one year

Saturday marked exactly one year of us living in Utah.  

All day I thought about a year ago.
A year ago we watched our house cleared out and packed up, we said goodbyes to our friends, closed up our sweet little home and locked the door and flew to Utah, arriving at our apartment well after midnight with two sleepy, crying children. 
The next morning Kent went to work and I began my first day in a brand new place (as well as my first day with two children all on my own.)  It was exciting and tearful and relieving and empowering.

This December first,
We bought a Christmas tree, went to my brother's concert on campus, ate dinner with my family, and then got to see the Christmas lights at a nearby shopping center. 

I found the envelope in my file box where I'd placed the key from our house in Texas, tied a ribbon through it, and hung it on our tree.

When we first started talking about moving last year,
when I was 30-something weeks pregnant,
my brain was screaming "this is crazy!!" 

It all happened so fast.  Kent applied and interviewed and flew to Utah to interview again and suddenly, we were seriously considering moving.

I cried a lot in those short weeks.  I wondered why we had to move "now." Why not later, after Ellie was born, after we got to finish some of our plans with our friends there, why not when we actually felt "ready" to move?

Although I will probably never feel ready for that kind of change in my life.

And then Ellie was born. And Kent moved to Utah without us at first, and I was packing up (with TONS of help-thank you again everyone) and moving away with a brand-new baby girl who wanted to eat and eat and eat and eat and a crazy two-year-old boy whose life was being turned upside down.  

It felt impossible.  It was so hard and sudden and seemed to be the worst timing ever.

But we did it. I had a baby. And then we moved across the country, and I took care of two children all on my own in a brand new place.  I had never felt more powerful and capable.

We settled in. We found a beautiful home. Kent is happier with his work now than he has ever been before.  We're making friends.

And we sold our house in Texas.  
A few months later, the previously empty lot across the street from that house started being developed.  My friends tell me it is an instacare clinic and that with each new building put in, the street becomes less and less "neighborhood" and more and more "parking lot."  

Timing.  If we were still there, we wouldn't have had any reason to move out of that home.  We wouldn't have known they were going to start building, and we wouldn't have been able to get out and sell the house before it happened.  
From what I hear about the street, it would be very difficult to sell the house at all anymore, let alone at a price close to what we paid for it.

And so now, a year later, I think I see why it was that Heavenly Father wanted to bless us by asking us to move out of our home only four weeks after Ellie was born.  
I am grateful.