We keep outgrowing our surroundings. We have lived in one apartment and two houses in the past eight years, and again, I find myself ready to pack up and go. My neighbors are moving, they sold their house in three days, so of course that gets me excited about our chances of selling fast, and as they load up their big yellow Penske truck today and are off to Florida, I envy that feeling, the fresh start, the new beginning.

As I look around my house, I’m reminded daily of the lack of space. I feel like the walls are literally closing in on me. My living room, which we thought was a great size when we moved in, has turned into a badly organized Toys ‘R Us. I keep putting toys in bins after my son grows out of them, yet more toys keep appearing. It’s frightening.

My dining room/office #1 is in no way the formal eating area we imagined. My Dell laptop (I HATE PCs, I’M A MAC SNOB) is sitting atop my table, legal pads are strewn about with notes on what needs done for the million clients I have, power cords are plugged in everywhere, and the most action this table gets is a nice rub down when I Pledge every couple of days. I think I’ve served a giant meal with family around this table twice in four years.

Office #2 (bedroom #3) houses a huge computer desk with my beautiful iMac, the love of my life (besides my hubs and my kid) and sometimes sitting there writing, I forget about everything else around me. Then reality hits. Shelves upon shelves of scrapbook material (I’m only two years behind on that, so sue me), a basketball hoop of my sons, my keyboard I got for Christmas when I was 12 that is still awesome and still works, unlike my shredder also housed here, that I have to hit reverse on 5o times before I can shred one receipt, and a massive stockpile of “to sell on eBay” stuff. My husband has been doing a really sweet job of making us some extra dough by selling his old stuff, but holy hell, I am constantly tripping over wrestlers, Nintendo games, records, you name it. The man has three garbage bags full of wrestlers right now. He threw nothing away as a child, and I’m shocked at how much people will pay for these rubber men.

We have…

We had an awesome game room with a wet bar, that for the early part of our time living here was used solely for parties, and lots of them. There were plenty of places to house the five or six coolers our friends had, bar space for snacks and sweets, our college dorm-esque futon that I didn’t care if people spilled stuff on, and our old school computer. We would just spend hours looking up YouTube videos, taking turns as the DJ. The walls are adorned with vintage movie posters and photos: Audrey, Marilyn, James Dean, and it was just our space, our special space where so many memories were made and good times were had. Beer Pong was in the next room, and the boys bathroom downstairs, while us ladies went upstairs.

Now… the bathroom downstairs doesn’t work, and the only activity that game room sees is once a year on fantasy football draft day. It’s littered with everything. Baby swings and bouncers, highchairs, holiday decorations, bins of clothes, my husband’s home gym. I don’t even go in there anymore. It depresses me. Sometimes I look at my favorite pic of Audrey down there and just start singing Madonna, “This used to be my playground…” LOL!

Just as wowed I am every time my son grows out of something so quickly, I realize that we are growing out of our life, too. This “big” house seems so small. And the party days, few and far between. Now it’s us “adults” getting together so our own kids can play. I guess this is 30. I guess we had to grow up someday. And you know what, I like this new life. I like being older. I never thought I would, but you know who your true friends are at this point, and more importantly, you know more about yourself. So I’m sure a bigger house will come someday. I’ll try not to rush this time of my life. Years go by, people come and go, places change, and I want to remember everything.

If you need me, I’ll be at Walmart, buying yet another storage bin.