On the move...

A little less than a year ago...10 months ago, to be more specific, we made the decision to pack up all of our belongings and take them on the oh-so-long trek across...........the hall. Yes, that was quite possibly THE easiest move I have ever made in my life, and what made it even better was that we did it on a weekday, so Angelica got to hang out at daycare and play with her friends while we (along with a couple of good friends) did the gruntwork of moving. We got an extra bedroom out of the deal, so that was really nice.

At the time we made that move, Angelica (who was 13 months old then) had only been walking for a few months, was still not capable of climbing on things and only had a vocabulary of about twenty words. Now, at almost 23 months, she can run, jump, climb, yell, tell me to go away, tell me that she loves me, tell me that she hates me, tell me who her best friends are, and is generally a ball of giggly energy that goes flying across the apartment so fast that we call her "the streak". (Especially on the frequent occasions that she does it after stripping!)

And quite frankly, it's not always easy to take her to the park to burn off all of her energy, but I can't just open the door here and let her go, since running in the parking lot isn't necessarily safe.

So began our hunt for the perfect house to rent, and lo and behold, we found one! With a fenced in back yard! And about $300 less per month than we pay now! Although the finding it came about two months too soon, it was a deal we couldn't pass up, and so we jumped on it. And in just about a week's time, we will again pack up all of our belongings, but this time we'll trek them about 10 miles down the road in trucks and cars.

And therein was a dilemma.

Making this move meant that the daycare she attends now...the daycare we love, with her best friends and awesome teachers and her cousins, is no longer on either of our routes to work. There is, however, one that I can see from the front yard of our new house (well, almost...Mapquest says it's 0.4 miles). So we mulled it over and found out the rates of the closer place (way cheaper, too), checked their inspections, and decided to make the move.

I don't know why this always makes me sad, but it does! Tonight I told her teachers that next week will be her last week there, and it was hard, especially since I know that Angelica has really bonded with them, and one teacher has a son who is a week older than Angelica, and they're best friends. (I ask her all the time who her best friend is, and she either picks one of her cousins or her teacher's son.) But I also remind myself that she's turning two in a few weeks, and won't be in the class with these teachers anymore. And she'll make new friends. And she'll still have her cousins.

These parenting decisions are tougher than any decisions I've ever had to make. I sure hope she doesn't wind up hating me for it when she's older!