Day 46 - I smoke up the apartment.

Okay, so Richard told me the way to clean a cast iron skillet is to char anything stuck to it and then scrub that out - it's what his grandmother apparently used to do. Well, I tried this method and wound up retreating to the bedroom with Elizabeth because of all of the smoke! There was no fire, just a ton of smoke. I had to take the smoke detector down until all of it cleared out. Because of the neighborhood we currently live in, I couldn't leave the patio door open to let the smoke out, I had to settle for the one living room window that has a screen on it, so it took quite a while for it to clear out. I really can't wait to move. Hopefully we'll find out soon whether or not the house we have a contract on qualifies for FHA funding. (It should, we had an inspection done and he didn't see anything that should disqualify it.)

It's about time we found a house. We've been looking since before I was pregnant. We've been close to getting a house several times. The first time was last year. We spent months and quite a bit of money only to find out that the foundation was just bad enough that it didn't qualify for FHA. Word to the wise, if you are looking for a mortgage, do not go with Bank of America. We were almost out $3000 because of their incompetence. The rep we were working with said that we didn't have to have an engineering survey even though the appraisal said we did. We kept filing contract extensions because of BoA which was $350 an extension. Fortunately, after a lot of run around, we were reimbursed. What topped it all off - BoA was so out of it, they sent us TWO reimbursement checks! Way to be on top of things! They caught their error fairly quickly, but damn...

On a lighter note, I had the Mirena IUD placed yesterday. I was scared going in because of the reviews I had read online. I thought it was going to hurt and I'd be in pain afterwards. I'm a wuss and have a very low pain tolerance. I had only mild discomfort while my doctor was placing it. What "hurt" the worst (and I say "hurt" because it wasn't that bad) was having the speculum in and pulling a little at my tears (they're still a little tender.) I also had read that after it was put in, women experienced pain like bad menstrual cramps. Maybe because my regular period cramps were/are horrible, it didn't seem bad. I've always had problems with my period. Bad cramps, heavy bleeding... Hopefully the Mirena will really help that...

So Mother's Day is Sunday. Mom, Elizabeth, and I are going home to visit my grandmother. She's excited. This is the second time she's getting to see Elizabeth in person. I send photos to her, but it's not the same. Grandma found out today that my father knows about Elizabeth. I don't speak with my father and his family, that's another story for another day. Thanks to social networking sites, he found out. I don't care that he found out, I just wasn't going to be the one to tell him.