Welcome to our new apartment! Last fall, we put ourselves on a waiting list for some two-bedroom apartments near campus. In April, we received a call that a unit was available for us (at that point we were not planning on moving, since Becca was surviving in the closet). After looking at the apartment, we didn’t feel comfortable with moving there, but since we were in the looking mood, we decided to go across the street and see if the other nearby apartment complex had anything available. They did — an apartment that they were redoing. To make a long story short, we signed the papers and prepared for our move . . . but we didn’t think we’d like it that much, since we loved our first apartment.

We now frequently talk about how much we like our new apartment.  We are thankful to the Lord for providing above and beyond what we asked for . . . even when we’d stopped asking! We love having the extra space — Josh can concentrate on his research, we don’t have to worry about waking Becca up when we’re in our room, and people can use the bathroom without going through our bedroom.  We also love having “all bills paid” — living with 75 degree air conditioning all the time is very nice! I was a little worried about using a gas stove/oven — but I love it, and I love having a big window in the kitchen!

We really like our apartment manager. He lives on site with his family (wife and 4 kids) and is very friendly. When the building’s air conditioning broke, he was out there at 11PM and then again the next morning trying to fix the unit. One evening last week, Josh and I were in our bedroom working on our computer (since we have wireless access on that side of the apartment — legally, since it’s UTA wireless from a nearby building), when we heard banging on our window . . . it was our apartment manager saying hi and telling me I had put our outgoing mail in his box instead of the outgoing box! [And I think it’s cool that he shares a first name with the found, ruler, and emperor of the Mongol Empire! -Josh]

The past two Wednesday mornings, Becca and I have gone to the free kids concert at The Levitt Pavilion. She doesn’t really enjoy the music, but she does enjoy the fountains. We plan to go every Wednesday this month for the kids’ concerts. Friday evening we went to a park that has water play. Becca loved it and we all enjoyed getting wet.

Becca is enjoying helping in the kitchen. She likes scrambling eggs in the mornings and really enjoyed helping me make pizza dough and brownies recently. We have lots of fun in our new apartment and are enjoying running around. Becca continues to fill our house with joy. We are so blessed to be married to each other and to have our precious little gift, Becca Bear. What a kind and gracious God we have!