Why We Moved Onto Base

It’s the million dollar question. I’ve had so many of you ask, “but why did you move onto base? Your off-base home seemed like the perfect setup! It was so cute!” etc. And you’re not wrong. We loved our off-base home. We loved our little English village. We loved our neighbors and, most importantly, we loved our kitchen! In a country where most kitchens don’t even allow 2 people to comfortably cook at the same time, ours had room for 10. AND we had an American size fridge/freezer.

At the end of the day, the answer truly comes down to prayer. Champ and I had both received some prompting to move to base that we had mentioned in passing, however, we didn’t take them seriously because, we loved where we were at …. and more than that we hated the idea of moving … again.

But as many of you know, promptings come back stronger. So when the feelings kept knocking on both of our hypothetical doors, we knew we needed to pray about it. The Lord also has this way of taking your deep-rooted discomfort and unsurety and dissolving it at a moments notice. What we thought we were afraid of, became unrecognizable the moment we enlisted His help in making this decision.

We knew we were meant to at least attempt to move to base. So the next day we put our names on the waiting list. What happened next was a series of tender mercies and little miracles that prove The Lord’s hand is in all things. And he will support you in righteous desires to follow His promptings and accept His plan.

At this base, you have to have at least a year left on your DEROS to apply to the housing waitlist. (I may be throwing around a few acronyms here. I’m a military gangsta like that 😉 Just google them if you’re not privileged enough to live your life communicating in illusive acronyms) We had 1 year + 2 weeks currently on our DEROS. Which didn’t sound like good odds because most of my friends who had moved onto base had been on the waiting list for several months before being offered a home. But we moved forward with faith.

We got offered a house 2 days later.

There are three bases in this area. And the first home offer is ANY home available on ANY of the bases. We wanted to be on the base that Champ flies out of. But so does everybody else. It’s the coveted neighborhood as far as base housing goes. (insert hair flip) Usually people are offered a home on one of the other bases first because they usually have availability first. And then there’s the process of declining and listing your preferred neighborhood and waiting for a second offer. But we didn’t have to go through any of that because the first home we were offered was right where we wanted to be.

The Air Force also paid for us to move onto base which was a giant blessing. (Except working with TMO is never a blessing 😅 IYKYK) Not sure how many trips that move would have taken in my SUV 😅 (joking)

Overall, we are really happy with our decision. And despite leaving our beautiful kitchen, friends, English countryside, large yard etc, we truly feel at peace because we know this is exactly where The Lord wants us to be.

Some things we are loving about our new home: Champ’s commute went from 40 mins to 4! Which means the girls see their Daddy an extra hour and a half each day.

We don’t have to use transformers anymore!! Base houses are wired for both 110 and 220 power. It’s absolutely brilliant.

We don’t have to pay our utilities! Which is a significant deal in this country right now. Energy is ridiculousssssly expensive right now.

We have a vented dryer! Only my UK friends will understand the joy this statement can bring. Our laundry time just went from 6 hours per load to 2! I forgot how quickly clothes can dry in America!

We’re loving this season and we’re always grateful for opportunities to learn more about fine-tuning our lives to better align with His plan, and seeing the beautiful blessings that come when we (finally) do.