dreaming of our new home

So we've found a place and agreed to rent it and all that. We'll be signing an 18 month lease, so through to April 2009, meaning our stay in London will be at least 3 years and 2 months. Haven't actually signed a lease yet, but we're renting directly from the owners and things are a bit slower to sort out than when an estate agent is doing all the paperwork - not that it matters, since we're not moving for another month anyway, and we've got enough documentation to constitute a contract in emails and stuff. In the meantime, I've been daydreaming about how much nicer it will be to live in the new place. It has a dishwasher and a combo washer/dryer and a decent sized fridge/freezer and a functional kitchen sink. The living space is set up so much better than what we have now. The bathroom is smaller and yet more spacious because it uses the space better. There's a separate toilet. We will have proper wardrobes again. It has two levels, meaning that even though the square footage is probably not a whole lot bigger than our current place, it feels much more like a home. We have access to the loft to store things like luggage and the giant tv box that Graeme refuses to throw away, as well as any stuff the owners leave behind that we don't want to have to live with. We even still have a little private patio area, which is cool because having realised that outside space is not as necessary here as it is back home (being that it's unusable for over half the year) we weren't actively seeking a garden of any sort. Aaaaahhhhh. Reading back over that it kinda makes it sound like the place we're currently in is totally dodgy, which it isn't - it's in a great location, it's a much sought after style of home for the area, etc - it's just that we've been here 18 months now and some of the things that seemed fine or even great when we moved in have proved less liveable/homely than we'd like. Plus, I think that living anywhere too long exposes flaws and as renters you don't even really have the power to change them - we are so ready to own our own place, I hope my parents are happy for us to live with them until we buy one when we get back :D