Closing Time.

So today is the day. We've closed on the McIntosh Hotel.

Jon-Michael and I met at the title office, signed the papers, and took the keys.

She. is. ours.

In case you didn't know - and you probably didn't, since this is the first entry in this new journal - in October, we set out to acquire the beauty sitting alone across from the Post Office in McIntosh.

What started out as a joke has evolved into a family dream.

Rewind to mid-September, maybe early October. JM sent me a listing to an eleven bedroom, three bath, single family residence for sale in a prime location for our family and work lives. Eleven bedrooms? Who on earth would ever need that?!

You know me, I had to know.

I called an agent I was connected with randomly on Zillow. She looked up the listing and she too was immediately intrigued. We went to look. I fell in love. We'd all be fooling each other if we said JM was as excited as I was right out of the gate. He is always more of the realist between us. We walked up the stairs and down the long hallway separated the bedrooms. We walked out onto the veranda and took in the mossy view. We envisioned the noise from Dominic playing. I envisioned myself nestled in a hammock on the upstairs porch. I got supremely excited about the possibility of having my own work space in the house. JM dreamed of a room where he would retreat to for a quiet read.

We learned quickly it was not eleven rooms anymore. Several rooms had been combined to make larger, more spacious bedrooms. Now there are only seven. The plumbing had been updated and the bathrooms remodeled in really adorable fashion, the air conditioners reasonably new, and the kitchen cabinets were beautiful.

The walls though ... the walls were leaning. This beyond anything else hung us up greatly. Why is it leaning? How badly is it leaning? Is the lean the reason it's been for sale all this time? I'll tell you all about the lean later. For now, we celebrate!