This Past Week in List Format and an Ode to Ibuprofen

Last weekend my husband, 2 kids, and I moved almost the entire contents of one storage unit and a townhome to our new house. Such an exciting time for our family, but also a super exhausting week. I have compiled this list of sorts so that down the road we can laugh about all of the stuff we had to do this week (at least I hope we think this is funny down the road, right now we are just exhausted.)

1. Load moving van twice with contents of townhome
2. Unload one very large storage unit into moving van, frequent trips up and down stairs.
3. Took ibuprofen
4. A trip to townhome to pick up more things
5. More ibuprofen
6. Basketball practice
7. Unpacking and cleaning new house
8. Choir concert
9. Another trip to townhome to pick up more things
10. More ibuprofen
11. Morning choir rehearsal
12. Another townhome trip
13. Ibuprofen
14. Bought a Christmas tree
15. Tried to put up lights, realized most are broken, now need to get more lights
16. Realized dishwasher in new home is broken-seriously?
17. More unpacking
18. Started addressing holiday cards
19. Still waiting on a few addresses and time to finish cards
20. Called five stores to find more white twinkle lights (everyone is out.)
21. Another trips to townhome
22. More ibuprofen
23. Called seven more stores (no white twinkle lights)
24. Trip to Target to buy socks for kids-cannot locate any of their socks, way to many boxes still need to be unpacked
25. Bought more Christmas presents
26. Packed up Elliot for his trip to Washington State
27. Unpacking new house
28. More ibuprofen
29. Hand washing all dishes, groan.
30. Another trips to townhome
31. Ibuprofen again
32. Baked cookies
33. Edited photos and had printed
34. Worked on a scrapbook layout
35. Edited photos of layout
36. Spent way too long locating Christmas presents, finally gave up for the day.
37. Wrapped Elliot's Christmas presents
38. More hand washing of dishes
39. Celebrated Christmas with Elliot
40. Watched Dinosaurs with Ibuprofen chaser
41. Took Elliot to airport
42. Drove to the wrong store two times before I found the right store that had white twinkle lights (wasted three hours.)
43. Brought twinkle lights home-still all not on tree
44. Another trip to townhome
45. More ibuprofen
46. Spent all day yesterday, cleaning, packing up, prepping, and painting townhome
47. Located rest of Christmas presents!
48. Fell into bed and finally fell asleep
49. Today's agenda-unload van from yesterday's trip, clean house and unpack some boxes in our bedrooms, pickup downstairs of house, dishes, finish getting last items from townhome and turn in keys-FINALLY!!! Basketball practice, decorate tree and house for Christmas, more cleaning
50. Tomorrow-clean entire house, finish unpacking last of boxes in house or put in garage what do not need now, wash all bedding, and clothes, prep rooms for guests, decorating, Christmas cards, pickup family at airport at 8pm.  Good thing we wake up at 6am and the kids will be our of my hair tomorrow day. Think a jumbo sized cup of coffee is in order.

Almost to the home stretch, thank goodness, I can do this, almost there!

I will go back to posting on a regular basis (of the scrappy variety) once the holidays are over, but for now, I will be cleaning, or unpacking, visiting with family, baking, or something else of that nature.

Happy Sunday! Thanks for listening.

xoxox

Toni

December, currently.

Waking up at 2:30 am, full of excitement to move all of our furniture to our new home.
Wishing that I could fall back asleep.
Chuckling at the thought that my mom and I both cannot sleep when we are excited.
Dreaming of having all of the boxes unpacked and my kitchen organized.
Listening to Isabelle sleeping beside me.
Hearing the fan turn on, circulating heat throughout our townhome.
Avoiding running into boxes as I pad slowly across the carpet.
Seeing lots of items left to pack, but also super impressed with the progress we have made thus far.
Realizing that this will be my last night in this home.
Praying in thanks for this tremendous blessing.
Anticipating a very long day today.
Imagining my cup of coffee in the morning.
Smelling the beans, adding vanilla Coffeemate, and almost tasting that first delicious sip.
Exciting that my parents, nephew, and cousin will be here to spend the holidays with us.
Thinking that I wish I could pack more right now, but I don't want to wake anyone up.
Preparing myself for some disagreements between the kiddos tomorrow.
Hoping that they will get along better today than yesterday.
Contemplating what I want to unpack and organize each day in the upcoming week.
Wishing I had time to work on my December Daily album or any scrapbooking right now.
Going to find a way to carve in some time everyday next week to get my craft on.
Browsing Home Depot online to find a lightbulb changing pole extender thingy.
Discovering that it is called a "pole lightbulb extension kit."
Focusing on my breathing, taking long deep breaths.
Smoothing my duvet cover and blanket.
Adjusting my pillows and Sheldon, the pillow pet that Isabelle brought to bed with us tonight.
Trying to figure out what to do since I am wide awake.
Deciding on watching the new Vampire Diaries on Hulu Plus.
Finishing typing up this post.

So thankful, so very thankful to have a home again. I have missed our Washington house these past 18 months in our Raleigh townhome. So thankful to have great tenants taking care of our first house. So thankful to be moving to our second house and that I adore it more than our first. So thankful for great mortgage rates and VA loans. So thankful to have a garage again and all of our extra items out of our storage unit.

So very, very thankful. So thankful for this leap of faith, and job opportunity for my husband in another state. So thankful that the Lord continues to provide for our little family. So thankful that we can do all of this with me staying home with the kids.

Washington house 2003-2011 (photo taken 10 / 08.) Currently a rental property

 Townhome rental, Raleigh, NC June 16, 2011-December 9, 2012. (Photo taken 11/ 12)

Rolesville, NC, new house. Present day. (Photo taken 11/ 12.) 

Thank you reader for taking the time to stop by my blog, I appreciate you!

Happy Sunday!

xoxox

Toni