I grew up in Chicago, moved to Baltimore halfway through 6th grade and to Northern California halfway through freshman year of high school. I moved to back to Chicago for my freshman year of college until I was offered a scholarship to play volleyball in San Francisco. I moved to St. Louis after O and I were married and a few months later, moved to Virginia. I’m no stranger to moving.

I’ve never made a move with kids, though. And it’s never been as difficult to make a decision. When we moved for my dad’s job, it was official and immediate. When I moved for college, it’s plain and simple. Same goes for moving in with my husband after the wedding and moving when he was signed to the Redskins. This is the first move that was totally up to us, and that was pretty intimidating.

We have known for years we wouldn’t live here forever (you can read more about that here) but even once we finally knew it was time to leave, there was just no ‘perfect time’ to move. Since we work for ourselves and our kids aren’t in school, the freedom was almost worse than the rigid timelines. Do we move at the start of the year? Do we move in the summer when it’s better to sell our house? I quickly remembered the Lord was guiding our steps and if I’d just offer up the stress of it all, he’d graciously guide us. And he has.

The factors that played most heavily into our “move date” were the housing market and our summer travel schedule. May is a fantastic time to put your home on the market. We know there are updates to do like giving everything a fresh coat of paint and deep cleaning the exterior, but other than that our home is in great shape and we wanted to get it listed as quickly as possible. On the flip side, we realize it’s our last time living in Virginia and didn’t want to rush the time we had left here. We decided to move in January and realized May would give us enough time to organize, declutter and pack at our leisure while still enjoying our sweet friends here a bit longer.

This summer, we’re celebrating my dad’s 60th birthday a few months early in Austin, my friend and college roommate is getting married in northern California and my brother is getting married in Dallas. Flying there for all those events just wasn’t appealing at all, so we knew we wanted to be settled before they happened. One of the biggest things I kept thinking when we were struggling between moving and staying was this, “the place you’re always traveling to might be the place you should live.” Most of our travels are split between Canada and Dallas, so we knew our roots were in the wrong place!

I’m so excited to share this moving journey with you. I’ll be back with everything from packing and decluttering tips to how we plan on settling in. Thank you guys so much for your well wishes and prayers throughout this process, be sure to stay tuned!