Once upon a time, my life was calm. I had a great marriage, good job, nice house and cute dog. I was young, innocent and blissfully ignorant of the evils of relocation.

It's amazing what can happen in six months. Especially six months in which my husband and I totally upended our lives to move to Las Vegas so he could start his own business. We've dealt with massive amounts of home improvement, quitting our jobs, telling our friends, and last, but certainly not least, navigating our way through one of the worst real estate markets in recent memory.

I mused in my first post that the entire process was likely to put our marriage to the test, and it certainly did. There were many sleepless nights, several fights, and at least two full bottles of antacids consumed during the process, but now that we're (more or less) settled in our new life, I can say that we've survived intact.

Click here to read Amy's Tips for Surviving Adventures in Relocation ...


Amy's Top Tips for Relocating with Style:

1. Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.
2. Don't blog about your relocation under your real name if you haven't yet given notice at work. Employers tend to get testy about those sorts of things.
3. Ditto with Facebook updates and Twitter feeds.
4. If you're fixing up your home in preparation for selling it, fill your TiVo with as much HGTV as possible. Your husband doesn't need to see the season finale of "Stargate" anyway.
5. Margaritas are an excellent mood lifter.
6. Not sure if you've heard, but the housing market is in shambles. When your realtor tells you how much you can sell your house for, it's not a cruel joke. He's actually being serious.
7. That being said, "staging" your home to sell can work wonders. But actually living in it while it's staged sucks big time. Be prepared to live out of a suitcase for several weeks.
8. Pepcid lasts longer, but Tums taste better.
9. Professional movers will cost you exactly double what you think and at least twice as much as you have in your bank account, so get rid of everything you're not actively using.
10. If you hold a garage sale to get rid of it all, be prepared for early birds. Early, as in "before the sun rises."
11. Craigslist is a slice of Internet heaven for dumping what's left.
12. 2300 square feet of furniture will not fit in a 1200-square-foot house. Doesn't matter how you Feng Shui it.
13. Yoga is good for relieving tension. So is smashing a dish against a tile floor.
14. See #1.

I would have liked to wrap up my "Adventures in Relocation" series with a post about how our move has made my life infinitely better and I don't regret anything. Unfortunately, that's just not true. I still wonder if we did the right thing. Maybe in 50 years, Lemondrop will invite me back for a reunion post to let you know how it all turned out. Until then, we'll all just have to wait and see.

If you're pondering a relocation of your own and you have burning questions beyond this, feel free to e-mail me at amy@lemondrop.com. I can't promise I'll have sage advice on every matter, but I can promise to entertain you with my answers.