Where to even begin on this past year.
2019 was a big freaking year.
There was a lot of big change in 2019, that to be honest, I am still wrapping my head around. This past year brought some huge life changes and some huge career changes for both Drew and I. Let’s start at the beginning.
In January of 2019, I was in a horrible place in my full time job. Working towards my final days at a company that I once loved so dearly. A company that felt like my family for 2 years, suddenly became a stranger to me. I stepped away from my friends, my career with this brand and this opened many doors. For the first time in my career, I had to step away from something that I once loved so much. I truly felt like I had lost something so major in my life. In February, I stepped out of one door and right into something that truly did change my life. I had the opportunity to travel to North Carolina, meet some incredibly people in my industry and heck we truly contemplated moving there for this career move. Something about that felt so right, but also Drew and I both had a weird pull to move closer to our family for this next chapter in our lives.
Come April, I had been flown to a few interviews around the country, left my old job of 2 years, and Drew’s time on Active Duty in the military was transitioning to Guard Duty. We decided to take a leap of faith, an opening that we hadn’t had in our careers, and move back to Bozeman.
Bozeman, MT. This quant mountain town that houses Montana State University (my alma mater), the town my parents moved to after 24 years in the Bay Area, and 1 hour away where Drew’s parents live, just felt right.
In our 3 years of life and careers post our college graduation, Drew and I have lived in many states; Texas (Drew), Florida (both of us), Utah (twice – yea weird I know), California (me after college, I worked on the Web Development Team at Williams Sonoma Inc. in SF) and now Montana. In July of 2019, we moved back to Bozeman. We had so much excitement, and trust in this move that unlike our past moves, of exploration and newness we were finding who we were in a town where we were babies when we last were living here.
Upon moving to Montana, we decided it was right time to move into my parents house for a few months to see if we could buy a house. I started my full time job (while balancing my freelance clients, my food development and photography) and Drew was back and forth on TDY’s for 5 months of our new move. A few days after we moved back with our parents, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. This diagnosis rocked my family. If you have had the pleasure of meeting my mom, she is a force. Nothing will stop her, including this diagnosis. She took with so much grace, tact and clear mind that her energy to fight was radiated for 10000000s of miles. She never let this stop her and even continued to dive deeper into her PhD studies, at University of Souther California during treatment.
Not only were we all hands on deck with my mom and helping my dad rest enough to help her make it through chemo, radiation and her PhD, we decided to put an offer on a house…to buy!
They say when it rains it pours. 2019 f*cking poured the entire year. We were well into my moms treatment when we heard the news that we didn’t get accepted on our house. My parents were in the process of finishing a remodel and we were just unsure where we were going to go. We ended up finding the cutest dang rental house, 6 blocks from my office and settling in. This was the best thing for my family and my parents. We were so close to the hospital, they could come and rest between treatments and have a place to put their head. I truly feel this whole shitty process we went through in 2019, played out how it was suppose to, and that is why we had such a strong feeling to get up and move back to Montana.
As challenging, eye opening and exhausting this year has been, it will end on a good note. My mom is cancer free and finished with her daily treatment, my sister and her amazing boyfriend are engaged (@lwbean), Drew has an incredible job that continues his military career into civilian life and for me, I have the most incredible dog out there! Oh and the most amazing clients that fill my day with so much joy!
Oh! And for 2020, Drew and I are going to Grad School! Go Sun Devils!
No Comments