The jump is complete... officially.  Alyse and I have now set up residence in Austin, TX.  It's been a rather long and strange trip, but it's good to be in a home again.  Our in-laws were nice enough to set us up in their guest house for almost six months while our house was being built.  Getting in here was one of the most taxing experiences I've ever had buying a house.  The last two were simple.  Sign some forms, move in.  This one had a builder that was up against a financial wall.  It was their end of fiscal year, so they wanted to make sure everyone closed by Jan. 31st.  The sub-prime crisis is in full swing, and loans we applied for in May of 2007 are now non existant.  We ended up going with our own loan provider, Prodigy Mortgage LLC.  These guys are a start-up and they were great.  The were up past 10pm on several nights to rush our application and get us closed by noon on Jan 31.  We had 34 minutes to spare on Jan. 31 when we signed.  The consequence being the house going back on the market and loosing our substantial deposit.  However that is all behind us know.  We got what we wanted, everyone closed on time, Mercedes made their numbers, and Prodigy Mortgage got their commission.  All is well.

 

Now we get to customize our place even more.  We're never satisfied with beige, so we painted almost every room.  We're starting on the deck, but that project is so large it's rather off putting.  I guess this is nesting, but it was the best time to do it.  The movers didn't show up withour worldly posessions for over a week, so we had plenty of time with an empty house to paint, seal, sand, and stucco where we liked.

 

Home - check

Moved Cats - check

Create new bank accounts - check

Get new insurance - check

Career - um, where's my eraser?

 

This is the big goal now, and one that can't be solved with 14 trips to Home Depot.  Not even 15 trips.  Alyse and I are both chasing big dreams right now which is both exciting and terrifying.  Alyse is having quite a bit of success getting her music in front of the right people.  She's won some prestigious awards, and is now setting up a tour for later this year which will likely be followed by another tour, and another, oh and probably at least a few more.  It's important to layer them so that word of mouth from each one generates larger subsequent tours.  It's going to be quite a lot of work, but it's what she is passionate about.  I am certainly very glad to see her go after it and support her the best I can.

 

Whereas I am in a slightly different position.  The wind project is coming along nicely.  We still have several milestones ahead of us, but there is nothing putting a hard stop in front of us yet.  Our next big goal is to secure enough land to plan for 10 3.0 MW Vestas turbines on our land owner's property for the site we are developing in Wyoming.  If we cannot fit that many, we'll need to expand to neighboring land owners whom we do not know as well at this point.  That however can change, and hopefully we can bring a profitable opportunity to them as well.  The siting plan is actually due back today, so there will be more news on that soon.

 

In the end, we're all dead, so despite the risk, we're going to make it a great ride.