We Bought a House!

I have the most exciting news (to me, anyway)...we bought a house!
I know I've alluded to it here and there, but I didn't want to talk about it until everything was for sure all set. With so many big life-events happening lately, I was kind of waiting for the other shoe to drop. With every form we filled out, I half-expected a phone call saying "Oh hello yes, it has come to our attention that you are not a real-life adult and you may not have this house." But somehow we actually are grownups, and we're set to close on Friday!
To say I'm excited about this is an incredibly large understatement. We took a packing break on Saturday to get some things from Target, where I picked out a rug and shower curtain for Jack, and later cried tears of actual joy over it. It may seem silly, but the thought of filling our own house with our own stuff...literally brings me to tears. 
I'm excited about everything, especially: 

• Getting to hang up my clothes. We have the tiniest little closet right now, which means most of my clothes are in my dresser. I'm so excited to be able to hang my clothes where I can see them without having to unfold them! It's the little things. 

• Having a separate laundry room. No more piling dirty clothes in front of the washer that happens to be at the foot of our bed!

• Having a backyard! GUYS, I cannot wait to share pictures of the backyard. Serious perfection. Gatsby is not going to know what to do with himself. I cannot wait.

• Jack having his own room. See also: Not having to avoid making noise while Jack naps.

• Having somewhere to eat dinner that is not my lap. 

• Having a desk again! Somewhere to write, and blog, and create. 

• Paying a mortgage instead of rent. AKA, paying towards something each month for A WHOLE HOUSE instead of just giving the office downstairs most of my paycheck for a single room.

aaaand about a million other things. I can't wait to fill a house with things we love, to make a house into a home that reflects our life, and to cover it in bright colors and flowers and all things happy.

Life is good, you guys. It's pretty dang good.

Tell me something good that's going on in your life!

Look at The Good More Than You Look at The Bad.

As our time in Orlando comes to a close, I'm getting so excited about moving into an actual house. I've loved our studio, but ever since the tiny person joined the party this year, things have gotten pretty cramped. Looking at houses online and imagining having two or three bedrooms (that have doors! I haven't had rooms with doors in two years!) and a fenced-in backyard and a driveway where you can just pull up and walk inside instead of parking in a six story garage and waiting on an elevator sounds incredible to me.

As the possibility of having all of these things comes near, I find myself getting frustrated with our current living situation easier than I normally would. I get irritated by the lack of space, how there's nowhere to take Jack if he's crying and Chris is asleep. I get frustrated by how it's such a process to take Gatsby outside. Irritated with how quickly it looks messy, how a day of cleaning can seemingly be undone by just a few things left out in such a small space.

We actually went to look at houses on Monday, and while it made me all the more thrilled for moving there, it also reminded me of how much I have loved our tiny apartment. I will always, always cherish it and the time we've spent there. I'll never forget when we first moved in, the thrill of living seventeen stories in the sky with an all glass wall. I'll never forget waking up bright and early for the first few weeks of living there, watching the sunrise. I'll always remember laying in bed with Chris, laughing at how much this new place felt like a vacation, and we got to live in it. It was beautiful and breathtaking and stunning and a once-in-a-lifetime kind of apartment.

And it still is. It didn't stop being those things. What happened is that I allowed myself to look at the bad more than I was looking at the good, and like with anything else, whenever that happens, the good seems to shrink dramatically.

So today, I'm reminding myself of how important it is to look at the good. The good is always, always there. And it always deserves to be looked at way more often than the bad does. So I'm enjoying this view for the last few weeks I have it. I'm cherishing the sunrises that shine through the glass wall. I'm soaking in the coziness of the one room we do everything in. It has been so, so good to me, and I will always look back on it with such happiness.

But also: I am really, really excited to have doors again. 

First Things First: How to Make a New City Feel Like Home.

I'm not someone who does great with mass amounts of change. I'm working on it, because I want to be this free, adventurous soul who just goes with the flow. But we live in reality, and here I still find lots of change hard.

Before we found out where we'd be moving, I starting thinking about what I love about Orlando and how I'm so comfortable here. I wondered how I would be able to feel like that in a new town. So, being the easy-going, go with the flow, whatever-happens-happens girl that I am (ha), I made a list. A list of things to do first, no matter where we move, to make a new city feel a bit more like home.

Find your Library. I love the romantic notion of filling my home to the brim with books. I love the idea of just buying any book I come across that I may one day like to read. But, I also really like the thought of having enough money to buy groceries. Because of this, the library is my best friend. As soon as I have lived at my new house long enough to have two pieces of mail addressed to me at my new address, I am getting a library card.

Find your Take-Out Haven. We all have days that were just too busy, too stressful to even think about cooking dinner. We also all have days that are hard and result in the need for a hug in the form of food cooked by someone else. When these days happen, there is a safe little haven known as the take-out place. This haven is different for everyone, but for me, it's Chinese food. There's rarely a problem that can't be solved with some good Chinese food. Moving week can be brutal, so it's probably best to start testing out take-out havens as soon as you get to your new city.

Find your Church. If you're like me, finding a good church just feels like home. It's a comforting and refreshing addition to the week, and finding one you like can make a new town quickly feel like home. Plus, trying out different churches automatically gives you something to do and a way to meet new people. If church isn't your thing, fill in the blank with whatever is. Find your art museum or your book club or your fitness center.

Find your Grocery Store. For when you run out of money for take-out. Listen, I don't particularly like grocery shopping. It's draining and a commitment and then, after you have foraged through the store in search of all the items on your list, you have to drive home and actually unload all the food. It's just not my idea of fun. However, finding a good (and clean, please) grocery store where things are in relatively easy-to-find places (I'm looking at you, Target who puts the baby formula with the cat litter) can make a not-so-fun task enjoyable enough to not dread it.

Make your house homey. I absolutely cannot wait for this one. I want to decorate our new house slowly, only filling it with things we absolutely love. I don't want to buy a bunch of so-so things just because I'm in a rush to get it done. That being said, there are things that make your house feel like your house. Things like your favorite blanket and your chipped coffee mug that you just can't bring yourself to throw away. Put those things where you can see them, because this is your house now, and they belong. And so do you.



How do you make a new town feel like home?

Totally Logical Tips for an Easy Move.

1.  Don't move.  The most logical way to have an easy move is don't.

2.  Hire a company.  Hire someone else to pack and move your stuff, to clean your old place, and to unpack at your new place.  Then just pop some champagne and watch them work.

Side note:  You're probably going to want to get them to cook you dinner your first night in your new place.  Watching other people work is exhausting.

3.  Abandon your old place and everything in it.  Buy all new things for your new place.  And have someone else unpack your new things, obviously.

4.  Change your identity.  If you are no longer Sarah Smith, you no longer have to be responsible for Sarah Smith's old apartment.  Right?  Right.

5.  Don't move. 

An easy move just doesn't exist.  I have literally been moving since Friday and am pretty sure I've never been this tired...but man, you just can't beat this new view.

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