Moving Trucks and Mayhem

We have arrived. And that is all I feel like writing right now, but I will press on. It is snowing outside, the first I've had to deal with since November, and I have to go to the grocery store, and then try and bring some order to our overflowing pile of stuff. The house we are staying in until April is perfect for our month long layover and is such a blessing to have. I suppose I'll start at the beginning...

We left the Springs Thursday at 6:00 to head to Denver. Matt and the girls were in the truck and I was in the van. Matt was taking us to the airport where he would then pick up Mark, his driving buddy, and they would be off. Well, about 20 minutes into the drive Anna had to go potty so Matt got off the exit in Monument. I was ahead in the van a ways because I was going to find a place to park the beast while we went to the airport. So, he pulls off at the exit, stops at the light, and the truck dies. He tries to start it...nothing. Stuck at the light. 4 year old has to pee. Matt calls me and I turned around in Larkspur to head back. Meanwhile a truck stopped and towed Matt to the parking lot at McDonalds. We had to wait 45 minutes for a Penske guy to come so we fed the girls and let them play in the play area. When he got there we hopped in the van and continued on to Denver. It is a good thing we gave ourselves so much time or we would have missed our flight. Matt waited for Mark, and they headed back to Monument. After a day of waiting, the truck was unfixable and they had to transfer everything to a new truck. The good thing is that they sent a team of 3 moving guys to help Matt and Mark, the bad thing: those guys don't care about my things and when we unloaded yesterday I found some things were not as they should be...luckily nothing important seems to be damaged. They finally left Monument at 7:00 that night and arrived in PA at 7:00 Saturday morning...33 hours straight through. My flight was pretty uneventful, just exhausting. We had a layover in Chicago, but everything went pretty good. I bunked with Mary until the boys got there which was nice because the girls just played with her girls. Although, Libby did throw up about 6 times Friday night so we got no sleep. But, now we are settled, Matt is at work, and life goes on!

On to happy things (if you made it this far anyways)! We thought we would have a month of stressful searching for a place to live. We had a pretty tight budget we were trying to stay in and I was sure we would end up in a little townhouse with no room. A couple of weeks before we left I just started praying about our housing. When we lived here before we rented a 3 bedroom rancher for $600 a month. I had no idea then how excellent that was and took it for granted. I started thinking about that and started asking God for some specifics. I asked for a home that we could fit comfortably in, for a price in our budget. I knew that probably meant renting from someone we knew. So Saturday we got a phone call from a friends parents who had a house to rent and if we wanted it they would hold it for us. So we drove out there not expecting much...God is so good!! It is a two bedroom rancher but the bedrooms are very big. There is a huge kitchen, huge dining room with hardwood floors, a living room, a sun porch, a huge laundry room, two-car garage (heated and insulated so Matt can build things!), a fabulous yard with a fabulous patio!! There is only one full bath but it has a half bath, and there isn't a dishwasher but I can survive that. But, it does have a full, carpeted, heated basement! It is huge! All of the toys can go downstairs and the girls can play it up. I can also put the dartboard, card table, and all other man toys down there for the boys to be loud while they play their man games. And all this for the grand price of ....$800!!!! And no security deposit!!! I am blown away by the faithfulness of God in this area. I was so nervous about squishing into some small place and being miserable.

I still don't feel like I'm living here yet, but that will come. And while part of me is a bit scared of the unknown, I also have a feeling that some of the struggles of the last 5 years are going to be softened in this next season. A friend prayed for us the night before we left and he felt that God was going to give us some shade in this next chapter. That we had been in some scorching times, but there is a big tree just waiting to give us rest from that sun. I am excited for what God has for us, I just want to be sure not to miss anything.

I'll put pics up as soon as I get some...and more updates soon!! Thanks for the prayers!