House Huntin'

Originally I was keeping this information "under wraps", but since everyone around here knows that we're trying to rent our current house out, I guess the cat's out of the bag! Basically, we've outgrown our little Pine Avenue cottage, and need some space! So we've been exploring options.

We've spent the last three weeks touring the houses in BV and Lexington, and believe me, there are lots of options! Not all of them are great options, but they're there to be explored. It was fun finally seeing the insides of houses we'd looked at online for months (Logan and I are addicted to trolling the MLS system). What with the housing market being the way it is, most of these houses have been on the market for months, if not years. Yeesh!

We started this process because someone who was moving called us to see if we were interested in looking at their house. It had quite a bit more space, but it was an 80 year old house (lots of updates, but still that really old feeling) and Logan really isn't crazy about that aspect of BV houses. Plus the way the space was arranged would only work for us for a few years, and we'd like to find a house that could work for at least the next 10 years (whether or not we'll actually stay in a house for 10 years is unknown, but we'd like the option).

Since we know we want more children, we'd like a 4 bedroom house, or a 3 bedroom with an office. As we've gone through different houses (and even made an offer on a few) we've really been able to find out what's important to us, and what's just extra fluff. Surprisingly, the style of house we're settling on is "ranch", which I never would have guessed. I've always been more of a cape cod/2 story house kind of person, but they're so daggone expensive, plus the use of space inside is much less efficient, giving you less bang for your buck. Since we have a budget (and we're stickin' to it!) we need something modest, but very efficient. Like, super efficient. Ranch houses are great because they usually have a basement that ends up doubling your square footage, and provides lots of storage space.

Tomorrow we're looking at another option, and I'm pretty excited! It's in Lexington, so it's closer to Logan's work, and it looks like it's been nicely updated, and the price is right, so we're hoping for a match!

Will this be "the one"? Only time will tell!

Mt. Vernon

(Note: I started this post about two weeks ago, couldn't finish it in one sitting, saved it, and promptly forgot about it. So sorry the news is a little old, but hopefully it's still interesting!)

June is over, and I can't believe it! My last post recaps most of what happened in June, but I haven't posted anything yet about Grandma Rae Rae and Grandpa Tad's visit.

We had a great time! The kids had a lot of fun getting to know their grandparents better, and Anna was a sweetie pie most of the time. We went up on June 21st to DC so that the boys could go to a Mariners/Nationals game, and then Rae Rae and I went with Anna to a lia sophia show I had slyly scheduled in Arlington (about five minutes from our hotel!)

Grandpa Tad was pretty good at keeping the boys entertained, and was a good sport about sitting in the "tight spot" in between Jack's car seat and Tommy's booster seat. This allowed us to just take our minivan up (have I mentioned how much I love our car?)

Jack got some pretty good naps in on the way, and reminded me an awful lot of his father while he slept...

When we checked into the hotel, the boys had a lot of fun mauling their father and climbing on the beds. They love hotels! So exciting to children.

The boys had a lot of fun at the baseball game (no photos, though)
These photos were taken at the Mt. Vernon Gristmill and Distillery. We were already planning to go to Mount Vernon, and then it just so happened that I was assigned to work on the jacket cover and page design of a book about George Washington's distillery operation. We got to meet the guy in charge who wrote the book, and it was fun checking everything out!

The boys weren't terribly interested in the gristmill or distillery, but they did like looking for the lizards that were hiding in the bushes!

This is our little family in front of Mt. Vernon (Anna's in the baby carrier that I'm wearing. How would we survive without it?) It was a pretty warm day, but the kids were pretty cooperative (all things considered).

They have an awesome interpretive center there, where the kids could play with a miniature doll house of Mt. Vernon (Tommy liked that) and they could have even dressed up like George Washington (but they didn't feel like it). There were lots of other fun things, so we'll have to go back again sometime when it's a little cooler outside!

There is so much history in this area! We'll have to try and plan more day trips in the upcoming summers.

And these pictures are just for fun...

We had a great time, and we were so glad we could spend it with Rae Rae and Tad! Thanks for making a fun memory with us :-)