Susan Visconti, Neighbor

Although I have travelled the world, the Chicagoland area has been home my entire life.  That is about to change as my family and I fulfill our dream to live in Florida.We have been actively avid (ahem- this is an understatement) Walt Disney World fans since our honeymoon in December 1992. We went from visits occurring every other year, to every year, to three times a year. My husband and I have been known to make trips for a one day visit just to get our fix.Aside from Walt Disney World, I have had an infatuation with Florida since spending summers at my Uncle's home on the Atlantic coast as a teenager. Luckily, my husband is as excited as I am about our upcoming opportunities to explore more of Florida, especially the less travelled backroads.We have called Woodridge home for 17 years. We LOVE it here, have made great friends and neighbors, and have enjoyed the quality of life that Woodridge has to offer. If this laid back town with caring residents were in Florida, I would consider my life perfect.  Aside from friends and neighbors, the things I will miss most once we move are walking our dog on the paths around the lakes, visiting our library (I am MADLY in love with our library), monthly pool parties, and walking to the Jubilee for drinks and music with friends.The plan to move to Florida became an alive thought back in 2008 when we started to explore areas where we would like to live, investigated the quality of schools and dreamed with a colorful imagination what it would be like living there.In June 2011, we watched a family make their dream come true by making a plan and taking action toward that plan to live their dream.  They accomplished what they had set out to do.  This was all I needed to light the fire to my desire.  To see someone make their dream come true instead of waiting for some happenchance set off a bomb inside of me. We immediately took action to start making our dream come true.  On June 3rd, we made a conscious decision that all action as a family moving forward would be thought of in the arena of making our dream come true. Most decisions we make these days are weighed against how the decision propels us forward or holds us back.We expect that we will not be ready to move for at least two years.  Aside from the unknown length of time it will take for us to sell our home, we must 1) save enough money 2) have jobs in Florida 3) assess the situation of our family (our children and parents) once #1 has been met.  Numbers 2 and 3 sort of go hand in hand as we will not be looking for jobs if our family needs us here.  I started to blog about making our dream come true and found that most of my blog topics are related to purging and liberating oneself from stuff. We can all use this help so when Woodridge Patch offered the opportunity to blog, I stepped up. My hope is that our experience over the next couple of years will help others whether it is to make their dream come true, purge their homes of "stuff", dig into the emotions a relationship and family can experience when going through a change, living more simply, or what one needs to consider when moving. It is also our hope to receive feedback from others who have been on this trek and have seasoned experience to offer us.  We are not keen on hearing the negative aspects of living in Florida.  We are fairly certain that we have heard it all. As I mentioned earlier, we have been looking into this sincfe 2008 so we are not entering this move blindly. If we go there and find that it isn't for us, we'll plan to move on until we find a place that offers everything we're looking for.