We're back from our veeeerrry long vacation. I think I'm going to need a few days just to recover. Note to self: three weeks is way too long to be away from home with three little ones.

These are two of my favorite pictures from our trip. The first picture is Otter Creek in New Hampshire where we played in the water for a bit to the kids out of the car. The second is sunset over Salem Mass. where we spent a wonderful evening at an old fashioned kiddie amusement park.

New England is one of the most beautiful places in the US. We particularly loved Vermont. The mountains, streams and idyllic farms were breathtaking. For relocation purposes we liked the Burlington VT area out of all the places we visited. It's a small city but if you go 7 miles it's complete farmland. Living with such urban sprawl right now it was amazing to me to see how close city-country life were.

The biggest part of the trip though was how much we fell in love with co-housing. Living in a community where it's very much like the neighborhoods of my childhood is very appealing to me. I really felt like it was what we're always searching for in the city... a strong community where everyone knows each other, watches out for each others kids, participates together beyond yearly block parties and really work to form relationships and be a support system. I think we've shifted our relocation efforts to look specifically for a co-housing community where our Gay-Black-Jewish-Disabled Family would be an asset and a resource to others instead of looking for a place where we "fit".
Of the two co-housing communities we visited one was decidedly more child centered and that is the one that we preferred. I think if Vermont in general and that area specifically were'nt so damn white....we'd be there in a heartbeat.