Moving Story

SO we had big plans. How can your plans not be big when you are moving to Texas?!? We were filling our moving trailer ourselves and then the movers were to pick it up and drive it to Texas for us. Then, they were to drop it off at our new home. We were going to depart Logan at 7:30 am on Saturday, August 14th, and drive for 11 hours to arrive in our nice hotel in Pueblo, Colorado. We would then eat a fabulous FREE breakfast at the hotel, drive for 7 hours to arrive at the home of our good friends from Riverside, the Coxes, to stay for the night. Monday, August 16 we would drive from Lubbock to Wylie (which was to be approximately 6 hours), where we would find our keys to our rental home hidden in a secret location. We would walk in to find a clean, comfortable home, spend Monday night in sleeping bags and, on Tuesday, get our trailer containing all of our possessions.
Big plans make for big flops.
Filling our trailer went smoothly. Dave and I did most of it ourselves, and had some Elders in our ward help with the big stuff on Wednesday night. The movers picked the trailer up on Thursday, as scheduled. We were going to live in our home, without any furniture until Saturday morning. Friday night our friends threw us a great BBQ/going away party. After we got home we loaded most of our "left behind" stuff into the back of the van and truck. At about 10:00pm I started feeling poorly. By midnight, I knew I was sick, but tried to go to sleep anyway. At 2:00am I woke up, and took a trip to the ER. I had a raging bladder infection. Lucky me.
I got home from the hospital at 4:00 am, went to sleep and had to get up at 6:30 to get ready to leave. We didn't make it out at 7:30, but ended up leaving shortly after 8:00am. (Not bad!)
If you have ever had a bladder infection, you know how uncomfortable they are. We stopped in Brigham City at Walmart to get my prescriptions filled (and to get some caffeine...) and then got on the road.
Our 11 hour trip to Pueblo, CO turned into a 13 1/2 hour trip because we had to stop about a million times for me and our four little girls to use the bathroom. Dave was a really good sport... mostly because I was sick and he knew I HAD to stop. (I also blamed it on the girls if we had to stop soon after we had just made a stop...) Ciera and Chloe rode in the pickup with Dave and Brooke and Autumn stayed with me. Most of the journey, they did a great job! Autumn fell asleep once and after she woke up she cried hysterically for half an hour. I was about to lose my mind! We found an exit where we could stop for dinner and there was a Burger King with a play place. As soon as Autumn realized she could get out and play, she was happy. I think all of the girls were happy to get out and play for a little while.
We made it to our hotel (which was not great, but not bad either), checked in, watched some tv, and went to sleep. During the night, it rained. The stuff in the back of the pickup got a little wet, but most of it was okay. The free breakfast at the hotel left something to be desired, but it was free, and it filled our tummies. We traveled, without much frustration to the Coxes house on Sunday. Cynthia was cooking a dinner for us, which was so yummy! We let the kids play for a long time and just relaxed and visited. In the morning, Rob cooked breakfast (which was also yummy) and then we loaded up to drive to our new home. This drive was only going to be 6 hours, and we would finally reach our home, so we were pretty excited.
We had positive attitudes, directions printed out from the computer, and a relatively short drive. What could go wrong?
Well, I will tell you. Dallas/Fort Worth is a large metro area, with a lot of freeways with a lot of interchanges. I was following Dave. The freeways we chose to take went around Dallas so we wouldn't get confused. That didn't matter... we still got confused. We lost our way, tried to find it again, and ended up on Tollways with no "Toll Tag" on our cars. We got off at the last "cash" exit, and tried to find our way without using that Tollway. We got lost. Dave followed me for a while, and I ended up getting us lost too. After that, I didn't want to lead anymore, so Dave took charge again. We decided to try a main street that headed in the direction that we wanted to go, and eventually found our way to the 78 highway that leads to Wylie. It ended up taking a couple of hours more than we planned, but we found Wylie, and were almost to our home.
When we found our house, there was a truck in the driveway, and an old man with no front teeth in our house. We told him that we were the renters, and he said he was just finishing the repairs prior to our move in. We walked into the house and it REEKED of cigarette smoke. Maintenance man took about 1/2 hour to finish up what he needed to do and then left us. We finally were home. It was a horrible, HORRIBLE Monday, but we made it. Our trailer got here Wednesday (instead of Tuesday), and Dave unloaded it (I helped a bit) in over 100 degree heat with major humidity. It was awful! We got in touch with our ward in the evening and some guys came over and helped with the last 5 pieces of furniture (the piano included...), and we were finally done.
Now that we are here, and our stuff is mostly put away, and we are learning our way around it is getting better. The first couple of days, I wanted to turn around and go back to Logan. (I still wouldn't mind going back... but I don't dislike it here.) I will be posting some pictures of our home in a few days. Thanks for letting me rant about our move... I feel better.

First Day of School in Texas

Well, we made it to Texas. Barely. I will have to do another post telling our "moving story" when I have time, but for now I will focus on the first day of school.Monday, August 23, my Brooke started Kindergarten. In Texas (at least in Wylie) Kindergarten is all day. From 7:30am to 2:30pm. That is a long time... I was worried about how Brooke would handle it. I shouldn't have worried. She did great. In fact, when I was talking to her last weekend, I was saying how much I was going to miss her when she was in school. She told me not to worry, she would come home right when school got out. She is a good girl... and she did great.Ciera and Chloe got to start 5th and 3rd grade on Monday too. They both were excited and nervous, but of course they did great as well. Ciera started intermediate school and gets to switch classes throughout the day... which she loves. She feels so grown up. Chloe has a really good teacher and is already making friends... she does so well every time they start back to school!
I thought that Autumn would have a hard time with her sisters all gone... she is doing great. She loves having "mommy time" all day. It has been so hot that we bought a little inflatable pool to cool off in... Autumn played in it for a long time today.

This transition has been a difficult one, but I think we all are going to be okay.

Sorry, the number you are calling has been disconnected...

Our lives have been a bit crazy lately. The month of July was terribly busy, and the month of August is even more insane. I have little time to do anything except pack and clean (because we are moving next week, and still trying to sell our home...)
So, I am going to make this post short and sweet. A few weeks ago we went to Southern Utah to Zion National Park. It was beautiful. (And I have to say, my girls are beautiful too!)
Today I took my girls to the Logan Aquatic Center for the last time. It was a beautiful day, the pool wasn't very crowded, and we had a good time.
Please forgive my lack of posts for a while. I will post again once we are settled in Texas!!

Rattle, Rattle, Rattle

Have you ever seen your life flash before your eyes? I have. Twice. Once was in our car accident in 2006, (which is another story), but this time it was last week at GIRLS CAMP!

I was having a great time with all of my girls, and had not seen one scary creature. We saw lots of squirrels and a raccoon, which was pretty fun. Thursday morning, after we packed lunches and water bottles into our backpacks, we departed for our planned hike. It was going to be a 3-5 mile hike (depending on what year the girls were...), and I was going to go the distance. We hiked up to an old abandoned mine, which was awesome! At that point, the lesser hikers turned back to camp, while the uber hikers continued on.After a mile more, we turned to go back to the camp too. I was in the lead, with my friend (and YW President) Amy, and one of our cute first-years. We were talking and having fun when I took a step and instantly heard the rattling of a RATTLESNAKE right by my foot. In all the manuals it says to freeze and calmly back away. I KNOW that. However, in that instant, all I thought was, "HOLY COW!" I screamed and ran, pulling our young woman out of harms way with me. The snake was mad. He rattled for a LONG time, and the when the man who was helping us on the hike tried to move it out of the way with a stick, it struck the stick. That could have been my leg. Yikes!My heart felt like it was going to explode out of my chest. I have not had the great experience of almost stepping on a rattlesnake before, but let me tell you... it is NO fun! The rest of the way back to camp I was paranoid. Was that the end of our snake adventures? NO! We had one more rattlesnake encounter a little ways down the trail. This time it was a little further away, so it wasn't quite as traumatic. But still scary. And then a little garter snake slithered out of a hole in a fallen-log bridge just as I was crossing the river on it. Let me tell you, I was DONE with snakes for that day. And probably for the rest of my life. (By the way, this is not the snake that we saw... I was too afraid to get close enough to take a picture after it almost took my life! This is thanks to some other brave soul who put it on Google images.)

HaPpY InDePeNdAnCe DaY!

Have a wonderful 4th of July!

Dallas it is!

So a lot has happened in a month. We thought we were moving to Guam, which filled us with both happiness and anxiety. Dave had an offer of employment from the University of Guam, which we were prepared to take, and then he got calls from Clayton State University in Georgia, and the University of North Texas, Dallas for interviews. We both felt like he should do the interviews to keep all our options open, so he went to Texas and Georgia to interview. Last week, he got offers of employment from both of them. Now, it was decision time.
We weighed all of our options, and tried to take into account all sorts of things, and we made our decision this weekend. We are going to Dallas, Texas. YAY!
Now we will all have to grow big hair (and a big mustache for Dave), wear cowboy boots, and become fans of the Dallas Cowboys. Because everything is bigger in Texas.

Happy Father's Day and Anniversary to my love...

Dave is the best husband and father I could ever imagine or hope for. I love him with all my heart, and can't believe that we have been married for thirteen years! He is such a great man, and such an awesome dad to our girls. There is nobody in this world like him. I am so glad I get to be on this adventure with him... and look forward to being with him forever.
Today is our anniversary and Father's day, and Dave is not here. He is on his way to Atlanta, GA for an interview with a university there. I know he would be here if he could, and we miss him...
He is such a hard worker, and has always provided for our family so that I could stay home with our children. He is loyal and true, brave and strong, and my hero. I love him.