and declaring that he was jealous. Very wholehearted endorsements from that front.

So we decided to meet with Peter on Monday and assemble an offer. Then he called Monday morning to let us know that he had spoken with the seller's agent (the house is a bank foreclosure, so we're dealing with A Bank and not A Person) who said that the bank was not accepting FHA loans on the house. Uhhh, what? After all the trouble of being told we only qualified for an FHA loan (and therefore weren't eligible to buy our own house that we've rented for three years), we ended up finding a conforming (conventional) loan that would work for us, with only 3% down in a gift form and no requirements about the condition of the house. This was all accomplished during the work day on Monday, so we still got our offer put together and sent to the bank Monday night.

Then we waited and waited. We had requested to hear back on our offer by Wednesday at 6, but the seller's agent didn't seem to think it would happen in that time frame. He did say it was a "pretty good" offer, and hoped the bank would just take it and not draw out the process. Wednesday came and went, and Thursday. Luckily we had the Cheatham County Fair Demolition Derby to distract us from the agony of waiting for an answer. Finally, Friday afternoon after lunch we got a quick email from our realtor: "ACCEPTED!!" Hooray!

So now we have to see the addendums placed on the contract by the foreclosing bank, and approve them. We have to fork over 3% earnest money, which will also be our down payment. We have to line up an inspection and then figure out what our lending bank wants from us. And then we've got to BUY A HOUSE.

A big house. 2025 square feet. With a finished attic, a finished basement, 3 bedrooms, two bath, a huge kitchen with baby blue formica countertops, and a gigantic magnolia tree in the backyard. The living room, dining room and kitchen make up the front half of the house, all flowing into each other with huge doorways. This might be my favorite part of this place. Where we live now, the kitchen is the back of the house, the living room is the front, and there isn't a natural social flow in between. I love the idea of these three rooms feeling like one big area for visiting, dining, cooking, entertaining. The bedrooms are both large, in the back half of the house, with a large bathroom between. We will need to pull up the carpet in these bedrooms before we move in, but there are good quality hardwoods underneath and it shouldn't be a huge project. We also need to paint (as you'll see from the photos) and finish the fence in the backyard so our dogs will be safe and we can just kick them out of the basement door. Other than that, we could happily move straight into the main floor of this house and slowly update/furnish the attic and basement into our own usable space. I think we'll make the second bedroom on the main floor into an office/library, and put the spare bedroom in the attic. And I also think we'll get a grownup couch, and move the Big Brown Couch into the basement, along with the darts and eventually an entertainment center. It needs a good cleaning, it's been empty since May. Otherwise, it's a house where we could live for years, with privacy and big lawns and a covered patio.

I'm just so excited. More fingers crossed for all the contract negotiations to go quickly. With luck we'll be homeowners soon!

Oh, and thanks for all the amazing advice and guidance we've gotten from all of our friends and family. This whole experience has been vastly easier because we know so many smart, experienced people!

Quick update

We put in an offer on a house. On Wayne Drive, near Stratford and Porter. It has been our frontrunner favorite the whole time, and signs are looking good. I'm too superstitious to talk about it yet, so that's all I can give you. We should hear back on our offer by Friday morning (tomorrow!) at 10 am.

I don't even know what to tell you, other than that. It's pretty much all I can think about. I will send pictures as soon as I feel it is safe. Oh, and I finally got to talk one-on-one with our landlord and he was, as expected, so nice and sweet and understanding about everything. I am really relieved that it didn't turn into a combative situation. He's coming by this weekend to look at the condition of the house, and we're committed to give him at least 30 days notice when we're going to move out. So that all feels way better. No bad karma.

That's all I've got right now, folks. Hopefully I'll have even better news for you tomorrow.

I guess I owe you all some fudge...

...call me if you want to collect. I could make some fudge if you need me to.

This is apparently the time of my month when I want to cry every time I see the videophone commercial with the sincere-looking curly-haired Army guy talking to his family from a tent in War-ville. Also the time when I want to just lie on the floor and have the dogs be really still and let me hug them like stuffed animals. But most especially the time when I embrace my capacity for Overwhelming Worry about Many Things Over Which I Have No Control.

For example: the dogs. Are out in the rain and cold. And I want to rush home and towel them off and let them in but they'll just get muddy again. And I think about installing a dog door in the garage, so they'd at least have some shelter in bad weather. But would they even be smart enough to go inside if we're not there to encourage them (which of course doesn't work because if we were there they'd be inside with us)? Can I even convince my high-strung dogs who won't go up stairs or through gates to squeeze through a hole in a door? Would they destroy the (mostly unimportant) contents of our garage? Or would putting in a dog door open the garage up to looters?

Another example: work. I got a new job! I only have less-than-three weeks here! I should be emotionally extricating myself with every passing moment! Instead, I'm laying in bed this morning obsessing about taxes and printers and hiring new bookkeepers and...well...taxes. I'm really concerned about taxes.

And the new job! Could the people who work there possibly be as cool and friendly and welcoming as they appear? What if it's a cult of terminally clever and hip prototypes who say all the right things until you're suddenly sucked into a white slave workshop and they've replaced you with a robot and no one notices? When they say they dress casually for work, does that mean "rock star" casual or "ratty sweatshirt" casual? Would they be horrified if they saw me in my current ensemble of Extreme Slack? HOW am I going to adjust to getting to work at 8:30 in the morning?

Then there are the random creepers of worry that populate the rest of my life when I'm not busy obsessing about many aspects of one thing. Like windshield wipers. And my herb garden. And the light bulbs in our ceiling fans, which are not only hard to find and frequent to burn out, but aren't the environmentally friendly ones! And then I start doing the thing where I'm listing all the people I miss. Mom. Aunt Paula. Mike McIntyre. My grandmas. Kate. Ingrid.

What this means to me is that by this time next week, I'll find myself picking unnecessarily cruel arguments with people I love while denying that I am the one who started it. And then by the week after that, I'll just be thinking about Sex and Salty Foods, all the time.

This makes me sound like a crazy person. Or perfectly normal, depending on how you look at it. And really, I need to just force myself to examine the Utter Joy that is my life right now (outside of work, at least). We have got it going on pretty damn good right now. Lots of free time with which to sloth around the house with my Boo, snuggle our animals, play lots of Tetris, cook lots of good food, plan lots of fun things for the spring, which is starting to feel like it might come after all. Multiple times, every day, I sigh and say, "How lucky are we?" Who gets to say that and mean it? Looking at it all from over here, I think I can pack up my worry pants for another three weeks. At least.

had enough hinting and foreshadowing?

Oh, okay. I'll break it. I got a new job. One that I've been angling for for a very long time, and at a place that I'm so excited about that I can hardly sit still. I've given three weeks notice at my current job, and my boss was both gracious and helpful when I told him, so I'm really relieved about that.

I mean, really. I don't think this has even sunk in yet. And I don't know if it will until March 17th, when I drive south instead of north in the morning.

I suppose you want to hear details about the new job. I have this weird superstitious instinct kicking in here as I type. I have to keep telling myself that the hard part is over, my coworkers all know, I don't have to keep any secrets anymore. It's a billing associate position with Emma, an email marketing company that is one of the coolest places to work in Nashville. This is just one of those things where I can see myself there. I can't wait to get started.

But right now, I have a lot of work to do, to make an easy transition for my replacement at my current position. I've been working towards this for a while, and really getting caught up on all my pending long-term projects, and I feel good about my ability to finish everything. I was dreading coming in today and telling everyone that I was leaving. I had to psyche myself up and tell myself that the last two times I gave notice at a job, the first time I was leaving my family of seven years, and the second time they FIRED me for giving notice, so this couldn't possibly be as bad as either of those, right? And of course it wasn't.

AND much more importantly I've got to plan my celebratory dinner at Red Lobster tonight. Nothing says Congratulations Delaney like dipping it in butter.

to eliminate confusion

Just so you know, the undiscussable Thing for which I asked for good luck jujus last summer and again this week? It is not a baby. Good lord. It is a coincidence that I posted a video of a hilarious baby and then asked for karmic help on another Issue in my Life entirely. No babies. I do not need a Good Luck Baby right now. Sorry Mom.

But oh boy, I can't wait until I can tell you all the rest.

In all honesty, both of you who read this blog already know what I'm talking about. I don't know why I pretend that discretion is necessary. I'm not in the military. Mostly I'm just trying not to jinx it, while still naturally squealing with excitement to every person that crosses my path.

Discretion = not my strong suit. Geez, shut your mouth, Delaney.

it's been a long time since my ovaries have twinged with this kind of regularity...

Please. Please. Just watch the whole thing.



Oh, and remember last summer, when I asked you for some good karmic juju, and you did your best but the thing I was wishing for didn't pan out? Well, this time, multiply that times ten thousand, and please throw me some mental good-luck love this week. I'll make every one of you some fudge if this comes through. A Delaney's-Good-Luck-Fudge-of-the-Month subscription, how does that sound?

Psst

I know I always send All Users out and ask for help with things, or demand your presence somewhere important, but today I'm asking for a tiny favor: I just really need a few seconds of your Best Wishes types of thoughts... good luck, crossed fingers, a little prayer, whatever it is you do. I hate to be one of those Vague Bloggers who talks about things in a nonspecific way so as to not incriminate themselves, but just this once, please just trust me and send some Positive JuJu Hoo Doo Voodoo my way for this afternoon. I'll tell you all about it as soon as I can.