New things can be terrifying | Day 1

31 Days. I’m joining the 31 days of writing in October for bloggers hosted by one of my favorite home decorator bloggers and authors – Myquillin Smith or, the Nester, as she’s affectionately known. 🙂 So after you read through this post, and you’re just dying for more…no worries. Come back tomorrow. And the next day. And the next day. I promise I won’t run out of stuff to talk about. hee hee hee hee. 🙂 Because I’m in Philadelphia. Like, the one *not* in the south. And I’ve got lots to explain. So I need 31 days. Therefore I present….

Day 1:

Seven hundred miles away from where we were just 17 days ago. And 17 days away from our last day in the South for a-good-long-while.

I still can’t even believe we’re here! Here’s the *attempted* super quick version on how this all went down.

June 1st – We drove back from a wedding in West Virginia.

June 2nd – My husband was a part of the third round of layoffs at his company of seven years.

June something – mid August – My husband had somewhere close to 50 different interviews…3 different companies in one day one time. He has always been an incredibly hard worker. But I think he worked harder with(out) a job than he did with one.  He lost his company issued computer because of the layoff, so mine was his only ticket to finding work. Therefore, no blogging from me. My phone is awesome. And my thumbs are fast. But I’m drawing the line at blogging from my iPhone. 🙂

August 4th – He had a skype interview with a company in Philadelphia.

August 5th – We all drove to Charlotte for hanging with friends while my husband had an interview all morning. (There’s a pizza place here that’s unreal. Brooklyn South. If you live in the Charlotte, NC vicinity, consider yourself blessed.)

August 6th – He had another skype interview with the company in Philadelphia. And an in person interview in town locally.

August 8th – He got a phone call from the company in Philly asking him if he could fly up. He said yes.

August 11th – He had an interview at another company in town. Then caught a plane to Philadelphia. Then had his first original Philly cheesesteak with some friends.

August 12th – He had his interview in Philadelphia, then started back to Greenville. Before he boarded the plane, Philadelphia called with the job offer.  Within 2 hours, two other companies had called with offers.

August 16th (2 PM) – We found a place to live in Philadelphia. (Note, we didn’t see the place. We just found one online. And signed the lease. Yeehaw! More on what we found when we got here later this week……) So we needed someone to live in our place in Greenville.

August 16th (7 PM) – Thanks to a quick facebook post, we found a family who wanted to live in our house! GREAT someones who had recently been displaced from an area flood that kinda filled their whole house with water.  And she knew who we were because the mama read my blog?!?! Oh. And she wanted our chickens. So, yeah. House = rented.

My chickens were saying goodbye until we gave them more food…

August 18th – 25th – We squeezed in as many playdates and dinners and lunches with our friends in town as we could.

Some of Chloe’s favorite girl friends…

August 26th – We started packing. Like til 2 AM every morning. Thanks to my favorite neighbor and friend ever who gave so sacrificially of herself to help me.

August 30th – Some of our closest friends came out to help us pack the truck. Like our whole house on a truck. That was too small, so we had to get an extra trailer. (Please someone tell me they’ve had to pull a Uhaul with a Uhaul before?)

August 31st – We went to church that morning. Then ran home to our empty house, cleaned like mad crazy people. repainted everything, and cut the grass, and fixed the yard, and kissed the chickens goodbye…well, maybe not kissed them…

It just doesn’t feel like your house anymore when it’s so empty your voice echos.

September 1st – 8 hours after we locked the front door, the renters moved in our now empty and cleaned house. (In case you’ve lost track, this is exactly 21 days after my husband flew to Philadelphia for his interview.) Chris went to get the oil changed in our car for the long trip to Philadelphia the next day. One of the employees at the mechanic’s shop ran into our car.  We drove an hour north to some outlets while they were working out insurance stuff and spent a lot of money on long sleeved clothes. And boots for me. And you should go put on a sweater and a hat. Because the thought of this Southern girl in *real* snow should make your toes curl. Well, it makes mine curl.

September 2nd – Chris and his dad drove up to Philadelphia with all of our stuff. I stayed behind with the girls to finish up a few things in town.

Chris works right downtown – in the tallest building of the Philadelphia skyline!

September 8th – Chris started his new job. (He loves it, by the way! The layoff ended up being the biggest blessing in disguise for us.)

September 13th (noon) – I had a catering event at a large church in Spartanburg – this was the reason I had stayed behind to begin with – We had a lovely time and lovely food! 🙂

Cranberry walnut chicken salad, and the most amazingly crispy cheese wafers.

September 14th (8 AM) – The girls and I boarded a flight to Philadelphia and arrived a few hours later.

Welcome home! My sweet husband had cards, and cookies, and flowers waiting for us when we arrived. He is such a sweetheart. 🙂

Today – There’s only about 10 boxes left to go and our new place will be unpacked! And we started our (home) school year officially.

WHEW! That “super quick” attempt was about as successful as the last 1,254 times I’ve attempted parallel parking in this giant city the last 14 days.

But yeah, we’ve been a tad busy.  And I can’t wait to share with you the things I’m seeing and doing this first fall of mine in Philadelphia! I’ll share more pictures when my house doesn’t look like this.

Or this.

I’ve got 31 days to get it ship shape. And enjoy fall. And make sweet tea so I don’t forget what it tastes like. Stick around and enjoy this ride, ya’ll.

I’ll see ya tomorrow!