Mindy Carlson

Less than 2 months left.

7 weeks and 1 days.

I still feel I am in the middle of the river Denial. But the boat I am on is quickly heading towards the shoreline.

In 50 days.

Switzerland has been magical. Last week I went with friends to France just to sample cheese. My favorite winery is just down in Ticino. We are only 30 minutes away from amazing hiking and biking trails.

Part of my coping mechanisms is to go into planning mode. H’s 7th birthday is conveniently time so I can focus on planning his party. Superhero theme, incidentally.

I am also cruising Zillow like other people visit Facebook. Everyday I am scouring Zillow for rental houses in our budget in the DC area.  And then when I am bored or I’ve seen everything there is to offer in DC I look at houses in other states. Cost of housing variances are crazy.

It is May, which my realtor tells me means we can start looking for houses in earnest. Which means I can play House Hunters International from this side of the pond. I have emailed him a couple of listings that I found suitable. Our friend Ingrid is going to help us out and perform the necessary “sniff tests.”

Not having a place to live and, therefore, not having a school for the boys is one of my major stress points. So I focus on it a lot.

And then I start to bake. Again, it’s handy that H’s birthday is right around the corner. Yesterday I made cupcakes for his class. Tomorrow I will be baking some layers of his cake and attempting pinwheel sugar cookies.  Then there is all the snack food to make for the party.

Not to mention I’m working on the hefe-schnecken roll that I love so much.

In other planning:

• The moving company is booked
• We have the final walk-through with the landlord set
• An AirBNB place is booked for after the moving company takes our beds
• Plane tickets are purchased and confirmed
• Final trips to places in Switzerland and Europe are booked
• Realtor is emailed about possible houses

What I still have to do:

• Convince Mark to ditch our old mattress
• Buy a new suitcase
• Convince Mark to give away our old desk
• Throw away the broken suitcase
• Sort through books and papers
• Find a place to live
• Enroll the kids in school
• Make more lists
• Cross things off my lists
• Buy colored pens to make crossing the things off my lists more fun

Oh yes, and breathe. I need to breathe.

And have some wine on my terrace.