Moving House: The next chapter of summers in America

Last updated on October 1st, 2023 at 04:16 pm

We started a new chapter for our family in America this summer by moving house. We said goodbye to the family home. The home I grew up in, got married at, and watched all my children take their firs steps too. After the death of my father, my mom moved to town. A town that holds other memories from my childhood, where I went to school and worked as a teenager. It’s where we have come full circle back to the very streets I rode my first bike on. My kids now ride their bike on. It’s a new start for us all.

It somehow feels the same as it always did, visiting family and friends and going to all our favorite stomping grounds: the beach, the theme park, shopping, favorite restaurants, and more. Yet, it feels so different and weird. It will never be the same without my Dad making us laughing and the kids climbing all over him but I know he is watching over us now.

The kids are running down the hallway and swimming in the pool just as they have always done yet in a new house. They are jumping on the trampoline with all their cousins yet in a different town.

I feel mixed emotions about our new summers in America.

But the one thing that surprises me the most is how at home I feel in the new house. We aren’t surrounded by the same furniture so I don’t know what makes it feels so comfortable and welcoming but it does. I am familiar with the creak of the floorboards and the squeak of the bathroom doors already. The kids have made their mark on the house and the garden with their toys spread out and their laughter bouncing around.

We are now right in town next to the park, the shops, the store, our friends and family. It means we no longer have to spend hours in the car to get here, there and everywhere. That in itself is a bonus to our new chapter. I love that I can run to the grocery store for milk and it takes 1o mins there and back not 2 hours.

While we don’t have the river running right in front of us with that beautiful view, we had a chance to say goodbye to it properly on Buba’s birthday one last time before the new owners moved in. We set out our picnic and chairs on the grass like we always did. We ate, we celebrated and we walked around the property taking photos together one last time. We said hello to Papa too! He built that house and we made it a home altogether and now I wish the next owners as much love and happiness it brought us all.

Here is some photos of the kids one last time at our family home way deep in the mountains. May their memories of it always stay strong and with them.

 

I look forward to this new chapter and how it will change our summers here in America forever. Not better, not worse just a new chapter for us all.