The Journey to Our New Home

I haven't been very good at taking pictures.  I think the stress of life has kept me from getting my camera out.  I vow to do better.  I probably should have taken a driving away from our home picture, or a final picture of empty rooms.  I didn't.  The summer is slipping away and I have so little time left.  But here are the few pictures I have of our journey from Ohio to Idaho with a little pit stop in Wyoming/Utah.

We flew to Utah and stayed with my parents for a couple of days.  We also got to go to Salem and see Tanner be baptized and spend time with Bryan's family but I took zero pictures.  Maybe I can make an online plea to Amanda to send me some!

 We played and played and played with cousins.  I love that my girls have such a wonderful relationship with their cousins on both sides of our family.  They adore them.  We swam in the Bear River, ate at Wally's and spent hours outside with squirt bottles.  Perfect summer days.

 The girls loved playing at Nana's house.  Julia insisted I take a picture of her animals that she created paper costumes for.

 We went to the fire pit and roasted marshmallows with my dad.  We sure do love him.

 Sticky fingers.

 Check out that cute marshmallow faced pose.

 I have felt particularly lucky during these stressful moving days to have such wonderful parents.  They have received a few tearful calls over the past month or so and have been so supportive.  I don't know what I would do without them.

 So this is a rather depressing picture, no?  As I arrived in Idaho in our new home we were anxiously awaiting the arrival of all of our stuff from Ohio.  Bryan's work offered a dollar amount for our move and we HAD to use it for moving or we would lose it.  So we figured we would ship all of our things, ship our cars and fly to our destination making the move as easy for us as possible.  Well we have now learned that having our things shipped may have not been such a great idea.

Our wonderful friends the Nye's were in town for just one day and were here visiting when the truck came.  I foolishly thought it would be a quick unload/set up and they would be gone.  Much to our surprise almost everything they packed was broken.  I will never forget sitting in our living room talking to our friends and having Bryan come in and telling me basically everything was broken.  Our flat screen t.v. was totally smashed.

 Furniture was not brought to us whole.

 And boxes were completely crushed.  Needless to say there are many more pictures like this being sent to insurance claims and many angry phone calls have been made.  Thankfully we didn't bring very much and you can't smash clothing and photo albums but it was still not the best way to start enjoying our new home.

 And to top it all off the very next day my wedding ring went missing.  I spent two days scouring the floors, drawers, every inch of this house.  I was crying, moping, sobbing and I'm pretty sure my girls thought I had completely lost it.  By some true miracle and tender mercy my little Audrey was picking up her room and found it there on the carpet a few days later.  I don't know how it got there!  I was so thankful to have this little baby back on my finger!

 So, stressful?  Yes.  But through it all I have SO so so very much to be grateful for.  We have a beautiful home that we absolutely love.  We love it even more than we remembered when we made an offer on it.  Bryan has an excellent job and is really enjoying it.  We actually get to spend a little bit more time with him as it is less busy than residency.  Bryan is also making more money which I am certainly not going to complain about.  And most of all we have these sweet little girls that are healthy, happy and doing very well.  I definitely could not ask for more.  We have enjoyed our new ward so far and have had so many neighbors dropping off treats, zuchinni (tons of it!) and other things.  We are blessed and though the stress levels have been off the charts I feel strongly that this is where we are meant to be and that things are going to be good.

There is a lake a mile or so from our house.  We went up there one evening.

 And we were so lucky to have Bryan's mom here.  She was so great to watch the girls while I took care of MANY things and it was so fun to have her here.  My girls adore her and she is a master with them.  This woman has a gift I tell you.

I didn't even know this lake had a beach!  We will have to come here more often.

 Lily was teething when we first got here and I was sure that I had broken her from all this moving.  Luckily she is back to her sweet and happy self.

 So stay tuned for some pictures of our new house and adventures we are having in Idaho.