Moving Day

Three weeks ago, we moved.  We sold a house we loved, one we lived in for 13 years and the only home our boys can ever remember.  A house full of memories of holidays, family, firsts (first steps! first days of school! first lost tooth!), and over time, it became a place of lasts.  Last time in car seats, last time I carried my boys to their beds, and now, the last of elementary school.  It’s been 13 beautiful years and some really (REALLY) tough growing pains happened in between these walls.  I wouldn’t change them for anything, and so it has felt so incredibly bittersweet saying goodbye to one chapter and beginning another.  Our new house is less than half the size.  We just felt like it was time to simplify, downsize, and minimize our possessions . . . because once I start to sort through all the crap accumulated in a house over 13 years of life, it became clear that we owned too many things, held onto too many preschool craft projects, and needed to reduce our tendency to accumulate rather than curate what we loved and things that were most important.  

With our oldest heading to high school next year and our boys being at the point where they are more and more independent every day, it felt like this huge shift in our life.  Then, as we were trying to sell our house, the pandemic hit.  Suddenly, our house plans seemed to be falling through our hands.  Fortunately, a lovely family (with three girls!) fell in love with our house.  I know it sounds silly, but I had been praying for the family who bought our house more than six months prior to the actual closing.  I couldn’t imagine a better family to create their own memories in the house I have loved so much.  

It was hard to leave, and my boys were as sentimental about it as I was.  So on the day when the moving truck came (and Dave had to work) it felt extra bittersweet, like a lump in my throat pushing back a good cry as I saw the rooms emptied out of the life we had put into it.  It felt empty and so sad.  The first night in the new house, I just kept thinking I wish I was home and panicked that we made the wrong decision.  But a few days later, when we filled our new bookcases with all of the books and treasures we love so much, Jackson said, Wow, it feels like ours now because a house is just a house, but home is where your treasures are.