You may or may not remember my post about the pros and the cons of living in Tennessee. I wrote it almost a year ago. Well, now that I've lived in Phoenix for over six months, I feel like I can do a similar post for our new home. This is what I have learned so far about the good and the bad of living in Phoenix:
GOOD:
- I feel like Phoenix has almost every store or restaurant that I could ever want. Believe it or not, before I moved to Phoenix the place that I missed the shopping the most was actually Utah, followed closely by LA, and then Nashville. (There were some great things about Nashville, but shopping was NOT one of them). Now I prefer the shopping in Phoenix over anywhere else. It has stores like DownEast, H&M, Charming Charlie's, (best jewelry store EVER) and basically any other store you can think of. I live down the street from a really good Ross, Target, and Hobby Lobby. I love the shopping here. If we had a Tai Pan, I really wouldn't be able to ask for more.
-There is a high LDS population without having to live in Utah. :-) (I don't hate Utah, I hate snow).
-Phoenix is within driving distance to places that we want to visit often, such as Vegas, LA, and Utah. I also like that we're close to Mexico, because Mexican farmers drive their produce up to random markets up here and we can get boxes of strawberries for 50 cents each. Love it.
-The cost of living is pretty low. This is great for our financial situation at the moment. ;-)
-Good job and housing market. We might be able to get into a home a lot sooner that I originally thought we would. I've already started joining the rest of the Pinterest world in planning out my future home.
-Michael wants me to add that there are pro sports teams in every sport that "matters," and that the Phoenix Suns play here.
-The weather. I am putting this in between the good and the bad, because it is both very good, and very bad.
Fall and winter were seriously amazing. I am so whiny about snow and freezing weather, and finally, this last winter, for the first time since I left my parents' home seven years ago, I had nothing to complain about. I wore a sweatshirt maybe 10 to 15 times, and I didn't even touch my winter jackets. I went on walks in the middle of January and didn't have to worry about bundling up Matthew. (Random, funny side story: I love the old people here. One day in February, this old lady comes up to me and asks me if my baby is too cold because he was wearing a shirt and jeans and no sweatshirt. I felt like a bad mom for a quarter of a second until I remembered that it was quite warm. Apparently, 75 degrees is freezing to old people in Phoenix. I laughed, and then realized that she was serious. And then I really started noticing that unless it was over 80 degrees, old people wore their winter coats. Hilarious). :-)
Anyway, the weather is also very bad.... in the summer. Today it got to 100 degrees and it was way too hot for me. Then I got anxiety because I realized it's only April. I am actually scared for the weather this summer. I have been told by several people to run my errands first thing in the morning or in the evening. Guess I'll have to start doing that.
BAD:
-Heaven knows me and Michael aren't huge "nature people," but I can appreciate some trees, pretty hills, bodies of water, or even some grass! I told Michael that Phoenix has no "nature" and he looked shocked and pointed out all the cacti. Gross- who the heck likes cacti?!
-There is nothing super cool or unique about Phoenix. When people come to visit us, I don't feel like there's anywhere special that I should take them. For example, when you visit LA, you have the beach. When you go to Vegas, you can go see the Strip. And when people came to Nashville, we showed them Opryland and even just downtown. Phoenix? Maybe I just haven't lived here long enough, but I can't think of anything cool to go do or see. So unless you want to see a cool cactus, maybe WE should come visit YOU.
-Awful traffic, but this really isn't any different from any other big city.
-It's brown, dry, and dusty. Unless you're downtown, all the buildings and houses look the same.
-Desert insects/snakes are scary.
