Part II-- The Adventures (and Misadventures) of Our Cross Country Relocation...Part 1

The last post was long enough as it was and after a hungry baby began to revolt, a two year old stripped down to her diaper and the girls came home from school, I realized I had to find a stopping point and attend to them. Sorry I left ya hanging!

I'm happy to say things have improved vastly and while everyone is still adjusting, we are feeling much better about our current situation....

I left off on Halloween morning when He-Man and I was debating whether or not we should stay in this home. After taking a moment to ponder our conundrum, we prayed for guidance and decided to call our landlord. When we couldn't get a hold of him, we called our realtor. We were very frank about our concerns. Within an hour our landlord called back and began the process of fixing our most important concerns first.

I had a good cry and started unpacking. I'm almost positive I would've felt the same insecurity and terror moving to another place at that point because I was so overwhelmed by the whole experience. On Monday, the work started and we were all feeling much better. Our landlord, who is a very good man, showed me pictures of what the house was like when the last tenants left.

All I can say is "Wow!" I have honestly never seen anything like it. The house was totally trashed. The walls were badly painted and floors covered with drips of paint that would not come off. The garage was filled with trash with local library books strewn in the mix. There were, what I assume to be profound quotes, written in permanent marker written on the walls all over the house, holes in the walls, stains in the carpet, the list goes on.

At that point I had 2 epiphanies.

#1 When your dealing with that kind of destruction, any improvements you make are going to seem pretty major. I really believe that as the landlord worked on the house he was making amazing progress and it seemed like it'd be sufficient. When things change that dramatically, sometimes it's hard to see just how far you still have to go. Does that make sense?

#2 We really weren't the victims in the situation. The poor owner of the house lost thousands of dollars in this circumstance. Yes, we could've reasonably decided not to stay but we both felt strongly that we could help the situation become better for everyone involved. We had the opportunity to make a difference and help this guy out.

I'm glad we did because with the immediate improvements on the house and putting ourselves together has made this place feel like home.

So now that our refuge is starting to feel like just that, we've been able to venture out and explore our surroundings...

Yesterday, we went to the temple. He-Man and I traded between watching the kids and having some time to work there. It was nice and reminded me of how close to home we are, even if it feels so far away.

We happened upon the Blue Angels practicing their routine for the Veteran's Day celebration. We enjoyed it so much we came back twice just to watch. They are amazing!!























Yesterday, we drove past Disneyworld to show the girls what they can look forward to when they save up for our next vacation...I can hardly wait!!

This is our front walkway wall. I love the way it turned out!

By the way, look whose laughing now!! Reese's Pieces is the spittin' image of her Daddy!

So, there you have it! We've survived our first 2 weeks here in Florida! Hopefully, He-Man will be starting work on Monday and we'll be able to get into a routine.


In the meantime, here's a couple of gems I've happened to overhear in the past few days:

Bunny: "Do you want to play at my house?"

Bunny's new neighborhood friend: "Hmmmm, yours! Although, we always could go down to the pond. (then she casually added) You can't swim in it though because you have to keep your eye out for alligators." That is when Bunny's momma fainted and upon recovery declared all puddle jumping restricted. Just in case. :)

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The girls were watching "Enchanted" in the car while driving through Pensacola. At the end when good overcomes evil, Bunny sighed and exclaimed, "This must be why they call it 'Enchanted!"

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"Wow! You've got a lot of kids!" (This is when I knew we were no where near home) Nope, Toto we are definitely not in Kans...er, Utah anymore!

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Button Nose: "Skooose Mees!" Exclaimed upon discovering that she can make bodily function noise on command. We're hearing those a lot lately.

We love you all! Have a good one. I'll leave you with one more pic...



Seriously, this kid looks just like her Daddy in his baby pictures. Except, she's got my E.T. toes.