Moving Monday Part 3

So, I started this on Monday if that helps. I think I have yet to post one on a Monday - but there's room to grow right?

Just over 3 years ago when we found out we'd be moving to Monterey we started the process of determining what to do with our house in Aurora. We bought it in 2007 and we bought it well below its appraisal due to a short sale, so we thought we were just walking into equity. But, by 2012 the market hadn't bounced back enough and to sell the house we were going to have to pay about $10,000 at closing. Not ok by us.

So, against my hearts desires, we decided to contract a rental management company and rent it out. The luxury of living 7 minutes from a military base is that your house will always been in demand for renters. The market was great and overall I would say the experience has been a decent one. But overall I'd also say I've never waivered in my desire to sell it and move on. I don't think I was built to be a rental property owner. I worried nonstop that tenants would fail to pay, or move without notice, or trash the house - and all of those things happened at least once. But, most months I worried for no reason as rent came on time and the maintenance expenses were minimal. We have really been fortunate in having a virtually pain free process.

Last fall, before knowing anything about little loretta or fort Hood, our tenants requested an extension of their lease. It was set to expire 9/30 and we offered a 6 month extension. Their request couldn't have been more percect. It put us right in the prime time for home sales in Denver and we were excited at the prospect of maybe selling instead of finding new tenants this time. Less than a month later I saw those 2 pink lines, and then a few weeks after that we found out about our move. The Aurora house situation was so perfectly timed and I know exactly who was in charge of that upstairs.

It hasn't been as smooth as we had hoped between our property manager, tenants and realtor - and things got a little hairy 2 weeks ago - but I am SO excited to say that on April 2 our house will be on the market!!! Our realtor is optimistic that we will have an offer within a couple of weeks and hopefully it's smooth sailing. If we could close on that sale before we embark on being parents of 3 that'd be pretty fantastic.

And that $10,000 payment at closing? Yeah. Not even close to the case anymore. So very thankful for the turn in the market and for how wonderfully these things all lined up.

3 years ago I thought the cards were stacked against us and was so frustrated that we couldn't just sell it and be done. I was just sure our financial lives would tank due to this rental. Oh ye of little faith. God always knows, doesn't he?

Moving Monday Part 2

One of our favorite parts of living in Colorado was owning our home. We could paint it however we wanted, hang as much stuff on the walls as our hearts desires, build a patio to our liking - it was fun, and it was home. A part of me thought maybe we'd be there indefinitely, as austin was maybe getting out of the army in 2011. Obviously that didn't happen, but it still made it feel so much more like home.

When we moved to California we didn't even consider buying a house. we had no interest in incurring $500,000 of debt for 1,500 sq feet of space. (Still don't!) But, it has been an adjustment for us to go back to being renters while still trying to feel at home. We didn't paint, we did minimal decorating - I know we could have done more to make it cozy and inviting but it was just not an easy adjustment.

So, one if the parts about moving back to Texas that has excited us the most is that we plan to buy a house. The price range is awesome (especially compared to here!) and we can't wait to find a house and call it ours.

Because we had the ability to stay in Houston while we house hunt we won't be making any early trips out to house hunt. We debated having austin fly down there in May, but something about my track record of bed rest and babies born early made us decide to nix that idea. We have enough going on. But that hasn't stopped us (mostly austin) from searching trulia, zillow, and realtor.com on a daily basis to find just what we are looking for.

We want something no bigger than 2,400 square feet - but no smaller than 2,000. Items to think 2,200 is perfect but austin doesn't seem to have a cap on size. I'm just not into big houses myself, and I don't want to clean it :) 

We want 4 bedrooms (again, austin would go for 5) and at least 2 bathrooms but 3 preferably. William and Charles  will share a room (William's request!) and Loretta will have her own (already the princess) The 4th room will serve as my office and guest room, unless there is also an extra space to be an office. I think I prefer a one story house, while austin is indifferent. If it's 2 story we disagree on where we want the master bedroom. 4 years down the road I'll much prefer it on the main floor, but looking at the 12 months ahead of us I'd like to minimize the effort it will take to get from our room to a crying baby's room...or crying babies' rooms. So it seems like a single story would just be easier. 

We have a couple 'internet favorites' (my name for them since our opinions may vary greatly in person) and there is one in particular that I think I'd just love to buy right now.

I'm exhausted thinking about house hunting, making an offer, signing our lives away, and then physically moving into and setting up a new house. But, let's face it, I'm just exhausted all of the time now and I probably shouldn't expect relief anytime in the next 10 years. So, that being said, I can't wait to hold the keys to whatever house God has picked to be the next home of the Wallis family. And I just can't wait to see what is in store for us there!

Moving Monday: Part 1

I am sitting here in bed, laptop and all, getting ready to work some more for the day when it occurs to me...I was determined to kick this series off today and I better just take the few minutes to do it. And, since I'm up to my eye balls in tax returns and even more so in stress, I figured the best place to start in this moving journey is with work. And so it begins.


You know how there are those people who are relaxed and chill throughout life? They take things as they come, they never know what is around the corner, they plan for nothing, and yet they somehow always manage to get done just enough to get by, never worrying for a minute about how they got there?


Yeah, that's not me.


I'm a planner. I'm a do-er. I'm an achiever. I like to cram as many things and commitments in as possible, stress myself to the limit and fall asleep crying because of how much I've committed to, and then when I cross a finish line I hardly notice it because I'm already running the next race. In a lot of ways, these are not bad traits. Being motivated and driven, self sufficient and aiming to succeed are not bad things in themselves. But they can get in the way, and sometimes when there are 30 commitments to make you do have to step back and say no to a few. This has not been an easy decision for me, but it has honestly been one that God has orchestrated so much so that I didn't have much of a choice.


Back up 10 (errrrr 15? years) and I remember watching One Fine Day with Michelle Pfeifer and George Clooney. Ok - so I don't know how to spell her name, and I'm pretty sure it was more than 15 years ago. But, just work with me. In One Fine Day Pfeifer's character was a single mom with a little toddler boy and a very demanding job. She tried to juggle the demands of her son and her job at the same time and while she felt like she failed repeatedly, I remember thinking "I want to be that mom one day. I want to be the mom who gets the laundry done, gets everyone fed and off to school, has a solid and demanding career and manages it with ease. I want to be the mom who makes people say "how DOES she do it? That's going to be me one day".


And for awhile - it was. When it was just William - I gotta say, I killed it. I nailed the balance of a kid and a job, a deployed husband at times and a highly demanding husband-schedule at others. I managed to work out and cook and keep a clean house and do all of the things that I was so hell-bent on doing to prove I was the mom who had it all together.


Then I became a mom of 2. I had to cut my hours back to 35/week instead of 40 (the travesty!) I had to give up personal time. I had to make a lot of concessions, and at the end of the day I wasn't succeeding at being that mom very well. Sure, I had managed to keep 2 kids alive (so far) and I had managed to not lose my job...but was I doing it well? That's debatable. I was forgetting things at work I'd never forgotten before, I was putting off until tomorrow...then the next day...then the next day...household duties I had never let slip. I was surviving - but I was far from thriving.


And then I got the best worst news of my life: I was pregnant. What? How? (ok don't answer that) Why? But....damn it.


I was forced to look at our life and our situation and rethink what I had always been so confident in. I was forced to step out of myself and look at the needs of 5 people instead of 2. I was forced to swallow my pride and admit that maybe...just maybe...I'm not the mom who can do it all with a smile on her face, starbucks in her hand, and size 6 pants around her waist.


So, I worked out a deal with my current employer and I am SO excited to say that I will be a part time work from home mom. I will have a kid in kindergarten (barf), 2 kids in part time day care and I will work part time. I do not for one minute pretend to think that this is going to be like a vacation in the tropics. I know that having the 2 babies home with me a few days a week does not mean I'll have all the time in the world for all of that cooking and cleaning and shopping I never do now.  I know I'll still be busy. But I will be reducing my commitments and focusing on the ones that matter the most. My kids. I'm not for one minute saying that a working mom doesn't focus on her kids - I've been doing it for 5 years now and they have always been #1. But, circumstances change and life changes...we have to too. With the demands of the 2 career fields we have, and the ages of our kids, it just wasn't going to work to keep going at the same pace. 

And so God provided a way to accommodate, adapt and adjust. I am very excited for the opportunity to not wake up at 5:00am, turn on the turbo speed to rush out the door, only to return home at 6:00 to frantically make dinner and rush through bath and bedtime. I'm excited to have a little less responsibility. I'm excited to slow down just a bit. 

Neither my employer or I know how long this will be a viable option but for now it's mutually beneficial and I'm so thankful that it is. I know it will be a huge adjustment for me to not be driven so strongly in that direction - there are a lot of elements to that adjustment which will take some time for me to get used to. I don't anticipate it'll be seamless or pain free for me to give up (whether it is temporary or permanent) this professional ambition inside of me. But I know it's the best for the 5 people within the walls of my house, and that's what I have to think of. I'm thankful for the guidance and provision to make this work, I'm thankful for the incredible employer God placed in my path 3 years ago, I'm thankful for austins support in this, and I'm very excited to see what happens next.

Moving step one

Well, it's March - and all my well intentions of staying on top of blogging and moving details and documenting my third pregnancy flew out the window when tax season hit. Unfortunately, with some new IRS regulations that happened in January this year. 

Nevertheless, Sunday morning when I need to be getting ready for church is as good a time as any to start my 'moving Monday' blog series. No, it's not Monday. Yes, it's ambitious to call it a series when it's taken 2 months to post the first one. But, I'm pregnant so no one has to expect me to be realistic. Plus I've got stuff to do! Maybe I'll even post one tomorrow to really shock myself.

So, ready or not here we go...and it's probably more like 'or not'.

I shared awhile ago how oddly at peace and excited I was to move back to Texas after years of insisting I couldn't handle the heat. Both of those things are still true. But, being excited to go doesn't mean being excited to leave. It's one of the oddest conundrums of life I would say. I read a quote recently about how military families never quite feel 100% at home anywhere, because they leave pieces of their heart all over the country or world. Sadly, and sort of beautifully, it's true. There are about 100 reasons why I'm excited, and probably 3 why I'm not ready. But those 3 are some pretty hefty reasons, and I'll talk more about them as the time draws closer. For now, we are in the thick of trying to coordinate and organize and plan...music to my ears even in the middle of tax season.

Here are the main things I'm planning (hoping) to document in this new blog series I'm starting. And trust me, this 'series' is way more for me than for you. It probably won't be witty and funny, but I want to remember the details and I was to be able to go back and read when I forget what I'm even trying to do here.

Moving Monday Topics

-job arrangements

-house arrangements 

-church

-school

-purging

-a baby too?

...and many more. By my count I have about 13 more Mondays to write and I really intend to find a topic each week. This post is just a little bonus to get me started!

Someone has begged me for 6 years to give him a Texas born baby. But someone got me pregnant in the most mild of climates twice, so if he thinks I'd leave a month early to go down into 150 degree weather (not an exaggeration, Houston is always 150 degrees in May) he obviously doesn't know who he's married to. Being pregnant in 65 degree weather is about as good as it gets, and that's pretty close to our daily temp. So, I'll stick it out here til the bitter end...or maybe not so bitter since it ends with a sweet baby. I'll stick it out here til the beautiful end.

Our rough plans (assuming our third child listens better than the first two) is for Loretta to be born via c section on June 1 at 39 weeks. Then, it's off to the races! 2 weeks to adjust to life with 3 kids, then 3/5 of our family will fly to Texas while 2/5 have a father son road trip across the country. You can choose who to be jealous of...if I were you I'd probably just be glad to not be in either camp! 2 babies on a plane for 6 hours or a 5 year old in a car for 5 days...mmm, pick your poison. Anyhow. We will stay in Houston most of the summer as we try to quickly find a house and move to Killeen as soon as escrow allows. 

And then we get to relax with mai tais on the beach right? That's what comes next with 3 kids and the army life isn't it? Eh, something like that. It just occurred to me a few days ago actually that when summer domes to an end and we move into a house that house won't actually be furnished and ready to go. Apparently I had been envisioning it that way the whole time - Pinterest style and all. I'm sure it'll be a work in progress for awhile as we still have plenty of adjustments and arrangements to work out once we get to Killeen.

Like KINDERGARTEN. Oh my goodness, I think maybe that's enough for today. 

6 more weeks of tax season, then hopefully 6 more calm weeks of pregnancy before the real madness begins. I'm ready, excited, anxious, nervous, impatient and not at all ready all the same time. But, here we go!