England, Day 4 & 5, 9-15/16-08

England, Day 4 & 5, 9-15/16-08

We seem to have this problem of getting off to a late start nearly every day! Yesterday, David had to go do some work stuff and so the kids and I kinda hung out here, didn’t really do much. David was home fairly early, and we went to lunch…with a friend. Her name is Lydia. She’s very nice; my kids seemed to take right to her – like they would anyone from M2M. She and I have been emailing back and forth for a few months. One of the Moms, Darlene from M2M, knew her several years ago, when she and her husband were stationed in the states. Thankfully they stayed in touch and Darlene put me in touch with her. She has shared lots of information with me about living over here. It feels good to at least know someone’s name and number over here. Thanks Darlene!

After lunch, we went into town “centre” (new word – I assume it means center) and we went into these real estate offices and got listings of “lettings” (rentals). We have a whole stack of them and then later I think it might have been close to 3 or 4 not really sure, but we went to look at 2 homes.

The first one David said felt like a “cereal box” the lady showing us the home got a kick out of that! Thankfully I didn’t tell her what I thought of the kitchen! It was a Cracker Jack box, no joke! It might have been okay…except they have their washing machine and dryer + dishwasher in the kitchen! It seriously was tiny. It had no dryer (tumble dryer…I think that’s what she called it). David asked her how they dry their clothes and she said on the “wash line” (clothesline). Needless to say if you don’t have a dryer you do a lot of washing on sunny days! Kinda funny. It had 3 floors. 1st floor – the one you walk in on had the study, dinning room, bathroom (just toilet and sink) and Cracker Jack box Kitchen. Then up to the 2nd floor, were the living room, master bedroom, and bathroom with tub. 3rd floor, 3 bedrooms – one no bigger than a walk-in closet. David said he felt Closter phobic. We called it the Stuart little house.

The next one was a bungalow, totally detached (meaning no other home connected to it). It was bigger, it had more room, it had a lot of pink, and a massively over taken backyard. I think they planted everything under the sun in that yard, oh I mean “garden”. They have flowers, little mini ponds, chicken pen, fruit trees…you name it, it was there! Not exactly what we were looking for either. A little overwhelming.

We could make either home work if we had to, but if we don’t have to why bother? Why settle for something you’re not exactly thrilled over and have to live in it for 3 years or longer?

After that we came back to our room, ate some sandwiches and then tried to go look at other homes, so we could rule out those that we didn’t wish to view. It didn’t work out quite right, our GPS, even got lost I think! We put in this one location and she brought us back 2 miles past the base…which is completely the wrong direction of the Village (town) we were headed too. Needless, to say after that it was dark and we called it a night.

I’ve still been typing things up in word and then copy/pasting them to save time and give me something to do while sitting in our room. I sure wish we had internet in here! I feel like I’m totally out of touch! It’s crazy. If we don’t find us a home soon I might go crazy…especially once David is working all day everyday.

We are still continuing our search. David has to work all day tomorrow, in-processing, it’s called. Basically it means getting signed in and everything. Hopefully, he will come home with more “new” information. If we’re lucky he might get done early and then we could go house hunting some more, now that we have a list – I really want to go look!

Anyway – patience I know…thanking God everyday for the lesson’s I learned over the last 3 years! J

Well, I’m off to the community center to post this. Today is Day 5, it will be boring! So not much to write. David is doing in-processing till like 4 p.m. So it’s going to be difficult to keep everyone awake today – since my kids would not go to bed last night! It was after 1!!! I woke them up as soon as I woke up 9:30, thirty minutes earlier than yesterday. On a roll uh? J We will get this time change straightened out sooner or later!

~T~

Joshua 1:9 “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”