Goals for 2012

So this year, we made goals. My husbands cousin wrote them all down in a notepad so that we can revisit them at the end of the year and see if we accomplished them. My goal was to get pregnant. Still no luck there. Jumping my husband every chance I get. Paul's (my husband) goal was to buy a house. Now that goal should have been pretty straight forward. We had a good enough deposit, and after all the hoo-ha with the bank, we finally got pre-approval for a mortgage. In February we found our home. So far so good. The place may look messy from the outside (it hasn't been painted since it was built in the 70's), it has just about everything we need. It has 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and 2 living areas, plus a laundry, and a garage with internal access. Seriously good stuff in our price range. And then we got the council report. The previous owner (before the guy selling it to us) had built in the basement. All good. Except that he got no permits. And post-permitting is quite possibly the hardest thing to accomplish in the home-owning world. So of course one of our conditions to buy the place is that it gets permitted first. Save ourselves the hassle and money. Except that it's now June. The poor guy who owns the house has to get reports and changes from all over the place. And it's not easy. So we're still waiting. And our pre-approval is running out. On the eleventh. So something better happen fast. This has been a great way to learn patience. And to buy all brand new furniture with the money we're supposed to be saving. But currently we're living in the self-contained sleep-out at my in-laws place. I don't mind too much, I actually get on really well with my in-laws. But it's hard to have all my stuff inaccessible in boxes in the garage. And it's hard to have no dryer (or hair dryer) in the middle of winter. And I hate that my 16 year old sister-in-law picks on and insults my husband every chance she gets. Those two living on the same property is not ideal. So yeah, I'm looking forward to our own place. There's a challenge with this house too. Our aim is to be as hospitable as possible. To have people around to use our large deck and BBQ, to play on the Xbox, to just hang out. Also to have people stay when they're in town, whether we know them or not. If we're blessed with this place we need to give back. And that is hard when you're as unsociable as we are. So I'm hoping you will keep me accountable. If I don't mention that someone's been around in a while, hit me up. Let me know I'm not sticking to my challenge. Hopefully I'll have updated news about this situation shortly. Well about all our goals and challenges.