We passed an odd little milestone on Wednesday. On the surface it simply marked seven months of living in a house that no longer feels “new,” but the milestone felt bigger when we realized it also marked the moment Clara has now spent more of her life here than she did in our first home.
We always assumed our first house would be a fuzzy blur in Clara’s memory, but reaching this point brings that idea into focus. That first house was incredibly meaningful to Sherry and me. We poured more than 4.5 years into renovating and loving it — it was our first home, our backyard wedding venue, the place we experimented with dozens of DIY projects, the inspiration behind starting this blog, and where we brought our baby home from the hospital. It’s strange and a little bittersweet to realize it’s already becoming “that place I lived for a few months when I was a baby” in Clara’s story.
Here’s Clara at almost seven months, checking out her new room on moving day. These early photos are already precious evidence of the transitions she’s lived through.
And here she is just over seven months later — such a big girl, still adorably bald. Watching her grow in this new space has been a quiet, constant joy.
We’re so relieved that both Clara and Burger adapted well to the move. Pets and kids can make moving especially unpredictable, but both of them settled in quickly and made the new house feel like home. For us, too, the house has become a place of comfort and continued creativity. Even if the first house remains a landmark in our own history, for Clara it’s already shrinking into the category of early childhood that will live mostly in photos, videos, and stories rather than vivid memories.
Do you have a childhood home that you remember only vaguely, or one where photos and stories are what keep the memory alive? Personally, I lived in the same house for my entire childhood, so I have clear memories tied to that single place. Sherry moved several times growing up and has just a few distinct memories from her earliest home—like the drop ceiling in the basement that she and the boys would “accidentally” break all the time. Clara’s recollection of her first home is unlikely to include such mishaps, unless you count all the DIY projects she observed while we worked on renovating and improving that house.
Preserving these early moments matters to us. Photos and videos become anchors for family stories, and they help shape how we tell Clara about her past when she’s older. Even if she doesn’t remember the exact layout of a room or the color of a wall, she will have a vivid archive of small moments — the way she explored a new bedroom, the first time she sat in a different window seat, or the slow realization that the world around her can change and still feel safe and loving.
Moving and settling into a new home is more than packing boxes and arranging furniture; it’s about creating a new backdrop for everyday life. It’s strange to accept that places we once thought of as permanent can become footnotes in a child’s life, but it’s also comforting to know that memories are portable. We carry them in pictures, in stories we tell around the table, and in the traditions we recreate in new spaces.
Update — We just finished Clara’s latest monthly photo; check it out here. We’ve got a walker!!