Winds of Change

This fall has been all about change. If you've spent any amount of time with me ever, you know that I hate change. This is why I love Anne Shirley so much. In her words, "Why do people have to grow up, marry, and change...I don't want any of it to change. I wish I could hold on to these days forever. I have a feeling things will never be the same again, will they?" I am entering a new chapter, a chapter that I have told Bill many times, that I did not sign up for.

Back in February we found out that our school district was switching over to all day kindergarten. While many parents were super excited, I was not one of them. I thought I had one more year left with Brendan home part time. He is such a fun kid and great company. He has so many funny things to say, and will chat my ears off. All spring I lived in denial that fall was coming and he was going to be leaving me. My last baby was going to be gone all day. Much to my dismay, fall arrived and school started. I didn't sign up for babies leaving the nest. I had only planned for the part where they were home with me. Now they are at school all day, and I am wandering about, completely without purpose. I even ended up asking if I could come in additional day at work. Who does that?

One (fateful) day I was out walking and noticed a house for sale in our subdivision. It was the same model that my friend Leslie used to live in so I was very familiar with it. We only have three bedrooms, and I have imagined that as the boys become large teenagers, they may want to move out of bunk beds. To do that in their current room, would be very cozy. This house has four good sized bedrooms so I mentioned it to Bill. To my shock, he was interested in looking at it. We looked at it, and there wasn't anything wrong with it (I had been kind of hoping it would be a dump so that moving would no longer be an option for a while). We decided to hurry and get our house on the market, while deep down I was secretly hoping someone else would snatch up that house so we wouldn't be able to buy it. Shortly after looking at the house, Bill's parents decided it was time to downsize and they approached us about buying their house. It's much larger than ours and has 5 bedrooms. We talked about it and last Thursday we agreed that we would put our house on the market in the spring and hopefully buy theirs at the beginning of June (which is when they plan to move). While it's a wonderful house and we really need the space, I am incredibly sad to leave my home. We planted lilac bushes in the back yard as soon as we moved in. My parents bought me a peach tree in honor of Faith, while I was pregnant with Rori. I had my babies here. I redid my kitchen. I made my living room into my sanctuary. It's my HOME. I know that not everyone is weird like me, but I am sentimental and sappy and clearly I don't do well with change.

The day after we decided to buy their house and officially move, we had to say goodbye to one of our kitties that we had adopted the day after we got home from our honeymoon. He was the one affectionately known as "dirty cat" because he had never learned to clean himself (this is one of the benefits of cats--their being self-cleaning). It was so much harder than I had ever anticipated.

good lord he was young and they were so tiny

so that's my natural hair color

 I wasn't ready to say goodbye to him, it was all very much a devastating surprise. So by Saturday I was in a deep funk. That morning I said something along the lines of, "My babies are grown up and don't need me anymore, the cat that we got when we got home from our honeymoon died, so that means our marriage is over, and now you are ripping me from my home so you can go home, so I'm never getting out of bed because what's the point." something like that. I may have a flair for the dramatic. Fortunately Bill is used to my little bit of crazy and melodramatics, so he texted my sister and asked her family to come out to help pull me out of my funk. They did and it was helpful, but it doesn't change things. Isn't that ironic? It doesn't change the fact that things are changing. The last few weeks have been more change than I've had in a long time. I don't like it, but I am aware that I need to get on board the change train before I miss out on the future. So, I am going to keep opening the doors that God puts in front of us and pray that He keeps pushing me in the direction He wants me to go, lest I get left behind.