From One Sunshine State to the Other...

West Coast is the best coast, they say. Well, I guess we'll find out if that's true because S-U-R-P-R-I-S-E!!! Team Cote just got orders to move to the great state of CALIFORNIA!

No, you don't need to adjust your eyes. You read that last paragraph correctly. We're moving. To California. THIS JUNE. Cue panic and shock and all of the freak outs.

Have we been keeping a secret? Nope. Was this in our plan for 2016? Not a chance. Were we supposed to move this year? Negative. Are we excited? Welllll...yes and no. Is this the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard? YES, DEFINITELY. Here's the skinny on life as of two weeks ago:

Back in January, D got word that he had been selected for a very prestigious list of 60-some top-vectored officers in his career field. Big deal, super proud, he's a rockstar (for real). From this list, a board of important higher-up, big wig-types had the task of placing select officers into spots for 26 different jobs around the world. Long story short, we thought it was a long shot that D was get chosen for a spot. I should stop thinking anything is too crazy for the Air Force because lo and behold, D was selected for a job at a base in Cali and now here we are! Preparing to move to the West Coast for the first time in either of our lives.

To say all of this is blowing my mind would be a serious understatement. In fact, I did lose my marbles the morning D broke the news to me (as one would expect from a hormonal pregnant woman). I'd really washed my hands of the idea that we might even have the slightest chance to be selected for a new job. I know that seems like I don't think much of D and his stellar Air Force performance as an officer, but there were so many other factors involved in selection that I didn't give it a second thought. Probably why I feel so blind-sighted by it all! For the record, D is a bit shocked, too. Also for the record, even though this was totally not in our plan, I'm so darn proud of that man o' mine! He's really the cream of the crop in more ways than one.

Where does that leave us now? Well, for one thing, we've got a house to sell in less than 3 months time. So, that's fun. I'll be 7 months pregnant traveling 3,000 miles cross-country...also SUPER fun. And we get to do all the other typical "moving with the military" appointments and paperwork and pack-outs as with any other move (plus a slurry of doc appointments for yours truly). Needless to say, I'm pooped just thinking of all that we have to do in such a short amount of time. BUT we've done it before and we'll hike up our bootstraps and do it again! If I can move to Europe for 3 years, I can surely handle moving to California, right? RIGHT, YOU GUYS?!

If I could drink wine right now, I'd need ALL of it.

Having an extra layer of stress because our pending bundle of joy isn't ideal, but it's also not the end of the world. I have to keep reminding myself that hundreds of women/families do this each year, so it's not like I'm reinventing the wheel here. It is, however, more than I wanted to handle during this special time in our lives. I'm slowly trying to let go of the romantic ideas of a perfect nursery, seaside delivery, and spending the next year sharing mornings by the ocean with our little beach baby. I hate the abyss of unknown that will be the last few months of my pregnancy. There's only so much we can do from here in Florida, so some important baby-related details will have to wait until we finally make it to Cali. Feeling a bit out of control (and me no likey), but onward we march. 

From the research I've been feverishly doing these last few days, I think I'm really going to like the medical facilities/hospitals in our soon-to-be new home city. I'm thankful that I'll be able to stay with off-base OB care since the base doesn't have that (much like our current base here in Florida). So, that's a bright spot in all of this. Not to mention, the base we'll be moving to is a hop, skip, and jump away from insanely gorgeous destinations like Napa Valley, San Francisco, and Lake Tahoe (yay!). We've always wanted to venture out west and explore, so the travel opportunities that are about to be afforded us are endless and so exciting! Even with a little babe in tow! Can you tell I'm clinging to all the little silver-linings I can find? I am. And rightly so. This is a major life change among some already major life changes happening for us this year, so we need all the little bright spots we can get. Is Tuck going with us? That's an issue still to be determined. He's an old fart that doesn't do well with change and I'm a pregnant fart that is slightly neurotic and we're worried how those two will mesh so far from our lifelines (re: my parents). So, we have some pros and cons to weigh out, but it's likely he'll be back with his grandma and grandpa. That KILLS me, but he'll be a much happier (and less neglected) pup living with them.

Truth be told, we are excited. I'll be even more excited once we start making big check marks on our "to-do" list, but excited just the same. If you have any California or moving cross-country tips for us, please, we're all ears! And if you have any prayers or words of encouragement to spare, we could use a few (or a lot) of those as well. While our world seems totally upside down at the moment, we continue to trust in God's plan for our growing family. His plan is always much more wonderful than ours, I just need to get outta my head and get onboard! 

Cali, here we come!

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