Living in Fremont by September

The time has come. Our family has wanted to move to Fremont for several reasons. Cutting Lawrence's commute, being closer to church, closer to buddies. Moving presents opportunity. The house we have now has been a blessing from God. We are satisfied here, however, have both felt the desire to move to Fremont, and so far the lights are green. We have renters planning on staying at least until 2012. We've decided for now to rent a home.

Opportunity. We have a small yard. With a Charlotte Mason education, a natural style of learning, kids should spend time outside, exploring nature. Easier done with a larger yard. Can it be done without a yard at all, sure, just more work on my part. Really, with boys, they should be living outside irregardless. Trampoline, sandbox, trees, composting, climbing trees, play structure, blessings for lifestyle. We found a modest house in a fabulous neighborhood, tree lined street, and it has a HUGE yard. There are fruit trees, lawns and the landlord pays the water bill, oh yeah, and they provide a gardener!

The house is smaller than our current house, ironic since I wanted to upgrade square footage and yard, but this is short term. And did I mention the yard is HUGE? The bathroom has a serious case of 60's pink tile explosion, the landlord doesn't want us to paint, which is a way to modernise crazy tile color schemes, but there is a freedom in this. My kids don't have to tread lightly in this house, it comes with smudges, not dirty, but smudged. I see the cringing in some of you, but with 3 boys and a short term rental, it can be quite exhausting making our house ready to rent, then prepping a new house, and then fixing it back up in a short time to move again, and the cycle continues. Freedom and provision. God knows what we need when we need it.

When we were homeless (I use the term loosely) 5 years ago, we stayed at 4-5 places. The way I was raised, you leave a place better than when you found it, especially when hospitality has been extended. So scrubbing, cleaning, from one place to the next, quite exhausting.

I still haven't given up on Dennis Court either. This leaves the door open for possibilities, yet gets us into Fremont, so we can take advantage of having great longer term tenants ourselves. We could live here 6 months, a year, or who knows.