Ode To A Home

Have you ever broken up with someone over a period of time? You know it’s coming but you just don’t have the heart to do it right now so you spend time coming up with what you don’t like about a person and why it’s for the better, etc. Then when you do it, you feel better for a split second but almost immediately feel a deep sense of regret and longing and afraid you’ve made a mistake?

That’s what moving was like for us this past month. Our house just wasn’t cutting it anymore. Two bedrooms and one bath wasn’t big enough for our growing family and the severe lack of storage space was going to be almost impossible to deal with when we have two babies. So, we found another place, slightly smaller square footage, but three bedrooms, two baths, and more closets than you can shake a stick at!

We had to sign the lease on the new place almost a full month before our lease was up on the old house, so we had no choice but to drag out the breakup. That’s a lot of time to think about why you want to break up.

The fact that you could see daylight between the wall and the floor in our bedroom.
The doors that don’t actually close.
The two closets in the entire house.
The neighbors across the street (when my mom visited, she asked if it was a halfway home. Seriously.)
The sinking spots in the floor.
The fact that one side of the house was always on fire while the other side was freezing.
The water that sat under our bedroom for 2.5 years until the landlords replaced the pipes.
The gas stove that only had three working burners.
The staircase in the back that only was touching the ground on one pole (not dangerous at all, right?)

You get the idea? I had a list a mile long of why this breakup was a good thing.

Then moving day came, and all I could think of was

This is the house where I got all three of my positive pregnancy tests

The house where we said hello and goodbye to our Thomas Kitty

The house where we hosted our first Thanksgiving as a married couple

The house where we parked our first new car

The house where I got the middle of the night call that my grandfather passed away

The house where my feet got h-u-g-e

The house where we weathered a hurricane

The house where we brought Marion home

The house where I learned to love more than I ever knew I was capable of loving

The house where we learned how much fun Christmas is with children

Even if the child wasn’t having so much fun

The house where we learned to appreciate sleep

The house where we had a Texan (which I still can’t believe our baby was born in TEXAS!)

The house with the fantastic back yard

The house where someone learned to be naughty

The house of learning to crawl

The house of learning to stand

The house where a father celebrated his first father’s day

The house of a first birthday

The house of, well, this one really speaks for itself

The house of teaching the next generation how to be a fan

The house of chunky little mosquito bitten toddler legs

The house of first arts and crafts projects

The house of first snowfalls (thanks to a well timed visit of Gigi from Alaska)

The house of learning how much fun it is to help mama in the kitchen

And dada with his bike

The house of a first pair of boots

It was more than a house, it was our home, and despite the fact that it is (to use the classic break up line) “for the best,” we’re sad to say goodbye.