Whew! Sunday morning and I am enjoying my first pot of coffee brewed in the new house, while my boys are both napping upstairs. If you’ve been paying attention, you may have noticed that I dropped the ball a bit on my 30 consecutive days of blogging. (If you’ve been paying attention that closely, I have to wonder if you might have some time on your hands…)

I honestly thought about blogging a couple of times in the past four days, but up until yesterday it was pretty much physically impossible. Between getting out of the old place, into the new place, and getting the condo cleaned and ready for renters; not to mention work for both of us, we have been going nonstop this week.

There have been lots of moments of joy in the last few days… Looking out the window into our amazing new backyard my second morning in the house (because the first morning I was out the door by 6:15 before I could see the backyard). Having the company and support of my mother-in-law, dad and aunt on three separate days while we tried to get everything accomplished. Collapsing on the couch together Thursday night with a bottle of wine when we were too tired to move anymore. Watching MLM go excitedly up and down the new half-flight of stairs over and over. And over. And over….

And of course there have been some challenges, too. Finding some new and interesting plumbing leaks; and realizing that it’s going to take a while to replace the vacant-house smell with something more comforting and familiar. Discovering last night that the clothes washer left by the previous owner — the reason we left our washer and dryer behind for the tenant’s use — doesn’t really work when there are actual clothes in it. It passed the home inspection because the inspector, obviously, didn’t actually wash anything. (Wherever she is, I’m sending the seller a big cosmic “thank-you” for that one.)

And in non-house news, there’s been lots of teeth-gnashing as my beloved Alma Mater seems determined to have a losing football season this year; and the Atlanta Braves are taking the MLB wild-card race down to the final game this afternoon.

But the good news is that post-season baseball, and even a disappointing start to college football, mean fall is here nonetheless. I am so excited to have a yard to enjoy with my little guy as the beautiful, crisp fall days are upon us. It’s going to be really fun exploring our new neighborhood and setting up our house as we look toward the cozy days of the end of the year.

We might be a little smelly snuggled up in our unwashed clothes, listening to the drip of the pipes in the basement; but we’ll be in our home, together. And that’s enough!

MJ Pullen

M.J. Pullen is a distracted writer and the mom of two boys in Roswell, Georgia, where she is absolutely late for something important right now. Her books include quirky romantic comedies and playful women's fiction. She blogs erratically with writing advice, random observations, and reflections on raising very loud kids and dogs. Join her Distracted Readers newsletter list for updates, free content, giveaways and more.