what did we get ourselves into?

Well, when you move around as much as we do, it is very difficult to make a trip out to find a place to live, so we have to go by phone calls and what the owners tell us. Well, here's what we got.

living room and bathroom (yes that's the whole bathroom, the shower is just to the left you can see the blue curtain)

don't you love the wallpaper in the kitchen, and yes - only one plug and half being used by the fridge.

No doors on the closets and don't you love the green carpet.

I have to admit that when I walked in and was overwhelmed by that old house smell and saw these rooms I about burst into tears. Dave - amazing husband he is hugged me and said at least it's not a one bedroom cabin. It made me laugh because I actually liked the cabin. But it's true you really can live anywhere for a short amount of time. We have been here for a month and for the most part it is working out okay.

I do have a question for all of you though - our renter's policy says this was built in 1985. I'm going for 1955 myself. What do you think?

Girls nite from the move

What a great family I have. I married into a family with a bunch of CRAZY girls. (well, I fit right in) They planned a girl's night/guy night for the one night we were with them. The guys got to play all their "games" and were even gracious enough to take most of the children. While the girls got to go eat at P.F. Chang's and then have a wild Kareoke party. I don't have pics from dinner since my battery died, but here is a sampling from the party.

Sing BABY Sing!! It's time to PARTY!!

(so Christina, what is up with that belly? YIKES. I hope it's just the angle)

We sang duets too.

Even Mama Kilton and Baby Reagan joined in the fun.

and well, who can resist "The Twist"?

It was a great stress reliever I can tell you. Thanks to all my wonderful family (on both sides) for all your help though all of our moving.

Firedragon

Whitney has been biting her sister lately. So after many time-outs and talks we finally told her that if she bites again she will get hot sauce on her tongue. Well, she just bit Danica again, so we put her in time out and Dave got out the tabasco sauce. He put a drop on her tongue and ...

no reaction. She smiled. She liked it.

ummm, so now what do we do?

Happy Birthday, Danica

Five years ago I became a mom. To this beautiful girl.

Some things she likes to do:

Jump rope ; climb trees ;


play outside., and do crafts

She also loves to play tea party with her sister, help make dinner and treats, and she loves to wash windows and do dishes (when it's her idea).
She is such a fun little girl that is so grown up for her age. I am so grateful that she chose me to be her mom.
I love you Danica

How fun it is to move!!

Oh the joys of moving. What fun our kids get to have discovering things. Whitney found that the dresser drawers make great hideouts and play places. (i'm not sure how she got through all the boxes to get to the dresser but hey kids are imaginative.) She also discovered a swim diaper somewhere and decided it would make a great hat. Doesn't she look so cute!!



The girls were great helpers to daddy when he started loading the truck. They carried anything they were strong enough to carry. (you'd think they had done this a couple times already :) ) Dave was so amazing with the packing. He not only started packing boxes since I was swamped with that scrapbook, but he loaded the entire truck by himself (minus three big items that he had our friend Barry help him with). He really is my Superman!! oh - and he helped to finish cleaning the kitchen once he had finished loading the truck. Is that not a man or what!!
Then came all the fun. The day we were moving we planned on getting up finishing up the cleaning and checking out by 8 or 9 am. Well, 12:30 pm and we are finally done cleaning. Gotta love having to wash window three or four times because every time you turn around there's another hand print. Then, we walk over to the office and they are on lunch break- AHHHH! So Dave walks back to the cars finds the phone burried in my purse and we call them. They finally get there, and we get checked out (now about 1 pm) Then what was supposed to be a quick trip to Walmart for gas and snacks (ha ha, not with a tired two year old) and a stop to get lunch we are finally on the road. Then every 2o minutes we hear - I have to go potty!!! Tell me again why we potty trained Whitney before we moved ??? The wind is blowing so hard the truck is at an angle and I have to get whitney out on the side of the road every 20 minutes since there is nothing between towns. We nearly get blown away only to not have her go because she is not comfortable. UGGG.

We finally make it to Albuquerque around 7:30 pm (it's only supposed to take 4 hours). By now I am very tired because I've only had a few hours sleep, and I've been cleaning all morning, fighting wind in the car and little kids, and we still are trying to make it to Provo tonight. Hahaha. It startes to storm and now we get a break from the wind, but have to fight sleet and rain. Well, as I am doing the head bob I realize I need to tell Dave I'm not safe to drive anymore so we get on the walkie talkie and I let him know I need to stop. We pull into Gallup about 11 pm, it is still raining and we see the sign for the hotel, but then we get to the stop sign and neither one of us could remember what direction. so we pick one and yes - it was the wrong one. It's dark and raining and everything looks the same so Dave flips a U only to end up in this:

Yes, we got stuck in the mud. Not just the truck, the car too since I was following right behind. Luckily enough we got the car out, but the truck is just a tad bit heavier than the car, after trying for 30 minutes we call AAA and get a tow truck on it's way. He showed up shortly after midnight and was able to get the truck out of the mud. Yay!!!!

On to the hotel to get cleaned up and rested.

The next day we don't get on the road until 9:30 am, but I think it was worth it. We are only half a day behind schedule at this point - no biggie right.What an adventure we had that day. So grateful to the Lord that I didn't fall asleep, that we were able to get a tow, and that the hotel had wonderful showers and beds. All in all, the rest of trip was a breeze. I will post all the fun we had with our families later. (thank for hanging in to the end)

a break from packing

Our good Friends the Ricks were brave enough to feed us the last two nights we were in Carlsbad. Here are some photos of our good times together.


Dave and Whitney are enjoying the swing and then Danica and whitney find a fun tree to climb. However, I think it was more than Whitney expected because she looks terrified and is hanging on for dear life.





Barry is grilling the dogs and Krystle takes a break to read to Danica.






After the yummy food we went inside. The girls found these cute books and turned themselves into many different things.
Then came the Wii. How much fun we have. Danica had a blast as usual and was very proud of her "Pink Ribbon"


















How precious this picture is. They love you Krystle.

We had a great time and it was a wonderful break from the stresses of moving. We are going to miss all our friends very much. (since that was the best part of being in Carlsbad)

Dave's Last day at the caverns

On Dave's Last day of work for Carlsbad Caverns, we went and picked him up so we could spend soem more time there. We were lucky to find some people waiting for the bat flight program that were willing to take our picture. This is in front of the Natural Entrance to the caves. (where the bats fly out at night)

Our two lizard friends posed for us while we were walking by. I think they were excited to get their picture taken, don't you?

Check out these beautiful desert plants. The one on the top is a Cholla plant with it's blooms all bright and beautiful. The one on the bottom is a prickly pear cactus with blooms and fruit. Whoever said the desert wasn't beautiful. (okay I did, but I've been proven wrong)

(Don't you love the wind?)

All together we had a wonderful time in Carlsbad. Dave is happy to not be in the dark all the time but was very grateful to not have to deal with the 100+ temps during the day. (for those who don't know the cave is a constant 56 degrees F all year long)
We made some wonderful friends whom we will miss dearly!! But we will always have somewhere to stay when we go back to visit.

Anyone need a Doctor??

A favorite pastime of the girls is to play doctor and daddy just happens to be one of their favorite patients.

This particular day Dave was having surgery to take out the snakes and scorpions that had died inside him. The snakes were in his stomache and the scorpions were in his leg, He had a broken toe, there were live snakes and scorpions in his head and his arm was bleeding for some unkown reason. Danica was the doctor, Whitney was the nurse and she was documenting with picutres. The doctor had to be reminded that the patient needed anesthesia before she started operating so the patient wasn't too sure he was going to come out of it okay.

Some fun "docotor" quotes.

Danica "You're very sick you're temp is 24 degrees" Dave "what's normal doctor?" Danica "9"

Danica, "If I squeeze this and blow air into you, you'll feel better."

Danica, "Mom let me listen to your heart I need to see if it's beaping"

Oh the parks we like

The girls had really enjoyed some of the parks in the city we just moved from and there was a playdate at this one a few weeks before we left, so I took the camera and got some pics of them playing around.

As you can see they really enjoyed themselves. We are excited that we still have a nice park nearby (close enough to walk to this time) so there will be plenty more days of park play!!