Down the Rabbit Hole Fire Pole?

I love my current apartment.   It's the second floor (and the lookout tower!) of an old firehouse, and it has lovely features (the first place I've live that I could imagine being photographed for a design blog...), a giant bathroom, laundry in the bathroom, a nice kitchen, open layout, sweet landlords who work in the first floor during the days, but aren't there nights/weekends (so I can sing and dance to my heart's content, and invite other people over to do the same...)

Of course, it's not perfect.  The hot water pressure is not entirely satisfactory.  And... well, basically that's my one major complaint.

But more or less, it's great, except that it only has one bedroom.  So, before I can complete my Quest of Foster Parent Licensing, I'm going to have to move.  I'm targeting August 1 or Sept 1 for the move.  No need to force it before that-- the next licensing class for my area starts in September, so it doesn't become a limiting factor until then.  June/July will be crunch time (need to give a month's notice), but until then, I can idly peruse Craigslist (dreaming of finding a little 3BR 1920's bungalow with a nice backyard and new windows, a dishwasher, and in-apartment laundry for under $1000....), trying to figure out what I want.

I'm more or less pulled towards 3 options for how to go about this.  In all cases, we're probably talking a 2-3BR double parlor flat of the sort ubiquitous around here:

Option A:  The Edge of Edgewood
Edgewood is a lovely neighborhood!  It's right near 3 things that are pretty sweet:  1)Roger Williams Park (lots of Green space!  A neo-classical Temple to Music! Carousel!  Swanboats!); 2) Work (as in, I'd be 5-10 minutes away from the office; 3) some of the better public schools in the area.

Pros:
Lots of trees!  More likely to have a backyard.
Close to work!
Pretty diverse!
More likely to be able to find something nice in my price range.

Cons:
A little further away from north-living folks
Don't know people in the neighborhood.

Option B: Summit or Oak Hill
Return to the East Side, or vaguely north of it.  It's an area with more people I know, plus cool things always going on.  However, it's more expensive, and might not be as doable.  Schools are also an issue-- I'm not thrilled at the idea of doing education advocacy in Providence, and I hear that it's not much better in Pawtucket?   Still, if I found a nice place that fit my budget around here, I'd be mighty tempted.

Pros:
Close to Providentials.
Closer to Northern folks (and everyone who's anyone knows how to get there...)
Very liveable neighborhood, easy to walk to parks.

Cons:
More expensive.
Providence side is less likely to have yards because of stupid parking regs.
School systems would likely be a pain to deal with.

Crazy Option C:
Ok, not really an option in any concrete way.  But, I wonder if my landlords might possibly offer me the house next door at a reasonable price to keep me as a tenant.  It's probably more space than I need, but it's really lovely, with a window seat on the landing, and so on.

Pros:
Big, gorgeous space
Nice landlords, who act a bit like extended family, in a non-creepy way.
Nice back yard? (I think--- haven't actually seen it.)

Cons:
Neighborhood is a little dodgy.
Ice Cream trucks rampage through the neighborhood, and I am weak to the pleas of children...
Big house might cost a fortune to heat. (also, old windows)
Could house pass lead inspection? (see above, re: old windows.)
Providence schools, as above, likely a pain to negotiate with

First Steps

I needed some phone number the other day, and I vaguely remembered having scribbled it in my date book.   Flipping back over the past few months, I saw that I had the monthly foster care info session written down each month for the past 3 months.  February it had snowed out of nowhere (ok, not that snow is unexpected in New England in February, but this past winter was crazy warm-- and one of the TWO time it snowed (the other being the Halloween Blizzard...), it was the night of the foster care info session.  Then in March, I had a hearing run late-- probably not too late, just late enough that doing something else that night seemed exhausting (there's been a lot to learn this year-- I'm looking forward to doing it again next year with 2000% more clue...)

As it happened, the April event was that night.  And, having seen the history of the intent in my calendar, I felt pretty committed to having the third time be the charm.  If nothing else, I write in pen in my calendar, and 4 months running of the same appointment would knock down all that "getting things DONE!" pride that I got for getting my taxes in NOT AT THE LAST MINUTE.

Yeah, it's been a little "CLEAN ALL THE THINGS!" around here lately...

All of which is to say, I went to the info session.  Which was more like a conversation with the recruiter, since I was the only one there.  So, I'm not really sure what her spiel would have been with more folks-- by asking questions more or less off the bat I got her to skip most of the demographic info (because I had spent an hour studying the 2011 numbers in my shiny new RI Kids Count Factbook last week) and basic overview of how the child protective and court systems work.

Most of my questions were either the logistical (lead inspections, how does transportation to visits work, can you let friends and family babysit when needed, how do you get approved to be a child's educational advocate) and broad (have you seen working single people do this successfully, is this crazy for me to be considering???).  I was a bit relieved to be the only one there when she brought up a few "things people usually ask."  For instance:

- "Why would you ever want the kids to return to their parents?  Aren't their parents terrible people?"
- "How many white kids are in foster care?"
- "Can I have a healthy baby to be all mine forever?" (Ok, she didn't phrase it that way, but I got the distinct sense that she felt like she had to manage my expectations in that department because of my race and age-- of course the thirty-something white woman is just pretending to want to foster to try to get a baby.)

The big thing for me is in my own court, though-- I need to settle my living arrangement more before I can take the next step.  Most concrete is that I can't do this living in the firehouse-- at a minimum, I need a second bedroom.  But being some place a little more walkable and with a park nearby would be a good plan too.  I also need to do some network-expanding and getting my own support structures set up-- get a stable local doctor, etc.

One option would be to hold off on this for another couple years, and arrange things to move back to DC, which has the big bonus of family nearby.  But I think I don't want to put this on hold that long.  So, I'm going to start moving towards this.  The next licensing class is in the autumn, and my plan is to be there.