Fortunately, searching on craigslist I found a few places we could manage but this one was my favorite and sounded two good to be true. A two bedroom apartment with porch and washer and dryer right on the water in Quantico, VA. Hmm, close to work- check, on the water - check, price =cheap - check! Seriously, I was determined that this little place would be in the bad neighborhood of triangle where I work because of the price but I was greatly surprised.
Our new little home actually turned out to be a 2 bedroom duplex that was old school style built in the 1940's on the marina and it is actually on base of Quantico! For those of you who don't know, Quantico is a marine base that was built around the small teensy town of Quantico (talk about security no crime here!). The duplex has a small back yard and front yard, a basement and a porch that we will soon be screening in. The landlord is wonderful and told us we can make any changes to the house and anything we fix or update will be taken out of our rent.
It has not by any means been easy transitioning from a single woman living with her cousin to living with my boyfriend and basically becoming instant step mom to two children and managing school full time and work full time. Fortunately, I have an amazing boyfriend and when I break down in tears in the middle of the kitchen because the window pane fell out of the window or we don't have enough milk he graciously gives me a hug tells me he loves and makes me laugh. I love it ( minus my dramatic breakdowns which will hopefully soon be gone).
The apartment is old fashioned just like I grew up in (my mothers taste) with old doorknobs, radiators and of course beautiful small pane wood flooring. Of course the previous tenant didn't take very good care of it so we have a lot of work to do but its exciting. Thanks to my aunt sydney we have some furniture including a dresser, couch, bookshelf and bed for Aubrey and Katie found a perfect toddler bed for little miss Briella. We still need a lot of stuff but its coming along nicely. David started a job with Craftsman auto body (thanks to my cousin mike) so we hopefully won't be dirt poor for long. Once we get on our feet we hope to paint and decorate and gain more for our house.
In the mean time I am bringing him over to the bright side of vegetarianism. He even asked me to make him tofu tonight and likes my almond milk. :) Of course the kids love it too. Below are some pictures and more to come soon. If you would like to update your address book our new address is: 200 Potomac Ave #101 Quantico, VA 22134.
Peace, Love and Serenity,
Sam