Filming Day 2

House #1: Sugarhouse

We absolutely loved the charm of House 1. But I mentioned several times in the show that "I love everything about this house". Well...I didn't. I loved the tree lined street, the windows, the arches, the curb appeal, but when it came to the inside, especially the basement, the small bedrooms and bath, I was not in love! It wasn't the right house for us, I'm not sure we would have purchased it. I dunno. Maybe after much TLC.

The reason I claimed to have loved it so much is because they wanted us to have differing opinions. They said when we agree on everything it doesn't make for an interesting show. So we made sure to find things we didn't like, or pretend to like/dislike something, when in reality we felt the opposite. This bugged me, I'd rather see people be real, It wouldn't bother me if people agreed on everything.

I get it, but now I know that reality tv isn't really reality. I talk more about it in this post. 

Many people have asked if Julia was in fact our realtor when we bought the home or if she was an actor for the show. Yes, she was our realtor. She also had to submit an audition tape. We worked with one other realtor before Julia and let me just say, Julia Splan is amazing. She has become a good friend and I recommend her to anyone/everyone looking to buy/sell their home. I was scared to work with a realtor because I didn't think I was quite ready to make the jump in buying a home since we had such a good set up at Alpine Storage. I didn't want our realtor to waste their time. But Julia didn't pressure us and was patient as we looked at home, after home, after home that didn't "feel right". We were kinda picky, as most first time home buyers are. We spent about a good month with Julia looking at homes last summer, we realized our budget wasn't going to get us the house we wanted in the neighborhood we wanted so we took a 3 month break. Julia didn't pressure us or make us feel guilty for what I thought we were "wasting" her time. When we began the search again she was right there with us, then we found our home and she gave us the best advice, and really became our friend through all of this. 

Getting mic'ed up.

This day was the hardest of all 5 days. We were still trying to get comfortable with the camera and we didn't quite know what Susan, the director, wanted and expected from us. I know that she had an idea of what she envisioned in her head, but we weren't getting it. There were times when I just felt so uncomfortable, so overwhelmed, and felt so worried with how we were going to look on camera I wanted to just shut off but couldn't. 

We always broke for lunch and for some reason taking a lunch break always made everything better. Lunch was always on them and they took us wherever we wanted to go that was close by. I looked forward to lunch because it was a time where we could talk as friends and get to know them...their "director", "camera guy", and "sound guy" hats came off and they were more real. 

After we finished at the house, we went to downtown Sugarhouse so they could film us walking down the streets and looking at boutiques and thrift shops.