Couldn't hide from stress

This move began as a positive one, it still is, overall. However, we are beginning to find the stress points.

I will be bringing home less money. That isn't something we can fix.
L's Dad decided not to approve her continuing on his health insurance. She found out when she went to go get her new card. There isn't anything we can do about it and we can't afford to help her either.

The money is a huge thing. I am not sure how we are going to be able to afford to live here with making some changes to our finances. I am going to have to revisit our internet and television stuff and try to cut the expenses.

I have started back to work, but my first paycheck is a month and a half away. I am not sure what we are going to do. I thought I would have a transition loan. Not sure if that is going to go through for us. Its a wait and see thing. I hate waiting.

Space issues

I am sitting in our "office space." It was suppose to a bedroom for one of the boys, but it is too small. This whole house has a shortage of space. It is taking some interesting solutions to fix the problems.

The house is two levels and you would think there would be enough space. Technically, mathematically, there is enough space. The problems and issues arise when you take a look at the way this space is divided up. it is choppy to say the least.

Take the master bedroom. We have a closet, not a walk-in, but a closet. We have NEVER not had a walk-in closet. Where do we put all the clothes? In a dresser, you would think. Ummm, yeah, unless you notice that our master bedroom is only 10x11. That is it. We have downgraded our bed to a queen sized one in order to free up more space, but still. We only have one dresser right now. We are going to have to go out and buy a second one.

This bedroom, that we are now using as office space is a direct result of the choppiness of this place. There is no other place in this entire house that will work as an office space that will also be able to be used to store my sewing stuff.

The positive thing is that there is space downstairs that can be used for the kids living areas. The girls are sharing the largest room in the house down there. It also has access to the outside and I am not thrilled about that, but they need the space. There is an awkward space down there that the boys are going to use for their overflow stuff. They have their own "office space" now. There is a large area down there that they will be able to use for a family room and rec area. So that will be helpful.

The move has been positive, but there have been pitfalls as well.

It seems that after all of the new deductions that will be taken out of my paycheck I will actually be bringing less home that I had before. I am not thrilled about that at all. Scary, actually. It is more expensive to live here and I had thought that the increase in pay would absorb the increase in costs, fully. But it isn't. I tried to lower some of our expenses before we left. For instance, the Rav. I traded in the truck for a more economical form of transportation. Our monthly payments are going to be less and it definitely doesn't eat up the amount of gas that the truck did.

During the move we had to leave behind a great deal of things. They just wouldn't fit into the moving van. We had to purchase everyone new mattresses once we got here, oh and bed frames. Only person who had a bed frame still was C.  We think we got a pretty good deal though. Everyone has a bed and a mattress and it cost us about $1100. Now, that is $1100 we didn't budget for, but it was money we had to spend.

Ker says I have been happier since we moved. I feel moved at ease right now. I am feeling stress, but I feel more at ease about things over all. I am not sure how to explain that.   

One week in Virginia

Our first full week in Virginia is officially up tomorrow. Now I know we haven't been in our home a full week until Monday, but a week ago tomorrow we crossed into Virginia to start our new chapter here.

In has been an eventful, well busy week. Eventful would mean we had a lot of different things happening, but in reality we were busy trying to get the new house ready for us. It's not that it is in horrible shape, but there are several things that we are trying to change to make it more livable for us.

The people who lived here before us had a dog, so our first order of business is to try to get the dog smell out of here. That isn't easy to do since there is carpet.

Our first order of business was to get our things off the moving truck. That was a very tiring and slow process. In fact, it took us three days to do it because we took a day off in the middle to work on pulling carpet and laying down tile in the master bedroom.

I have been sore most of the week. However, it has been a good sore. I can see progress being made on the house and we are finally getting rooms looking like we live here.

Waiting on Internet service to be installed later this week. Have to get the office space ready. We have noticed there is a definitely space issue for us here. The layout is odd for us right now. Virginia has been treating us well. 

Driving a moving van

We have finally made it into Virginia. After driving about 8 hours every day the past 3 days, we are now about an hour or so away from our final destination.

During the drive I have been driving a 30' long moving van that has almost everything  own in it, plus the trailer that has the Rav on it. I have not physically gone out and measured it, but I will assume I am easily driving about 40' of metal. I am tired. Physically and mentally. The seats aren't movable, so my shoulders are hurting from the way I have to sit and the lack of support they have had.

Mentally it is tough becauseI have had to be constantly on top of where the trailer is on the road behind me. Oh and I forgot to mention the 11 year old who has been beside me the entire route. He has not been too bad, really. Once he realized I couldn't look at whatever it was he wanted to show me or ask me about because I was preoccupied with trying to make sure. Didn't run off the road, side swipe someone, or worse,not be able to stop. Those baking times suck!

Tomorrow wwe di be into our new home town and begin to unload at our new home. These next couple of days will bring many new things for all of us. There are a lot of good things ahead for us. 

Texas in the rearview mirror

As we  leave Texas we are closing a very long chapter in our lives.

When I first moved to Texas, 14 1/2 year ago, I was married to Rob. Rob was in the Navy and we were transferred here from South Carolina. Our daughter has just turned 1 and I was wondering what the hell we had gotten ourselves into by moving here. I felt like I was in a foreign country.

Fifty-percent of the population, at least, spoke another language. There were advertisements in Spanish, every where. There were people I could not understand because they were speaking a foreign language. There were so many things I had to get use to.

My mother and sister were living with us when we first got here. That only lasted a few months.

So, much has happened to us all here.

I never expected to meet Ker. Never would have imagined this would have developed the way they have. She came into my life as a friend, but became so much more.

Texas has had a positive place in our lives, but we both felt like it wasn't the place we were suppose to be. We started to find our way out of here many years ago. We had always said when the chance to move happens, we will take it. Neither of us are leaving with ill feeling towards the area, just the feeling that it has run its course for us.

Thank you Texas for bringing so many wonderful people into my life, some of them for only a few years, but several for a life time. Thank you Texas for the wonderful memories, the education,the career start, and the family. This chapter of our lives was a great one, but one that we need to move on from.

Here, we build a strong foundation for our relationship and for our family. Our family needs space to grow,our relationship is ready for more than Texas seems to be able to offer.

As I look in the rear view mirror at Texas I am smiling, I am teary eyed, I am proud, I am a better person for having been here.

And we're off.....

First night out of Corpus is now behind us. We only have about 1200 miles ahead of us. Not bad until you realize that with the truck and trailer I can only average about 60 mph. Maybe it will get better once I am use to the truck.

We left so much behind that we didn't expect to have to leave, but we need to look ahead and not behind. Things can be replaced, our new home is awaiting us.

Last Day....

Today we have been tying up loose ends, well running errands. We needed hair cuts and had to stop in at the bank to get the account number for our car loan. Had to make sure we knew it before we left.

I am trying not to worry too much about the loading up. I think it is just going to get to a point where we are putting loose things into totes and will be done with it. Tonight we will make sure all of the heavy things are ready to go and then work through the kinks in the morning.

The hope is that we can get everything loaded up in 2 hours. Hoping that doesn't seem unrealistic, especially since we have it all ready and if everyone who is suppose to be here shows then we should be able to get it done fairly quickly.

K and I have done really well through this. Which is awesome!! Moving is one of the big stresses in a relationship and we have been handling it together rather than snipping at each other. We haven't been perfect, but we have bot had any huge arguments at all. That has really helped the process feel easier.

We will finish what we can tonight - can't do much outside until the sun goes down, and then tomorrow we are on our way north.