Some people believe in a higher power that influences our lives. Some believe in karma. Some believe in random chance. I'm not sure what I believe some days, but I think things happen they way there are supposed to. I haven't always made the best choices in life, but all the ups and downs fell into place. If my life hadn't fallen apart at one point, I never would have moved to Seattle. If I hadn't moved to Seattle, I wouldn't have met my husband. If he hadn't lost his job, we wouldn't have moved to Savannah. If we didn't move to Savannah, we wouldn't have the house we do now.

How we found the house is even more boggling. When we decided to start house shopping, we drove through neighborhoods to see what was available. In one subdistrict, my husband spotted a house on a hill and said, "If I could choose any on this block, I'd pick that one. But there's no way it will go for sale." We looked at 5 or 6 houses with realtors, then narrowed our choices down to our top two. We were getting ready to make a bid on one, then something inexplicable happened. The house my husband spotted as the one he'd most want went up for sale. To be honest, I wasn't as keen on it as my husband, but we decided to set up an appointment to take a look.

We took a walk inside, and it was 'the one'. It had a lot of the features of other houses we liked, but it was all combined into one. We put a bid on it the same day it first went on sale. I got to learn about offers, counteroffers, loans, appraisers, and all the other fun stuff that goes with buying a house. We eventually came to an agreement on the offer, and we were on our way to home ownership.

We met the owners at the closing, and discovered the strangest twist to this whole saga. My husband is British from a very small town near Birmingham. When people ask where he is from, he usually just says Birmingham because few people would recognize his hometown. When we met the owners, though, the conversation went something like this:

Mr. Owner: "Hi, I'm P."
Husband: "Hello, I'm D." (Hand shaking goes on.)
Mr. Owner: "I detect a bit of an accent there. Are you from the UK?"
Husband: "Yes, I'm originally from Birmingham."
Mr. Owner: "I am from the UK, too, not too far from Birmingham. From Dudley."
Me (extremely surprised and blurt out): "Actually, D is also from Dudley! He just usually says Birmingham because that's most recognizable!"

Everyone in the room had dropped jaws. It was a stunning revelation. It might be a small world, but this was just the weirdest of coincidences. Everything seemed to line up as though we were supposed to have this.

When the cats moved in, the reaction was mixed. The black cat was scared and tried to hide. I think she was afraid that we were going to drop her off and disappear on vacation, like we usually did after a car ride. The fluffy one instantly loved it and purred from room to room. After we started moving stuff in, the black cat seemed to realize, "Oh...we're all staying! Ok, this sunny spot is mine. Purr, purr!" It's been a love affair with the windows ever since.



We're still getting acquainted with our new home. Today we made our first home improvement, which was replacing incandescent bulbs with high efficiency CFCs and LEDs. The kitchen is my favorite room in the house. As I'm chopping vegetables, I think to myself, "Wow! I can't believe this is my kitchen!"

Some of you asked for photos. Here is one of the realtor's photos:



Hubs and I have both been so busy, we haven't had much time to relax or enjoy it, though. The kitchen and bathroom are the only rooms that are put together - all the others have boxes all over them in various levels of disarray. I don't have my clothes fully put away into drawers. We won't be able to replace furniture for a few months, so we'll continue to eat on our fancy fold up table and patio chairs. I won't be showcased in Martha Stewart Living anytime soon.

We exchanged phone numbers with the previous owners at closing. I hope that we'll meet up with them again - they seemed like nice people, and we had a lot of things in common. I told them they are welcome to come by at any time - they know where we live! I've already met a few of our new neighbors, welcoming us to the neighborhood. For the first time since my husband and I moved here almost 3 years ago, I feel like I'm finally home.