New Rental House

Well, I haven't updated since April but things are slowing down now and I thought I would update a little bit. Some of you know that we were in the process of buying a house when we heard that the government is going to cut the military band budget by quite a bit. We felt that our future in the Navy band wasn't stable enough to continue with that process and, since my job was a one year sub position and has run out, we decided not to buy after all. That was a hard decision. We really liked the little house we had picked out and were very excited to be first time home owners. The day after we backed out of the deal, I started searching hard for a house to rent. We came to this street and looked at two houses. One of them had a better layout, was right next to the extra parking lot at the end of the road (we're not allowed to park on the street and the one-car garage/driveway situation is sometimes hard to manage), but the yard wasn't completely fenced and the kitchen was small. The second had a fenced yard and bigger kitchen, but the layout wasn't very good. However, the yard was our top priority and so we went with 708 NE Flagstone Lane (the second one!). We are so glad we did, too. I had strong reservations about our couch even fitting into the living room. It is also painted dark red, which makes for a pretty dark space. I dreaded it until we found a way to set up the couch and realized that the paint job didn't look half as bad once the furniture was in and we had our floor lamp up. I took a few pictures of the downstairs and will post them, although I think it's still hard to get a good feel for the space, even with the pictures. The dogs' new favorite game is running up and down the stairs (thump thump thump thump thump) and they also enjoy lying in the yard eating the woodchips that surround the tree and the rose bush (really more of a rose stick, if you ask me) and occasionally the corner of the shed.

This is the end of the living room when standing up against the couch.

I turned slightly to the right to show the kitchen.

This view is of the middle of the living room from standing next to the counter in the kitchen. Ruby wanted to show off her new favorite part of the house, the rug by the sliding door where she can nap and keep an eye on the yard intruders, mostly birds but a few squirrels.

I took this shot while standing in the middle of the room and aiming at where I took the very first picture from. Just past the TV is the hallway to the front door and you can also see the railing because the stairs to upstairs are there as well. In the front hall are the half bath, the closet for the washer and dryer (which live under the stairway), and a coat closet.

There is the backyard, taken from our bedroom window, with Ruby and Otis doing what they like best. Otis: lying the in sun avoiding being bothered by his sister. Ruby: Doing various jobs including bothering Otis.

There aren't any pictures of the upstairs yet because it wasn't unpacked when I took these and then I spent my time unpacking but haven't had time for pictures! It's coming together nicely, though, and we are comfortable and enjoying living above ground again!