I'm so ready for this! | Princess and the Bug

   Imagine living in a neighborhood where you know all the neighbors, everyone's kids play together in the afternoons, and you can take your dog for a walk passed sunset. Imagine living in a place where you're only worries are keeping your lawn green and pretty and your house spotless.

   Now let me tell you about where I live... When we come home, I check the street when I'm pulling in. I check to see if the door is jammed before I unlock it. I very rarely leave when it's dark, and when I do, it's only when my husband is home and I make him walk me to and from our vehicle when I go alone or with the kids.

   We've always rented, because that's all we've been able to do. For the last 5 years we've work HARD to fix David's not so great credit. We've lived in shabby houses in not so great neighborhoods. Our first apartment together was a small one bedroom apartment that was shut down and boarded up. We then moved into small, one bedroom house. Our son was born there and for the first two years of his life, he, my husband and I shared our itty bitty bedroom. It was super cramped, but we made it work.



   In 2007, David and I decided to try to conceive our second child. We planned that we would find a bigger place to live, something that would accommodate us and our soon to be two children. We figured it would take more than a few months for the birth control to stop working, but 3 month later and no move, we were pregnant! One month before Princess Abigail was born, we moved into a bigger place. Three bedroom, good enough to hold us over until we saved enough to finally buy a house.

   It's been hell to say the least. Not the saving money part, but the living in this neighborhood part. We've been here for just over two years. At first it wasn't so bad. We had extra space, what more could we ask for? Then we started missing things like our children's outside toys, water hoses, anything that was in our yard pretty much. I've lost count of how many water hoses we've bought. Sorry landlord, but the green lawn policy is null and void when the hose goes missing "/ Then, this passed June, our house, apartment, whatever you want to call it, was broken into. Anything that was electronic and of great value was stolen. Thankfully we have renter's insurance, so it covered the items, but that doesn't ever make the weird feeling of having your privacy invaded go away. I'm always paranoid that it's going to happen again.

   Like I mentioned, we're only suppose to be here until we have enough money saved for a down payment and we're approved for a loan. In September, we scheduled an appointment with a lender that we were referred to, gritted our teeth and prayed we would be approved. I sat on egg shells the entire time we were in that office, but.... we were APPROVED! Are you kidding me?! All that paying off old debt, settling and hard work on credit repair finally paid off! Want to know what we did when we left that office? That's right, house shopping!

   We've been on a house hunting high since then. We know a great Realtor, and he took us to look at a few houses so we could see what was in our price range. The third house he took us to, we fell in love. Everything else we looked at just didn't compare, it was perfecting. It had enough rooms for both of our children, and ourselves, an office, spare room, loft, the works. Tons of square footage and a HUGE backyard. Immaculate barely begins to describe it's beauty. We told each other that we wouldn't get our hopes up because we knew it would be gone before we could have a chance to bid on it.

   Still, I dreamed of this house, Bradley talked about how he would decorate his room, David talked about his future "Man-cave". At least once a week I would drive by just to see if the "For Sale" sign was still posted in the beautiful front lawn. Two weeks ago, we drove by to check on it for the last time. The sign was gone, our dream house was sold. I bit my lip and fought back the tears, we drove away silent. The first words in our vehicle were from a shaky voiced Bradley, "So I guess we're not going to buy that house then, daddy?" The tears rolled. Not just from me, but from Bradley and David too. Abigail doesn't quite understand, and thinking back now, I'm pretty sure she was snoozing. We had to reassure Bradley (and ourselves) that we would find another house that we loved just as much, if not better. Even though we knew from the beginning, we LOVED that house.

   The plan is by the end of December, or sometime in January, we'll find the perfect house and put in our offer. Fingers crossed, well be in our first HOME in spring of 2011! Obviously it's a long process and I'm sure we're going to have our hearts broken again, but I cannot WAIT to be out of this disaster area. Space to call our own. Walls to paint how we please. A neighborhood we feel safe in. I. Can. Wait. Our dreams are finally coming true ♥