Saturday, December 27, 2008

Joyful and Triumphant!

Well, Christmas is over and I thought I would just do a quick update.

Our move was totally insane! We ended up not fitting all of our stuff in the moving truck, so at the last minute Vaughn went and got another small trailer to pull behind his pickup. We stuffed that full, as well as the van (which was getting towed behind the moving truck) and every square nook and cranny in the Tacoma, which I drove with Rebekah and Rachel. Vaughn and I (and Andy and Rachel, too) spent different nights up until the wee hours, packing, painting and cleaning. We are so grateful to neighbors and friends who spent many hours helping us pack the truck, and paint and clean. I was panicking the last hour before our inspection, because we were still trying to empty the house of a few more things, and then sweep and do all the last minute stuff. I just kept praying that we would get it done, and people kept showing up to help! THANK YOU! We are truly blessed with good friends. We finally made it out of town and headed down to Oklahoma. We had one small glitch when we missed the turnpike and had to drive all the way to Salina and then down to Enid. It only added about an hour to our trip. :)

We pulled into Enid around 11:30 and went to weigh everything. I weighed the rig I was driving and then went to our friends' house to pick up some bedding so we didn't have to unpack anything. I grabbed the blankets, got back into the truck and headed down the street. I had to turn the truck around, which wouldn't have been a problem, except I HAD A TRAILER ON IT and I am terrible at backing up a trailer. Plus, it was freezing cold and icy. I acted out the Austin Powers 47 point turn for about 30 minutes. Then I gave up and waited for Vaughn to rescue me. He came and backed up the truck and trailer, and we all drove to our new house. It was only 1 am by this point! We all collapsed (okay, I collapsed, the girls ran around like crazy people for about an hour!) and went to bed. It was quite a feat. Luckily, unpacking only took several hours and we were able to return the truck and trailer by 6 pm that day.

That is the triumphant part of my story! The joyful part is that we got to spend Christmas in our new home! We are mostly unpacked, somewhat organized, and almost recovered from the aches and pains of last week. It is fun to see Christmas decorations that have been in storage since we went to Korea. It was exciting to learn that Santa was able to find us, even though we haven't been in the same place for the last 4 Christmases!

Now, on to more unpacking, organizing and enjoying of the season. At some point I hope to be able to find our camera, and share some pix of our new home. I have no idea when that will be. Hope you all are having a great holiday!

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Forty and Fabulous???

Happy Birthday to me! Unbelievably, I am forty years old today. I woke up feeling all stiff and achy. I am hoping that is due to all the moving stress and exhaustion, coupled with the unpacking and Christmas baking, rather than my advanced age! I am grateful for having had a pretty great life. I have a wonderful husband, beautiful children and the gospel. What else is there? Okay, I am also grateful for chocolate and fuzzy socks! Hope you are having a great day and enjoying the anticipation of the season!

Saturday, December 13, 2008

Catching up

So this week has been nuts! I started it off by driving down to our new house in Oklahoma. It is very exciting to think we own a house now! I went down to paint a little bit and try and organize utilities and schools and stuff. Of course, when I do a road trip, you know there is going to be some excitement. You won't be disappointed! I had a very interesting drive home! It started off with me trying to back out of our garage. I pushed the button to open the garage door, but realized it was already open, so I hit the button again. I thought the door had lifted all the way back up, but when I heard the crunching noise...I noticed I had knocked off one of the racks on the top of Vaughn's truck! Remembering my past experiences with things not being securely attached to the roof, I went to my friend Brenda's house and her husband kindly removed the rack all the way. (Apparently, it just popped off, it's not actually broken! Vaughn says he did the same thing in the car wash a little while ago, so I don't feel so stupid). So, I finished all my little errands, packed up, and headed out onto the highway. Now, it had snowed quite a bit the day before, and I had put the truck in 4-wheel drive. I wanted to see how clear the roads were, so I waited until I had driven on the highway for a few miles, before I pulled over to unlock the hubs. I was feeling so self-sufficient and competent as I turned the hubs on the driver's side, went around to the passenger's side, did the same and continued back to my door, only to find it LOCKED! Yes, I had locked myself out of the truck, while it was running, it was 10 degrees outside, and my coat and cell phone were on the seat. I think I stood there staring at the lock for a good 5 minutes, because I just could not believe what had happened. It took me about 10 minutes to get someone to stop and help me. These two wonderful gentlemen in a pickup pulled over and tried to call the police, who said they don't help in these situations. Then one of them noticed that the window in the back of the cab was unlocked and we could open it from the shell. Yay! However, none of us could fit through the window. They tried reaching the locks, and the door handles with no success. Then I had the brilliant idea of trying to use my flatiron to grab the locks. You haven't lived until you have seen a guy in his big coveralls and boots trying to use a flatiron as pincers to grab a door lock. Alas, it didn't work! They dug around in their truck and found some Gophers, the things you can pick up stuff of the floor with. Those also weren't strong enought to lift the lock, but finally, my rescuers hit on the idea of pulling the keys out of the ignition! Hallelujah! I am so grateful to them for stopping to help a crazy lady! How stupid do you have to be to lock yourself out of your running car in the middle of nowhere? Anyway, I made it home and we are madly packing. I had to take a time-out, though to make this yummy treat
Brownie candy cane lollipops! They are for the ladies I am teaching my lesson to tomorrow at church. And of course, we had to take a break from packing for Vaughn's graduation yesterday!
I am very proud of him, and though I don't love all men in uniform, I love THIS man in uniform! He is the bomb!
We are excited about a lot of things in our new house, but this is the best: our walk-in closet!



It's HUGE! The picture doesn't do it justice. I will take one with the kids in it so you have some idea of how big it really is! My friend Brenda thought it was another room!

This is one wall in my nice new BIG kitchen. Except I painted the walls, not the tile, candy apple red! It's going to be fun to have Christmas here!
Well, that's all for now. Back to the chaos that is my life, and hopefully, we will be moved in by the time I post again! Merry Christmas!