house

We are contemplating a move. We love our house and even more we love where it is. The location is just the best. 4 blocks from the park, 3 blocks from shops, restaurants, Walgreens, Starbucks, ice cream shop, bars (not that we use those much anymore), 8 blocks from either girls school, 3 good friends within 8 blocks of us, great neighbors, and much much more. It’s just a great area. The 2 problems are, we are outgrowing our house and it’s a neighborhood on a grid (meaning it’s busy and gets lots of thru traffic). The road makes me so nervous. I want a road that the girls can ride their bikes on and that really does not get traffic other than the people who live there. It’s really hard to balance what we as the parents would ideally want (city) and what is the best situation for the kids to grow up in. We looked at a house last night. It’s father out than John ever wanted to be (still not the suburbs though) but the house is in a pretty neighborhood, great school, cul-de-sac, on a nice flat lot, and has great space (each bedroom (4) has 2 walk in closets in it all upstairs). It needs work. Can we really handle the work right now? We can’t afford the space we want, inside the city, and updated. What do you give up? Do we just stay where we are? I just don’t know what the answer is.