1. Close on a house

Does anyone remember playing MASH when they were little? You know, the game that decides who you'll marry, what your job will be, and where you'll live. (Fingers crossed it's not in a shed.) I remember playing that game all the time, but even so, I had my life all planned out. I was going to get married at 22, and start having babies at 24. I was going to be a marine biologist, or a physical therapist, or at one point, a professional cheerleader. And I was going to live in a nice house with lots of pets.

Well...I'm 25, happily single, and my only children are furry. Instead of going the medical route, I teach dance and preschool. BUT, one month from today, I will be closing on my first house. And it's a nice one.

I didn't start 2012 thinking I'd be going house hunting. I'd decided last September that I wouldn't be renewing my current lease, but I didn't really have a plan of where I would go. My dad had suggested a few times that I look into a house, but I didn't think I needed all that space for myself. However, once I figured out it was going to be cheaper to live in a house than an apartment, I started the hunt.

I found the perfect house my first day of looking. Giant kitchen, big backyard, hard wood floors, fireplace, exposed brick in the dining room. I fell in love. I dreamed about the house, I mentally decorated it, I found ways to slip it into any and all conversations. And then the honeymoon phase ended and reality set it. The house was a disaster and needed way more work and money put into it than I would afford. So, I gave the house the boot. After a few days of excessive ice cream consumption, I started to look again. I found a few houses with potential, and then I remembered a house I had seen right after I had first looked at the "perfect house." I asked my realtor to go through it again with me and I knew it was the right fit. And the rest, is history.

Let's be honest...me actually closing on the house will be just the beginning of me talking about it. I'm sure I'll encounter plenty of "joys" of homeowning that I'll need to share. But in the mean time, I'm going to be counting down the days until I can cross number one off my list.