Man...where does the time go?! Is anyone still here? Hello?
I know, I have completely neglected the little old blog lately, but life is crazy like that. And thanks to the ease and convenience of social media (I'm a new Instagram believer...how did I live without it?!) I just don't get around to blogging...ever.
So here's the haps: As mentioned, we moved to Idaho. It is AWESOME. We seriously love it here! On our way to Idaho, we stopped in Utah for a few weeks where Claire was baptized (as posted about previously) and then we made our way on.
Anyway, prepare yourself for a bunch of posts as I try to catch up a little. There will be a massive picture overload and LOTS of words. I am going to just get it all out. The girls have been reading my old blog books from years past (which I haven't printed since probably 2009....again...where does time go?!) and it has given me a new desire to keep up the blog as they read and laugh about things they did when they were younger.
So without further ado....I will begin with our move.
This move was kind of hectic and crazy! We had a pretty short time frame, and no family or military to move us like in moves past. Pretty much, these pictures will do the talking...
Our house looked like this throughout the whole move...it was SO hard for me.
Desperate times call for desperate measures...
We finally got the moving truck early one morning in April and then we got to work!
Marty had help from some men in the ward, and the missionaries to get the big stuff loaded. One of the missionaries "rode" our washing machine down the stairs. It was quite epic. He was at the front of the washing machine, guiding while someone was above with it on a dolly. He lifted it up instead of guiding and pulled it off the dolly and it slid off and he ran backwards, holding the washing machine. We thought he was doomed. But luckily nobody sustained any injuries.
Our plan was to get the truck all loaded that evening, sleep, and then Marty and I would just quickly load the last few things the next morning and head out by 9 a.m. Ha ha....we were very wrong about how long it would take. We did get all the big stuff done that night, but our friends stayed with us until almost midnight and we still had a lot of work left to do. We are SO grateful for those friends...even if they did endure a police manhunt with full on helicopter and spotlights on us.
We felt like it was a fitting farewell from Victorville.
A super sweet lady in our ward (who Molly INSISTED on calling 'Sister Grandma') brought us over a sweet little farewell gift with fun things for the girls to play with in the car, and some yummy snacks. We love and miss Sister Grandma!
The morning of the move...our helpers were not exactly raring to go.
Thankfully this morning the sister missionaries and a few friends came over to help us finish up. Without them, we would have been sunk!
We had (somewhat foolishly) scheduled the carpet cleaners to come the same day as we were finishing up the loading. Of course nothing ever goes according to plan, and we got to a point where we got everything shoved down into the kitchen and off the carpet because the carpet cleaners were there, but we needed to finish packing. It was CHAOS! Thankfully some amazingly wonderful friends came and took the girls to the park so they were off the carpet while we worked.
Brody was not happy, as he was getting tired and ready for a nap, but we had nowhere to put him down since we couldn't be on the carpet, and Marty had the Yukon and was gone picking up another trailer. (we may have also underestimated how much stuff we had and how much space it would take up) So I spent a nice long hour and a half with him like this, bouncing and pacing to keep him asleep.
We were all SO exhausted!
FINALLY we got out the door around dinner time.....approximately 8 hours later than we had been hoping. We got to a point where we just started leaving stuff behind and some friends came over to do the final mopping of the kitchen. We were desperate to leave!
Marty had sold his car before we left, and so I had the Yukon with a trailer and he drove the big truck. It was my first time pulling a trailer, and I had all the kids with me. But everything went well. I may have cried a little (OK, a lot) as we pulled away from the house. Not because I was sad to leave, but because all the emotions and exhaustion hit me at the same time, as well as "Holy cow, I'm pulling a trailer with 5 little kids in the car with me!" I called my dad and got a quick rundown on trailer towing....but I held it together...although maybe I didn't, I may have cried to him.
Thankfully my wonderful sister Emily has an equally wonderful neighbor who wasn't home and let us stop in St. George at their house for the night. We got there at about 2 a.m. and just crashed. The girls were so excited in the morning to play and swing and to relax before we went the rest of the way to my parent's house.
We basically got to my parent's house, slept one night and then dropped the girls off with Marty's mom and took the truck all the way up to Idaho and unloaded it into a storage unit with the help of some wonderful family members, and then went back to Utah all in one day. It was a LONG day as well...lots of driving and working. But we had this beautiful scenery to look at, so that helped.
And then...our time looking for a rental began...
