A bitter/sweet moment. The last picture we will ever take on our front porch. This was taken right after we turned over our keys to the new buyer's realtor.
Moving sure can take it out of you! Whew! We are beyond tired, but by golly we did it, and lived to tell the story.
If
you have read any of my previous post you know we just moved out of our
family home of 37 years. To say it was an emotional roller coaster
would be an understatement.
So many of our family members, and close
friends were a bit saddened by this move as well, but like us, they
knew it was a good move, and time for us to start a new adventure.
I know everyone was so curious about the WHERE and the WHEN
of our move. I was not trying to be secretive, but I did not want to
say anything until I knew for sure that our home would sell.
Boy
did it sell, and very, very quickly at that. We were very fortunate to
have 7 over asking bids. We chose the right bid for our situation, and
the rest is history.
While we were getting ready for the selling of our home we were also looking for a new place to purchase as our next home.
We are pretty logical people, maybe I should clarify that, my husband is beyond logical.
He
is the one that had researched, and punched the numbers to makes sure
this was all doable before he showed me a house he thought we would
like.
He might take a long time to process all the angles of a situation, but once he has done that he is ready to jump forward.
So literally one day he told me he had found a home he thought we both might like, and he was ready to go and look at it.
Even
though we had talked about moving for over 4 years, I was still in
shock because this time was different. He was READY to make the move.
I
immediately started asking questions, and doing the back stroke. He was
more than ready so we went to look at the home, and needless to say we
decided to sign on the dotted line.
We
had our list of priorities, and at the very top of the list was to stay
close to family. We will be living about 20 min. closer to our family,
the second priority was to be in a gated community with an HOA. Of
course there were other things on our list, but these were the most
important to us.
So I am purging my existing home, packing, and signing very important documents all at the same time.
Our home sold within the very first weekend so this was a definite GOOOOOO!!!
Our brand new home is in a beautiful little community. It is in an over 55 community, but they like to refer to it as an, "Active Lifestyle Community."
The area is surrounded by hills, and grape vineyards, very peaceful, and beautifully planned.
We are still pinching ourselves, and can’t believe we will be spending the rest of our retirement years there.
Here is a little video link of the community, if you are interested in seeing what it looks like…….
We
are downsizing just a bit to 1590 sq. ft. home, and we found a floor
plan that will work well for the way we live, and for when our family
visits….
What we loved about this model was how the kitchen and great room related to each other.
The
kitchen has always been the hub of our home. I like seeing my family
when I am in the kitchen, and I also like to have a view of the backyard
while in the kitchen so this model fulfilled all the criteria for our
needs, and most of our wants.
There are three different elevation choices……
The Mediterranean
The Vineyard Cottage
The Napa
Since
this community is surrounded by hills, Oak trees and grape vineyards it
has a California wine country feel so the homes are aptly named, and
the elevations reflect that style.
You all know by now I am a cottage loving gal so we chose The Napa.
Our home will be flipped so the garage is on the right. The paint color, and roof will also be different than in the picture.
You get to choose from 5 choices of combinations of house, trim, door and roof color.
I felt very, very lucky because the one I wanted was offered for the elevation we chose.
We
had driven around the existing homes, and I kept pointing out one color
combination that I loved, and it was offered with the elevation we
chose.
Here is the color combination that we chose for our new home …….
I know all monitors will read it a bit differently, but it is a grayed/blue/green color The roof will be a gray……
We chose our lot……..
We are now the proud owners of DIRT!!!
You
can see the vineyards on the hills behind our home, of course once the
other homes are built we will not be able to see them from our yard, but
on our walks we will get to see their beauty.
So
for now we are residing in a very nice 1,200 sq. ft. apartment for the
next 6 months while our new home is being built. We settled in very quickly and feel very comfortable here.
To say it has been a fast, crazy month would be an understatement.
This past week while moving I was also having to make ALL of the interior and exterior design choices.
I would NOT
recommend doing it this way. I was so mentally, and physically
exhausted, and I had all my design meetings the week of the move.
Decisions
did not come easily due to the available elements to choose from (am I
the only one in the world that does not live with earth tones?), but I
think we made the best decisions for us, or at least I hope we did.
We are going to take this next week to catch up with you all in blogland, and rest my body and my brain.
We now have the time to truly get excited about this new adventure.
I hope you are ready to take a ride with me on the journey to a new lifestyle, and the designing process of our new home.
Oh and just one more thing!! Trilogy has a blog and guess what the name of the blog is??? Coincidence? I will let you be the judge!
HERE WE GO!……..
And I am determined to …….
