Moving from NE Ohio to DC

[normie]

Reston's great, but the OP wants newer construction. If they're interested in living as far out as Reston, they might as well go 5 miles further and live in Cascades, where everything is new.

[xrk971]

Wow! I did not expect to receive so much help in such a short amount of time from you folks. Certainly it looks like NOVA is very friendly and full of helpful neighbors.

I would like to thank all of you for your informative (and very entertaining) responses. Scanbarre provided a superb description of Reston, we have stayed near Reston several times and your description is spot on for the parts we have seen, and you have opened our eyes up to parts we have not seen. Thank you to Normie for your wonderful photos of Lowes Island - it looks idyllic. The franklymls.com site that jeb77 suggested is awesome - I wish all real estate websites were this good. I think from the suggestions so far, we are thinking that the area around Sterling is starting to look like it may offer us what we are looking for in terms of the newer home, square footage, and price.

We really love the green space in the neighborhoods that were discussed. I can see my daughter going around hunting for monarch butterfly eggs or caterpillars in the milkweeds and raising them. We raised 4 monarchs this past summer/fall in NE Ohio and it was a magical experience for my daughter (and us) to see the eggs transform to beautiful butterflies which we released for (presumably their migration to Mexico). With our love of nature stuff, what we are kind of still having a harder time finding is a decent size backyard for gardening, fruit trees, and a butterfly garden for our daughter. Another interesting thing to do, that maybe I can take up beekeeping as a hobby... This is great for the fruit trees, and gives you local honey which can help with plant and pollen allergies (and tastes terrific on peanut butter sandwiches). A friend of mine raised bees while he was going to grad school in Texas and said he made good money selling not the honey but the pollen. How are the HOA's in these neighborhoods regarding being able to do stuff in your backyard like beekeeping?

Thanks again.

[Jenniferma]

Originally Posted by xrk971

We really love the green space in the neighborhoods that were discussed. I can see my daughter going around hunting for monarch butterfly eggs or caterpillars in the milkweeds and raising them. We raised 4 monarchs this past summer/fall in NE Ohio and it was a magical experience for my daughter (and us) to see the eggs transform to beautiful butterflies which we released for (presumably their migration to Mexico). With our love of nature stuff, what we are kind of still having a harder time finding is a decent size backyard for gardening, fruit trees, and a butterfly garden for our daughter. Another interesting thing to do, that maybe I can take up beekeeping as a hobby... This is great for the fruit trees, and gives you local honey which can help with plant and pollen allergies (and tastes terrific on peanut butter sandwiches). A friend of mine raised bees while he was going to grad school in Texas and said he made good money selling not the honey but the pollen. How are the HOA's in these neighborhoods regarding being able to do stuff in your backyard like beekeeping?

Thanks again.

Hi Again--

I am not sure about the bees, but you can check the Cascades HOA rules on their website: Cascades Community Association - Welcome to Cascades Community Association's New Website

In regards to the backyards-- you may want to check into the Countryside area of Cascades. The homes are a little bit older though.. but the yards are bigger and some of the houses have amazing wrap around front porches. I looked on franklymls and there is nothing really on the market there--but here is a house that is under contract that will give you a feel for the yard sizes: LO7211674 on FranklyMLS.com 115 COPPER CT, STERLING VA for $523,999 in ENVIRONS Home For Sale

There are homes in the newer sections of Cascades that have bigger yards-- they are just a bit harder to come by... unfortunately if you look in Countryside, I am not sure about the larger walk out basements (for inlaw suites) and the newer construction you had mentioned.

Good luck!
Jen

[cdmurphy]

Originally Posted by xrk971

Another interesting thing to do, that maybe I can take up beekeeping as a hobby... This is great for the fruit trees, and gives you local honey which can help with plant and pollen allergies (and tastes terrific on peanut butter sandwiches). A friend of mine raised bees while he was going to grad school in Texas and said he made good money selling not the honey but the pollen. How are the HOA's in these neighborhoods regarding being able to do stuff in your backyard like beekeeping?

The Loudoun Beekeepers Association, Beekeepers Association of Northern Virginia, and the DCmetro Beekeepers would be good sources of info for you.