Moving Weekend

This past weekend we sold our house and officially moved!

We started off the long weekend with Cooper's last bedtime in his very first room.  This was one of the sadder moments when the reality hit that it was our last time rocking him in the room where we spent lots of hours rocking him.  But we all held it together and he didn't know any differently.

Friday morning we went and got breakfast and then we decided to take a few family pictures in front of the house.  I'm planning to use this picture to update our Texas picture on our map-- our very first house together.

Then we headed to closing!  We signed off on all the paperwork and handed over most of the keys-- we had a leaseback through the weekend to get moved so we kept a couple keys.  We grabbed a picture with one of the cute signs that the title company had and our agent who walked closely with us through the past crazy months.

While Cooper napped on Friday my mom came and stayed with him and then took him and Lily to stay at her house for the night.  So David and I worked on moving stuff over.  We had done a few carloads the weekend before and I had taken a carload each day last week, but we took about 4 carloads over Friday afternoon-- mostly clothes and some odds and ends that didn't pack as well.  We went out to dinner and briefly considered going to a movie while we had a kid-free night, but decided that bedtime sounded way better.  We worked on dissembling and getting a few things ready and then turned in for an early bedtime.

Saturday morning we had hired movers and they came a little after 7 and got started.  We mainly just had furniture and big stuff for them to move along with some boxes from our storage shed and garage.  They were so quick and thorough.  After about an hour they were all packed up and we headed to the apartment to unload.

They did an awesome job getting everything unloaded, but this was the most impressive part to me.  We didn't think we'd be able to fit everything from our storage shed into our smaller storage closet at the apartment, but one of the guys on the moving crew puzzled it all together.  He was so quick and got it all in there!  We've even been able to add some more things without making it all fall apart.  This alone made their services worth every penny ;)

We spent the rest of Saturday working on unpacking and getting things set up.  Including this...

We decided to switch Cooper's crib to a toddler bed.  We'd been talking about this since he started climbing out of his crib in April, but had been holding off.  Since we had to dissemble the crib to move it, we decided to just try a toddler bed when we reassembled it.  We anchored all the furniture to the wall and hoped for the best.  So far he's done pretty well so we're not quite regretting it yet.

Sunday was spent at church and getting the last few things out of the house.  Monday morning I met a cleaner over at the house as our final step before handing in the keys.  She did an awesome job and I left a few notes for the new owners and locked ourselves out of the house for the last time.  

Honestly by the time we got to this weekend we were just ready to close the door on that chapter of our lives.  There was a lot of sadness in anticipation of selling the house, but by the time we got to closing we both felt pretty ready to be settled in our new home at the apartment.  So by Monday we were completely ready to hand over the house, which was such an answer to prayer to have such peace about it by then after a few weeks of some inner turmoil.  

And now we're working on getting settled.  We've downsized quite a bit, so we're trying to find places for everything, but slowly it's coming together.  Cooper loves the apartment and even Lily is adjusting well.  We have a yard which they both love.

Monday we also spent some time exploring the trails right by our new apartments.  We look forward to more time checking it all out.  I am so grateful that we have paved trails right by us that we can get to without driving-- this is such a blessing and one thing I was sad about losing when we left a neighborhood.  We also spent some time at the pool after naptime on Monday.

Overall it was a busy weekend but also really good.  We're looking forward to seeing what's next for us, but for now we're enjoying where we're at and settling in together.

Selling, Moving, and Trusting God

The blog has been a little quiet this month, but our lives have not been quite as quiet.  At the very end of April we had the inspection on the house we wanted to buy... and it was pretty bad.  We spent some time walking around the house while the inspector was there and as we were walking through it I think both David and I had some uneasiness about it all.  And then we got the inspection report and there was a lot more wrong with it than we thought.  There were a lot of major repairs needed and even if those were all done we both felt uneasy about what else there might be in the minor things.

So that started the roller coaster of emotions and figuring out what we wanted to do.  We already had a contract on our house so it was being sold and if we didn't buy this house we had no idea where to go.  Not to mention that the only reason we put our house on the market was to buy this specific house.  We weren't necessarily looking to move, but we found this house in our neighborhood that offered more space so we decided to try for it.  We eventually decided it would be better to walk away from that house, even not knowing what the next steps would be.  There are a lot more details, but we spent over a week waiting to hear if we would be allowed out of the contract while we also tried to figure out what to do next.

So we close on our house that we're selling this Friday and we started a lease on an apartment this past weekend and have started moving stuff over.  There's been a lot of thoughts and emotions as we've processed it all.  Feeling stupid and like we've made a huge mistake in selling our house.  Feeling sad about leaving the house we've loved without somewhere "bigger and better" to go.  Feeling anxiety about where to move.  Feeling fear of not being able to afford to buy something else.  And on and on and on.

I pretty much just cried off and on for a few days thinking about it all.  I had some nights where I barely slept with all of the thoughts running through my head.  I am in a better place this week, but I'm sure there will still be some sadness as we officially move out this weekend.  But most of all I am so thankful for the ways God has carried us this month.

In all honesty, it took time to get to a place of being able to see His goodness in this whole thing.  It felt like all the doors were open and then suddenly slammed shut and we were in our "worst case scenario" that I had worried about from the time we listed our house.  And it felt like if the timing of things had worked out just a little better we wouldn't be in this situation of having to move without a house to buy.  But He was faithful to remind me that His goodness doesn't change and isn't dependent on my circumstances.  

I am thankful for friends who listened and kept pointing me to the truth, time to sit in prayer and read through old notes to remind me of His character, truths of worship music that I repeatedly listened to. 

 I'm thankful that the week it all fell apart, our family devotional song for the week was "It is Well" and we sang it over and over and Cooper would constantly sing "it is well with my soul" as we drove around and played that week.  

I'm thankful that we found out about getting out of contract and getting the appraisal on our house back on the same day that the unit we wanted to rent became available again so we had peace about applying for an apartment and signing a lease.  

I'm thankful for time to start a lease early and start moving our things to make the move a little less stressful.  

I'm thankful for notes from a book I read last year that reminded me of God's true character despite my circumstances.

And I know I will be thankful for the way He is refining us through this, causing us to have no choice but to trust Him with everything.  I know I will be able to look back and see so many more details that he took care of.  

And I'm thankful for my family and that no matter what happens we've got each other.  

It's been a whirlwind, but we're stepping into the unknown together, knowing we're not alone.