We're in Zurich -- For Another Hour, or Two, or Three...

Brenna, blogging in the Zurich airport.It's official, we're blogging from Europe! We've said goodbye to the US for a year (or so), hopped the plane, and after a long and blissfully uneventful overnight flight, we're in the Zurich airport tapping into the high speed wireless. We're waiting for our flight to Belgrade, which has been delayed a bit, and then a bit again. The kids are trouping along, and except for a few sharp words going through security (Owen just has NO security antenna), everybody is pretty happy. Ella wants to getElla has picked out several Swatches she wants. some M&M's for 2.90 Swiss Francs, but we've got only dollars right now, so sad girl has to make due with the box of Sees Candy that Brenna brought. Yes - Brenna is sitting in Switzerland eating a box of chocolates from California. Along with her first cup of coffee - in a paper cup from an airport kiosk.  If all coffee at airports in Europe is like this she may not come back.

More soon about sad goodbyes, last-minute freak-outs, and the final days of prep.

Getting Better All The Time (better better be-tter)

Goodbye House!!The house keys are turned in, the storage pods and the dumpster are gone, the cars are sold, and we have now officially added tremendously to Salvation Army's bottom line for the year. We're in San Francisco with family for a few days, then back to LA for a 24 hour goodbye and re-pack whirlwind, and then we board the plane. Voila! Life changed! Easy as pie!

I slept 9 hours last night. That's more than the cumulative of the last week put together. I was actually able to forget about the relentless prep for a bit yesterday, and have a carefree glass of slightly-warm wine at an Italian street festival we went to with my Dad.  Brenna, her Dad and Eleanor in San Rafael, CA

We're having fun doing all our "lasts". We went to our favorite little Teriyaki Me! for dinner the night before we left. And Foster's Freeze (don't tell the kids - they weren't there for the coke floats).  I bought Cap'n Crunch yesterday at the grocery store.  Owen is the happiest kid this morning! 

Little Motorboat (our cat) is adjusting really well to her new temporary home. For the next three weeks she'll be in San Fran, in a house with 2 dogs and another cat. The dogs could care less, and the other cat has taken to the hills -- our cat has pretty much taken over. In three weeks time she'll go back to Los Angeles, to live for the year with Uncle Paul, who rescued her in the first place.Little Motorboat in our ridiculousy pink chair

I was talking to my sister in Atlanta yesterday, and she said "So - less than a week now. You leave on Monday!" and I had a little bit of a freak-out right there in the post office. Less than a week?!

I said to Bob "We leave in less than a week?!", and then I said "I thought we left on Tuesday!" 

"We do leave on Tuesday" he said.

"The 22nd is Monday" My sister is laughing by this point. So, but for my sister we might have been hanging around our next crashing pad, waiting for Tuesday to come. We're so good at this travel thing! We're going to be awesome! 

PS. We leased a car, AND booked a flight from Serbia to Germany (to pick up the car) yesterday. Now we have the first three months planned.  With 5 whole days to spare!

Goodbye from Owen

Hey, It's Owen. I just had one of the funnest (most depressing) parties of my life:  The good-bye party with friends before our trip to Europe. I invited 5 of my closest friends. They all came, and they all got to sleep over. It was an RPG (more specifically Dungeons & Dragons) party. We all did RPG for 3 hours straight. Last night one of my friends (I won't say names) kinda kept us up.  We got quiet at 1:30 am. I'm not sure when we fell asleep. My mom hired one of my most favorite babysitters to be the dungeon master. He and I are also going to go buy comics on Tuesday for me to take with me on the plane. It's going to be the last time I get to hang out with him before I leave.  

All my friends have just left, and it's really depressing.  I think writing about it is helping though.  I'm really glad that my friends got to come and say goodbye, (it would mean a lot less virtually) (I'm putting a lot of thing in parenthesis, aren't I).

I think I'm going to like it in Europe, but I'm also going to miss my friends. I'm just glad some of my friends have Skype (and online telephone system where you get audio and video).

I'm looking forward to going to San Francisco, so I can cross the Golden Gate Bridge one more time before I go (that was on my list of things to do), but I'm also dreading it, because that means we're one enormous step closer to leaving.

I think the thing I looking forward to least is the plane trip. I'll have about 16 hours to think about how I won't see my friends for a year.

I'm looking forward to Europe, and all in all I'm glad I got to have this party.  Without being able to say goodbye to all my closest friends, I don't think I'd get by. 

Video Blog: Brenna Gives Herself A Talking To

This is hard. Leaving is hard. Writing about leaving is hard. It's 4:00am, and I woke up thinking "Just go write it down", and between then and now you can't imagine how many things I've come up with to do instead. Watch Borne Identity on Netflix.  Read about Gwyneth Paltrow's shiny legs.  Scrub the cabinetry in the kitchen. Anything but blog about how hard this is. Because - really - seriously - who am I to complain!! I'm leaving on the "Adventure Of A Lifetime!" That's everybody's favorite saying. I can't think about it like that. Too much pressure to have a lifetime's worth of adventure in the next year. I think we're having the adventure of our life. If we can make this next year work, we will have the skills, knowledge, and juice to be shooting new projects through the pipeline, working together a year from now, and I'm just as excited about that part as I am the year of travel.

But right now is hard. Everyone in the house has lost their funny bone except Owen, and instead of taking his que, I just get infuriated! Yesterday Bob was like "Let's just do it Owen's way. He's the only one of us having any fun!" I could only point out that after 2 days of compiling clothing to take on the trip, all Owen had in his pile was two t-shirts and a pair of boxers, so while he was having a lot of fun walking around the house, poking his fingers out of the top of his head, and saying "My antenna say it's getting worse in here.", I couldn't see myself joining in. Thank God for Owen, and he's right of course. It is getting worse in here. Know why? BECAUSE IT'S SO FLIPPING HARD!!!!

We leave this house one week from today. We leave the country a little more than a week after that. I need to sell a car this weekend, and another car next week. The couch doesn't fit into the storage cube. We have bookcases, lawn furniture, and a composter to deliver to friends. The realty company is trouping people through the house in the midst of chaos. Owen has his goodbye sleep over party tomorrow night. We have a TV crew coming next Wednesday, and instead of stepping up the exfoliation and wondering what to wear, I caught myself thinking "I can't loose a whole afternoon to this!"  Truly - I have lost the excitement of adventure somewhere in the agony of dismantling my life. Every single thing we own had been addressed, evaluated, and decided upon. This is why it's different from moving to a new house. We can't pack it up and deal with it on the other side of the move. We have had to find almost everything we own a new home. We've done well. I see light. I just see very little humor, and it's about to kill me.

So this morning, instead of curling up with Jason Borne, or scrubbing out my fury in a Pine-Sol haze, I sat down with a cup of coffee and my notebook, and gave myself a little talking to. I am in the midst of an extraordinary moment in my life. It deserves my full self. I shall try my best to be here for it.

Live! Live! Live! Podcast Interview (well... now it's recorded)

We had our first ever live interview via podcast yesterday morning at GSPN.TV -- Generally Speaking Production Network.  Cliff and Stephanie Ravenscraft have been talking (on air) about taking some time off and traveling with their children, and one of their listeners told them about us.  I don't know if they're now more, or less, likely to jump off the deep end after our conversation, but it was fun. 

Cliff left the security of his job in insurance a year and a half ago to make the leap into full-time podcasting and new media consulting.  It's pretty inspiring, and exactly the kind of Uncertainty seekers that Bob and I love to find. Maybe we'll interview them back soon to get their story.

Listen to the podcast here if you like.  It's 060 Family From The Heart - From Here To Uncertainty and runs about an hour.