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My new neighborhood

This is the back side of my building. My apartment (from the back) is on the second floor. Here it is covered by the trees. 
Our street 

Fin's Flexi-leash field

Park near our house
Front of our apartment building - we are the first floor (from the front) on the right. We love the shade! 


In order to keep all of you that are helping me in this journey, or helping support the HPS community in general, I’m trying an experiment with blogging. I’m going to try to write several blog posts when I am able to blog, and then schedule the posts to stagger over a few days. Just FYI, lest you think I suddenly have more time to blog! Grin!

One of the things I’ve been eager to blog about, is my new neighborhood. I do miss my old neighborhood a lot. I miss the people and Homers. There just isn’t a comparable place here. Here, when you do find a little coffee shop, they don’t exactly go out of their way to make it a great place to stay a while and work. This is understandable given the economics here. Rent is so expensive that a coffee shop needs a good turnover to make the economics work. So, the tables are small. They don’t offer wifi generally, and there aren’t places to plug in.

That being said, I do very much like my new neighborhood. It has a lot of things to offer that are just different than the old neighborhood.

There is a large park only a half a block from our apartment. It is such a great place to walk Fin! It is also a great place to work on his social training as the park is always busy with people. I am amazed at how well used parks are here in Arlington. It isn’t like in Overland Park where you can go to a park during the day and hardly see another person.

Behind our building is a large green space no one seems to use. At one time, I can tell people hung their laundry out here – but now it is just a large grassy spot. I bought a flexi-leash for Fin that is 23 feet long. (You don’t use these types of leashes with service animals generally as it doesn’t give you as much quick control over the dog.) On the days when I am unable to take Fin for a long walk, we walk up and down this green space and Fin can run on his flexi-leash. He loves it! (I think he really misses his porch though.)

About a half mile away there are a number of little neighborhood shops, a library and a post office. I am so thrilled to have a post office so close by. It is a major hassle to have to lug packages to the post office. I hope to paint more and try to sell more…and a post office is important to that endeavor. The library is a place I can go and work. I am amazed at how crowded it is! It is the neighborhood version of Homers, only there is no coffee and you can’t chat as much. Yet, there are the work-at-home regulars there just like me.

My part of the neighborhood is mostly a bunch of apartment buildings from the 1940s. They generally have six to nine units in each building. Around us there is a lovely neighborhood.

There have been so many times I’ve wanted to take photos of the houses! They aren’t large by Midwest standards, but they are so well kept up and many have such beautiful yards! Many have lots and lots of beautiful gardens accented by paths and gates. I don’t take the photos only because I wonder if people would think I was strange. Grin!



I am looking forward to fall because there are so many large hardwood trees. I think the colors of the leaves will be so pretty.

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