BEFORE the move happened...

I was doing a lot. Too much. I told mom (and she agreed) that nothing short of moving states would have gotten me away from the life I had build for myself. It's been a high-stress, very busy but lovely life I've led in Chicago for the past 5 years. In fact, I lived in Chicago for a total of 10 years if you count my 5 years at DePaul in my early twenties.

Lots of "stuff" happened in Chicago in the last month. For example:

--suddenly needing two moving trucks instead of one ON moving day, May 15th, 2010.

--packing up not only my life in the "Four-one-one" Roscoe apartment in
beautiful Chicago, but also my non-profit organization's office space.

--finding a great new Director for my organization, which has held a really important part of my life since I founded it five years ago. (We found the fabulous Barbara Hirschfeld to take over!)

--organizing a big, final piano recital, finding new teachers for all (thirty-four 5 to 75-year-olds) my wonderful piano students and their families, and saying some hard goodbyes. (What a great little goodbye present my "piano moms" threw me!)



Barbara Hirschfeld

These past three months...

Have been a whirlwind. Forget about getting married in Chicago (March 6th, 2010.) Think more along these lines:

--Being convinced by my new husband to move back to and join his family's farming business in western Kansas. (It's a big one!)

--Writing a business proposal for manufacturing and selling red slippers, as I've gotten an abundance of Dorothy comments.

--On top of moving into our new farm home, aka "The Ranch", we found a great little apartment in Manhattan, KS, where Kansas State University is located. I'll be working with the Music Department there.

--negotiating the four-hour drive in-between "The Ranch" and our apartment on Humboldt St. in Manhattan. Beautiful scenery all around, especially the sky!

I've been in Kansas for 14 days, and I'm loving it so far. Suddenly all my commitments have disappeared and I have a blank, clean, exciting new slate to start building a new life.