This is so depressing.

My kids are asleep in a house full of the boxes of all our things.  I'm battling with feeling sadness and feeling detached from all of this.  I was thinking earlier that the last time we did a move, I did something similar.  My mind's way of coping is apparently to pretend this is all normal, but it compartmentalizes these moments.  For instance, I vividly remember walking through our house in Pennsylvania when it looked like this and feeling the same way.  Like I'm sectioning off the memories of my life by states I've lived in and things I've done in each.  Lots of uncomfortable encounters in Louisiana (really bad job...then a really good job which only lasted a few months but almost made up for how bad the first job was), baby in Pennsylvania, baby in Arizona ...wonder how I'll categorize Colorado (bc for sure no more babies).  I really want to publish a book while I'm 33 (I turn 33 on 3/3 so obviously I'm a fan of the number 3)...that would absolutely be the highlight of our next state if by some miracle it happens. 

I'm drinking wine out of a kid's cup from Chili's right now because literally everything I didn't set aside today is packed in boxes.  I was proud of myself for remembering a cup for my daughter for milk and water (she's got it in her room now but I almost resorted to borrowing it tonight for my mommy beverage...I'd've cleaned it and returned it before my own bedtime...probably). 

In the past few weeks I've:

• Celebrated a major holiday without my spouse (Thanksgiving...it was rough...just me and my kiddos...and I'm no cook but that dinner was damn good)
• Made over 50 pieces of jewelry and shipped the last 8 packages out today...it was a lucrative holiday season for my jewelry shop and at least a few of the orders were extremely emotional for me...I make personalized items (handwritten keychains, baby footprints, etc.) so I often have sales for memorial jewelry and one in particular had me crying pretty major tears as I packaged it up
• Worked a full time job (2 hours each night and 6 hours each day...those were the least exhausting 6 hours of my days for the past several weeks...I love my job and my coworkers and will miss them terribly)
• Cleaned out our house of all garbage and junk we didn't want moved to CO (well...most of it)
• Bathed and fed my children regularly (it deserves recognition)
• Exercised regularly (highlight of most days....aside seriously from picking up my kids from school every day...that makes my heart smile every time)
• Worked a conference with my children over a weekend in Phoenix
• Cancelled a few utilities here (hubby helped with this)
• Set up utilities in CO
• Survived at least 5 major mental breakdowns
• Oh...and moved a treadmill out of my house single handedly....then me and my awesomely strong friend from work lifted it onto the back of her truck WITHOUT the hatch down...because we're awesome....she's driving up with me to Colorado and I seriously love her...I could write a full post on her

So, I'm not trying to display how amazingly badass I am...I am just reminding a future version of myself that I can handle a hell of a lot.

I really, really, really, do not want to publish this post and go back to my reality...it is much easier to avoid than face.  I just want to write endlessly about how I feel than actually feel it.  It takes me a step away from it all.  I'll just keep writing then.  Right after I pour myself another Chili's cup of wine.

I'll write until I should go to bed...and then maybe I'll watch some Netflix on my phone.  I'm obsessed with Criminal Minds right now. 

There's so much to clean in this house...only floors and walls and sinks but there are sooo many floors and walls and sinks.  Once the movers load a room I plan to vacuum it and clean the walls (dog hair on white walls/molding is gross)...I'm hoping to get done when they do.  I have a hair cut scheduled tomorrow for 3:30 and I only have tomorrow and a couple of hours Wednesday morning to finish earning our deposit back on this house.  We close on a house in Colorado a week from tomorrow. 

One hellish week.  Thursday morning (early, early, morning) we fly to Atlanta, rent a car, drive almost 2 hours to Alabama and spend one night there for my husband's graduation from OTS...then drive (the day after we get there) back to Atlanta, fly back to Phoenix, pick up our dog, then get up early the next morning for 2 loooong days of driving to Colorado.  I know I'll be exhausted so I can't even imagine how my kids will handle it.  My older daughter will stay with her father and drive to Colorado with him...which should be fun for her. 

So one more week of this and we'll all be together again and for better or worse, we'll start the next chapter in another state.  I'm so tired...