Exciting news

Hello again! Okay – so that should be the last time for awhile that I go a whole week without contributing to the blog. Mat and I were away for the weekend, and I didn't take my computer with me. And, our camera is still broken, but we have gotten a new one. I just need to get a new memory stick for the new camera in the next day or two, and pictures will return to the blog – I promise! :)

Anywhoo, the reason Mat and I were away for the weekend (MINUS the kids by the way) is because we are moving to Connecticut. We are actually very excited about this move because, if you couldn't tell, we are not in love with Florida. :) Mat accepted a job with Pfizer in Groton, Connecticut so that is the reason for the move. If you are unfamiliar with Groton, it is near Mystic Seaport. It is a quaint New England town. Here is the link to Mystic so you can take a peek: Mystic

So Mat and I left Thursday morning for a whirlwind weekend of house hunting. We have already sold our house in Florida, so we were able to make this a real house hunting trip and know that if we found something we could buy it. We had a list of houses that we wanted to see, our agent at the ready, so off we went. Mat's parents were a blessing to us and they came down to watch our kids while we were gone. We knew we would be really busy and having three little ones in tow – they would have hated it. Anyway, we toured homes all day Thursday and Friday and repeated a few on Saturday. By Friday we had found “the one” and knew what we wanted to do. So on Saturday after one more look, we put our bid in. We found out Sunday that it was accepted! We couldn't be more thrilled. This is the perfect house for us.

We are moving to an area about 25 minutes north/west of where Mat will be working in Groton. It is called Salem, Connecticut. If you want to read about Salem, here is a link: Salem It is a small area – I think the population is about 3200 people! But it is close to neighboring, larger towns that have a lot of things to do. We are definitely not isolated from the world, but we will have our privacy. We are in a neighborhood, and on a cul-de-sac. Our yard is 9 acres of property, and it is all behind our house and then that backs onto an environmental preserve, so no one will be building around us. We have close neighbors to either side of us (that we can see from our house) but our house sits the highest on the hill. Arlington will be attending school at the only school in the town called the Salem School. It is Kindergarten through 8th grade. It is a cute school, and we visited and were very pleased. Connecticut schools in general are the best in the country and this one got an extremely high rating so we are happy. Here is the link if you want to see the school: Salem School

We found out that the people in our neighborhood are a few Pfizer families, families with young children the same age as our kids, and a police officer. (can't beat that!) We got a chance to meet the current owners of the house, and the husband works for Pfizer. Neat coincendence. They were very nice, and we got to talk to them about the town, the neighbors, etc. It sealed it that this was the house for us. They are moving because they are expecting their 4th child and they just don't have the room anymore.

The house is the perfect size for us. It doesn't need a thing done to it, but over time we will change little things to make it our own. It is smaller than the house we have now if you include the basement in the square footage, so it is around 2800-2900SF. That is what we wanted. We went down a bedroom, to a three bedroom, but that is fine. We gained the basement, and the house already has an office (which is what we use our 5th bedroom for now) so we didn't lose much. The basement is finished and is going to make an EXCELLENT playroom for our kids. It even has a mud room – my favorite thing in the Pottery Barn catalouges! We love everything about the house and can't wait to close the deal.

So that is our news. Mat accepted the Pfizer job, we sold our house, we bought a house, and on May 17th we start our drive to Connecticut to our new home. We will be traveling from May 17th-May 25th. We hope to close soon after we arrive.
I am going to try and post pictures below of the house – I hope it works. I have a few more that I took on my parents camera, so as soon as I get those uploaded, I will post them as well. Please don't pay any attention to the people's clutter! It isn't terrible, but they weren't too interested in cleaning up for the pictures. We think that is funny!

Take care!