Finding a house.

Well, our visitors have left, and they have taken Nicolas to Spain. He is going to spend two whole weeks at a summer house. Obviously, they will stay with some COLOMBIAN friends! (see previous note!) They are four sisters (all grown up) and their mom, and they are all meeting there with their families for a summer of fun. We talked to Nicolas today (via skype http://www.skype.com/) and he is having the time of his life. First thing I noticed: HE TALKED TO ME IN SPANISH! THE WHOLE TIME! HE TALKED TO ME IN SPANISH! It is interesting that children that learn a first language different that the language of the country in which they are born, will learn the prevalent language as their first and their parent's will be their second... see English is my second language and I already made a mess of my thoughts. What I mean is that my kid should speak Spanish fluently and he feels more comfortable speaking in English, or he used to, anyway, until his parents decided to make a mixed salad of his brain by trowing a third language in the mix, and now we will be lucky if he talks to us at all........

Now that we are on our own, we can focus on the task of finding a house. The premise of this task is that we need at least 3 bedrooms (refer to previous note and the Colombian connection) and we need some green space for dog and kid. We are looking for a rental, since this is suppose to be a 3 year deal. We started looking in the town of Varese, where Nicolas is going to attend school. We saw some great houses that were near the top of our budget. Then hubby (always the one with some sense) said we should look for a less expensive place and use the money we save on trips all over Europe (sounds like a good plan, doesn't it?)

Well, once you see the really nice places, you do not want to settle for anything less than nice, right? I gave it a chance, and we went looking south of town: quiet small villas with gardens. Well, I think we might have found our house on a little hill, near the town of Azzate. We almost didn't make it to the house though, because our relocation agent and her navigator took us to a field, behind the actual street where we needed to be. Funny thing is that she followed the instructions of the navigator, down a dirt road, up and down holes, until there was nowhere else to go. I guess the lower budget houses have lower standards as far as roads go...

More on the house as soon as we know if they will let us have the dog there.