North Carolina again!

Now that the dust has settled (literally and figuratively) after our move, I wanted to take some time out of my cleaning and organizing to write - we have moved!
I am fighting with my detailed sequential self and suppressing the urge to document the long saga that has been transitioning out of Baltimore and on to somewhere else, because the reason I started to write this post is because a phone call with a friend pulled me out of my grumpy disposition this morning (I'm having a bad hair quarter, my clothes are shabby, it's rainy outside, my house is a mess) and cheered me by allowing me to talk about all of the wonderful things I've been blessed with in this move. So let me make a thankful list - and I'll leave out all the nitty gritty on how we got from point A to point B.

1. I have a fenced-in backyard.
   Oh my goodness - this is life-changing. I don't know if I can express the difference from living in a 12' wide house, where when either front or back door is opened, there is likely to be a person, a dog, a stroller or all of the above within 5 feet of the doorway - to lots of green grass and a lot more buffer between us and anything else.

Case in point: in the above photo, Liam and I are standing on the street at our mailbox and calling for Penelope to come join us for a walk (she had a little panic thinking she was going to have to get in the car and decided she would rather go back inside... so she needed a little convincing to come along).

This was Penelope and me on the front steps of our house in Baltimore. Mary was taking the picture from the street in front of our house.
2. I have a laundry ROOM...
   

...not a closet (as shown above) for my washer/dryer.
3. There is a Caribou Coffee walking distance from my house.
   The first thing I said I would miss about Baltimore is not being able to walk places. Baltimore was so walkable for a lot of things! I loved that. But I never anticipated being able to walk places in Charlotte - and not only that, to my favorite places!
4. I have a driveway.
   If you've ever had to park on the street, you know how awesome this is. I can unload my groceries at my leisure, I am guaranteed to only have to walk a maximum of the few feet from my car door to my house door every time I come home.
5. I live less than 3 hours from a lot of people I care about.
Our families being the most obvious (2.5 hours away in Cary), but also some very close friends are a day trip away, and some friends are just a few minutes away! We left behind some very dear friends in Baltimore, but I'm banking on a lot of them moving south before too long. And I've been completely blown away by the people we've found here - college friends, neighbors from when I was a little kid, my best friend from middle school, a friend from Baltimore, friends from Durham (who played the piano in our wedding)... I mean, really? How is it that all these amazing people are in the same place? And like I said, if they're not in Charlotte, they are oh-so close by! [Note: If you are one of our dear ones scattered across other states, we still miss you :)]
6. I live 5 minutes from a Trader Joe's.
And this one has wine, too! :)
7. I don't have any stairs.
Which makes everything easier. I figure the trade off between being able to go for walks more easily means I might not gain weight from this change, but still - I love how easily it is to maneuver things and people and dogs in a house without stairs.