Anyone want an update?

Well, I thought it might be a good time for an update! So much has happened in the last month and a half since I updated last. We've packed up the entire house, cleaned it all (passing inspection with flying colors!), moved to the other side of the country, visited friends and family along the way, found a great house to rent (more on that story), had all our household goods delivered, cried over some pieces that were ruined, unpacked boxes and am currently busy trying to find a place for everything and make this place ito our home! whew... I'm tired just after writing all that! Living out of a suitcase for over a month is not for me!!

I don't have pictures of the house yet, but I promise they will be up shortly so today I will tell you about how we got this house!

On our way here, we stopped in Ohio to visit my mom and Papa O. We ended up leaving the kids with them (what a huge blessing) while Jason and I took off for VA to find us a house. We had already filled out all the paperwork for on post housing, but all the places told us the wait list was 6 to 12 - - remember that in 6 months Jason is supposed to deploy - - so waiting was not an option for us, we wanted to be in a home and settled by the time he has to leave. We got to VA late Monday night. We knew that on Tuesday, we had to go to the housing office and check in with them before we could start really looking for a house. On Monday night, we searched the internet for homes for rent in the DC area... we had a list of about 20 potential homes and we started calling that evening to try to set up times to see the homes. No one answered except for about 3 or 4 people who all told us that the homes had already been rented out. Tuesday we went into the city to check in at the post and talk to the housing office. We finished there about noon and we were on our way to trying to find a house.

We called on a few more homes on our list and either did not get an answer, or they had already rented it out. Finally we decided to just enter some of the addresses into our GPS and see the neighborhoods and houses and then we would know if we were even interested. We drove to the first house we entered and knew instantly that it was not for us. So we headed to the second address. when we pulled into the subdivision we knew this was a good possibility... We found the house that was listed and imediatly called on it - - - someone answered - a good sign! It was the realestate agent who promptly told us that the house had already rented...darn! As we were driving out of the subdivision we were looking at street sign and I saw one I recognized. I looked on our list and there was a home listed for rent on that street. We immediately called. Someone answered (oh happy day!). It was the owner she told us that the previous people had just moved out the day before. When Jason asked her if we could see it, she said it would take her about an hour to get there but we could see it. Woohoo! then someone actually called us back and told us we could come and look at their home at 3. We went and grabbed some lunch, then headed back to the first house to see the inside. we walked in and it was spacious, clean, new (only 3 years old), and a great location. The only negative was it was going to cost us all of our housing money and we would still have to pay utilities out of our pocket. We told the landlord that we were really interested, but we had another house to look at that had 5 bedrooms and was a lot less per month. She asked us how much. We told her and she said - - I will give it to you for that, but you will have to mow your own lawn. I know our jaws hit the ground! We told her that we would give her a call back after we looked at the other home...

The next home was not the one for us at all - - wallpaper and all green trim - - that's all I am going to say... we called the original landlord back immediately and told her we wanted it! Just like that - - we only looked at two homes and we had our house. Everyone told us to take our time and not make any quick decisions, but we just knew this was right. Turns out that the lady who works in the cubicle next to Jason lives just 5 houses down, so he was able to jump in on their carpool right away.

Oh - - - and did I mention that we now live only 5 minutes from the mall, Target and Ikea? I live in civilization again!!

I promise pictures will be on here soon!!