Riley Graduates!

Today, Riley worked on his floats in full winter clothes--thermal shirt and heavy sweater, jeans, shoes, and socks. CRAZY! He did awesome. After tomorrow, he's finished for the season....and ready for summer! We'll either go back at the end of summer for a refresher or wait til next spring.

Have I mentioned how worth the money and time these lessons are? ISR is invaluable!

As promised, a video clip from Riley's ongoing Infant Swimming Resource lessons. This is about 2 minutes of his 10-minute lesson last week. It's horrible lighting. (I should have been on the other side.) It gives a better idea at least of how he's doing.

This clip is his instructor taking him through some different exercises of how he could fall in the water, different angles, etc. Marcy has been working on stopping him from kicking so much during his back floats as you'll see him do lots here.

If you watch through the end you can see her burping him a little and then he puts his hand on his hand and says "Daddy ate it." At least he keeps his sense of humor during his lessons. Such a silly one.

He's progressed a lot even from here. This week we've been practicing floats with him fully clothed. Today we did summer clothes and shoes and tomorrow we're doing full winter gear. Better videos to come!

Eye of the beholder

Word on our oh-so-exciting second showing? They're thinking about it. Gag. That's what my mom used to say before the answer inevitably was 'no.' Don't get my wrong, I continue my efforts at optimism, just not very successfully.

One of the most humorous things about this joy ride of home-selling is reading the realtors comments post-showing. Yes, we get to read feedback. And sometimes, I wish I hadn't heard a thing.

Curious about what could turn-off our potential buyers? I present,

Things people hate about our house:

1. LOCATION

This is probably the most often heard dislike and this one, I actually understand. We are out of Oklahoma County, though still technically in Edmond (and in Edmond schools), but some people can't deal with the distance. Our biggest obstacle. I have little doubt that this is what has kept our house on the market for 4 months.

2. A SUPER-LONG HALLWAY

Believe or not, this extremely, offensively long hallway is our second most-heard complaint about our house. Are people lazy? Do they appreciate more compact houses? Who can say...but this hallway is turning buyers off. Who knew.

3. TOO CLOSE OIL WELL

Okay, I also understand this one. Although I don't see it as a huge deal. We have an oil well across the street. It's very well-contained, but I guess considered an eye-sore. Fine. I don't even think about it, but I guess buyers are hyper-sensitive to it. I actually like it when it runs sometimes at night. Kind of soothing. But whatev. People dislike it. (Wonder how the peeps across the street feel with it in their backyard....good luck selling your house someday!)


Those are the biggest complaints we hear, but I had to throw in these too. A couple crack me up, alot.

HUGE BACKYARD: (One man's positive is another man's negative. A lazy man.)


TOO MANY KIDS PLAYING IN THE STREETS: (these aren't actual kids from my neighborhood, I have to say. And this one might be my favorite complaint. Perhaps, because I kind of agree. Even though it's hateful.)


DINING ROOM OFF OF ENTRY:


A TEENY-TINY MASTER CLOSET (please note my dripping sarcasm. This picture represents less than HALF of our apparently shoebox-size closet. Yep, tiny.)



All of this to say, these complaints--some valid to me, some trivial--prove one thing. We really are in a buyers' market and people have time and inventory to be picky. Our second showing peeps didn't like the big backyard and oil well. So, we just have to hope that everything else they did like overrule those things. And I didn't mention all the positive things we hear--and there are lots of those too.

Either way, someday soon, it will stick for someone. The odds tell us it's true! But in the meantime, it really is entertaining to hear the complaints.

Whew. Just when I thought I might actually be consistent with blogging, it's suddenly 16 days later! Where does the time go?

Actually, I can tell you. All it takes is a little idle time for things to really take off. I was working on a cool tourism project I got as a follow up to the Chick Trips itineraries that I wrote and edited for the department last fall. So, I'm on deadline for the first two trips in the new series when I got an unexpected offer for a very cool assignment with Oklahoma Today.

That deadline took me on a great overnight trip to Tulsa where Kevin and I pounded the pavement for a good 24+ hours and saw more than I thought was possible in such a short time. We were in-and-out of restaurants, shops, and attractions all day long until we basically could go no more. We saw places like this:

And here's a shot with an actual person! Kevin drinking a pint of Guiness at McNellie's (the original!)

All of that to say, all of last week, and most of this week was all-Tulsa for me. Researching, phone calls, writing. It was a much bigger project than I thought! I finally finished up yesterday. Wondering what you should see and do in Tulsa? Stay tuned for my article coming out in Oklahoma Today's awesome July/August issue. It will be great.

Throughout this crazy week we've had three showings. One a day on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday....hooray! And even better news? Got the info today that one of those showings will be making a repeat visit this Sunday. Our first repeat! YAY! This is great news and basically means this is our visit to blow. They already like the house. We just have to seal the deal. Please stick, please. stick.

We had a very simple and great Mother's Day on Sunday (which is when the pictures above were taken). Riley is awesome. I have lots to report on his swimming lessons....which are going, well, swimmingly! He's close to being able to save his own life. And my Mother's Day gift? Boot camp! Also more on that coming up. See, I really am planning on blogging more. Really am planning...