A new adventure.

So, we have some news.

We have, officially, listed our home.

Shocked? Yeah, me too. So much so that even as I worked on writing this piece I would often stop and ramble to M that maybe we should just stop all the shenanigans. I mean, what were we doing? I love this house. We love this house. This house is everything.

Let back it up a bit here to this past winter. Chicago winters are rough, man. And long. And we are not winter people so the only way that we’ve found to to get through them is to bunker down with good friends and good food and good wine and power through. And that’s where our hang up comes in. We love to be that home. We love to entertain. We want all the friends all the time, period. Yet the problem is that our (active) boys, year by year, are somehow getting bigger and bigger (how dare they) and that only means their circle (and size!) of their friends are getting bigger and bigger until it gets to the point where we actually feel a little odd about sending the big boys to our small (ish) basement because, you know, it’s 11 degrees outside and our dining room is small(ish) and there isn’t really any other place to send them or to entertain.

Huge problems, I know.

But when your husband utters the words ‘I just want to give you the entertaining home of your dreams’ you go with it. Right? Maybe?

So we began to look.

And we took a couple of bites. And none of them panned out. But all was good because dude, I have this house.

This house that we moved crazy haired toddler Logan into. This house that we brought five day old Beckett home from the hospital to only to immediately be greeted by friends and neighbors who then all lazily (c-section, ahem) strolled with us around the block. The home that we have gutted and demolished and laid beautiful black and white marble and hosted Christmas Eve Eve’s in and painted with the perfect Benjamin Moore shade and had a claw foot tub delivered to and a massive huge steal beam installed by a massive huge crane for more support for the bigger and fabulous great room all the while nurturing and building friendships that, I have no doubt, will last a life time. You know, only that home.

So you see my dilemma here, don’t you? And around in circles we would go.

Until it hit us.

Just a few mere weeks ago. When we began to think about stopping to look it almost coyishly popped on the market around 10PM on an idle Monday night. 

We sent the listing to our realtor who immediately responded and said there was a 10AM broker open house the next day and she would meet us there. M said to bring the contract.

And just like that, he wrote the check.

It was everything our home was and more. It got bigger in all the right places while still maintaing a sense of togetherness and charm and that land…..! Well, the boys could roam which just so happens to be one of their favorite things to do. It had the space for the growing boys, the basement for dad, and the beauty and style for mom. It was a win all around.

The next week everything was glorious. I couldn’t stop smiling and even told a few friends and brought my parents by with the boys and seeing them run in the expansive yard made my heart swell. We were doing the right thing. All was grand.

And then conversations started to creep up with our relator.

‘Ok, so, we have to think about listing your home.’

‘Excuse me?’

BAM. It hit me. Hard. How dare she suggest that. How dare she make appointments for stagers (what? I’m staged fine, thank you) and photographers to come into my house and rearrange it for some random person to walk by and judge. No, no, NO! I could not say it loud enough and at that point everything just suddenly felt so wrong.

My ever so patient husband stepped in.

Courtney, do you not want the new home?

No, I want it. I just don’t want to list this home. (Dead serious, by the way).

Ok, well you can’t have both. 

And back in circles we would go.

I can’t tell you how many times I teared up while staring directly at my stone fireplace. Or how many hour long conversations we would have going back and forth about the positives and negatives. I want you to know, if you’re viewing our home, that this home is everything to me. I’ve always told my husband I wanted to die (very old, thank you) in this home and it would take a miracle to get me out of it.

The miracle just happens to be a hop skip and a jump over on Canyon Creek. I am, slowly but surely, wrapping my mind around the fact that it could be all this home is and more for our family. It’s a day by day process, it’s accepting a new adventure when every single thing in your body is screaming that you hate change. (You’re talking about a girl who has a hard time watching a movie she hasn’t seen). Deep issues, my friends. 

So now we are IN listing mode. My realtor asked me if there was anything that can make this easier for me (to be honest, I think she is afraid of me) and my answer quickly was wine. We are LIVE on the market, mama is an emotional mess while trying to clean up after the summer boys in her ‘perfectly staged’ home, and is, quite possibly, enjoying a chilled sauvignon blanc as you read this. (To clarify, I don’t typically condone or actually enjoy day drinking, at all, but desperate times man). 

I thought I would end with this picture that isn’t a huge deal and doesn’t showcase the beauty of the cabinets or the spacious front lawn or the fancy pot filler over the fancy stove (if you want to see all those delicious features you can see our listing right here). Yet what it does do is sum up how we live here. I may get in trouble for this, yet on this particular night I was to be ‘staging’ (gag) the basement and you know what we were doing? Collecting rocks by the pond in the sunshine and these were the most beautiful and sparkly ones and Beckett thought they looked really pretty right here by the mudroom door. I tripped over them later the night but haven’t yet had the heart to move them so there they will stay.

P.S. Aren’t the (brand new) floors pretty? I sure think so. 

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Courtney

Courtney is a wife to M and a mom of two boys, L (8) and B (3). Most of her blogging is done frantically during nap time in between laundry, cleaning, and the occasional housewives rerun. Or the brief hour or so that she can stay awake after the boys go down for the night. She loves her sleep. Read more...

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