It's storage time!

Jason and I love our place. We've been here since 2005. It was our first home together. We've hosted epic parties here (Halloween comes to mind). We became a family here, a year and a half ago, when we brought Molly home from the hospital. We've loved every minute of living here...but we're running out of room.

We've got Molly's stroller in the hallway; artwork and out of season clothes stashed under every piece of furniture in the place; toys, toys, and more toys shoved in every crevice. You get the idea. There's stuff. Everywhere.

We've been contemplating a move to the suburbs for some time now. But where would we go? We're not from Chicago, and have no ties to any particular part of town. My friends have mostly moved South and West. Jason's friends are talking about going North. What to do?

Well, it turns out there's an upside to the bad economy. Housing prices have gone down, along with interest rates, and it looks like we now might be able to afford a place in Evanston, the home of the Northwestern Wildcats, where I spent 4 glorious years in my youth, and where Susie and Sean are currently living while attending Kellogg.

I'm getting ahead of myself here. The first step will be to actually SELL our current place and who knows how long that might take. And before we can even list our condo, we're going to have to find a place to stash all of the junk that we've been accumulating over the years.

So, this weekend will be the big clean up. We've got golf clubs, baby gear, luggage, sleeping bags, clothes, and appliances to pack up and move out to our new 6x5 storage unit at Halsted and Lake. Yes, Greek Town is a bit of a drive for storage, but we decided to sacrifice convenience for price. I got 2 months free and a $20 rebate, so that deal fit well within my austerity plan budget. Speaking of which, the money-saving measures have been going pretty well and we've managed to cut our spending in half. Go us!

Anyway, I digress. After packing up this weekend, the plan is to get cleaners in next week, and then Lindsay will do what she needs to do to get this place listed and sold. The Western Ave address works against us, but (I think) our place is pretty darn cool. Hopefully someone else will think so. And hopefully they will have as happy a time living here as we've had.

Wish us luck!