Big News

Well, I definately have been lacking in the whole "keeping up with the blog" thing, but at least this time I have a REALLY good excuse. We are moving to Hannibal! :) We have finally found a place that we want to actually go through the whole hassel of moving again for! Yes, we know we have moved a hundred times in the past few years, but we haven't made a move for the better like this. Allen's mom always says that each time we move it's an upgrade. LOL! Well, this one is a HUGE improvement. It's not that we haven't been happy in this little house in Quincy, but we've been wanting to move back to Missouri for a while. We will be closer to all of my family and even half an hour closer to the Cooley side of the family! We wouldn't be doing it if the place wasn't as nice as it is, but the second we stepped into the place we both basically knew this was it! We are going to be the first renters the house has had since it has been completely remodeled by our landlords. They are what I think are called house flippers. They buy houses, fix them up super nice and sell them or rent them out. So, they have multiple properties. We feel like we are in good hands with them. The landlords said they originally fixed up the house to sell, but then they decided to go ahead and rent it out, and we can stay as long as we want to. That they have several long term renters. So, since they had fixed it up to sell, it has brand new carpets, new fixtures, fresh paint, and brand new windows. New gutters too! It doesn't have a basement but it does have a decently sized storage shed...big enough for our stuff. There are brand new maple cabinets, brand new gas stove, a microwave, a garbage disposal, and the big kicker, a dishwasher! YAY! :) The bathroom is MUCH bigger than our toddler sized bathroom we have now. There are three bedrooms. So now when we have guests they can sleep in a bedroom instead of on the living room floor! It's at the end of a quiet dead end street and the yard is beautiful. SOOOOO much prettier than our current back yard, and it's flat. Can you believe our luck? We found a house in Hannibal that doesn't have a vertical yard! :) The cool thing about the location is, it's far enough off McMasters and there are enough trees to block the traffic noises, but it's also central to everything shopping wise. Walmart is literally just up the hill from us. (Even though Walmart is the devil...when we are forced to go it will be nice for it not to be all the way on the other end of town like it is here in Quincy.) There is a Krogers just up the hill. County Market and Walgreens are only five minutes away, and the YMCA is about 2 minutes away! We are SUPER D-DUPER excited to be moving there! Of course with the move we will probably be w/o the internet for a little while, so if you need to get ahold of us between now and probably the end of the first week of August, it would be best to just give us a call. This place is going to be a little bit more expensive in rent than our current house, but with everysingle window being brand new and all the windows having screens on them, we figure we can make it up in energy savings over the course of a year. (The house we are in now has very old drafty windows that do not open.)

We can't wait to be moved in and have everyone over for dinner! :) Love you all!