A Place to Call Home

I should be finishing up cleaning right now, but I need a little break from all the packing and cleaning.
Well, as of last night we officially have a place to call home…for two months at least. It’s kind of a crazy story. When I hadn’t heard back from a man who wanted to sublet his apartment for 2-3 months, I started looking around at apartment complexes again to see if anyone offered short term leases for a decent price. I found one in particular, that I thought might work out, but it was still a little more expensive than the apartment I had originally found.
Sunday night, I received an e-mail from the man who had the apartment for sublet. For some reason my previous e-mails hadn’t gone though. He apologized and said the apartment was still available if we’d like to come see it.
Then on Monday, I found a home that had been newly listed for rent. It was a 4 bedroom, 1.5 bath, with 1800 sq ft. It was in the same area we’d lived before, and had a big fenced in backyard. Plus, it was available immediately. We thought it would be worth a shot to go see it and see if we liked it. If we did, we’d be able to move in right away and we would be done with moving for a year.
Wednesday night we went down to see the home. It was nice, but we just didn’t feel like it was right for us. We drove by the home we’ve been planning on, and even though they’re still doing renovations, we still felt like it was the right place for us.
So then we went to see the apartment for sublet. We thought it was pretty nice and actually gave the man a check for the deposit. It was really interesting though, afterwords when we had left and picked up the older kids (Thanks Amy!) we just started to feel like it wasn’t a good decision. It got worse and worse as we drove back, and we knew we hadn’t made the right decision. So when we got home after 11pm, we called the man with the apartment and told him we had changed our minds. So I canceled the check, and the next morning got to work on the application process for the apartment complex. We had to hurry and do all the paperwork, and ended up driving down to our 'new' old city again on Friday afternoon to sign papers and give the down payment on the apartment. (It’s a 2-hour drive between the two cities, so we’ve done a lot of traveling this week!) Even though the apartment was slightly more expensive than the one we originally thought we’d be taking, we feel so much more at peace with the decision. It’s amazing the difference between receiving a confirmation that what you’ve done is right or not. And we’ll look forward to living closer to where we used to live as well. The new place is actually just a couple blocks from our old apartment. And this makes me laugh, when we told Jacob we’d be moving to a place with 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, his response was, “Wow!” He thought that was pretty awesome. In our kids' minds, a home with 2 bedrooms is big! I guess we've all gotten used to the 1-bedroom over the past couple months. I'm excited for 2 bedrooms too!
So now we’re finishing our packing and getting ready to move. We’ll be settled for two months, and then hopefully we’ll be able to move into our new home where we’ll get to stay for at least 9 months before making another move (which will also be another short term 4-month stay).
We’re definitely getting better at the packing/moving process, but I’m sure going to be happy when we don’t have to do it so often!

More posts & pictures to come later….back to cleaning for me!

Keeping Life Exciting

Once again we’re at the end of another week. I can’t believe we only have one more week left in our new city before it’s time to head back to the old one. It’s really been great and we’ll miss the wonderful people here. I’m glad we’ll be back again so we don’t have to say the big goodbyes just yet!
We are excited to go back, but over the past couple weeks we’ve had some things come up that will definitely make it more interesting.
I found a cute little house for rent back in October, and even though we wouldn’t need a house for a while, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to contact the owners. It’s a cute 3-bedroom 1-bath, red brick home with a big kitchen, and big fenced in yard! To make a long story short, the owners liked me/our family I guess, and said that they would hold the house for us until March when we’d be coming back after Jeff’s rotation. They even dropped the rent $200, because it was a little out of our budget. We were all pretty excited. It’s a great little house and very close to Jacob’s new school, so I’d be able to walk Jacob to school every day if I wanted to! We had already sent in our application, lease contract, and our security deposit (first month rent, last month rent, and security deposit) so we were set and ready to go!
Well, a couple weeks back the owner contacted me just to let me know that some pipes had broken in the bathroom, which meant they would have to do some repairs, but they still thought it would be fine for us to move into March 1st, they just wanted to let us know in case we went by the house and saw construction people there.
Well, I got a call again the end of last week. Apparently the water damage was much worse than they thought. Not only do they have to redo the bathroom, they’ve had to tear out and will have to replace the entire bathroom, the bathroom floor, which is the ceiling of the kitchen, all the new kitchen cabinets and counters, a lot of hardwood flooring, radiators, etc. Basically they started and just kept having to take more and more. So now the house is undergoing some major remodeling.
It’s good in a way that the house will be really nice when we eventually do move in, the only problems are 1- We still have to move on Feb 27th because a new resident will be here, and Jeff has to be back at work. And 2-We don’t know how long all the repairs will take.
So with that, we’re supposed to be moving in 1-week and still don’t know where we’re going. The hardest part is finding a place for a family of five that will rent for a flexible amount of time (1 ½-3 months). Most places want you to sign at least a 12-month lease. I’ve found a couple places that do 2-3 month leases, but they’re more expensive and we certainly don’t want to be stuck paying extra if the repairs don’t end up taking 3 months. I found a person who was trying to sublet their apartment until the end of May, and we were e-mailing back and forth for a while, but now he hasn’t responded, so I’m not sure if he just changed his mind or what.
It seems we’ve done this type of thing a lot! At this point I can’t even imagine what it will be like to be settled in one house for longer than a year at a time. By the time we get into the new house, we will only be staying for about 10 months before we pick up and move again. I figured out that by the time we’re done with residency & possible fellowship; we will have had a different address at Christmas time for 7 straight years! (possibly longer) No wonder our Christmas cards get less each year.
I’m sure everything will work out the way it’s supposed to, but it sure adds a lot of undo stress to life. Good thing our kids are young and easy going! Right now my project is finding a place to move in a week. Might be a hotel…might be grandma’s…just kidding, although tempting. Wish us luck! *

The 'Fourteen' Days of Valentine's

I really believe I have just about the sweetest, most thoughtful husband ever. I keep telling him he should write a book about how to be a good husband....he could make millions. :) These are the things he did for the "14 Days of Valentines". Jeff would get up and get everything in place before he left for work in the mornings. The only problem with having your husband doing something so awesome is that it's hard to come up with a gift worthy of them!
We were actually able to hire a babysitter for Friday night, and enjoyed a night out together. Too bad I forgot my camera, we had fun going out to eat and spending time together. I am grateful to Jeff, it was a fun and memorable Valentine's Day (& fourteen days).

• On the fourteenth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me, two dozen roses, daisies, and “14 hugs and kisses”.
• On the thirteenth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me, “13 Pixie Sticks” Jeff also stuck lots of little foam hearts & flowers all over the table, with an "I love You" right in front.
• On the twelfth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me, “12 Lip Glosses- for all those kisses on day 14 of course!” Jeff had also made a path of rose petals leading to the table and the gift. The boys thought this was awesome! (For some reason blogger keeps turning the 2nd picture sideways)
• On the eleventh day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “11 Sweet Hearts” Jeff had written all sorts of names on the ‘to’s and from’s To: My Eternal Companion From: Your Best Friend, To: My Super Sexy Lady From: Your Hunk Muffin, To: Applesauce From: Burrito Boy, To: My Compadre From: Tu Amigo Eterna, To: My Best Friend From: Big Daddy, To: Honey Buns From: Your Dreamer, To: My Love From: Your Honey
• On the tenth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “Ten Chocolate Truffles” and balloons in the shape of a heart.
• On the ninth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “9 Sweet Tarts” Sweet tart candy in the shape of a heart, and little heart confetti on the table.
• On the eighth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “8 Blueberry Muffins” Jeff got up early and made my favorite blueberry muffin recipe, put the muffins in the shape of a heart, and cut out lots of hearts and put them around the table.
• On the seventh day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “7 Bit 'O Honey’s” Jeff made a necklace with sprees and bit-o-honey candy. The boys were pretty impressed with my necklace.
• On the sixth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “6 Candles a Burning” ‘I love you Ang, I hope you have a wonderful day.’
• On the fifth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “5 Bottles of Nail Polish… and a lot more hugs and kisses.”
• On the fourth day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “4 pairs of (well needed) nylons.” (more sideways pictures)
• On the third day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “3 Silky Hair Shampoos”
• On the second day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me “Two sets of lip stick, and two packages of beef jerky.”
• On the day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me: “One home spa set, and a spa gift certificate.”

Some Recent Favorites

These are some of my favorite pictures from the past couple weeks.

I let the boys watch a movie while I 'worked.' I thought they looked cute sitting there all together.

Pickle for Thought

Apparently Jacob and Caleb didn’t get enough for lunch…when I came out of the room from putting clothes away, this is what I found. The boys after nearly finishing a whole bottle of pickles, were sipping the pickle juice from the jar with spoons. They thought it was great! I don’t even like pickles, let alone the thought of drinking the juice! Yuck! Needless to say, I took the jar away and got them something better to eat.

A Sunbeam!

One thing that I forgot to write about earlier in the year was that Caleb is finally in Primary! He started Sunbeams the first week of January and has been pretty excited about the whole thing. It’s so crazy to me to see him sitting there in the front row of primary. I’ve been pleasantly surprised with how well he’s done. Caleb is the ‘forever nursery’ type of kid. He loves being able to run around and play, but he’s done very well with the adjustment to primary and actually is one of the more quiet and reverent children in the sunbeam class. Usually when I see him, he’s sitting there nicely with his arms folded. I would love to be able to sit in the primary and watch him sometime; it would be fun to see him during sharing time and singing time. Too bad I’m always either teaching or taking care of Matthew during that 2nd hour. I have, however, been able to walk by his classroom and sometimes hear him talking- he’s always so animated. Caleb really has done great. At the start of the year, he asked me if he could go to nursery a few times, but now he usually loves to go with Jacob to primary.

Sledding

On Saturday, we went over to some friends’ in our ward, Jamie & Aimee Olsen. They have one little girl who is almost three named Grace who is an absolute doll! We went over on Saturday afternoon and spent some time sledding down their hill. The boys had a blast and really enjoyed going down with Jeff, even Matthew thought it was great. I’m impressed that our little tube made it through so many trips down the big hill, especially with all four boys piled on top! We had some pretty good laughs watching them go down, and take the occasional tumble. I was impressed with Grace, she would go down all by herself with no fear. One of the funniest things was Caleb. He was so excited about the whole thing that even when it wasn't his turn to go down on the tube, he would sit on his bottom, or lay on his stomach and push himself down the hill. He ended up pretty wet when we were all done! The weather was in the 40’s and it was great! You really couldn't have asked for a better afternoon. After we had played outside for about an hour, we went in to have dinner. It was really a fun evening to spend with friends. The boys get a little crazy, I think they were amazed to have so much room to play in. We really enjoyed being with the Olsen’s. They’re a sweet family.

Happy February 1st

Sometimes it can be hard to find the motivation to get up early on a Sunday morning to get ready for early church when you’ve stayed up way too late the night before. I was a little groggy when I brought Matthew into the kitchen with me to get started on breakfast for the boys. I was pretty surprised and happy when I discovered this on the table.
Two dozen red roses with daisies, hugs candies, and a sweet note that said, “On the 14th day of Valentine’s my true love gave to me; lots of hugs and kisses.” Jeff even broke into my cardstock and glitter to make the heart-shaped note extra special with x’s and o’s.
Jeff actually did “14 Days of Valentine’s” for me 4 years ago. I was just as surprised today as I was those four years ago. He is such a sweet husband and so thoughtful. I still wonder sometimes how I ever got so lucky to be married to him. Even after being married for 6 ½ years, he’s still as romantic and sweet as ever. Thank you Jeff, I love you!

Birthday Party....Or not...

Friday night we had a fun, combined birthday party planned for Jacob and his best friend’s little brother (Andrew’s brother Ethan). We were going to meet up with a group of friends from the ward at a great indoor play land to celebrate both boys’ birthdays. During the day we made a big pan of brownies, and I made some birthday crowns for both boys.

Jeff had a lecture in Philadelphia that he had to be to. Fortunately it started at 1:30, so he had plenty of time to make it back in time for the party. Unfortunately things don’t always work out as planned. Jeff got caught in bad traffic on the way home due to accidents caused by the weather. I expected him home by at least 5pm, and he didn’t make it back until almost 7:30pm. The other thing was that his phone had died, so I couldn’t even get a hold of him; I was more than a little worried. I was sad that we missed our own party, but just grateful that Jeff made it back fine. We ended up having a movie night at home, and enjoyed some brownie sundaes. (The Playland was a good 45 minute drive away)

The boys were great sports. They were sad that we weren’t able to go be with our friends and have a party, but they were really sweet about the whole thing, and didn’t complain at all. Jeff and I decided to take them to Chuck-E-Cheese the next morning.

So we spent Saturday morning at Chuck-E-Cheese with the boys. Luckily we made it out early enough before it started to get really crowded. We had a good time, and although it wasn’t quite the same as a party with friends, we enjoyed the time together as a family. One of my favorite parts was getting pictures in the little sketch booth- it can get interesting when you try to fit five people in there! (Oh-and I hit the jackpot on one of the games and won lots of tickets. :)