T traveled to St. Louis this week for some job training. He's watching them install one of the machines that he'll engineer and then he begins work in California next Monday. In the last two weeks, we've gone to California twice for house hunting and paperwork reasons. On our first trip we toured several homes and ended up finding one we really liked right before we had to come back to Utah. We spent our last hours in California hurrying through paperwork to make an offer and still catch our flight back to Utah. We were elated to find that they accepted our offer and then we had to go right back to do more paperwork and make design decisions.
I literally squeal with delight when I think about our new home. It's located in Lincoln, CA and will give T a 25 minute commute to work. Perfect. They were already building it, but didn't have a buyer, so when we toured the home all the framing was done and they were beginning the plumbing. When we went back to CA the second time, all the plumbing and electrical work was done and the drywall was in the home, ready to be installed. We seem to have found it at the perfect time because all the groundwork was done, but we still got to pick out all the colors and fixtures for the home.
It's a one story, 2 car garage, fully fenced, front landscaped, 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, 1800 sq. ft., has a private backyard with no two-story homes looking down into it, is a half block from the new elementary school and a 200 acre wilderness preserve (CA code for open space), and one block from the city athletics park, and, best of all, it's a solar home. I'm so stoked about that. The house plan has an optional 4th bedroom that is extra space in the garage right now. It was too late for the builder to finish the bedroom, but we're game to finish it in a few years. Compared to the house projects we've done on our Utah house, it'll be a cake walk.
Our new home is slated to have the city inspector declare it finished and up to code on Dec. 16th! Granted, we're aware that this a construction deadline and it's around the holidays so who's to say when it will really be finished, but we're hoping and praying it's sooner rather than later. Till then, T will live with his parents in CA, while E and I stay here in UT and sell the house. When this house sells we'll house hop until our new home is finished. It'll be sad to be apart for a bit, but we're both hoping that it's not a long separation. After living apart last summer while E and I were at BYU, we weren't that daunted.
Exciting times! I'll keep you posted and hopefully post finished pictures of our UT home by the end of the week. It's been a long summer of yard projects, but our home is finally as charming from the outside as it is on the inside. Till then, enjoy the pictures of our new CA home.
The front. I hope they don't take away the garbage can. I think it really boosts the curb appeal.
The back. The yard continues back between 6-10 feet deeper than the picture shows. I'm tickled by the size of the yard and can't wait to landscape it. I'm thinking lemon tree, nectarine tree, avocado tree...
