Moving day is upon us

We decided to break our move up into a series of steps which so far has kept the stress to a tolerable level and Clementine has responded (so far) by sounding excited about it.  We started packing back in December to get the house ready for showing, so much of the awful work of decluttering had already been done.  I've been slowly packing a box here and there everyday for the last month while we've stashed boxes of stuff in storage. The idea is to let the hired movers focus on the big stuff we can't do ourselves.

Tomorrow I'll finish packing and start moving some things to our rental.  We'll be in a rental for 2 weeks while we work on the new house (did I mention it needs a new roof, a new AC, the pool is a pond, a deep clean of the carpet, add a pool cage, fence the property... the list goes on).  We mostly are trying to stay out of the way while the AC gets installed and we scrape off large amounts of wall paper and do some painting.  The rest of the painting we're going to do ourselves to save money so we'll pick away at it one room at a time.  We'll also have the house cleaned and the carpet steam cleaned before we move in. 

Our biggest challenge now that we've created some stability in Clementine's sleep cycle will be to try to keep the momentum going... so hopefully we can keep it up at the rental until we can get settled in the new house.  She is like a different kid when she sleeps well... and when she can't sleep... just imagine the Tasmanian Devil... complete with gibberish and flailing arms!

Next Wednesday the movers will pick up our furniture and it will sit on the truck for 4 days until delivery on Sunday the 8th.  We close on this house on May 5th and hope to keep up our Cinco de Mayo tradition with friends before getting up early on Friday to close on the new house.  I already have a lot of appointments lined up for that afternoon to start assessing everything we have to do.  It'll be an exciting week!  

Since our truck of stuff will be delivered on Mother's Day we celebrated two weeks early with a day at the beach and had a lovely time... I have yet to download the photos, but here is one action shot of Wade pulling all our stuff and C on the beach (she's the blue bump in the front wagon). :)  I have also found that Clementine really likes yoga (I got her some kids yoga story books for her birthday) and she loves doing poses at random, below she's modeling Tree Pose for my mom. :)

Breathing deeply

From time to time I still get the quizzical look and have to explain why I am not on Facebook or really any other social media for that matter.  I have a few chosen blogs I read and enjoy, but largely shut out most of the internet/social media world out there.  It's just too much.  Too many strangers sharing meaningless details (that generally make me feel worse) is something I can happily avoid (the psychological toll of social media: everything they do looks so easy and perfect and fun... and I suck at everything!  No seriously, there is real research that illustrates this).

And part of why this affects me is because I am prone to depression.  Yep, there it is.  I have been through enough rounds to recognize it's symptoms (the most obvious: I stop being able to do anything creative - cook, bake, blog, take pictures, etc), but this most recent bought came under a new guise wrapped in a cute bow - Post-Partum Depression!  Hooray!  Pregnancy hormones can really do a number on a woman and the two miscarriages before our finally successful pregnancy didn't do much to help get me in a good place before Clementine's birth.  Long story short, I've been nursing post-partum depression and didn't really come to terms with that for the last year and a half.  It was coupled with not sleeping much (getting up at least 5-7 times a night since before she was born) so my poor brain didn't even have any reserves to defend against it.  Socialization is a good salve for me with depression, but tack on the fact that with a sudden shift to zero ability to socialize last summer, it was only a matter of time before I crumbled.  (C's napping shifted and her ability to get out for not much more than an 1.5hr was pretty limiting - and she would scream like a banshee if she awoke at night and I wasn't home)  I finally did crack.  By Christmas I seriously didn't even want to celebrate and we barely got a tree up in time (but we did get our first real tree that C picked).  Some of my favorite bloggers also happen to struggle with depression or anxiety and their candid ability to discuss it has been really helpful in getting me to seek help.  So I am talking about it too in case anyone else might need the same nudge and not even know it like I did.

The good news is that come January I started a holistic treatment plan that has really worked.  I still have tough days, but I can keep them in perspective now and we've also made some big life changes to help me keep balanced and ensure I get enough "me" time to be the best version of myself.  First, we finally decided to sell our house - our new family was like trying to fit a square peg into the round hole of our house - it wasn't working and no one was happy.  We're extremely excited about a fixer upper we found nearby that is on a mangrove creek (paddling whenever we want!), it has a pool, plenty of yard for growing and playing, and a floorplan just perfect for us.  We will actually be able to have other people over while Clementine sleeps!  Oh my!  It's been bittersweet selling our house, we love many things about it, but it just isn't a good fit for us anymore and we tried for all of last year to make it work (remodel plans, change of how we use the house, you name it).  We will be moving Mother's Day weekend and are equally excited and terrified because the house needs A LOT of work - the good news is that the neglect scared off most people so we could actually afford to buy it!  Haha!  Kind of like how our current house was come to think of it...

The second big change - we also just finished finally weaning Clementine and are working to sleep train her a bit so she is not so reliant on me at night.  We've managed to also improve how she goes down for a nap too which has been wonderful - we read her a book, snuggle, and she goes to sleep (mostly).  Last fall I had to start going to a chiropractor since C was getting so big that the combination of how we slept together and wearing her in the pack so much was just more than my (already sensitive) neck and shoulders could handle.  After 3 months of intensive treatment and changing sleep habits I'm finally getting back to a more normal range of motion (at its worst, I couldn't look over my should to check my blindspot while driving).

Wade also started a new job with PriceWaterhouseCoopers last month that he's enjoying and he gets to work from home a few days a week which is great, but also meant we needed a dedicated home office for him and for me when I have projects.  The last few weeks I've been working trying to save up for the remodel and we've been juggling who gets to use the desk.

And last, our picture sharing site is getting rolled into Google Photos by Google so I've been trying to adapt it and make sure everything transfers which has been a little annoying.  Please let me know if something doesn't work!  If you're still reading then I am sure you're waiting for the goods (adorable toddler photos!) and you can check out pictures with these links.

Fall 2015

Christmas

Camping for Cara's birthday at Fort Desoto

Winter/Spring 2016

Camping for our 10th wedding anniversary at Fort Desoto 

Clementine's 2nd birthday

Our little baby is officially a little girl now.  She is talking in real sentences, has an ornery sense of humor, is learning her numbers and letters, and eats more foods than I do (fermented pickles and blue cheese!).  She is only missing her last two molars and then we'll throw a real party because she is like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde when she teethes - everyone will be relieved when that phase is behind us.  This spring we've been doing an art/science exploration class, swim lessons, and a music class each week to give her a schedule and tire her out so she naps better and it seems to be working.  It's a little overwhelming, but it's also good prep for when we start her in Montessori preschool for 3 half days a week in the fall.  She still LOVES playing in the water, loves music (her music class CDs, Love Shack, the Star Wars soundtrack, or one of the songs from the Hobbit are her favorite requests), loves coloring and drawing, loves the cats, likes to entertain small crowds of people she knows, is endlessly curious, and has a surprising ability to focus when trying to learn new things.  She loves the times we've taken her camping and also enjoys paddling (she even fell asleep in the kayak!).  She can't get enough of the beach and looking for shells too.

She will also tell you her favorite movies are Finding Nemo or Star Wars depending on the day (to survive an awful bought of stomach flu we all had a few months back I had to park her on the couch with me and we had a Star Wars movie marathon which she loved.  Otherwise, we still don't watch TV but do an occasional movie on the weekend every few months for something fun.  

Clementine's 2nd birthday fell on Easter this year, so we had a little gathering the day before then went to visit my family for the usual Easter brunch.  We were happy that Wade's parents were able to make their annual Easter visit this year and be able to celebrate with us. 

Lots of change is still ahead for us and I have to remind myself to take a deep breath and pace myself.  I'm looking forward to documenting all the progress on the new house.  Clementine sort of stopped napping this winter (teething sucks) so it made it nearly impossible to get any blogging done (also a challenge since my iPad died), but it seems we've turned a corner and I might have small pockets of time again to do some blogging when I'm not trying my hand at fixing things around the new house.

Hope everyone is doing well!  I'm looking forward to having a social life again and finally fulfilling my lifelong dream of having a house with a pool. ;)  Hope we can see you all by the pool soon!