Home is where the heart is, but where's our house?

We're still trying to figure out the house thing. Yesterday, we looked at a 4000 sq. ft. house with enormous gardens, (a yard, to Americans) vegetable gardens, fruit trees, 3 garages, 3 outbuildings, a greenhouse, and, drumroll, please, an indoor heated swimming pool. And we could almost have afforded it, if the man hadn't upped the estimated rent 500 pounds. So, we're not going to live there. Plus, it only had 4 bedrooms, not quite large enough to share, especially since all the walls were used up by built-in cupboards, headboards, and nightstands. It was an amazing house, though. The other day, we went to a house that was an old country house, huge, had three stories, 5 bedrooms, a playroom (used to be the servants' quarters - all the way upstairs in the attic with very low ceilings with a spiral staircase to the kitchen), an enormous boot room (what we call a mud room), a laundry room, a nice kitchen with an AGA and an electric hob (oven - so you can still cook without having the AGA on during the summer), a large dining room right off the kitchen, two enormous reception areas - lounges (living rooms), and a large entryway big enough to be its own room. It also had enormous gardens, livery stables, a vegetable garden, a trampoline with safety enclosure, two little playhouses, and the views were amazing. Out front were grassy hills where the sheep graze as far as the eye can see, and out back the cows were meandering about. Lovely. The floors were all wonky (crooked, slanted). In order to keep bedframes level, different sized blocks had to be placed under each leg. It was quite the house. It was also 45 minutes from the base on TINY roads through beautiful countryside. I'm not driving my Chevy Astro van 45 minutes on TINY country roads to go grocery shopping, and I'd rather have Sean home those extra hours, rather than fighting fatigue as he drives those roads each day. So that house still sits there empty. There's another potential house 9 minutes up the road from the base, 6 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, playroom, dining room, lounge (living room), study, AGA kitchen, and large entry hall. There's a thinned out forest right there, with a tree with a hole in it big enough for kids to hide inside, and an absolutely ornate rose garden thing out front. There's some grass, and a large pebbled driveway. Why we aren't living there right now, I'm not sure. We were ready to go sign the papers, but we both felt uneasy. So, we didn't sign them. It's still sitting there, empty. I'm kind of hoping for a better one, I guess. What could be better than that, you ask? Well, perhaps not BETTER, but perhaps different, and in a different place. Last night I dreamed we were sitting in the Bury St. Edmunds Ward, and I know some towns in that ward that would be under 15 minutes to work, and about 20 to church. If we live down there, the kids will probably go to the English schools. And if we stay in the Thetford Ward, I'd really like to live in Hockwold cum Wilton. It's right between the kids' school and Sean's work - under 10 minutes either way, and the church is 23 minutes away. Unfortunately, there aren't currently houses for rent in those places that are ideal. So we're waiting. And while we wait, we look at the houses that might work if we were desperate enough. I apologize if I sound awful. These houses we're looking at are amazing, but as we're prayerfully considering where to go, none of these are working. So we're looking, searching, praying, and doing what we can. Soon, hopefully. Maybe our trip to the temple Saturday will give us some insight.
So anyway, that's what's going on here.
Have a happy day!
Love,
Emily :)