It’s been a good long time since I posted anything, and that’s because a good many unexpected and surprising things happened at the end of 2024. This post is just a brief update on the changes in our lives, and what it means, especially for me and my blogging and painting, going forward.
As many of you know, we moved to Texas in 2021. The entire ordeal turned out much differently than we planned (you can read about it here). Texas, also, presented challenges we hadn’t foreseen when I wrote that old blog post. Most notably were health issues caused by extreme allergies, mold, and a practically year-long mosquito season (we have one kiddo who reacts terribly to the bites). The home we lived in had many structural issues that kept getting worse. It felt like we were throwing money we didn’t have into a home we didn’t want, and weren’t even making it that much better, anyway. We had planned for some projects in the backyard (chickens and a garden), but the necessary infrastructure was proving to be more costly (in time and money) than we could afford, mostly due to weather and soil conditions.
To be fair, our entire experience in Texas wasn’t miserable. We had a great church and we met amazing people. While our backyard didn’t produce any food, it did produce hours and hours and hours of fun for the kids. We loved the library and some of the restaurants and shops in Bryan, about a 25 minute drive from where we were.
However, day to day life was hard, and our finances were floundering (mold remediation, water pipe leak, roof leak…each new discovery set us back hundreds or thousands). My husband and I had a conversation in July/August of 2024 to decide what our plan was. I was tired of living in a state of limbo, not fully committed to Texas and the house because we wanted live somewhere else, but also feeling exhausted and overwhelmed at the prospect of doing what it took to financially be able to move. We discussed whether we should accept that we were going to be here awhile, move on with figuring out chickens, maybe have another baby, and help our hearts live in our situation with contentment and joy, or if we should stop all other projects and just focus on basic survival and the sacrifices necessary to improve our finances, sell the house, and leave.
We decided to put our heads down, work hard, and find a new place to live, without any other distractions. I was staying up late and getting up early, working on painting and making videos. I was building up a portfolio, growing an audience online, and preparing for the upcoming holiday market season. My husband was focused on working and getting extra hours in. We stripped back the grocery budget even more.
About a month later….I found out I was pregnant.
This came as a total surprise. We were actively trying not to get pregnant, obviously unsuccessfully. It took a couple days for us to wrap our heads around the news. This was completely unplanned. It didn’t fit in with what we were trying to do. It caught us 100% off guard. At the same time, we were, of course, happy at the idea of another baby. It felt a bit like a surprise present, or finding money in the coat pocket of a jacket you had hung in the closet last season.
For a bit, our hopes were cautiously optimistic that my health would be ok this time around, as well. Based on my calculations, I should have begun to experience really bad nausea, but it was manageable. I thought, maybe this won’t be so bad. Maybe I can still do everything even though I’m pregnant.
Narrator- “She was not, in fact, able to do anything while pregnant.”
A couple weeks later, the nausea hit, along with the news from an ultrasound that I wasn’t quite as far along as I thought. That explained it. And not only was this pregnancy bad, like the others, it was worse. Way worse. It lasted so much longer, was so much more pervasive, and came with other fun things like regular headaches/migraines (which I’m still experiencing, 20 weeks later) and the ability to smell even the slightest hint of mildew or mold, which was basically our entire house. I was miserable. Everything shut down. Our school lessons stopped (talking made me throw up), meals were stripped down to bare necessity, I altogether quit painting or writing or posting. We didn’t go to church for weeks…we didn’t leave the house for weeks.
I kept expecting my symptoms to begin to abate around 11-12 weeks, which has happened in my past pregnancies, but no such luck. Week 13….week 14….week 15…..I wasn’t improving at all. Despite medication, it was a challenge to handle the most basic of tasks.
I think compounding the struggle was the fact that I had so many plans, hopes, and exciting things I was working on when it came to painting, YouTube, blogging, and the upcoming holiday season. I wanted to push through and try to keep up but I literally couldn’t scrape together enough brain cells to figure out what to do, let alone do it. So I dropped it altogether. And it would have made me really sad, if I had any extra energy to feel sad with.
At this same time, my maternal Grandma died. I found out the day after I found out I was pregnant. While she wasn’t in vibrant health, she also wasn’t currently hospitalized or anything, so it was definitely unexpected. I’m thankful that I have so very many amazing memories of her and with her. I was also able to travel back to Arizona by myself for her service, which I’m grateful for (although, being in the first trimester, it was a rough journey).
In the background was the knowledge that my grandma left behind an empty house, and the fact that we would really love to not be in Texas anymore. The home, which is owned by my aunt and uncle, was a lot smaller than our home in Hearne, but it was by family and a host of other conveniences, during a season where we felt spent and exhausted. We kind of joked around about seeing if we could stay in it for awhile, but then began to seriously consider whether or not we could try to work it out.
Shortly after I traveled to AZ for my grandma’s memorial service, I woke up in the middle of the night bleeding. Due to my history of miscarriage and hemorrhaging, this always rings alarm bells for us. I immediately changed clothes and headed to Bryan to go to an ER, down the dark highway at 3 am.
Thankfully, after an ultrasound, they confirmed that Baby was totally fine and healthy, and diagnosed me with a subchorionic hemorrhage (which sounds pretty awful but is usually completely benign). Despite the good news, it really motivated us to move forward and see if there was any way we could be in Arizona during the remainder of my pregnancy and when the baby was born. Having one car and no family around to call if we had emergencies was really weighing on us…it always had, but the situation made it even more pressing.
After multiple conversations back and forth with family to discuss details, my aunt and uncle so very graciously allowed us to stay in the house for a year. We found out two weeks before Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving weekend, my parents drove out to help us load up a truck and make the journey back to AZ.
Of course, the holiday season was in full swing during and after the move, and it was such a blessing to get to celebrate with family this year. We’ve dealt with lots of sickness since being in AZ, too, but it’s been nice to be closer to pharmacies and grocery stores and our beloved Costco.
Sometime in the middle of December, when I was about 19-20 weeks, I finally began to feel significantly better. I still have to take medication to keep the throwing up at bay, and I definitely feel yucky most mornings and evenings, but I’ve been able to cook, clean, and take care of the kids again, which makes me so happy.
It’s been really, really amazing to be in Arizona during this time. I kind of feel like the process of moving to Texas depleted us on every level, with all the sad and hard and difficult things that happened, and so we headed in to an experience that would require a lot of strength and stamina (which we were prepared for, before all the sad and hard and difficult things mentioned) with absolutely no strength or stamina. Life has felt very defeating since then, with very little margin for breaks or emergencies.
We are really hopeful that this year in Arizona will give us a bit of time to recoup. We get to go on some dates. We get to see family. Errands won’t take as long. My husband won’t have to spend hours mowing the lawn each week. Cleaning the house takes half the time, partly because it’s a smaller house, and partly because I’m not working around broken tiles and gaps in countertops and mold. The kitchen here feels massive, and with additional storage and counter space, cooking is faster and easier.
Along with the chance to take a breath, we also want to use the additional bandwidth provided by living here to fully pursue the goal we set about six months ago…save up money, pay down debt, and build in ways to increase income. I have some really big plans and hopes for what I want to do this year with art and videos, and I’m so thankful that our living situation right now is one that can support that, despite being pregnant/having a baby.
So that is the update and the explanation as to why I stopped painting, why we’re suddenly in Arizona, and what the plan is for the new year. I’m still working on creating a sustainable system for being able to paint, edit, and post videos while being an attentive, present wife and homeschool mom. I think I’m pretty close to finding a good balance (although time will tell) and I’m excited to kick off my return to these creative outlets with this post.
For a while, I really had a hard time dealing with the forced sudden stop of these pursuits. I have never, in my life, experienced such good momentum. I was forming worthy habits and breaking bad ones. I was practicing consistency (something I have always struggled with). I was letting go of perfectionism and just showing up…doing my best, of course, but also being ok with little bumps in the road. Completely and suddenly abandoning everything, missing the holiday event and marketing season, and not painting for months? That was way more than a bump, and it made me anxious and panicky.
But, you know what? This experience was, and is, a really, really good opportunity to not be a perfectionist. The reason for my absence was understandable and amazing (I am so happy to get to welcome another sweet little baby into our home). We were able to tackle some important conversations, a move, and celebrate holidays with family during that time. And I honestly think it has made me a better, wiser, more balanced person as we enter this new year and I begin to think, once again, about my goals.
My prayer is, ultimately, that God would be glorified this year in the ways I choose to spend my time and the things I choose to say. Of course I hope to be able to grow a thriving art business, experiment with new projects, host classes, and sell stickers…but more than that, it’s my desire to spread a message of beauty, creativity, and hope to those around me, especially moms who may feel like their day to day life holds anything but.
I hope that you look back on a holiday season filled with fond memories, and that you are looking forward with excitement to 2025, despite the unique hardships and challenges we all face. Let’s make it a beautiful year!
