Dan and I both agree that on a sunny day... Washington might be the most beautiful place we've ever lived. With neighborhood views of Mt. Rainier and Mt. Baker... the endless, towering trees that seem to be covered in a dreamy blanket of moss year round... mornings that started with fog blankets sitting low in the valley but resting on the trees leading up into the foothills. It seemed every direction has a beautiful view that could take your breath away and make you realize how really small we are in this grand scheme of life and all that *is*.
Dan and I also realized, fairly quickly, after moving to Washington that we would not be there long term. It just wasn't for us. I think our hearts were left behind in California. I think... maybe I even felt like we left little Matteo's soul behind.
The constant gray sort of put an exclamation point on the feelings on just *knowing it wouldn't be our forever home*. When you grow-up, or live somewhere for 12 years that sees the sun at least 300 days a year to a place that sees the sun less than half of that... it's a mental challenge. Or, I should say - it was for us.
People say the Seattle rain is a deal breaker.
It wasn't for us. It was the gray skies. The rain just put the exclamation mark on it.
We loved our home. We loved our neighborhood and community. We loved the schools our children attended. We loved the activities/facilities we were involved with. And, we loved the newfound friendships that we had built with a few people.
But, we just couldn't envision us planting our roots any deeper there. We decided that living in a place where we see the sun regularly really IS important to us. We like warm climates. We missed California and all that it offers with beaches and mountains and family vacations and trails to run, hike and explore... not to mention the fact that we deeply missed the family, friends and professional networks we left behind.
We decided it was time to put the house up for sale. If we were going to move - we wanted to do it sooner, rather than later... and get on with our life and planting roots for our family.
We put the house up for sale ourselves. Our rationale being that we could save some money by doing it ourselves, and we weren't in any hurry. We figured that if it took over a year to sell... Rocco would have the benefit of having the same kindergarten teacher that Gabby had, and that would be worth staying in gloomy WA another year.
I staged the house. I took the photos. Dan took care of all the legal and broker details. And, much to our surprise... we sold the house in just over 2 months. We never held one open house. We showed the house to inquiries only and had about 10 families total do walkthrough's. Of course, it was never at a convenient time. It always seemed like Dan was out of town and I was scrambling to get the house in tip-top condition and oh-by-the-way, disappear with 4 kids for however long.
We had 2 months from sale contract (May 11) to the close of our sale (July 18). So, the race was on to find a new home. Dan and I both made multiple day trips down to CA to scout homes in our new target city. We finally put an offer on a home at the end of June. This was quickly followed by a race to get 2 children registered at the new elementary school, etc. Oh, and PACKING. Packing with 4 young children is super fun. SUPER. FUN.
The move was sad for Gabby...she was devastated to be leaving her friends. This was heartbreaking to me. She had such a great group of girlfriends at school. And, she was tight with her gymnastics teammates as well. I knew the move would be the most difficult for her. I frequently reminded her that we could keep in touch with all her friends via Skype, email and snail mail.
Rocco was leaving behind one very good friend who just happened to be a neighbor. They would spend every day (the entire day!) on their bikes... biking between our houses, shooting their guns while biking, playing in the yard, snacking, and just hanging out how little boys do. His name was Reid and they were self-proclaimed *best buddies*. Oh, and Giuliana had a huge crush on Reid too. And, Reid was seriously the sweetest, big-hearted, giant kindergartener I've ever known (next to Rocco, of course!). They were a perfect match!
And, I was also leaving two very special friendships (which I cherish just as much as friendships from my childhood). And, thank goodness for text messaging because we remain the *mommy text network* (per Dan)... frequently texting and laughing about the constant comedy in our lives as each of us has 3+ children, and so many stories every day we could start our own comedy show. So, we just *get* each other so much.
July 18th approached a lot faster than I had anticipated. And, since our new home in CA was under construction... the road to living in our next house was not going to be fast OR easy.
Showing posts with label Home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Home. Show all posts
7/14/13
11/9/10
New Home! You can run... but you can't hide.
So... we FINALLY moved into our new home approximately one month ago!!
Since we moved in, I feel as if almost every waking moment of the day I've been unpacking boxes and organizing "stuff". When not unpacking, I'm still nursing an almost 10 month old, making dinner every night (we've only eaten out once since we moved in), finding a new pediatrician and school for Gabby, twice weekly gymnastics classes, at least 50 visits to Target, hitting the grocery store at least 4 times a week and squeezing in 3-5 mile runs for my sanity.
If I've learned anything in this big move... it's that we have way too much STUFF!! Oh... and that it is a much bigger pain in the butt to finalize a loan than it was 8 years ago.
Only a few things were broken in the move... a glass pitcher, a frame, and of course the new TV that we gifted ourselves with for Christmas last year. Yup... that sort of sucked.
The kids were SO ECSTATIC to finally see and move into their new home. They spent that entire day running through the house screaming with excitement, playing hide and go seek, exploring their new yard, the forest and playhouse behind the house (with real electric lights and everything!), and cheering every time we opened a box with some of their long lost toys or belongings. The kids have truly been enjoying the freedoms that come with living in a house that has a big yard to run and play. They ride their bikes and scooters freely and sometimes for miles every day! They have met 9 new kids in our neighborhood. Two of the girls have become Gabby's newest best friends, and they also play so great with Rocco. And, there is a little boy across the street who plays nicely with all of them as well. And, he has identical twin sisters who are just a few months older than Rocco.
For Dan and I, moving into the new house came with a big sigh of relief. We had been floating for a few months and it was so nice to know that we were on our own turf again and able to once again create some routine and structure in our lives again. We are in love with the house and having a big yard (4.5 acres... ~ 2.5 acres being forest) for the kids to run and play. We have met a lot of the neighbors and they're all so nice and have been very kind and given us warm welcomes. We also were so happy to be reunited with some of our things... like our own bed. It's SO comfy... love it. The best part of being reunited with our stuff though was the feeling that comes along with being oddly close to Matteo again. I love having all of our personal photos decorate the walls of our home... and we have a LOT of beautiful photos of Matteo. And, I love having his urn within our care again, and his precious chest gifted to us by his God parents that neatly stores all of his sweet and short little life's favorite and most memorable possessions. It sits in our new family room, and nicely displays some of our favorite photos of Matteo. Gabby and Rocco gravitate to this often and love to talk about Matteo and look through the priceless items in his chest.
It would have been completely naive of me to have thought for even a moment that moving from our house in CA would take away the pain and loss that one feels constantly throughout the day when you lose a child. But, I wouldn't be honest if I said I didn't somewhat hope that it would relieve us of a tiny bit of that pain and constant feeling of loss and emptiness.
While I'm not having to constantly walk past the specific places in our CA house where I held Matteo dead for the first time... or went screaming down the hall, or watched Dan try to do CPR on him, or watched the medics work on him, and where I held him, sobbing and in complete shock, as he lay dead in my arms. I still find myself replaying all of those things a lot every single day. I guess I wished somehow that my mind would stop doing that to some degree.
This big move was to be a fresh start for us. And, in so many ways, it has been. Mostly good, of course! And, we do love it here... it's breathtaking and beautiful. The weather has been great... much cooler than we're used to, but I'll take that over the heat any day! Perfect running weather. But, I still have days where I miss Matteo so much that I feel completely paralyzed by the pain. I hurt so much. I miss him so much. I am so angry that he died and feel as I should have been the one to have prevented it... that somehow, I failed completely on my parental duties the night he died. I sometimes feel like I can't possibly live another day without that little guy.
He would have loved it here... finding and catching caterpillars with Rocco and Gabby. Finding and watching gigantic banana slugs making trails across the driveway, seeing snakes, hearing the coyotes, etc. I wonder sometimes if we've lost his little spirit along the way or if he's followed us... of if he's just taking his own sweet time to show us a strong sign that he's still with us. A few times when I've needed it most here... Matteo's gifted me with a sky full of stars, or at least sightings of his big star in the sky... situated right near the moon.
Is it awful that I still look at what are our current family photos... and I focus on what is missing. I wonder where he would have been standing or what he would have looked like.
I guess it's true what they say... you can run, but you can't hide.
Since we moved in, I feel as if almost every waking moment of the day I've been unpacking boxes and organizing "stuff". When not unpacking, I'm still nursing an almost 10 month old, making dinner every night (we've only eaten out once since we moved in), finding a new pediatrician and school for Gabby, twice weekly gymnastics classes, at least 50 visits to Target, hitting the grocery store at least 4 times a week and squeezing in 3-5 mile runs for my sanity.
If I've learned anything in this big move... it's that we have way too much STUFF!! Oh... and that it is a much bigger pain in the butt to finalize a loan than it was 8 years ago.
Only a few things were broken in the move... a glass pitcher, a frame, and of course the new TV that we gifted ourselves with for Christmas last year. Yup... that sort of sucked.
The kids were SO ECSTATIC to finally see and move into their new home. They spent that entire day running through the house screaming with excitement, playing hide and go seek, exploring their new yard, the forest and playhouse behind the house (with real electric lights and everything!), and cheering every time we opened a box with some of their long lost toys or belongings. The kids have truly been enjoying the freedoms that come with living in a house that has a big yard to run and play. They ride their bikes and scooters freely and sometimes for miles every day! They have met 9 new kids in our neighborhood. Two of the girls have become Gabby's newest best friends, and they also play so great with Rocco. And, there is a little boy across the street who plays nicely with all of them as well. And, he has identical twin sisters who are just a few months older than Rocco.
For Dan and I, moving into the new house came with a big sigh of relief. We had been floating for a few months and it was so nice to know that we were on our own turf again and able to once again create some routine and structure in our lives again. We are in love with the house and having a big yard (4.5 acres... ~ 2.5 acres being forest) for the kids to run and play. We have met a lot of the neighbors and they're all so nice and have been very kind and given us warm welcomes. We also were so happy to be reunited with some of our things... like our own bed. It's SO comfy... love it. The best part of being reunited with our stuff though was the feeling that comes along with being oddly close to Matteo again. I love having all of our personal photos decorate the walls of our home... and we have a LOT of beautiful photos of Matteo. And, I love having his urn within our care again, and his precious chest gifted to us by his God parents that neatly stores all of his sweet and short little life's favorite and most memorable possessions. It sits in our new family room, and nicely displays some of our favorite photos of Matteo. Gabby and Rocco gravitate to this often and love to talk about Matteo and look through the priceless items in his chest.
It would have been completely naive of me to have thought for even a moment that moving from our house in CA would take away the pain and loss that one feels constantly throughout the day when you lose a child. But, I wouldn't be honest if I said I didn't somewhat hope that it would relieve us of a tiny bit of that pain and constant feeling of loss and emptiness.
While I'm not having to constantly walk past the specific places in our CA house where I held Matteo dead for the first time... or went screaming down the hall, or watched Dan try to do CPR on him, or watched the medics work on him, and where I held him, sobbing and in complete shock, as he lay dead in my arms. I still find myself replaying all of those things a lot every single day. I guess I wished somehow that my mind would stop doing that to some degree.
This big move was to be a fresh start for us. And, in so many ways, it has been. Mostly good, of course! And, we do love it here... it's breathtaking and beautiful. The weather has been great... much cooler than we're used to, but I'll take that over the heat any day! Perfect running weather. But, I still have days where I miss Matteo so much that I feel completely paralyzed by the pain. I hurt so much. I miss him so much. I am so angry that he died and feel as I should have been the one to have prevented it... that somehow, I failed completely on my parental duties the night he died. I sometimes feel like I can't possibly live another day without that little guy.
He would have loved it here... finding and catching caterpillars with Rocco and Gabby. Finding and watching gigantic banana slugs making trails across the driveway, seeing snakes, hearing the coyotes, etc. I wonder sometimes if we've lost his little spirit along the way or if he's followed us... of if he's just taking his own sweet time to show us a strong sign that he's still with us. A few times when I've needed it most here... Matteo's gifted me with a sky full of stars, or at least sightings of his big star in the sky... situated right near the moon.
Is it awful that I still look at what are our current family photos... and I focus on what is missing. I wonder where he would have been standing or what he would have looked like.
I guess it's true what they say... you can run, but you can't hide.
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