Whenever the clock struck midnight on January 1st, announcing a new year, I closed my eyes as wished for adventure in 2018. Well, I might be lying there, it was probably actually closer to 10 pm and as rubbed my tired mom eyes, threw my hair up in a messy bun and kissed the ones I love, that’s when I made my wishes. (You can read more about that here.) Either way, I prayed to God for some adventure, thinking that this would mean more travel, more stepping outside my comfort zone to zip line over tropical forests and take on business challenges that pushed myself further than I ever had before. While I certainly have had sprinklings of those things throughout the first 7 months of this year (you can read about our Texas adventure here and our family trip to Deep Creek here), God laughed at my request, because He had a different plan in mind.
If you have been following along these last few years, you know how open I’ve been about us wanting to leave the city. The truth is that we’ve been unhappy here for a while, not feeling like our quality of life is where it should be due to the high expense of everything, family support far, far away, and friends not really close by to hang with at a moments notice. And don’t get me started on the whole stroller on the subway thing. Even though this city is small, everyone is so spread out and it feels like plans to hang with friends take a year to come to fruition and being really social people, we feel like we’re missing out on something. Not to mention, we’ve been so incredibly unhappy with the school system.
So when we knew we had outgrown our apartment and our lease was coming to an end this month, we started looking in the Connecticut area for homes to rent so that Chris could still commute into the city for work. This turned into a few month nightmare, even though we were working with an awesome realtor. It was highly competitive and due to the lack of rentals in this very residential area, whenever one would go on the market the owner was flooded with applicants. Getting chosen was like finding a needle in a haystack and my stomach had been in such knots every week, waiting for good news or bad news. So I’ve been spending a lot of time praying.
Not wanting to quickly buy something in an area that we were unsure we wanted to be our forever home, we made a really big decision. And this decision is encompassing the full meaning of the word “adventure,” but also bringing a bunch of bravery into the mix.
This weekend, at the end of our lease, we will be packing our essentials into a NYC storage unit and Chris will be driving the kids and I to my parent’s for 6 months. He will stay with his mom in the city, continue to work, but has a lengthy military training in between, and then in February, we’ll all join back together in a townhouse we’ll rent in Ohio near my sister and her family (with lots of visits in between). Why? We’ll be in an area we all really enjoy and not have to worry about paying $400 a month for parking ever again. Saving some dough on rent will be great, but most importantly, we’ll be able to put all the hard earned money that we have worked so hard to save into some investments so that we can finally buy a gorgeous home in an area where we can all live our best life.
It’s all so scary and I have not been myself lately. I’ve been really absent on social media and on the blog in the last weeks that have lead to us making this decision, and now you know why. I haven’t been healthy. While I have been running each week, but I’ve been cooking all the comfort food and drinking way too much every single night and I hate the idea of being apart from Chris for 6 months. It’s almost like I have a permanent stomach bug that won’t go away. But within all of this chaos, there is a silver lining: Chris and I, my forever partner, have made yet another, big, life decision together and its liberating and amazing to know that we can get through anything – together. We’re working towards big things, hand in hand.
Once we get settled, I’ll be working a lot more to distract myself from missing Chris and (gasp!) finally get my drivers license. Branden is excited to be registered in the fall to go to school in the district that I went to. We’ll be doing everything we can to stay connected during these months apart. We’re all trying to shift our mindset and get excited about what the future has in store for us, instead of worrying about the day to day. We’re strong and will get through it.
Anytime we second guess what we’re doing or start thinking that we’re crazy, I keep repeating the words “change cannot happen unless change happens.” We’re never going to reach our goals of living in a place where the kids have a backyard to play in if we just keep renewing our lease in an apartment we hate. We’re never going to have the life that we sit and talk about almost every single night if we don’t push forward and make it happen. We only have this one life to live and the Cooper family is ready to make the most of it.
Have you ever made a really big change like this? I would love to hear your story! Comment below!
XOXO,
Allison
Best of luck!!! Change is so scary and unknown, but I bet once you get into the thick of it you are going to be so happy!
Thanks Reesa! Its going to be a bit of getting used to, but I’m happy with the decision we made!
CONGRATULATIONS!!! Being near family is so important- I wish you all the happiness in the world. You know what they say when one door closes……
Thanks Jenn! You’re always so supportive and encouraging! I think it will make the world of a difference being near family and having some help!
Congratulations and best of luck to you all! I can’t wait to follow along with your journey and adventure. xoxo
Thanks for your sweet words Margarita! How are your sweet boys? I miss you! XO
Good luck to the Cooper family! Go for it!
My only words of wisdom from times of big change in my life is that there will be hard times, even though things are exciting and new. But there are hard times no matter what, so go for it!