Kids

One of the hardest parts of moving across the country is trying to figure out the timing of everything.

We don’t really remember everything that happened when we bought our house. It was like 8 years ago, before kids. It feels like a whole different lifetime. And doing all that crap without having kids is completely different than doing it when you already have 3 small children. Plus, where we’re going is a completely different market. So we’re not even really sure how everything works on the buying end.

And now we have to sell a house too!

We have never sold a house before, so we don’t really have a great idea of how the whole process of selling a house works. That was one of the things that could have held us back, even the idea of getting the house ready to put on the market just seemed like it would be too much work. We would never have time for it. I’ll write more about this, but let me just say that asking for help is the best way to accomplish this part.

I’m thinking you just do it all on a wing and a prayer.

You pray that your house sells quickly.

You wing it when it comes to when to quit your job, give notice at daycare, give notice at aftercare, pull your child out of school, move out of your house, etc.

For now it feels like there are a million balls in the air and a million things to think about. It’s exciting. But it’s also a little difficult because it’s just hard to function when you have so much going on in your head.

I just try to take it one thing at a time.

First step, get the house listed.

I mean, there are a lot of steps that need to happen to accomplish Step #1, but I can break all that down to.

What’s the big thing that needs to happen next?

What actions do I need to take to get there?

There’s really no question about when it can get done, so I don’t exactly have to schedule it. Nights. Weekends. That’s all there is.

Sidenote: I was looking for an image to use in this post and the images of happy, smiling, put-together families with children surrounded by an immaculate room with a cute stack of boxes just kill me. Not realistic. 

We made a huge decision – we’re moving across the country!

From Denver, CO to Grand Rapids, MI.

How did we come to this decision?

It feels like we had one conversation and that was it, decision made. But that’s not really how it went down.

My husband has been saying since we got married that he would move to Grand Rapids.

He’s been telling me for the last year (or more) that we could pay cash for a house there. (I did not believe him.)

About a month and a half ago, we went to Grand Rapids. When I was there I asked my aunt how much her house was listed at. She wouldn’t tell me. I didn’t even ask how much she paid. I knew she wouldn’t answer that, but I was curious to know what a gorgeous house like that costs in that area. I thought my husband would want to know.

I noticed a house for sale down the street from my mom, but didn’t think too much about it.

She pointed out her realtor’s house (also down the street) when we were out for a walk.

We got back to Denver and I think we wanted to find the house down the street from my mom.

We started looking on realtor.com.

I realized we could actually get enough from the sale of our current house to be able to pay cash for a house in the Grand Rapids area.

Everything just snowballed from there.

One night, we sat on the couch and we talked about it.

What if?

What if we can pay cash for a house?

What if I could quit my job?

What if the kids didn’t have to be in daycare, but could be?

What if we could spend the summers at the beach with the kids?

What if my mom could watch them twice a week?

We finally found an idea that we were excited about.

We didn’t “officially” decide with that conversation, but that was when we knew, we were both ready for a big change and this was the big change we wanted. It took another week or so and some move conversations to really decide.

Every other conversation we’d had about adding on to the house, finding a new house in Denver, just left us feeling blah. It never felt right.

We have a lot of family here that we don’t want to leave, and we knew that would be the hardest part. It’s one of the biggest things keeping us here and one of the main things holding us back.

I hesitate to put this in writing, because I don’t really like to admit it, but the reality is the idea of how much work it would take to move was holding us back too.

We’re just tired.

We’re tired of the way our life is right now. It doesn’t fill us up with energy, it drains us. So we knew that finding the energy to move would be hard. (It’s excitement and asking for help that fuels it, by the way).

But that’s why we want to make this move.

We’re tired and we’re ready for a change.

Telling people makes it feel real.

My husband started telling people probably before I was ready, but then it was like “I guess we can’t back out now.”

It kind of pushed us to action, because we did mean it.

So now it’s official – we’re moving.