BIG news!

I have a confession to make. We have been lying to you recently. Tim and I are not looking at houses in Los Angeles. We stopped six weeks ago. But yet we continued to tell the majority of our family and friends that we were house hunting. Remember when you asked about it a week ago and I was like, "eh, it's alright." That was a lie. We felt bad about it - having to lie to those we love most (except in the case of our parents - we've been crafting fibs to tell you our whole lives. That part wasn't hard.)

But there is a reason for this deception. We stopped looking for houses because Tim started pursing a new job opportunity. In Orange County. And we found out this week that he is going to be Blizzard Entertainment's newest Senior Gameplay Engineer. Yes, we are moving to Orange County. I know - I can't believe it either, because I wasn't kidding all of those years when I said I would never live behind the Orange Curtain. It's amazing what you do for love!

We are so happy and excited about this prospect. Tim has wanted to work for Blizzard for as long as he's wanted to make video games. The job truly excites him and is something he's wanted to do for a very long time. Moving to Orange County will allow us to buy a lot more house for a lot less money, which means the future Wolfie Von Focker will have a bigger yard. And mommy Von Focker will have more free childcare, because we'll be closer to all of the grandmas and grandpas (who are thrilled and chomping at the bit for us to move closer and produce an heir.) Wolfie will also have access to better schools, which apparently is important.

It is, of course, all very sudden. We were actually in the process of putting together a counter-counter offer on a house in LA when we decided to take the call from Blizzard and explore the possibility and literally, at 2pm, I had to call our realtor and say that we wouldn't be making our 5pm appointment fill out paperwork - the appointment we'd made at 8pm the night before. There's definitely a little bit of whiplash involved!

Tim has given his notice at work and will start at Blizzard on September 14th. We have our fabulous Ireland trip with the Fords scheduled for the end of September, and will start the house hunting process after that. Our initial plan is to keep the apartment until we find a house. I am planning to stay at my job as long as possible (including taking the train from the OC when we move down there) so I'm in no hurry. It's also easier to stay in the apartment than it is to move into storage, live out of a suitcase and keep our cats locked in a bedroom at someone's house, IMO. Tim will probably stay with either Jake, the Thiels or the Fords and then come back to LA on the weekends. Or I'll come down and we'll househunt. But for me, I'd like to keep my life, and the cats lives, as normal as possible until we're ready to become full time Orange County residents, and home owners.

My boss knows about the change in our lives and is super supportive, so I'm hoping that they will work with me as I figure out a new schedule. I anticipate that I'll be able to take the train from San Juan to Union Station for a couple of months, and then I anticipate that at some point, maternity leave will make my employment a moot point. Our development team is a small but mighty team of three and we're leanly stretched as it is, so I don't want to do anything that will leave them hanging out to dry. And more importantly, I love my job and value what I do, so I'm not desperate to quit and take up a live of leisure any time soon (unless I win the megamillions - my boss would accept my resignation on the spot if it also was accompanied by a check for a million dollars!) So, in the near term, Tim will commute. Hopefully before the year is up, I will be the commuter, and then in a perfect world, by the end of 2010, I'm a stay at home mom and Tim is the best engineer Blizzard Entertainment has ever seen.

Or I win the Megamillions and we're living the life of luxury. With a vacation home in Door County and a private jet, naturally.