Randomness on a Friday morning

I have had a billion thoughts running through my head and longed to write them all down. What stops me? That I have to log out of Brandon's gmail account to get into mine and...and as lame as it sounds, it felt like too much work.

But here I am, early morning. Been up for a few hours now sandwiched in between Brandon on one side and Josie on the other. Co-sleeping is totally not my thing, but you find when you're longing for a baby to sleep, you do whatever it takes. She loves to snuggle next to me. And I love it too--just not all night long. I finally was able to squeeze myself out from in between them and just wanted to take a few minutes and spill my thoughts.

In no particular order, here goes!

My first thought is a long one--but an important one.

--I have thought a lot lately about this house and how it came to be. We looked at tons of places--a few in person, and MANY online and with the help of other people. Nothing felt right. We looked at so many outdated, old, expensive, TINY places. Or the spaces had dog / smoker issues. And I am totally good with an imperfect place, but people were asking a premium for the space we needed. It was a week before we were scheduled to move and we still had no where. In desperation, I called back one of the previous places and was told it wasn't available but the identical floor plan had just come open--the previous tenants had just up and moved and never said a word.

The house happened to be only a few months old. It had all the space we needed. And it was a price that was no more than the old yucky houses we saw. After deciding to move forward with it, I happened to notice online that the price posted for a different (but identical) rental on their site was $100 less each month. So I called and asked about it and was told it was a typo on their part, and had been corrected almost immediately, but that by law they had to honor that price for me because I had seen in it the short time it was up. $100 may not be much to some, but that's a pretty big deal in my wallet. :)

I remember the day we came to move in--we had never seen the house in person. We hadn't even seen pictures of the whole thing period! But we walked in and marveled at the beautiful cabinets, the granite, the amazing bathrooms and the soaker tub, the giant toy room, etc. I looked at Brandon and said, we totally don't deserve a place like this! "It had exceeded all our expectations. And while it wasn't our DREAM house, it was so much better than everything else we saw!

Fast forward a few weeks--I have found myself dwelling on the kinks. (let's face it, almost every house has them!) The tall cabinets are REALLY tall. The closet shelf was designed by someone who would never intend to store anything on them. There are little things I would change about construction, etc. Point is, as people have asked us how we like it I find myself responding that "it's okay", when just weeks ago I was over the moon about it! :) Recently a young woman gave a talk on the 10 lepers who were healed and how there was only one to return and give thanks. It isn't a new story...but it hit me in a completely new way. I felt like I could totally relate. I had prayed those pleadings for the Lord to take pity on us, so to speak. I had prayed for a place to live, a job, a house--and walked forward with a lot of faith that something would work out. And it did...but I don't want to forget that "healing". I don't want to forget the miracles of how it all came to be. I look around this house and feel a tremendous gratitude for a God who knows us and loves us. This house truly is more than we could have hoped for--and I have no doubt it is by His hand that everything fell into place or out of place at the right time so that we would be given this opportunity. And I truly do feel immensely blessed.
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Other thoughts...

This is the first time in my married life that we have moved and not had anyone else in our similar situation. We always were with other students in undergrad, or a huge group of other Podiatry families in Ohio, and in residency there were our pick of resident families moving in or out at any given time. We always had one thing in common with multiple other families.

And then we moved here.

And nobody else is moving in with us. Life is established for others. And it is summer...and everyone has a routine already or is on vacation. And it feels kind of lonely. It's lonely to not have a network of people to navigate your way through things. Don't get me wrong--there are the kindest people here and we feel incredibly blessed to be in the ward we are in, etc. But it's also a strange feeling--a very unfamiliar feeling. And I think it will just take a lot of time to have situations to get to know people the way I hope to.

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I hadn't posted here, but I went back to WW shortly after Josie was born. It feels good to be back. Thanks to a move, and living 2 weeks in a new place without a husband around, and a vacation to Idaho, my weight loss has been much slower than I hoped. I'm trying to not be too discouraged about it. And I am crossing my fingers that now that we are settling into a new normal, I can focus more and be more successful! So far, I'm down about 7 pounds. But there is a lot more to go where that came from. Ick.

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I feel like such a mess--it is frazzling to try to change your address with a billion places, and remember who was paid and wasn't paid during a time of major transition. It's frustrating to wonder where things are and to not have everything put away yet. I long to hang things on my living room walls, and decorate the boys room, etc. But everything hinges on something else--furniture coming in, decisions about room sharing, etc. From a planner like me, who prefers everything just so, it's been stressful to say the least! I just always am wondering what I am forgetting--

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I went from only letting my kids have cereal 2 times a week to having it every day--I've seriously got to get myself figured out in the breakfast department.

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One thing I really have come to love is parking in the garage. We never could do it at our old house, but a 3 car garage is dreamy--and both Brandon and I fit our cards inside.

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I LOVE AMARILLO. Have I said that yet? Oh yes. I have. SO many places for great deals--so easy to get around. I am so excited to be here...

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In many ways I want to fast forward time to when Brandon can start work and we have a real schedule...and in other ways I want to freeze the time he is here at home to help, spend time, etc....the time is flying though and I am sure in a few months I will long for these days where the pace was slow (SLOOOOOOOW) and we had nothing on the calendar.


Until then, I have an Idaho trip to catch up on, pictures to post, a house to finish unpacking--the list goes on...just hoping to find the motivation to do something about it! :)

Josie--2 months

Dear Josie-- 2 months. I can't believe they have passed in the blink of an eye. We celebrated your 2 month mark in Idaho and were able to have your blessing and Kaden's baptism together. We had a room full of family and there was a beautiful spirit there. Grandma Net (my mom) made your dress--it was patterned after my own blessing dress, and made from my wedding dress. It holds a lot of significance to me and I am grateful to pass that along to you now. There is no doubt in my mind that you are meant to be in our family. The past 2 months have been a roller coaster of emotion and a whir of activity, but somehow you have felt like the perfect blessing planted in the middle of a sea of uncertainty. We love you so much, I am grateful for your sweet spirit and the beginning of smiles we are getting to see--it makes the sleepless nights a little more bearable. :) Love, Mom