Is it really necessary to be asked: "How are you surviving The Move"...??
Really...how could it be that bad...??
I guess I just never understood until I had to actually do it!
I'm not talking about how the twelve years of memories tears your heart right into pieces while thinking of leaving the place...
you walked into after your honeymoon to start a life together in...
you brought your babies home to from the hospital to embark on the rollercoaster of parenting...
where you found solace and comfort when the world outside seemed too much to bear...
you put your head to the carpet countless times as you agonized in prayer or fell to your knees overwhelmed with praise...
your little ones took their first steps and giggled their first giggles...
where your children first acknowledged Jesus as their Savior and King...
you rocked in the rocking chair until it broke...
you taught those sweet babies how to read...
where you kissed goodbye and whispered "I love you" in the wee hours of every single workday morning...
you hurt your worst hurts and celebrated in elation at unspeakable JOYS...
you began Christmas traditions and baked your first batch of cookies with two messy "helpers"...
where you sat up late night after night reading and researching, trying to figure out how in the world you were going to kick this Autism thing in it's butt...
you hosted 1st birthday parties for little chubby cheeked darlings...
you held hands and watched movies for cheap entertainment on many-a-weekend...
where the God of the universe taught you personal, life-changing lessons and truths that have left you forever changed...
you taught them to ride their bikes and planted flowers and grew a garden and built a treehouse and looked at the stars and watched the baby Bluebirds grow...
you were allowed to be the very best and worst of yourself day after day...
where you first heard God whispering His plans of adoption into your hearts...
...where you did too many precious things to re-count in some silly blog post.
Even though we are leaving a teeny, tiny cramped little home, it was bulging with life and love and so many, many good things that might not have grown the way they did anywhere else. And even though we're only skipping a wee-bit down the road to our new home, it leaves us no less reflective on the time we spent back there.
So...moving. What's the big deal about that...?? Well, all of those things were just a sampling of the emotional part of it all! I didn't even mention the...
old, run-down house that needed to be torn down...
the homeschooling-out-of-a-box that we are experiencing...
the piles and piles of junk that had to be cleared off of the property...
the Home Study prep-work that is being delayed...
the pulling up of fences..
the digging and establishment of a septic system...
the extra, extra hours at his day-job that delay all the new-home-jobs needing attention
the laying of pipe and lines and hooking up electricity...
the walls being painted...
the waiting and waiting and more waiting...
the moving of furniture and books enough for 4 libraries...
the cleaning and scrubbing...
the "where is my knight (or rain forest or weather or drawing or whatever) book, Mom?" followed by a shrug of the shoulders...
and more moving of furniture and clothes and dishes and MORE books!
But look, see that picture of our flower? It was next to that old run-down house that was being torn down here. So, Christopher dug out a hole on the edge of the property, scooped up the hydrangea plant with the track-hoe, and moved that thing right into that spot. We weren't sure it would live. We hadn't had time to research and figure out the best way to transplant it and increase the chances of saving it. However, there it is...the beautiful, boisterous blue hydrangea.
So today I figured, if the flower can survive The Move, so shall I!