New Adventures

This last year has passed so fast and brought about many changes for us. My apologies for not writing and keeping you all up to date. There were so many moments where I thought..."I really need to write about this"...but then life happened and it never got written.

We spent the last year living in the apartment below Marc's parents house and for all intensive purposes created a very "normal" routine. The girls completed their 2nd year at the same school, Marc coached for the local year-round swim team, and I continued to work with clients and build my online business. There were play dates, sleep-overs, and dinner gatherings. And there was the day-to-day tasks of grocery shopping, homework, and after school activities. In some ways it felt as if we could have been back home and in other ways...no...we were in France.

There were lots of "blog-worthy" moments. France continues to surprise me...and at times frustrate me! Some of these moments I will still share with you because they're just that good but for today I felt like I really needed to bring everyone up to speed on our latest adventure.

Since we arrived in France 3 Augusts ago we have been in transition. Looking for a simpler, less stressful life filled with more time with each other and with our girls. In many ways we have accomplished this. But with Marc coaching last year we saw glimpses of the stressful time-consuming reality we had left back in California returning. We knew this was temporary and was definitely not all bad (Lola loved having her Papa coaching her again) but we were keeping an eye towards the next step.

At first this next step was going to be Marc creating a swim school using Endless Pools. I'm sure this would have worked really well in the region we were living in but the more time Marc spent working through this business plan, the more he realized that he would be getting himself right back into a scenario where he would be working long hours and dependent on making enough money to support the rent of his facility. Plus we really wanted to find a house or property we could build on in the mountains and unfortunately the price of things was still way beyond our reach...meaning we would be locked into working a lot to make enough money to support the increased price of living in this region. This is exactly what we had left in California and we were really hesitant to jump right back into that same scenario.

So...the soul searching began...followed by lots of time meditating, journaling, and long discussions while walking along the lake. I started to get clearer and clearer about what my overarching goals were...and thankfully they were the same for Marc.

There were 5 goals that continued to be true for me:

1. I did not want to worry about money anymore!
2. I wanted Marc to be home more, not less.
3. I wanted us to live back in nature again.
4. I wanted space to have animals & grow our own food.
5. I wanted a house that would provide enough space for us, a home office, and the ability for us to host visitors (most importantly my family when they came to visit).

From there it just became a numbers game. How much money we had in savings from the sale of our house in California, how much money I can make each month with my business, plus how much money Marc brought home each month...with the intention that he would be changing his job sooner than later.

It didn't take long for us to realize that we would not be able to stay in Haute Savoie. The price of living, being so close to Switzerland, was just too high for us to not have to worry about money. This gave us permission to start looking in other areas of France. Where could we live where we would be able to meet our goals?

For the next couple months our evenings were filled with this question and lots of time researching online. We ended up narrowing it down to several regions (Dordogne, Correze, Haute Pyrennes), which then led to researching housing in those regions.

We planned our first visit with the girls the beginning of May to meet with a realtor and start to explore the area more intimately (neither Marc nor I had ever been to any of these regions before!). It didn't take long for us to immediately feel at home there. So much more space, a lot less people, and beautiful rolling green hills and countrysides.

The department of Dordogne is known for all of its castles! Here was one we toured in Hautefort.

So many charming villages! We stopped at this one for lunch.

It was right on the Dordogne River.

One of my favorite towns we visited was Brantome, a little French Venice. So pretty!

Marc and I planned another trip the middle of June and explored some of the neighboring departments as well to widen our search a bit.

More beautiful villages!! This one is Collonges La Rouge.

And this one is Turenne.

The beautiful view of the Valley from the castle tower.

Let's just say that as much as I like "adventure", heights are not really my thing. I was a bit nervous up here and by the time we got back down, navigating all those stairs, my thigh cramped up...ouch!!

In July, while the girls and I were in California, Marc returned for one more visit. During that visit, he found it! In the countryside of Correze, on the outskirts of a sweet village called Palisse. The place which checked off (almost) all of our boxes...plenty of space to grow food & raise animals (9.5 acres to be exact!), off the beaten path and surrounded by forest, close to a beautiful lake and village where the girls would go to school, and a house big enough for an office and guest room!

The trick of course is I wasn't there to see it, although he sent me lots of photos & videos, he was nervous to make such a big decision without me (understandably!) and ultimately we didn't really know very much about this area.

But here's the thing. Thankfully for Marc I'm always up for adventure and I fully trusted his assessment and intuition. It met all the points that were important to us AND it was still within our budget. And nothing in France moves quickly. Which means if we wanted to get there before school started we needed to start the process as soon as possible.

The rest, I suppose, is history. We took a leap and made an offer, which was accepted! The owner also agreed to let us move in before the sale was finalized so the girls could start school. Marc began looking for work and within only a couple weeks found something! The girls and I arrived back from California and within a week we packed up the first of our things (clothing & other essentials) between both cars and drove to our new home! 

Thankfully the house was being used as an Airbnb, which meant it was fully furnished and ready to live in, making it an incredibly easy transition for us. A week later the girls started school and Marc started his new job. A couple weeks after that we returned to Thonon to finish moving the rest of our things.

It's kind of hard to believe all of this happened in such a short amount of time but I am a really firm believer in both the power of manifestation and in trusting the universe. We were clear about what we wanted. We put it out into the universe. And we were open to opportunity. When it presented itself we took a leap of faith and went for it.

It's been 3 months and so far no regrets!! Now, this is not to say that some parts haven't been hard (I'll blog more about this soon) but overall we couldn't be happier and super excited about what lies ahead.