So, This is North Carolina

I really thought I had posted before now, but it turns out I didn't! I'm sure I remember sitting down and writing something out...  Well, clearly this is just more evidence of my brain not quite managing to keep up with all the details in my life I found so easily manageable before we started our relocation. I probably complained back then too, but now I know I should have appreciated how much easier it was to keep track of things when you're settled.

So, when last I left you, I had the big move in front of me. What a bizarre series of events that ended up being! The movers showed up, but the main guy had (for some bizarre reason) underestimated the help he would need. That was the start of things going wrong. It really started going sideways when the driver couldn't navigate the truck correctly and ended up sinking about 10 inches into the wet ground in our front yard:

He had to call a wrecker to pull him out, because he was in DEEP. This left HUGE gouges in the yard, and he managed to slaughter one of my special big trees flanking my driveway:

That gouge is wider than my hand, and you can see where we had to cut the huge limb off, which made up about half the tree.

gouges and such in the lawn, off the driveway

My husband and I spent time going to a nursery and getting grass sod and tree tape, and trying to save the tree and repair the ground. This made me irrationally sad. Sad, maybe angry, is an appropriate response, but I was a bit beyond the norm with overwhelming feelings of leaving in the first place and remembering when we planted these trees, and, well... *sigh*

Now, the movers were hired to pack, load our stuff, and move it. I started helping a bit with some boxes and what I could as I realized they were falling way behind. WAY behind. The movers were supposed to be done in the early afternoon on July 2nd. We were then supposed to clean the house and get a good night's sleep and then leave on July 3rd at 5AM for our 15 hour drive to NC. However, by 3AM on July 3rd the movers still had a while to go and then gave up and went to bed. I don't fault them for going to get some rest, I fault them for not telling us that they had and we stayed up an extra 45 minutes before falling asleep on the floor.

Long story short, they finally got out of there after noon on the 3rd, and leaving us with a box of trash that they said they were going to take. A sort of last "Screw you" from them, I think. For the record, I never yelled, got mean, or even demanding. I pitched in where I could, and so on. It was just an ugly situation overall.

And then we drove. We got going over seven hours past when we were supposed to, and we knew we had to drive the whole thing through because hotels all said NO to the four of us, two dogs, a cat, and a rabbit. Even worse, it was a holiday weekend. So, on about two hours of sleep, my husband and I took turns driving straight through. We finally got into town around 3AM on the 4th of July, and we were so tired, we were literally poking each other in the shoulder to stay awake and not drive off the road. It was kind of scary, actually.

Lily thought the trip was great fun, at first. The rest of the animals were less excited than her.

This was not a good beginning to our move. I kept reminding myself that we were moving for better schools, cheaper colleges, more opportunities, and a bigger studio space (OK, that last one is purely selfish, but it's on my list!)

Since then, we've been living temporarily in an apartment while our house is being built.

Our first visit to the house when we got here. My husband has been living here since October and I've been doing the single parent thing up in Vermont. He'd been coming here often, but for the kids and I it was the first time. The kids could really only see wood, sticks... this becoming their house is a surreal concept.

I have to tell you it's been very strange doing the apartment-thing after so long. I last lived in an apartment in Chicago about 19 years ago. In some ways, even though I know it's temporary, it feels like back-tracking. No one is happy here. I can't fault the kids for feeling unhappy. We don't even have most of our things. A normal conversation is "Where is my..." "It's in storage, with everything else... sorry!" I don't even have shoes beyond flip-flops and a pair of cheap sneakers I bought so I can use the apartment gym. I was supposed to, but they all got snagged by accident by the movers. Nature of the beast, I suppose!

We had originally planned to take some family trips before school started, make this a fun and wonderful summer, but instead we had trouble figuring out what to do with the dogs and my daughter made Varsity Cheerleading so her practices started almost immediately tying us to the local area. I have immense guilt over this, as this is her last summer really with us, since she's a senior. They both miss their friends, too. While my daughter has made a few already, my son hasn't met anyone yet. (I'm hoping when school starts next week he'll meet some amazing people and be happy and excited about it. *crossing fingers*)

We did finally make it to a local lake-beach. At least that's something.

I just have "I'm a sucktastic mother" feelings going on because I pulled the kids away from their friends and didn't manage to take them anywhere fun, like we had promised (for example, we were going to drive or fly to Orlando and visit Universal Studios, but it turns out with the long drive and current schedule demands, we can't seem to make that work at all.) Normally, our summers are filled with catching fireflies and bonfires and friends. This year has been staying in an apartment and not really doing anything at all. I think I really underestimated the time I would need to make things happen.

We're STILL waiting to sell the house in Vermont. We got word that a few people are interested in the property just this past weekend, so we're hopeful! (cross your fingers for us! We need good thoughts!) So many moving parts and things still need to come together. It's funny really, because there is a part of me that just wants to go home to Vermont. Not sell the house, and just go back. That ship has sailed, of course, but it's there. I think the thing I miss most is the peace and quiet with beautiful views. I have none of that here. (It's almost the anti-Vermont. Almost. I think the total anti-Vermont would be Phoenix... ha!) It's sorta quiet where we're building, but with this being a suburban area, views are just not on the table for anyone.

I miss this:

This picture seems to represent every single thing that is missing in my life right now.
It actually makes me tearful. I took it right before we moved, from our deck.

I will say that on a general basis people do seem nicer. They also are far more inclined to chat than anyone was in Vermont. I still haven't made any friends, however. I think there just hasn't been any real opportunity. I'm actually not quite sure how to go about doing that. I got quite rusty living like a hermit in Vermont, so I'm not quite sure what to do with myself!

I'll address the art front in a later post. This one became far too long as it is, even though I have left so many things out! My sincere hope is that by Christmas all of this stress will have settled. The house will be sold in Vermont, the house will be settled into here in NC (the studio will be cranking away!)