Moving Sucks?

Nothing witty in that title...nope! Moving does suck. And unfortunately, I or should I say we, have become very close to the subject over the past 3 years. I even said the other day, Emma (our littlest duckling) has lived in 3 homes in her life.....well folks...she's 3 so you do the math. So yes, we are very familiar with this topic - MOVING! See for us its always a pack a little here and pack a litle there in the weeks prior to moving day for for the most part we "crash-pack" the day before. Oh yes friends, its so much funner that way. NOT! But its how we do it in the Allen house.

So why 3 moves in 3 years you ask? Well let me tell you. There was 2 1/2 lovely years in our original home that we hand picked from the rental ads. This lovely beast came well equipped with a pool, spa and perfect landscaping. This was the home where it all started. Our lives were now his, hers and ...well...."ours" was on the way. We found out we were pregenant the week we moved in. We considered buying this house. It did have everything we wanted you know. BUT......our instincts kicked in and so did the fact that we were planning a wedding and having a baby so why throw another big deed in the mix. So we passed. THANKG GOD we did! What would have cost us $630,000 would turn out to be worth $340,000 just 2 years later. Morale of that story my friends? Follow your instincts !

So enter economic spiral. Yes...this house was too much to take on at this point. And with a not-so-toddler-friendly-pool right off the back sliding doors? It was time to find a home that had no chance of our most recent pride and joy becoming a victim to. Good thing...because she learned how to open doors
THAT WEEK! Oh yes......that leads us to house #2.

So house number 2. Well, apparently 2700 square feet wasn't enough that we now needed 3300 square feet. We were paying less however if you can beleive that. This house was on a cute little cul-de-sac with a walking trail that ran next to it. It was big and it was beautiful and it was apparently a haven for black widows and brentwood beetles. OH MY GAWD!!!! Where do these valley critters come from. Oh yeah...it's the valley....duh! We had no idea until we sprayed the place and you could see these things scatter. (yes my friends another reason why I just couldn't fall in love this this town). Now see, back to our little one opening doors. As we unpacked on that second day of moving in, a neighbor knocks on our door. As I thought to myself "wow they have a welcome committee here", I opened the door to greet our new neighbors only to have her ask me "do you have a little girl?" Confused we ran outside only to see little Emma in all her glory coming around the corner with another neighbor. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? How in the world did this happen. Yes folks, lesson #1 in Your Toddler Can Open Doors. Can't let that happen again. Oh but just wait.

Now we are all moved in, kids rooms look cute as a button, the "room under the stairs" is now a playroom big enough to accomodate a preschool class and the energy is just beaming. Well see...the energy did "beam" you know. Our PG&E bills now surpassed our car payments each month. OUCH! Thats right, lets play a little game called How-Much-Does-It-Take-To-Heat/Cool-Your-House. Well...actually lets not. Thats a painful memory. So skip ahead a couple of weeks. The house is quiet, Daddy is playing his new favorite game Call of Duty and I am probably cleaning something (cuz thats what I do). See at this point the house is too quiet. "Where's Emma" I ask. "Isn't she upstairs?" is the husbands response. Well....we checked rooms, all 5 of them, we checked kitchen cabinets, we checked the "playroom" ...NO EMMA! I have never felt so much panic in my life. No one could have come into the house and taken her, to my knowledge there were no alien abductions in that neighborhood in previous months, so what in the world happended to her. The front door was closed tight and the back door was locked. So we decided to look outside. Now see we lived on a cul-de-sac where is should be bustling with kids on their bikes and grown ups mowing the lawns (which I seemed to have forgotten that you don't see that all that often in HOA neighborhoods..its done for them) and there was nobody outside. All I could hear was the Indy 500 going on in my head...my thoughts were racing. I saw another set of neighbors across the street down 3 houses sitting on their porch. Yes I remember the exact placement, you would too if you were a little OCD and your kid was missing. I asked the neighbors if they saw a little girl and "oh you mean this one?" Oh my god.....REALLY?! Lesson # 2 in Your Toddler Can Open Doors AND Get To Know Your Neighbors. Scary thing is that they found Emma coming back into the cul-de-sac from the walking path and thought she was from another neighborhood and called the cops. Do you think I felt like a bad parent? Well....lets just say I felt like CPS would be making the next house call.

So 3300 square feet was too big after all. We needed to downsize - EVERYTHING! Especially our utility bills. So enter house #3. I call it the "temporary". We knew only one year here and back to pleasanton. And here we are....packing day. Tomorrow is moving day and I am exhausted and excited. Its time to end commuting as we have known it for 4 years. Its time for a fresh start.