It started with a road trip

Yup! We moved! I'm no longer living an Austin although I'll always be an Austinite at heart and I'm still an active real estate agent in Austin.  I'll be back in Austin every 4-6 weeks for a while, but damn it feels good to breathe the mountain air. 

It all started with a road trip...

In May I had my diastasis recti repair surgery that knocked me on my ass for WAY longer than anticipated. In June I had two weeks without the kids and thought, "Where do I go when I can't do a damn thing but sit and look at pretty things?" Road trip?

My love and I bought a Mercedes Revel earlier this year and decided to drive to Oregon (look out for that post too) and we drive through Santa Fe, Utah, Idaho and finally Oregon where we stopped in a Norman Rockell-esque town called Bend.  Driving through the town seeing people surfing the RIVER waves (yes, that's a thing here), smiling and laughing on patios, weaving blankets sitting at the park...I was brought to tears! I decided immediately this is where I wanted to raise my boys. I started researching cost of living, schools, housing, etc and decided in two to five years, maybe I could pull it off. 

Flash forward to hot summer months with kids screaming about the Texas heat, overpriced waterparks, playgrounds covered in trash and feces from vagrants in our yards, we decided it may need to be sooner than later. A year perhaps?

​But then a HEAP of issues began involving my children and an unprotective person in their lives. Their behavior started to change rapidly. I began to see aggression, violence, sleepless nights, poor eating, and one of them was completely incapacitated over school and wouldn't leave my side. 

We decided we needed a breather. We drove to Oregon to show the kids to town, let them experience its beauty for themselves and after a few short days they were asking if they could live here, too. They wanted to be one the kids that lived in Bend. So, I did the crunchy-mom thing and made sure I found a place with natural beauty to live, a Waldorf school I could afford, a holistic pediatrician and dentist, and I researched youth sports and activities. Within a week of the cooler air, kinder people and negligent crime rate, we decided to turn family vacay into "we gon' stay!" 

I'm adding a page here, Bend-Mom, for all my new mommy friends to follow along on our adventures and of course I'll be forming "Tribes" here for new and expectant mamas and starting workshops for parents of all ages and weekly toddler play groups. Follow along on @bend_mom on instagram and be sure to subscribe to my podcast, Whole Heart: Crunchy Parenting wherever you get your podcasts!

"Be kind, you're in Bend"

​Chelsea