Klein Family Blog: House Hunting

I was really excited to go house hunting and to set up our home because I've never had the opportunity to do either of these, in our almost 7 years of being married. While I'm so grateful we had the freedom to choose everything, it was a lot harder than I thought it would be.

One of the hardest parts of the process was doing it with boys in tow, who were also experiencing jet-lag (though they handled that part surprisingly well) and who aren't as entertained by walking through flat after flat and listening to grown ups talk about rent, square footage, and back up generators. It was a bit more fun for us all when they stayed and played with some friends while we looked at the last few.

The other difficult part was having several good options to choose from, but all with sigificantly different advantages and disadvantages. We were feeling very indecisive and wishy-washy, changing our mind almost hourly. We didn't realize how nice the places could be here. The further you get from the center of town, the nicer, bigger, and cheaper the places are. Some of them felt like living on a resort! So seeing what we "could" have made the decision making process harder. We had to really weigh what are biggest priorities are during this season of life.

But...we were so thankful to have the options and get to make the choice ourselves. The place we chose is spacious enough for our family (3bedroom, 3 bath), is in a nice colony/society, and in a convenient location to walk to language class (in our colony) and plenty of places to eat and shop. Plus, there is a rickshaw cue right across the street from our gate.

We have a few pieces of furniture now and almost all our appliances, so we're well on our way to making this flat our home. Getting settled here is slow-going. Shopping feels more like hunting and delivery and instalation are rarely on the same day (or in the same week). Though it is awesome that nearly everything is delivered and installed for you. We've been using the rest of our time to clean the heck out of this place, wait for delivery people to arrive (sometimes not until 9pm) and explore our neighborhood. We can get just about anything we need within walking distance, which is awesome! Since we don't have our oven/stove yet, we've been eating out a lots of different kinds of food. Last night we tried our first "beside the road" food stand and it was pretty good. It only cost our family of 4, $3 for dinner (including a 7up)! So we'll keep that place in mind at the end of the month when money gets tight :)

We hope to have some "after" pictures posted by the end of the month, showing the transformation of our mark on the place, but until then, here are some "before" so you can get a feel for our new home.