Leah and Andy’s Goodbye and Cry Party

And now it’s time to say goodbye…

Two years and two days ago, we had ourselves a going away party at our townhouse in New Jersey. At the time, we had a semi-urgent need to get together with as many of our friends and family as possible in advance of our move to Florida. The urgency was spurred by the fact that we had changed our move time frame from “we’ll go whenever our second house sells” (by the way, it wasn’t even on the market yet) to “we are leaving in four weeks.”

Why the sudden change of plans? Well, we didn’t expect it since the real estate market was still pretty terrible at the time, but we sold our home just eight days after listing it. We actually got a great price for it too. It turned out the years of being weekend warriors and working on the house actually paid off in the end.

After we made arrangements for a prompt closing on our home, we had originally planned to move into our second home, which had previously been used as a rental property, but was currently vacant. Ultimately, we decided that if we were going to pack everything and move, we might as well just move directly to Florida. This way our Realtor could show a perfectly cleaned, empty home rather that one full of boxes and chaos, and we wouldn’t have to go through the effort twice.

Hence, it was time to gather our friends and say as many goodbyes in one shot as possible, so we could spend the next few weeks packing, tying up all loose ends and making our moving arrangements. It was time for our “Goodbye and Cry.”

What is a “Goodbye and Cry?” you ask. Well, when I was trying to come up with a plan/theme for the party, I asked Andy what he would call the opposite of a “Meet and Greet,” and that’s what he said. So, we had a “Goodbye and Cry” party on August 26, 2012, complete with our famous homemade matching shirts.

We decided to have an open house style party over an eight hour span of time on a Sunday. We invited way more people than could fit comfortably in our townhome and asked them to stop by any time that was convenient with the assumption that different folks would follow different schedules and our guests would spread out automatically. Sure enough, mostly everyone came around the same time frame, and it was difficult to spend time with everyone, but we sure tried! We had a wonderful day and we were so honored that so many friends, family members and coworkers came to visit us. We received many cards, gifts and well wishes plus this super cool cake from the family-owned bakery in my hometown. Thanks again, Joe!

We were so busy that we didn’t actually take any photos during the party! We just have this one from before the party when I was setting up all the food….

and a selfie we took after everyone had gone.

If you are planning a relocation, we highly recommend having an open house / “Goodbye and Cry” with your friends and family! It is a fun way to spend time with lots of important folks to ensure you see everyone one last time before you go.

Thanks again to everyone who came to say goodbye and cry with us! <3