With everything going on in the world and so much unknown, it’s sometimes hard to get grounded and get clear on your direction. The amount of different narratives in the world right now is overwhelming. One gift COVID-19 has given us is an absence of the busy-ness. Have you noticed what you have been filling your time with? In the beginning, we spent a lot of time doing puzzles, games, reading, and other things we never took the time to slow down to do before.
Puzzle-off on Sundays Time by the pool with Aiden
Of course, life must go on, so it was time to start looking at what our “new now” was going to be. As you know, this house project has been in the works for a very long time. Almost 2 years!
We were finally ready to go in at the end of February. Our Project Manager, Tomer, told us we may want to wait. There was talk of things shutting down and he did not want to leave us in a lurch with an unfinished project and living in our pop up trailer longer than we had to. So we delayed, again. Things opened back up towards the end of May with new restrictions, but it was now doable. We set the start date as June 29th.
We may not have been super excited about living in the pop up during the summer, it can get pretty hot out here. But, we were willing to take on the adventure, and the savings of renting another place to see it through. I guess our angels decided to step in and help us out.
We have an awesome neighborhood with great neighbors. Every month for about 6 months out of the year, our neighborhood has “Pink Flamingo Parties”. This is a Friday every month where everyone gets together at someone’s house and socializes. Up until June, Jess and I had only been to one of these parties in two years. We traveled all the time, so we weren’t able to make them. It also meant we didn’t know a lot of our neighbors.
June was the first one open since the COVID-19 shutdown. I went over there to hang out before taking our daughter to dinner. One of the neighbors approached me and asked if we had started the remodel because they noticed our camper was gone. I told them we had just gone camping for the weekend and when the actual remodel was starting. Another neighbor stepped into the conversation and I was introduced to Kathy. Apparently Kathy and her husband are avid RV’ers, having been all over the country many times. They were about to leave on a 3 month trip for the summer. I quickly noted our kindergarten way of RV’ing versus theirs and thought nothing more.
Our pop-up: great for camping but not for 3 months of living! RV camping with friends
I left with Jess to take our daughter to dinner (that’s another post). During dinner, the host messaged me and said Kathy and her husband wanted us to live in their house while they were gone. I was shocked and couldn’t quite process the generosity. I told Jess about the text and we went back to the party. I connected again with Kathy and her husband Ron. They asked us when we were moving in the pop up and for how long. I said we were moving in after our Utah trip on July 6th and would be living camper style until the end of September. How much of a coincidence is it that they were leaving July 5th until the end of September? I was still dumbfounded with the whole thing. Kathy asked us to “just come over, check the place out”. She said “If you don’t like it, that’s fine, we would just feel better knowing someone was there.”
I looked at Jess and we just said OK. The next Monday we went to an address we have not visited before. The house was amazing, a great representation of what we wanted to create at our place. Peaceful, serene, a gorgeous backyard with a pool, palapa, outdoor kitchen, and firepit. It was amazing, to say the least. We told them we would be so grateful to stay here. They upped the ante by telling us that all utilities, yard care, pool care, and house cleaning would be taken care of. We could not believe it and blissfully accepted their offer. Little did we know how much we really needed to stay here.
As we arrived at our new summer home, everything went into hyperspeed. Jess started two new businesses that are now in full force requiring her to work full time. I became the “general contractor” on the house remodel as well as running my coaching and training business. It has also been unseasonably hotter early this summer. At this moment I can’t imagine being in that popup, confined to less than 100 sq ft of space and the hot weather, with camp-like commodities. We now have 2 offices, a full kitchen, 2 bathrooms, laundry facilities, and everything is comfortable as we not only pivot our business but our lives. I have been so present throughout this and so appreciative of the little things. The truth is when you really stop and look, you have more things that are working for you than against you. I try to acknowledge my higher power, my angels, and the universe for the absolute prosperity and people in my life that are holding us up and giving us the best shot to get through this better than we started.
Ask yourself, “What am I truly grateful for today?” Then be prepared to be awed.
Follow the home reno here!