I couldn't find a more appropriate time than my birthday to share one of the big news about my life with you. If you still follow my Instagram, you've probably already known that I decided to move to a new house mid of this year. When I spoke to some of my friends about this decision, everyone seemed surprised as they knew how much I loved my old place. I even invested time and money to redecorate it and blogged about it here. Then, less than a year later, one day, while I was reading a book about getting out of the comfort zone, all of a sudden, my mind spoke to me, "Crystal, it's time to move." Then the fear held me back and said, "But you've invested so much in this place? How to find such a spacious bedroom elsewhere? Why need to leave when no one asked you to". That conversation repeated in my head for months, plus other factors to consider. I couldn't decide, so I relied on faith. Typical Asian me, I know. But experiences have proven to me many times that if something is meant to be, it will happen. So I keep holding to that thought whenever I have to take the leap of faith. Some people relocate so easily like they change clothes. I admire them. When I left Vietnam for Malaysia and left Malaysia for Singapore, I had only 2 pieces of luggage. 12 years later, I had 30 large carton boxes, 5 pieces of luggage, and dozen pieces of furniture to take with me. Hence, moving house is my worst nightmare. Besides, it reminds me of the teenage memories where we had to move house every year for nearly 10 years. It was sad.
I tried to stay as long as I could. Then, a couple of things happened that made me feel like it was the right time to change. After a few months of thinking and seeking advice from my most trusted group of people, I finally decided to move out and move forward. That was in April 2021.
I viewed nearly 20 houses within one month. Tiring, frustrating, disappointing, exciting, drooling, disheartening were the emotions I processed every week whenever I went for house viewing. And yet, in my mind, I was so sure that I'd find the house, or the house would find me. I viewed the last house on May 2nd, and it was not even on my top 3 list. But people often "Save the best for last.", who knew the Universe was doing the same to me. I was curious about the last house.
As soon as the car arrived at the condo entrance, I heard the soothing sound of the water fountain. Almost immediately, I felt like this could be the place that I call home. By the time I took my first few steps in the house, I knew I no longer had to schedule another viewing after that. It felt right. Right time, right place, right people.
June 8th, I moved to a new house. It was an auspicious day, as advised by my Dad. The house was empty without any furniture. It's like a blank canvas for me to paint a new artwork. Although I'm terrible at painting, I'm not too bad at home decoration, I think.
It took me 2 months to turn this empty space
into something I'm proud to call HOME.
It's much smaller than my last house, but it's cozy, bright, and windy. Exactly how I like it.
I buy fresh flowers every week as they make me happy looking at them. I enjoyed staying home during the lockdown before, but I love spending every minute in my new home much more now. A perfect morning routine to me (if I'm not working) is switching on the water fountain, opening the window, playing soft piano music, having my coffee and breakfast, reading a book, or playing with my piano. It's simple yet so satisfying.
Moving from a big house to a smaller one has turned me into an organized freak, in a good way, of course. You can tell from my work desk with no messy cables around, considering the number of devices I have. Wait until you see how I organized my closet. I'll save that for the Instagram stories maybe, so do follow me if you want to see.
This year, I've taken a big step back from social media. I went completely offline for a few months and didn't miss it at all. As if packing, moving house, and working weren't busy enough, I decided to go back to school. I took a couple of leadership & management courses from Harvard Business School Online to improve my skills and knowledge. More importantly, it was my dream to study at Harvard when I was in college. I couldn't do it then, so I do it now. As a result, I barely had 8hrs a day to sleep, but when these two certificates came into the mail, they made all the sleepless nights worth it. I'm still not done with my study, and I still have two more certificates to earn. But I can finally cross the "Study at Harvard" off the younger Crystal's bucket list. What's on the older Crystal's bucket list? Well, it's for another blog entry.
For now, here are some more photos from my lovely place. Oh, I also started learning piano. Why? I don't know. Covid made me do it.
A typical breakfast at C's!
Coffee with Crystal corner!
Having a clean, organized kitchen motivates me to cook more at home now. The spice and condiment containers are bonuses.
I have a much smaller bedroom in the new house, and I don't have a walk-in closet anymore, so I had to be super creative about keeping all the shoes and bags. Although it's smaller, it's super cozy, clean, and comfortable.
These babies have a new home and I think they are happy
The beauty corner
Once a while when I feel like I need a at-home spa day.
An afternoon walk after work in the neighborhood has become routine every week. I can never feel upset looking at this view, especially with a sunset view like this.
This view never gets old.
Every time I look at this, I feel immensely grateful for many things, especially this year. The global pandemic lasted much longer than we all expected. So many people lost their family members, their jobs, their hopes, and their dreams. Yet, I moved to a bigger house. Saying this out loud made me feel that I'm so spoiled. But the truth is, after 16 years of living abroad, moving from a shared bedroom to a storage room, from a storage room to a partitioned room (picture below), from a partitioned room to a master bedroom.
Finally, I moved from a master bedroom to a whole house.
It was a significant change that I didn't see it coming myself. But here I am celebrating my 37th birthday in my lovely home with a grateful heart.
Thank you to my family, my guardian angels, for guiding me on my journey! Thank you to my friends for staying with me through ups and downs and supporting me! For now, I need to go to sleep (it's 4.09am) so I can have energy to celebrate tomorrow.
Thank you so much for reading!
xoxo