A New Chapter

There we were, settled into our lovely little homestead in Washington, and Kevin's company lost government funding, so Kevin had his contract terminated. So, after some months of searching,  he finally found a job to his liking,  completely across the country. We couldn't have gone any further.

After some months working in Florida,  Kevin started looking for a new home for us. This wasn't as hard as it would have been a decade before; the internet and skype let kevin share real-time showings of houses with me, so that i could also stay in WA and deal with selling up our properties there. So, it was with sadness that we found homes for our animals and birds and packed everything up for a cross-country trip to our new home.

Seven years later

We have been in Florida for just over 7 years now. It's been quite a change for us both. Kevin is almost retired, although he still has a few hours a week devoted to the *Italian Job*.

View from front door

The pool and deck

The back *garden*

We have just under 2 1/2 acres of countryside, with a well sorted, single story house, pool, and very large, air conditioned outbuilding with 2 offices as well as huge work area. The house is much smaller and even better, a single story, which is far easier for me to maintain that the 3 story one in Washington. With temps often in the 80-90's much of the year, the pool is a big plus.

We are in the middle of setting up a garden area for herbs and vegetables, and this year we are enjoying our first crop, Aubergines. I'm not good with plants, but luckily I'm married to an engineer. All the planters have drip systems an so far, everything is working well. We did have a bit of a disappointment earlier this year; we had planted tomatoes in January,  and they grew wonderfully. Then, the lovely big tomatoes, got hit by frost. Of course,  the plants died, but I did get to try, for the first time,  fried green tomatoes.  They didn't disappoint!

Sadly, the few hundred acres at the back of the property have been sold, and are currently under development. We planted a row of bamboo, and a privacy hedge of viburnum. While not a perfect solution, it will, hopefully, leave us some privacy. I really don't want to move again.