whew!

I have officially survived what has been the most trying 6 weeks of my life thus far. (Perhaps I shouldn't admit that, since I can think of at least two dozen other scenarios that would be harder than what I went through, but ... there it is.)

At the end of November, Abe flew out to California to start his new job in San Francisco. I stayed in Michigan with the kids and spent the next 4 weeks packing our house, arranging the moving logistics, and preparing our condo for our departure. Not to mention finishing a major work project and taking care of the kids. Aside from that and sleeping each night, I did nothing else. My to-do list felt never-ending and my energy level was at an all-time low. Also, the day before we were scheduling to leave (and coincidentally the day I had a culminating meeting and presentation for work), we all came down with the flu.

Somehow, I made it through my meeting and we all made it onto the plane the next day. Seven hours of plane travel with the kids seemed pretty easy compared to what I'd been doing. But I must have looked pretty spent. When the plane landed on the first leg of the journey, I was leaning against Genghis's car seat and didn't move while everyone else deplaned. I heard the person behind me say, "I think she's dead".

Reuniting with Abe was a great relief. Eating off of the floor for two days with two children under 3 while waiting for our belongings was not.

The ray of hope in all of this was a glorious 5 days off that Abe would have over Christmas, just after we arrived. Unfortunately, his first day off he was down and out with the flu we were all just starting to get over.

But I think we've made it through. We have mostly unpacked and settled into a spacious and comfortable penthouse apartment in the San Francisco Bay area (about an hour out of the city). More on the apartment later. We celebrated Christmas and New Year's and have been enjoying family time. More pictures of that later. Abe is better and I've had two wonderful days in a row of sleeping in while he's had the kids. Tomorrow I might actually make a fresh "to-do" list to start off our new life here, which would mean I'm feeling back to my old self again.

So Happy New Year! I couldn't have asked for a better one.