a new chapter begins.

We are in Brooklyn, baby! This past almost-week has been one of the craziest weeks of my life. I'll start from the beginning.

In order to finish packing, I had to sell A TON of crap. And when I say a ton, I mean like a ridiculous amount. So, I had an indoor yard sale (because we seriously had a lack of yard, or a garage for that matter). I literally set everything from a bakers rack, to a microwave, to a TV (which didnt end up selling, btw :(, to clothing all in my living room. I had it all. The Mexicans came and went, with armfuls of my stuff for literally pennies (no offense to anyone that is Mexican, it's just how it was.) I think I sold about $200 (which isn't bad, I suppose) and before that I sold the bulk of my furniture on Craigslist. God Bless Craigslist-- I don't know what I would have done without it. So, after all was said and done, I got rid of a lot, but still had sooooooo much to do. Thank goodness my sister was there every day to help me out, because Benito had to leave 5 days before us to secure our apartment. We were up at 6am and didn't go to bed until 2am most nights. It was a blur.

The movers came on Saturday. They were awesome. Totally worth the price. I hadn't completely finished, but they came in and helped finish packing things up, and did it all in like an hour! I didn't have to lift one box. It was great.

Sunday was nuts. I still had odds and ends to get rid of, I had to somewhat clean because my walk-through was scheduled, and I was running on empty. By 11pm that night, we were all packed up and ready to go to Natalie's house. We stayed the night there because our flight was early in the morning on Monday. We all ended up piling in her bed, which I'm sure she hated because Riley was kicking and punching all night.

530am on Monday: Woke up in a daze. Wondered why in the world I would schedule a 930am flight. Then I remember that it's a 5 hr 45 min flight, and we wouldn't get into JFK until 600pm. So we hurriedly pack everything up in Nan's car, and book it out by 7am. Thinking this would be enough time, I was severely mistaken. Turns out that just about every route to the airport was jam-packed with traffic. (Surprise, surprise, this is LA after all.) We don't even get to the airport until around 815 or so. Run to the ticketing at Alaska Airlines with our 4 bags, 1 stroller, and 1 carseat. I booked our tickets through Alaska Airlines.com, but come to find out that my flight is actually being operated through American Airlines. They want me to run to the American terminal with all of our bags and Riley in stroller. These were honestly the rudest and least caring people I have ever seen. By this time, I know we are missing our flight. There's no other way. I was so overwhelmed and angry that I burst into tears. 1. Slightly embarrassing and 2. Really annoying. So we run (again) to the other terminal, stand in line and talk to yet another extremely rude person, and then get sent to another line to have our flight re-booked on the 1100am. $250 bag fee later, we are in the security line. Riley is hungry, I am hungry, and we are both exhausted. Made the 1100am and we were on our way.

(more to come, Riley just woke from his nap)