Home sweet home

I get to cross a huge task off my list of things to get done before we move. We finally signed a lease on a house! Yippee! It's so nice to have a forwarding address. Thanks a million to my sister, Janece, who did a lot of the legwork for us. She had to endure looking through dirty, smokey houses and brave a very sketchy part of town with her two kids to drop off deposit money for us at the property management office. I can't even imagine what it would have been like trying to lease a house from out-of-state without her help. You're the best, Janece!

A little about our next home for at least a year. It's 3 beds, 2 baths, about 1600 sq/ft (which is going to feel spacious to us after our 1050 sq/ft condo!), and single-level, which will be great for the hot Arizona summers. Much cheaper to run the a/c with a single-level house. It has a backyard, but instead of grass, it's all landscape rock, which is common and practical for Arizona, but I'm not sure how much fun the kids will have playing back there. As a consolation, there's a huge neighborhood park about two blocks away, complete with acres of green grass that we don't have to mow or fertilize. Plus, there's a community pool that we get to enjoy without the maintenance. And we'll be in the same neighborhood as Janece and her kids! Yay for cousins! And yay for having a sister close by who'll be a big help when the twins get here!