Our House

Well, it seems as if all of our preparing paid off.

We were able to spend another day (our second) looking at homes on Thursday. It was an insanely busy day; we left from Columbus at 4:30am, drove to PA/DE and then viewed 9 homes, went to dinner, made a choice, then placed an offer.

We had all but written off this house from our list due to concerns about the school district. greatschools.org doesn't give this district an extremely favorable rating (just about average) and a couple people had warned us about it. On the other hand, we talked to other people who said it was a great district (you'll have that). We weighed our options and took into consideration the fact that we do have other options when sending Henry, etc. to school. There's an excellent charter school 20 minutes from our house (and they bus kids from Oxford) and there's a private Christian P-12 school just minutes away that is reasonably priced. The Christian school is likely where Henry would have gone to preschool, regardless.

We will be living about 20 minutes from the world's mushroom capital. Kennett Square, PA is the largest producer of mushrooms.

My distant cousin (who lives nearby) mentioned that there's a district nearby that rates extremely well (6th in the state of PA), but it's 98% white, extremely wealthy, and there's a drug problem. I'm sure we're not the only ones that would rather pick a "worse" school district versus one that is running rampant with drugs. Basically - you can't always judge a book by its cover.

Lastly, this house was by FAR the cheapest one on our list. It's only 4 years old, in the country, on an acre lot, near some Amish (I'm fascinated by them), 29 minutes from the university, and NOT right near busy roads, highways and shopping malls. Winner, winner chicken dinner. 

So... here's "our" house.

I'm a big fan of the pink trees outside and also that adorable wreath she has hanging inside the door.

Here's the room right inside the front door that will probably never, ever be used.

This is the view of the back yard.

Standing in the living room looking at the kitchen (we don't get to keep the fridge, but that's OK because I don't like side-by-side's).

Bedroom #1

Bedroom #2

Master bedroom.

Master bathroom.
 

Other view of the master bedroom.

This is a room over the garage that is attached to the master bedroom... I call it the 'scrapbook room'.

Side of the house.

Play room :)

View inside the play room looking out... you can see it's right behind the stairs.

Looking to the left of the house... we own the land all the way to the street (near that pole), but it's awkward. It's not really functional since there's a sand hill (for the septic) and trees that cut it off from the house.

Looking to the right. The owners told us that there are babysitter's that live in the house on the right! Also, that's our Realtor, Keith. He is the jolliest man I've ever met.

Looking directly across the street. There's a little pond and a bunch of farm land in the distance.

Bedroom #4... not a great picture, but this was screaming Henry's name :)

The hallway upstairs leading to the master at the end.

The kid's bathroom off the hallway upstairs.

So that's it so far! There's also a half bath downstairs (boring) and an unfinished basement. We close August 3rd... come visit!