Going Back Home

When last I popped in, it was June in North Carolina. It was hot, humid, and just icky. I have to say it's a wonderful relief to sit here and tell you that there is a cool, crisp breeze outside and it'll be getting down to the low 40's tonight. If we were in NC still, that kind of weather would cause an all out panic (which makes me giggle a little, I admit.)

We have relocated back to Vermont!

This has been a very interesting experience, going back. When I left, I was angry. I felt like I had been driven out with the cost of living, solar panels going up all around us (a neighbor had a huge field of them go up on two sides of her property, and there wasn't a thing she or the town could do about it.) I was upset about the cost of college for my kids, and the thought that there was nothing they'd be able to do for work here. When given a second chance to rethink our relocation to NC at the last minute, we wavered, but in the end we decided it was the right thing to do to leave VT. I was convinced I was never going back.

I think a lot of my anger stemmed from the fact that when we first moved here, we thought that was it! Vermont was where we would retire, and everything would be wonderful! It wasn't - there were some negative/strange interactions that I let affect me, lots of hitches and snags (although, surmountable, had I tried harder), and in the end I think I just felt betrayed that I had to leave for my kids' future, when I thought I would be staying forever.

Life's lessons come in some funny forms. This one for me was a pretty big lesson. North Carolina was the biggest mistake we ever made. I won't go into the why's and what happened, because most of it is intensely personal. I think it's enough to say that it was life changing, and perspective altering. Your priorities shift on some major levels when things get really, really bad.

The opportunity came up for us to move back, and we realized how much we actually wanted to. On some level, I was aware that it was likely we were yearning for the life we had before some truly horrible things happened to us... and that's delusional, because you don't get to go backwards. I look back now, and realize that we really did love the land and we should have tried to find other solutions. Some things have also shifted and it turns out that what my children want to do IS supported here; there is a real path forward. Some things haven't shifted, but we have solutions now. Being aware of all of that, we were able to make the decision in a balanced way, and we chose to go home. 

I thought I would have to eat a lot of crow, having left in such a huff. But do you know, the only person who snapped back at me is someone who isn't even from Vermont at all? Instead, the people here welcomed me back with warmth and caring - leaving me practically tearful with gratitude. We were lucky enough to move back to our same town, which wasn't something we even tried to do (in VT, that's pretty tricky because the housing market is not such that you pick the town you want to live in, but rather that you look for a house that will work and THEN discover what town you will be living in.) That means the community we left is still mostly here, and that has been a huge blessing.

We have gone from a shiny "perfect" house in NC, to a house that needs a LOT of work - the kitchen is from the 1980's and my son cracked me up when he confessed to being afraid to use the oven because it's all dials and the only way to tell the temperature is an actual gauge you set inside on the rack (yeah, the kitchen is on our renovate list first, right after replacing the 25 year old boiler that's making really scary sounds right now!) But a big, shiny, perfect house doesn't mean anything if it doesn't feel like home. When I got here, I felt like I could breath after three years of holding my breath. I never relaxed in NC, but I did here, even in the midst of a crazy move.

My new backyard is about 100 acres, and this is the view from my new studio (it has a little balcony) and this is my husband (just celebrated our 23rd anniversary!) who is also thrilled beyond belief to be back

I wake up every morning and there are deer, and often a "rafter" of turkeys (no idea why they don't just call it a flock.) I have squirrels, and birds, and breezes that flow through my OPEN windows, and cool crisp air that smells of honey and clover. I have quiet, and butterflies, and I have peace. It took a bad turn to realize we really did need to be back, and it has been a lot of work - will continue to be a lot of work on multiple levels, but I really feel like we're on the right path for the first time in a long time.

sunset, in our backyard a week ago

I also have two new fluffy members of the family! We just adopted them a few days ago and are in the process of slowly introducing them to the other animals in the house. Meet Merlin:

and Stratus:

They're total snuggle-bugs, small kittens (especially compared to Socrates who is about 10 times their size) and they also like watching Disney movies.

Merlin and Stratus, snuggled up with me

Side note: I found a bathrobe covered in shiny silver stars!

I think I only have two new paintings to share, even though so much time has passed since I last wrote. The first is a painting that is currently on the Liberty Orchard's Halloween box!

"Halloween Kittens" 9x12 inches, acrylic on canvas, sold

The ad from Liberty Orchards

The next painting is the second in my Favorite Things series:

"Georgette" 6x8 inches, acrylic on canvas, available 

I have my kitchen unpacked, and my studio completely unpacked. That's it. The rest of the house is in complete disarray. I'll get there with the rest of the house, but I am ready to start painting again.

I tried working on an in-progress piece - but I feel out of sync. So, I think like after not exercising for a while, I need to warm up and do some smaller, faster work to get back into my groove. I'm going to try to do daily paintings again, at least for a little while, to break in my new studio area! Hopefully, I'll have a lot more to share, and check in more often!

Things may still be hard right now, but there is light. There is positivity. I didn't expect any of these turns, and I'm as surprised as anyone else that this is where I sit tonight... but I'm oh, so glad that this is where I am. Home.

Where Are Those Sleigh Bells?

Hey, look! It's December!

I can't believe it's December though. I mean, I know I said it was, but it really feels like October in Vermont, compared with December in North Carolina. Although, I hear it's been weirdly warm back in Vermont, so perhaps not all that different right now.

When last I checked in on my moving saga, I was stuck in the temporary apartment, but thinking the house was going to be done soon. That would have been nice, but instead the builder delayed our closing all the way out until mid-October. We lost the apartment in September (when the short-lease was up, and they said SURE! They'd be happy to extend it... for $4,000 a month. I kid you not.) So, we ended up putting everything in storage and staying at my parents' townhouse for a few weeks. Sleeping on the floor is not as easy as it once was, I think. Or maybe it's never easy.

We finally closed on the house, and moved in. It was a long, and difficult process even then. I know moving is always hard, I just don't remember it being this difficult. As a parent, I feel like I'm just letting my children down left and right. I know it's not really my fault... but it feels that way.

One very positive side is that I have my studio! Now, the movers, when they didn't want or know where to put certain boxes decided to just dump them all in my studio. So, I didn't get to really set things up the way I would have liked. However, I've worked through about 85% of the boxes now and I have been able to paint some. It's not comfortable yet, and I haven't found everything, but that's a start!

This is my newest painting, from sketch to finish:

The theme was "Winter Wonderland"

"Snowshoe" 9x12, oil on stretched canvas (Available)

Not only am I on a HUGE elephant kick, like this one before it:

"Somnium" 16x20, acrylic on canvas panel  (SOLD)

But I've also FINALLY been able to switch back over to oils. That's something I have been planning to do for a long time, but I knew the move would ruin oil paintings, so I held back.

This is another new painting:

"Candy" 9x12, oil on loose canvas (SOLD)

Candy was really more of an experiment. I had something I needed to paint for, but I wanted to dip back into my oils. So, this was my toe back into the oil-water, so to speak.

I've been feeling that my style is getting ready to grow, and make a bit of a jump. I think that now that I am in my house, that I will finally be able to let that happen. I feel a little like I want to barricade myself, stay off the computer and just paint for a few months. I don't know how to allow that to actually happen without shooting my business in the foot, however. My hope is that once I get the studio (and house) straightened out, that I will feel more relaxed about painting and it'll all just start flowing like I know it wants to.

On a side note, I ended up test ordering some pillows with my art on them, and they came out so cool!

I ended up selling a bunch, as a one time offer. The problem is that they're cost prohibitive for me. They seem very popular and are probably something I should stock when I do another art fair, but I need to find a cheaper way to make them. Anyone know any good wholesaler pillow/fabric type of businesses?

Well, anyway... Today, as I was looking up foxes for a new painting, I realized I hadn't checked in at all on here for a very long time! I'm going to do better with that!

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!)

Looking For Normal

Wow, it's been weeks since I posted. I would love to report that I've been working on art, but I haven't. Getting my house ready for the market was far more work than anticipated, and I've been simply buried in house projects since I last checked in. My parents did move out in of my basement in that time as well, but left their cat with us. It was very helpful to get my house reduced back down to just us. I simply couldn't even think straight with all the extra chaos in the house.

But it's done. We're done. The house is officially live on the market.

Now that we're finally settled and just ready to show, I can finally start working again. No more false starts, but actual working! I just have to be really careful about where I work and how messy things get. Oh, and I also found out that the movers won't touch my paints. This is frustrating, so I'm trying to figure out a workaround, but there doesn't seem to be one. UPS said they probably would accept mailing any water based paints, but any oils (of which, I have a lot) any aerosols, any fixatives, anything else not solely water based and with any sort of chemical composition is out. You see, you have to be licensed to ship them... but not to receive them. That's why you can order paint online and get it, but you could never send anyone paint yourself.

*grr*

So once we get to move, it looks like I'll have to pack my car high with art supplies and drive myself there over a day or two rather than have my car moved and being there in a few hours of flight instead. I know there are people who love road trips, I'm simply not one of them though. I get car sick even when I'm driving, plus I'll be worried about the changing conditions on my supplies (too hot? too cold?)

All these little logistical things are driving me crazy and making me very unhappy. I could deal with those, if we could just get the house under contract, I think.

But in the meantime, it's back to actual art work! Well, in a day or two. My husband surprised me with taking today and tomorrow off, because it's our 19th wedding anniversary!

It's hard to believe that it was 20 years ago out on a date with my then boyfriend that I got this in my fortune cookie (and I saved it! Good thing too, because otherwise no one would believe me.)

We met, total fluke after having mutual friends for five years and never meeting. We started dating. We were engaged six weeks later (yes, I know, if my kids did this I would probably have a stroke.) We were married 14 months from the day we met (and the only reason we waited that long was because we up and moved from Colorado to Chicago, so we had the transition to deal with as well as planning a wedding.)

19 years later, and here we are! Hard to believe how fast the time goes!

Off to paint... eventually!

An Adventure

I fear that I am yet again not accomplishing much from my studio, but I will say that great plans are starting to fall into place for it! I fully intend on getting back to my Queen of Hearts now that my work for Thrice Fiction is finished with this last piece:

"Lotus" 9x12 inch, acrylic on studio painting board. Available in my Etsy Surreal Shop.

I actually wasn't sure about this piece, but by the end I was in love with it. My daughter really likes it. It's one of those pieces that if it doesn't sell, it may mysteriously show up in my daughter's room. My art that she likes tend to magically show up there when I'm not looking (actually, my son will sneak a few pieces here and there too.)

On the Alice in Wonderland front, not only is my plan to work hard on my Queen of Hearts (who has now officially been reserved, but prints will be made eventually), but there are also plans in the work for the White Queen (who lived backwards) as a companion piece, and little paintings like the "eat me" tea cakes and so on. I'm nearing the end of the series, but I see a few more coming. I may not be painting much physically right now, but there is a lot going on internally in my mental studio! (I know that sounds wrong, but go with me on it. I paint many paintings in my head before they ever show up in reality!)

As I said in my last post, the move is on for North Carolina! That's all well and good, but there is a lot that needs to happen in order for us to get there. We're going on a trip to find a new house. At the top of my list is a REAL studio space! My husband is all on board, I imagine due to my studio here sprawling out over all levels of the house. The tiny bedroom upstairs that initially housed my entire studio doesn't even hold all my supplies at this point. Wedging myself in it to paint is near impossible! With my parents living with us temporarily, I've even pulled my painting back from the kitchen table to my bedroom. Neither are good places, but it's what has to happen in the chaos!

Anyway, I'm looking forward to looking at homes with a true eye to a good creative space! It's all very exciting! After we get back, my parents should be relocating within a week or two, and then things will settle down some. I can't move until the house here sells, and so I'll just be working on my studio projects and biding my time. It's actually a good thing I have work to focus on.

In fact, I've been perusing my unfinished pieces. There are a LOT, and I think I'm going to work on finishing them in between working on the queen (it's a sort of break, even though you're still working.) I'm not sure what to work on first, but I have some options:

The top left is the acrylic dragon/girl piece I was doing for autumn last year. The top right is actually in oils and I was doing a painting time-lapse of it. There are to be two castles, both crystalline/impressionist and one black and one white (white and night, black in the day) with lightning in between the two. The bottom left was my Christmas one from last year that I didn't finish on time as my Christmas card, but I'd like to finish it for this year's then. I wanted to paint a new Christmas painting every year! The last is a surreal landscape, with a big tree.

I have no idea why I wandered away from any of these. It's not as if there was a huge distance to go on them. I never used to do this. I would work on one piece and finish it, then move onto the next. Now, I have oodles of unfinished work... how did that happen?

Stasis

You'll be happy to know that the only person who got a stomach ache from my husband deciding to eat three-week-old-leftovers was me. I don't understand why men could eat the bark off a tree, lick a poison frog, and then roll in a barn without even causing the slightest quiver in their stomachs while the mere suggestion of any of those things turns me a quite unbecoming shade of green. While we're on the topic of men, I also don't understand why men can just consider losing weight and drop five pounds instantly while the same result requires a month of serious effort on my part. Just makes me want to slap the lot of you men. Love you, and all, but slap you just the same. *wink*

My ankle is still sprained, and my doctor floated the possibility that I actually fractured it, but since I was doing better I got to put off x-rays unless I fail to make reasonable progress. It's almost been a month (well, maybe just over three weeks, but it feels like a month) and I'm fair to going stir crazy not being able to go running as I normally do (and eating far too much, hence the five pounds commentary earlier.) I have been working, however.

I finished up a couple more pieces for the very shortly upcoming issue of Thrice Fiction Magazine (it's a free read digitally.) I wasn't able to participate in the last issue because I was overbooked with work, but I'm glad they gave me another shout this issue. As it involved snow, and we got a surprise four inches of the stuff after a lovely 80 degree day before that, it all sort of fit. I had a lot of fun changing how I do falling snow as well. I have done dots with the brush and a few other methods, but I think my favored one now is loading the brush with slightly watered down white, holding it about 6 inches from the surface, and then finger-flicking the brush with my other hand.

The first painting with the window is all flicked snow/stars, the cup is masking and flicking when I was undecided. Flicking it is, from here on out!

"The Window" 9x9 inches, watercolor and acrylic on 140lbs hot-pressed professional watercolor paper. Iridescent paint on moon and mirror/window frame. Available for purchase

"Fill It Up" 5x6 watercolor & acrylic on 140lbs hot-pressed professional watercolor paper.  Available for purchase.

Once I got those pieces done for the magazine, I needed to transition back over to my Alice painting (which is taking forever, and is entirely my own fault.) So, I did a quick (mostly quick) girl, another one for the "emotions" online open auction on facebook.

"Blue" 5x7 inches, watercolor & acrylic.Will be up for auction on Monday on Facebook at The Rabbit Hole Artist Collective

I was going with just black hair, but then it simply wasn't enough. So, I amped it up with blue and aqua highlights in iridescent paint, and it still wasn't enough. Finally I added the tattoos, and I liked it much better. One thing I really don't like about watercolors is that the skin features really wash out in a photograph. In person, it's a lot smoother and more even. The camera often picks up areas the eye simply doesn't see in reality and misses others. It's been very frustrating. At least it doesn't do that with acrylics and oils!

I haven't made much progress on my restructuring because we're still flailing about in the wind over whether we're moving or not. We've said yes to the offer, and yet it's been six weeks without any solid movement. I'm completely paralyzed personally and professionally, and that's been very difficult to work with. There has been some hope that we'll hear something on Monday, so I'm crossing my fingers. I can't exist in this stasis any longer.

I'm going to be focusing on my Queen, and trying to think about what my options are if I continue to be stuck. Making my current painting my priority will help, I hope!

Moving Forward

The time out worked, and I was finally able to finish this piece:

"By the Light" 18x12, watercolor & acrylic on 140lbs hot-pressed paper

It's a big piece, and I realize that I should have probably done it on a canvas. But, it had originally been intended as an all watercolor piece. I think I'm more of a canvas worker. Or really, a board one too - I'm keen to try those. I've ordered them, I just haven't done anything on them yet.

I do have a lot in the works though. My next project is to complete several ACEO's for an online auction on Monday, I have three paintings I need to do for an upcoming issue of Thrice Fiction Magazine that the art editor requested - one of which dovetails a bit with another one I was toying with, I'm going to see if I can't kill two birds with one stone on that, and I need to get back to my queen of hearts. Tons to do, and I realize I miss working on my larger pieces. I need to stop focusing on the little stuff so much, and really focus on the bigger pieces that make me feel more fulfilled.

It's hard to focus on much of anything when you feel complete pulled in 100 different directions though. My daily art just hasn't happened. I've been trying to just keep my head above water with everything happening. For example, last night we got one more green light on our potential move. We're now waiting for the last one, and if we get that? It's game on. Full speed, trying to sell our house and move states in under three months. Crazy. That's what that is!

Time-Out

I've been working steadily on my Secret Garden painting, and I'm down to just painting in the unicorn and some fireflies:

One would think this would be simple to finish off, but it's actually not. I'm having issues with the unicorn's mane, and I think it's probably my attitude, and not the painting itself. I had to put myself into time-out today. I had to make myself walk away instead of making myself finish the piece.

I've been having trouble focusing for a while now, because things are kind of getting wild here at home. In addition to not having a single week without a child home sick in over a month, I'm facing a potential move to North Carolina. But nothing is set. So, it's a maybe. A HUGE maybe, but a maybe nonetheless. I have no control over the outcome (a job position was offered, we said yes, but as it's a position within the current company there are a lot of hoops and other things that have to be settled, and so many things could happen to make this NOT happen.) Having no control over my own path makes me a bit grumpy.

I've played with the realtor-thing, looking at houses online, but deep down I know this is a colossal waste of my time if this doesn't pan out. Plus, if this does happen, I'll have a short period of time to figure out our situation here with our current house, a VERY large to-do list, of which I can do none of because I don't know if it's happening. I have this urgency to get things rolling one way or another, and I'm completely hog-tied instead.

It's very frustrating having no control or influence, and simply being at the whim of others. I thought throwing myself into my work would help, but it hasn't, and instead I'm finding myself increasingly distracted and frustrated (even angry) and that does not yield positive results. So, for my time, I really only have a few more ACEOs and the in progress piece above to show. A disappointing yield, to be sure.

There was another, but I completely ruined it. *head*desk*

I also haven't been hammering at my Queen of Hearts, for fear I'll ruin her in my current state. Unfortunately, this coming week looks to be just as stressful, so I'm not sure where things will end up.

I need a vacation. Or maybe just a direction. That would sure be lovely!

Itchy Feet

I really thought that I would finally be getting back into the swing of things in the studio once the kids got back into school. Unfortunately, my husband reminded me that he had a forced vacation the entire Labor Day week, and then my son came down with some sort of stomach bug.

To be fair, I suppose I should have seen the stomach bug coming. Back to school, if you have kids you know this, is filled with buying pencils and paper, and everyone getting sick for the first couple of months. Its inevitable. The children are just walking petri dishes waiting to unleash their biological warfare upon one another. I guess I just secretly hoped that since my youngest just started Junior High (7th grade), that this would be behind us.

*sigh*

The forced vacation my husband had to take (the company is forcing employees to burn their vacation time) is at a bad time because he's also coaching for the local high school and the children are obviously in school, so really we cannot go anywhere fun and he has obligations by 2 PM. That means we are here, and here means house projects. Lots and lots of house projects.

Instead of painting.

Yesterday, I dug holes for trees and shrubs. Even with gloves, I have blisters all over my hands. I am glad they're planted though!

We also went and looked at some houses that are on the market. For a while we thought that maybe we needed to totally change where we live, move states perhaps? That looks to be unfeasible at this time, so we thought that perhaps we don't need to change everything. Maybe we just need to change the here and now.

The truth is that we've outgrown our house. It isn't a small abode, but it's... crowded. Rooms just need to be a couple of feet bigger (especially the bedrooms, the poor kids. But even our bedroom doesn't have enough room.) I need more space in the kitchen. And when it comes to my studio? Forget it! The studio space is just storage for my studio, with things crammed in every corner. I've been painting in my kitchen or living room, or even on my bed. There simply is NO space here anymore.

This was a good house when we moved in with an almost 3-year-old and another on the way, me just being mom. Now, I have essentially two teenagers, and TWO businesses. Don't even get me started on the pets (three dogs, two rabbits, one giant cat, 20+ chickens, and two fish. Granted, the fish don't take up much room.) The cars don't fit in the garage, the landscaping is insane with this much open space, and everyone is on top of each other.

There aren't many houses on the market out here, so there hasn't been much cause to actually look. However, I found a couple that we were interested in and we poked through them on Tuesday. One of them might actually work. It's much bigger than our house is now (I would even say it's perhaps too big, which is a problem we're considering as we work through this.) Everyone would have their own room and I would actually have a dream studio. Maybe not the one I pictured nestled into the trees, it's very own building... but let's face it, I'd need to win the lottery to make that a reality! It would be on the top floor, a sort of finished attic with skylights and a couple windows, but it's big enough. It's perfect.

The house has privacy too, something I want more of (I'm a hermit!) It needs work, maybe more than is reasonable... we'll have to see. We're actually at the point where we're weighing the pros and cons quite seriously while we're waiting to hear back from our realtor what she's ferreted out about the property (which is currently rented to a bunch of college students, so it's one step shy of a frat house right now. It's not in horrible condition, but it's not great either.)

We basically have itchy feet. We need something to change, something major. I have felt this brewing for a long while, but I think seeing a house that could solve many of our problems (and probably create all new ones) really triggered the idea that we could actually change things.

And that, folks, is scary as all get out! I've been having nightmares, and I'm not sleeping much. I didn't realize how scary the reality of possibly uprooting everything we've built these last 14 years would actually be. When did I get so set in my ways and afraid of change?

Sheesh!