Top 5 Signs that Your Family is Preparing to Move Cross-Country

5. You are all exhausted. All the time. And probably more emotionally than physically, although it all looks the same.

4. Your husband's company deems it a good time to send him on not one but two business trips in the next two weeks, taking him away for 4 nights...and one of them is to Chicago.

3. Your kindergartner cries - no, bawls dramatically - at the drop of a hat at unusual times, such as when a friend asks if you are going to be giving away any of your houseplants. ("Nooooo...*sob*...not the spiiiider plaaaaannntssss....*sob*...")

4. The same elder child emerges from his bedroom long after he was assumed to be asleep, and gives as his reason for being awake: "I can't sleep. Everything in my room is too the same. Nothing is different."

5. Your toddler makes endless requests at bedtime in an effort to keep you in there and is now in the crib with all of the following items: three baby dolls, a kitchen timer, a cup of water, and his rocket ship slippers (on a warm night when he's in summer pj's). You have removed a lamp that seemed to be offensive. Furthermore, your spouse has had to go in to fulfill a request to pose a large Curious George monkey on his changing table in a certain way, and again later to pick up a tube of lotion that fell way across the room and purportedly hurt his arm. Note that he is in the crib; I did not say asleep in the crib. At a certain point it's time to say good night and leave him to find a corner amongst all those items to just go to sleep.