We have some happy and yet sad news to report. After a very long time of uncertainty, we have made the decision to relocate along with Dave's job to somewhere in the vicinity of Tempe, AZ. The reasons behind our decision to leave MN are many, and the decision was not made lightly. Minnesota is home. It's been my home for about 32 years, since my family and I moved from Illinois when I was 8. Dave was born and raised here. We've known for some time that this event was coming, and finally, quite recently, it became official. As of January 2015, we will be moving our pale Minnesota faces to sunny Arizona. The kids also have mixed emotions about the move. It's something we've talked about openly with them for some time, so they've been aware that a move was somewhere on the horizon. Though the timing isn't great, Dave and I are excited about this and are trying to consider it as an exciting adventure. Of course, parts of us are sad to leave behind so many cherished friends, family members, and the best neighbors you could hope to have. We expect our kids to be no different. There's always fear that goes along with change, especially when it involves leaving the only home they've known. There are a few things we hope we've gotten across to the kids:
It's OK to be sad.
It's OK to be scared.
It's also OK to be excited.
You can express your feelings to us without judgement.
We will all be a bit homesick at first.
We will always be together. As long as we're together, that's all we need.
It will get easier over time.
We've been working around the clock to get the house ready and with a great deal of help from family and friends, our house will go on the market this Friday, December 5. Dave and I leave Sunday for a week-long house hunting trip to Arizona and we will be under the gun to find a house quickly. The kids' requests are few: they each want their own room, and they want a pool. Hopefully we'll be able to accommodate their room requests; we'll have to see about the pool.This will be our first trip - longer than a weekend, anyway - without the kids, and the longest we'll have been away from them. Hopefully we'll have some downtime to relax and do a little sightseeing while we're down there.
In the chaos of the last few weeks we've of course been subject to Murphy's Law - there's never an exception when one is under a time crunch during a major upheaval such as this one - especially when the timing coincides with the holidays as well. We've had a toilet overflow; a toilet roll holder pulled out of the wall; the washing machine discharge hose somehow came out of the laundry tub and discharged water all over the laundry room floor; and most of us have come down with an ugly stomach bug - all in this week. But we're muddling through the best we can.
The only other sticking point with our move, thankfully, has been Winnie. Flying with a pet in January is not recommended - especially when the average air temp in MN is frequently below 20 degrees F, and the pet has separation anxiety as well as a fear of being crated. Our vet advised against sedating her since it can cause animals to be unable to regulate their body temp (remember the part about the cold in January?). Grandma and Lisa have come to our rescue by volunteering to drive my van down to our new house with Winnie. It's truly amazing how blessed we are to have such wonderful people in our lives.
More info to come, I'm hoping to resume updating this blog more regularly to document our move and our new adventures!
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