Saturday, October 29th

I suspect it’s time to make a major announcement for us. Several of you are aware of our news, and some of you have figured it out. So I need to make it official and announce our good, no, GREAT news!

After five years of searching and hoping for the right match, we have found a piece of property in the Yuma Foothills that we are going to purchase. It’s been a long time coming and we have gotten very frustrated at the different properties we looked at but didn’t quite get us excited. This one looks great and Dottie has even says she likes it! We were spoiled when we looked at the first property, made an offer, and the owner pulled it off the market. Nothing has quite measured up to that one. This one is a perfect fit and fills our needs, now and future.

We are buying an RV lot that has a 616 sq. ft. casita (little house) with one bedroom, one bathroom, and a nice combined living room/kitchen. The lot is over 7000 sq. ft., has a place to park our coach with full hookups, and a covered carport with a deck on top. It has an outside storage room, about 8’X20’, with electricity and worktable already installed. It has so much potential with some work. And it will take work! It is a foreclosure owned by Beneficial Finance. It has no furniture and no appliances, so we’ll be looking for adequate

furniture to make it feel like a home. The living area is a linoleum tile floor (easy to care for) and the bedroom is carpeted. We are thrilled to be able to find it and purchase it at a price almost $30,000 below comparable properties! Our close of escrow date is Dec. 8th, but the mortgage lender is shooting to have us in the house the week before Thanksgiving. We had planned to be in Yuma for Thanksgiving, so this is icing on the cake. We’d love to have possession early to be able to spend some time on the lot and decide what we are going to do to improve it.

If any of you are interested in looking at the property, the address is 12546 E. 47th Lane in Yuma, AZ. You can check it on any real estate web page and see the photographs of the property. I’ll have a photo of the house on our web page, “lewstravelogue.blogspot.com“. So, that’s our great news!

We are still parked at the Palisades Presbyterian Church in San Diego. I am enjoying the opportunities to help out when needed and provide security for the church property. I’m able to ease the workload of many of the folks here by being on-site to open doors, lock up at night, and do small custodial jobs when necessary. It’s a privilege to be able to park here and have our own “church family” that seems to appreciate our presence. Plus, we are parked on some of the best real estate in San Diego County. Our view to the west is magnificent as we see the sunsets through Mission Valley all the way to the ocean. It really can’t get much better!

Dottie is continuing to manage through the daily routines with the help of a walker and my right arm. She participates in a twice-weekly exercise class with some of the ladies in the church and seems to enjoy getting away from me for an hour or so. I still do all the cooking, house cleaning, and scheduling and easily get frustrated with the situation, but I’m slowly learning patience with the help of our friends here at the church. We really enjoy all the activities, especially with the Christmas Season coming soon. We plan to be here for many of the special events at the church before heading north to Sebastopol for the Christmas Holiday.

We are anxious to get things prepared for the arrival of guests in our new abode, but the “hurry up and wait” routine keeps us aware of the reality of buying a new house and the many things we will have to do to appropriately entertain company!