Moving along

I sat down a few times last week to do a post and couldn't write anything. I am so excited for this move, but also quite overwhelmed. So far our lives have been safe- we live with Jon's parents and I worked with mine. Few risks have tempted us, and we are both so practical that even the risks we take are safe ones. This move is a safe risk, but is still scaring me. It would be so easy to say that we are going to stay, that I will go back to Kids' and that we will continue to live in the basement.
But easy isn't always the best option. We need to do our own thing. We need to take a big risk and get our life going. We spent the last week in Victoria house hunting, job hunting and getting to know the city. It feels right there.
I am excited to work there- the high property values make my services more viable. When you are spending that much on a house you are willing to put a bit more money into preserving it. I am too scared to go there and just do design work, that much pressure usually means that I can't come up with anything creative. I do have some design leads there, and I will advertise to attract more clients, but I don't want my design work to be our only hope of making ends meet when we are there. We have received a surprising amount of flack from this decision- the advice I keep getting is that we are going there for me to do design, so I should only do that. Terrifying! I am finding a job and will do design work on the side until I get too busy and then I will start cutting back my hours.
I had a great interview at Chintz & Company (which is one of my favourite stores ever!!! They sell everything you would need in a home and offer design services. I would start out as retail floor staff, but as my private portfolio gets built up I could start to work in their design studio.

We both dropped off a ton of resumes, and Jon had a good interview with Fedex. I also had a really long chat with the manager of the downtown Lush. I would love to work there (and I already know all their products) Jon is terrified at the thought- my whole pay check would go back to them...but staff discount has it's perks! I think working here part time while I am at Chintz would be perfect. They are only looking for seasonal (summer) staff, so once my design work picks up they will be willing to cut my shifts! Plus, the condo we found has 2 bathrooms, what a perfect way to keep them stocked!!!

Oh yeah, right. Our new place. We ended up finding a great 2 bedroom and officially have the keys on March 29th. It is a bit farther north than we were originally thinking, but still on main bus routes and a bit closer for Jon to get to the airport for work. It is also close to my cousin's place, which wasn't planned at all. I think we will hang out with him and his friends a ton- at least until he gets all his permits in order and heads to Germany for a year. Some photos of the condo:

We took a peek at some great commercial real estate, but decided that the move and getting my design portfolio built up is stressful enough. We will still open the store, my guess is next spring so we can start out during the strong tourist season. There are a few competitors there, but nobody that concentrates on local products the way that we want to. So for now we will go out there, enjoy the spring weather and work our butts off to get established. I am going to start Indulgent Designs as my design company first and later on when we approach banks for financing they will be able to see what the business has done already.
I am pumped! Terrified, but pumped!