Bittersweet

Today marks a very important day in the life of the Otis family. Today we closed on the purchase of a new house. We are extremely excited on the one hand (after all, it's a really neat old home in Buena Vista, a neighborhood which we have always aspired to live in), but on the other, we are very sad to be leaving our current house and street and neighborhood (Ardmore) and park (Miller Park) and all of the amazing and kind and fun and thoughtful neighbors that we have met over the 8 and 1/2 years that we've lived here. I doubt there could ever be a better street than Elizabeth Avenue. In fact, just last week while Riley, the dogs and I were walking back from the park, we encountered a film crew preparing to film a commercial on our street because they felt that it was a perfect example of an "All American" street. It is.

But the new house and street and neighborhood are going to be wonderful as well. After the papers were all signed, the deed was recorded and the house became officially ours, Casey and I left the office and went in different directions. Casey went to the grocery store to pick up a bottle of champagne and then home to pick up the dogs. I went to pick up Riley from school. We all arrived at the new house at essentially the same time and explored together. The dogs were delighted to find a golden retriever and yellow lab next door. Riley was excited to have a house with absolutely nothing in it so he could run back and forth from wall to wall for about 10 minutes straight without anything interrupting his progress. Casey opened the bottle of champagne (he even had the foresight to place in an ice bucket with a bunch of ice and bring two champagne flutes - wow, I love this man), poured a glass for each of us and then all three of us "cheersed" -- Riley with his plastic cup full of water and Casey and I with our champagne.

Eventually we wandered outside to check out the yard and it was there that we encountered our first group of new neighbors. I immediately felt we had made the right decision when we discovered that the next door neighbors have three little boys under the age of 5 who Riley promptly abandoned us for. The sounds of their little squeals while running around the yard was a perfect way to end the very long process of buying a new home.