Hi Lori, I've been thinking alot about your family this season too. It's good to hear about you and the kids and that you are moving through things as best you can. A family in our community suffered a tragedy like yours about a month ago and I can only hope that they have the strength and support to weather things with the fortitude and aplomb that you have in this difficult time. I know you have no designs on being an example but you have been in so many ways. I wish you and your family peace in the new year, and I thank you for all you've shared with us in dealing with a family tragedy, it gave me the appropriate ways to help and support another family too. You are amazing, my heart and hope goes out to you and your children. I hope the new year holds a wealth of joy and new hope for you and the kids!

Deb, Her son was a senior in High School when this happened. It is believed that he was abducted, in his own vehicle, while leaving a local shopping mall. The killer was tracked from SW PA to Arizona, IIRC, but he shot himself before the police could get him into custody, so a lot of the details about the case died with him. It was several months later that her son's body was found.

OJ - IMO, completely OT and thoughtless. This thread is about Mother's Day. Yet you used it to yet again bash the US. Comparing NY bankers to Al Qaeda? You can't be serious. On this mother's day, my heart goes out to those with hurting hearts whether it's missing a mother or missing a child. I am fortunate to have been able to spend the day with my beloved 90 year old mother. I am blessed. But I am well aware of hearts that have holes today. Suzieque

Buyers who look at homes for 6 months are not motivated buyers in my book, I would establish a different preview regimen to save the buyers and my own time. We looked not-seriously from March until June. We looked SERIOUSLY after that until we signed a contract to buld about 10 days ago. A few things happened. One is that we learned we couldn't have what we wanted and changed what we would have accepted. The other is that with the current market, people who don't have to sell yet are waiting--nothing new has come on the market in the last few months here. I was looking daily on-line and our agent was looking for us--we were hoping to have purchased and moved before school started. Nothing new was coming up--even up to another $200k over our price limit. We had some non-negotiables that made it hard to find a house. We need 5 functioning bedrooms (one could be in the basement), a kitchen at least as nice as the one I was leaving, a basement, at least a 3 car garage and we didn't want to change middle school districts. DH wanted a newer house since he didn't want to spend every spare moment doing home improvement. We increased our price range. We increased it again. I was looking at houses that were *double* our initial plan--still didn't find something 'perfect'--and at double our price range, we didn't want to have to finish the basement, replace the floors, re-do the kitchen, add on a garage or anything else in the $10k plus range. Out of curiosity, after we raised our budget and relaxed some of our earlier wants, I went back and looked at the flyers of houses we'd looked at earlier--and still wouldn't have bought them. We might have done better if we'd been seriously looking May and June, but we were too busy planning our wedding to househunt :-) But 6 months didn't mean we weren't serious--it meant we were *particular* (or fussy, if you prefer). Up until the day we signed the contract to build, we'd have bought a pre-existing one if we could have found one. --Beth