Is This Thing On?

Greetings from the land of "I don't know what the hell to write about."

Is anybody still reading this?  If so, give a shout --- hey, give me an idea of something to write about, in the comments section, so that I can get back here in the next few days instead of a month from now.

When we last saw our heroine, she was up to her eyeballs in paperwork, attempting to buy and sell real estate...

SO yeah, a lot has happened -- it wasn't exactly painless, but over the past month we sold The Hubs house, apartment shopped with the intent of renting for a year, had massive sticker shock over the cost of renting a condo or townhouse, stumbled into a brand new development and built a house, badda boom, badda bing.

Well, technically we didn't build a house -- because to do that would have taken about 90 days, and we needed to move in like 3 weeks, but we wandered into a brand new development that is only about 1/3 built, walked through what we thought was a model home, which turned out to be a "quick move in home" and less than 24 hours later, we were writing a purchase agreement on what amounts my "dream home of the moment," ie,  probably not our "forever home," but hopefully our "for the next ten years home."  It's big enough to grow into, I got to pick out all the appliances, great school district, fun young neighborhood, just 2 miles from some of our best friends, TONS of closets and a killer kitchen, and about 20 minutes in either direction to our parents.

And, the best part?  After having spent the past 120 days fixing up The Hub's 1940s-era house, and the past 8 years fixing up my 1919 cottage, it is BRAND FREAKING NEW.

That's right -- nobody has ever lived here before.  Nobody has used the toilets, showered in my shower, hung clothes in the closets, or cooked on my stove.  For one calendar year, every single thing about this house is fully warrantied -- and we've already had a test of that, when we had a breaker go bad that controlled the garbage disposal, and literally 2 minutes after I hung up the phone, somebody was here to look at it, and then it was repaired (for free!) at 8:30 AM the next morning.

After the stress of owning old homes, THESE are basically the things my fantasies are made of.

One week in, and The Hubs and I have each both commented that if we can swing it, buying brand new is probably the way to go for the rest of our lives.  Nothing creaks, everything is so clean (no 100-year-old-dirt in my 100-year-old-window sills!), and it just feels... solid.

So we're here, we're fairly well settled.  We moved into the new house on 9/7 and I took the whole next week off of work, unpack, and as it turned out to deal with some issues that came up in regards to the sale of THe Hub's house -- which, in the end, ALSO went off without a hitch, but it was touch and go for a while there.  I am the type who cannot rest or focus on anything else until my living space is put together, so I've been pretty insane about unpacking and getting things put in their place.  The result?  I EXHALE every time I walk in the front door.

However, the week off was not exactly relaxing - on the contrary, I feel like I haven't stopped moving / erranding / unpacking / shopping for the past week and a half, but I did at least get a lot of really good sleep every night, and can go back to work feeling pretty well established in the new home.

We're now living further away from the city than I've EVER lived, and as a self-declared urbanite, that feels a little weird.  It is an entirely different county than I've EVER lived in, and a city neither of us has ever lived in.  I used to joke that if I was this far away from the city I'd melt, but apparently the fear of melting was usurped by the allure of affordable new construction, because I jumped at this place like it was an oasis in the desert.  And here we are. 

It has been fun exploring our new city, which has a bit of small town feel to it.  The farmers market is just a few blocks away from me, and is small and quaint.  Every time I walk into Target or the grocery store, it feels absolutely empty.  The pace is a little bit slower down here, and I'm finding it quite refreshing.

Of course, all of that said, I will have to commute back to the city each day for work  -- a drive that isn't going to be fun anytime, and will be less fun in the winter -- so I'll still get my urban fix. 

And on that note - time to make some breakfast, prep some dinner, and get ready to hit the road.  They moved my office while I was out last week, so at the end of my commute I have something super awesome to look forward to -- more unpacking.

Off and running,
Jessica