It has been starting to hit me. I don't know anybody. My kids don't have friends. I'm lonely! Why does everything have to break (dryer, air conditioner, Internet, door knob, windows, faucets- to just name a few of the issues we've been dealing with)? Steve says I'm experiencing a self-fulfilling prophecy, but when you can't even go grocery shopping without dropping huge cans of pineapple on your sandal clad feet, you start to wonder if someone is trying to tell you something.
I was determined this weekend to leave my concerns behind me and just have an enjoyable day with my family at the beach. We are blessed to live right by a beautiful lake and it was time to take advantage of the amazing natural resources around us. So I did a little research and came across a state park that you hike into to reach a peninsula with sandy beaches. It sounded perfect and my family agreed.
Saturday morning came and we packed up the car and headed out. We located the park with little trouble and got started on our little hike. Rowan was beside himself with excitement and kept saying "This is my favorite day in South Carolina!"
Aside from having slightly flat tires in the jogging stroller, everything went off without a hitch. We met up with someone who have camped in the park overnight and he directed us to the following site-
It was a little piece of paradise. Private, sunny with shade, pristine clear water at a perfect temperature, and really nice sand. We soaked it in.
We ate a picnic lunch and swam some more before we decided it was time to go back and face reality. There was a big to do list waiting for us at home and we wanted to tackle some projects before Sunday came. So, we hiked back to our parking spot and found this:
Tire tracks from where our car had apparently been towed. Now let me ask you, would you feel comfortable parking here?
To be fair if you look at the far right of this scene, you would see this: A close up of the sign in front of the gate
But we weren't parked inside, beside, or beyond the gate. We were way outside of the gate in what looked to us to be a parking lot so people could go enjoy this state park. Apparently we were wrong. What I don't understand is why they didn't put a sign in front of the actual parking lot instead of to the side of it and in front of the gate. Or why they didn't just give us a ticket instead of leaving us stranded in the middle of nowhere with two kids and no indication of where we could find our car. They recently changed the laws so that this state park is only accessible by boat (a bit elitist, don't you think?). It took us 8 hours, one very long cab ride (which was really just another awful reminder that we don't know anyone in the area who we could call for help), a trip to the police station, several trips to the impound lot (impound owners are neither accessible nor punctual), many phone calls and a whole lot of cash to finally reclaim our vehicle. Perhaps one day I will laugh at this experience. Right now all I feel is sadness. Not over the money or the inconvenience, but the fact that the sole purpose of this trip was to find something good about living here. Needless to say, that didn't happen.
I should feel more calm. In comparison to last week, I certainly do. We are here! We have arrived! We made it! Most of my time now involves figuring out what kind of bug that is (we have a kill first, ask later policy) and where to put things. This was a rough move, so much so that the only thing I felt as we were leaving our home of the past 7+ years was relief.
The Moving Truck
What a fiasco! I reserved a truck from Budget a month in advance and they called us 5 days before our move saying they didn't have a truck for us and couldn't fulfill our reservation. After many calls and being told to keep calling back every 2 hours, they eventually told us we were out of luck. With Budget you reserve the price, not the truck. Don't say I didn't warn you.
We ended up getting a truck through Penske and with some help from a friend I was able to get it pretty close to our original quote with Budget (thanks Tiffany!) and only a day later than we were planning on moving. We arranged for some Elder's Quorum members to come help us pack the truck at 10am. When Steve went to get the truck at 9am, they told us they didn't have it and we should call back later. By the time we got the truck 2 hours later, most of the people who could help, couldn't come anymore. I never want to move ourselves again and I hope I don't have to. Luckily some kind men came and helped us later in the day. Without them, we wouldn't have made it on the road in time and probably would have gotten caught in the rain. Thank you to all those who helped us in one way or another- watching our kids, bringing us cookies for the trip, and helping us pack up. We're sad to be leaving such great friends and support.
Steve's Travel Issues
Steve had left days before the move for a conference in Washington, D.C. He was supposed to fly in on Sunday and we were supposed to move on Monday, but things definitely did not go as planned. Steve's flight was delayed going out of Champaign and coming in. Just after he left, I ended up huddled in the downstairs bathroom with crying kids because the tornado sirens went off three times. He was scheduled to come in at 7pm on Sunday, but his flight kept getting pushed back. At 9:30pm, I offered to come rescue him by driving up to Chicago, but the flight was supposed to finally take off at 9:20pm. I went to bed with the phone and told him to call me when he got in at Champaign and I'd come pick him up. At 2am I woke up and called him. The airline finally decided to cancel the flight and so he and 9 other people ended up renting a van to drive down home. Good times. He got in at 5am. It's probably a good thing we didn't end up moving that day. The Grandparents
Steve's parents came on Saturday to help us pack up the truck, clean, and get us to South Carolina in one piece. I cannot emphasize how much we needed them and how much I appreciate their help. By Friday the kids were going crazy and melting down. Rowan kept telling me how he didn't want to move and Nadia was beside herself with having boxes everywhere and Daddy gone. I was supposed to get the kitchen packed up before Saturday, but the kids were not cooperating with that plan. The grandparents were a much needed happy distraction for the kids and myself. We literally could not have done it without them.
Our Memorial Day was spent cleaning and packing up what I wasn't able to finish before Saturday. Kenneth and Elaine were lifesavers. They cleaned, cooked, packed, entertained, drove, and made up for everything we lacked. The Drive
When Steve and I moved to Champaign from Provo, we had two cars filled with our worldly possessions. We've obviously upgraded in the amount of stuff we currently own. I need to downsize. But it all fit thanks to Steve and Kenneth's Tetris skills.
We managed to hit the road right before the rain hit and got as far as Louisville, KY that night. Rowan got to ride in the moving truck with Daddy and Grandma. Grandma brought huge bags full of goodies to entertain and keep the kids happy on the way down. Goodbye Champaign! Our marriage and family began here. You have been so good to us.
The second day, Grandma and I took the kids in the black car and raced to Columbia so we could get the keys to the house before the property management office closed. We cut it pretty close by arriving with only 30 minutes to spare, but we did it! Nadia had a couple of toddler moments, but overall it went well. Steve and Kenneth took their time with the truck and arrived a few hours after us. The New Place
It might have been wishful thinking for things to go smoothly once we arrived. The house's air conditioning was not working when we arrived and in 100+ degree weather, we were none too happy. The first night here, Rowan woke up barely able to breathe apparently due to an allergic reaction. There was a dog that had lived here before us and so we got the carpets cleaned the next day in addition to getting the air conditioning serviced. Nadia still has a heat rash from that first day that we are trying multiple treatments to get rid of. Most of us can boast of mosquito bites in excess of a dozen and we're still working out some kinks in the house. Most of our first day was spent deep cleaning the house and waiting for repairs to be made so that we could finally start moving stuff in. A lot of members came to help us unload the heavy stuff and we're looking forward to getting to know them and their families. Elaine was a trooper and unpacked and deep cleaned the kitchen and Kenneth might have done 75% of the moving of boxes and furniture. Insanity.
After we finally got the air conditioning working, we experienced a true thunderstorm that knocked out the power most of the night. Ironic?
Saying Goodbye
The day before Steve's parents left, we tried to get them to rest up a little and take a break. Earlier in the day, Rowan, Grandma, and Grandpa went to the community pond a block away and saw geese, turtles, and fish while everyone else took a nap. Later we went out for some authentic Southern cuisine and drove around the area a bit. We also went to where Steve will be working for the next 2+ years. While we walked around admiring the landscape, Rowan stuck his stick in a bench and proceeded to get his first wasp sting. Never a dull moment.
Things have calmed down since then, but there is still so much to do! I'm so excited to get things settled at home so that we can go out exploring.
Thank you again to all of you who helped us get here. You were an answer to prayers.
While I was uploading Steve's graduation ceremony videos, Rowan was expressing his disappointment in how boring the whole thing was. It was quite the contrast to his own preschool graduation that happened a week or so before. They should make the graduates do a song and dance number instead of mundane speeches that aren't that coherent. Even the cake was better at preschool.
He smiled this time, but pictures with friends were out of the question. Someone doesn't care for the spotlight.
Laney is a good friend of Rowan's, but their height difference is pretty significant. He's definitely looking big enough to be done with preschool!
I'm tempted to post this on the FAIL blog.
The kids love cake!
Rowan has had a great experience for the past two years with Mrs Yagow at Little Maroons. We're so grateful for the opportunity he has had to go and have some fun time outside of the house.
Steve with his advisor Kiel Christensen and fellow graduate from lab Rowan getting his long awaited cupcake post ceremonies Grandparents are the greatest! So glad Steve's folks could come out for graduation. Our kids wouldn't have made it through the ceremonies without them.
This month is insane. It's even more insane that I'm blogging about it instead of doing laundry, unpacking from our trip, packing for our move, and remedying the disaster that is currently my home. We have Steve's parents coming in 2 days and graduation ceremonies this weekend. My house looks like it imploded. That's one elephant I don't feel like eating.
Speaking of elephants that people eat, this is Steven eating his dissertation that he defended on Friday.
I'm very grateful to my friends who helped me with the refreshments and watched my kids so I could go and watch him defend his dissertation. He was classic Steve- plugging jokes in while making strong points and being the great teacher that he is. Whenever someone from the ward hears that we are moving, all I hear is "oh we'll miss Steve! He's the best Sunday School teacher!" The guy has a natural talent for infusing subtle humor into any topic and he keeps me laughing through the craziness of life.
Did I mention he passed? Congratulations Dr. Luke!
I made homemade donuts and blueberry muffins. Tiffany Peterson provided some yummy apple coconut ones. Before I got to take a picture, some treats had already left the table- a good sign.
Our bags were packed and ready to go after Steve defended. We left right after he was done to go to South Carolina and find a house to rent. Unfortunately, we had the misfortune of going through Kentucky during the Kentucky Derby. Not only was traffic awful, but our Priceline hotel in Lexington, KY ended up being a king sized bed in a smoking room. It was awful. Steve slept on the floor (he joked that this was some way to celebrate getting a PhD) and I was crammed in the bed with two squirmy kids and the stench of smoke. I will never again count on Priceline where there is a major event going on in the area where we want to stay. Lesson learned.
Kentucky was beautiful though. I never expected the South to be so LUSH. My favorite parts of driving through it all were the Thoroughbred Horse Retirement Farm and aptly named sites like Stinking River Road and French Broad River. I've never seen so many Waffle Houses and Cracker Barrel Stores in my life.
The Smoky Mountains are breathtaking. We need to go back and camp there someday.
The kids were pretty good on the trip down or I should say Rowan was. Nadia had a lot of meltdowns on the trip and was generally grumpy, but it was manageable. It's impossible for a 2 year old to understand "We are going to where we are moving and you need to stay in your car seat for 12 hours" or "We are going through random houses all day and you need to be patient." Did I mention Steve had a terrible cough and Nadia had diarrhea? Good times.
Once we arrived at South Carolina, we decided to go see one of the houses on our list. Columbia is a tough area to find decent housing. They have one of the worst crime rates in the nation and the public schools are pretty bad. All of the apartment buildings I was able to find had horrible reviews and poor schools, so apartment living was out of the question. Rowan is starting kindergarten and a good school was one of our top priorities. We narrowed our search down to three areas: Forest Acres, Irmo, and Lexington. Rosewood was on our list, but after finding a lot of comments about the area like "it's a great place-no one shot at me, but my car was broken into a couple times" we quickly crossed that one off our list. Anyways, this list we had was the result of hours of researching and scouring the Internet by yours truly.
The first place was a duplex in Irmo and looked very nice on the website. When we got there and were waiting for the landlord to come, we noticed that the neighborhood was not as diverse as we would have liked and we kind of stuck out like a sore thumb as evidenced by the looks we got. We didn't run away immediately and waited to see the inside, but were greeted with an interior that was filthy, old, and had several water leaks in the ceiling. Not a great start. We also tried to get a hold of a bishop who had a place for us to look at, but his phone rang busy all day, so we gave up and just went to our hotel. Our clean, non-smoking, two queen bed hotel room with a lovely pool. You redeemed yourself Priceline.
The second house we saw was an older home with a 2 car garage in Forest Acres. I was initially excited to see it, but then I saw the neighborhood. First there was the decrepit Pet Supply store across the road and "Arnie" who lived in what more resembled a junkyard with a welcoming sign that said "My dogs can make it to the fence in 3 seconds, can you?" The house had a weird layout with broken intercoms. The landlord suggested "just putting a picture over it" on one that had been ripped out of the wall with exposed wiring. What sealed the deal was on the way out we saw a sign on another neighbor's house that said "This property is under regular surveillance by the Sheriff's department." Next!
We went to two wards in the area and felt more welcomed in the Irmo ward. It has a lot of younger couples with kids and it's huge! One of the couples we were told to talk to when we mentioned we were looking for a place to live invited us over for dinner. Did I mention it was Mother's Day? Super sweet of them. They were trying to sell their house since they were moving out at the end of the month and were entertaining the thought of renting, but weren't sure about it. They introduced us to a neighbor who had been trying to sell her house for a year and wanted to rent, but needed to hear if she had been accepted into a graduate program. She wasn't expecting to hear for another 2 weeks, so we weren't able to move forward on either of those houses.
Monday we went house hunting all day. Either they were too old, next door dogs were too vicious and noisy, too small, neighborhood was too scary, back yard wasn't fenced- needless to say, by the end of the day I was feeling like nothing was going to work out. Most of the homes in Forest Acres had kitchens with only 6 small cupboards in a 5x5 space. The last house we saw in Forest Acres was $25 over what we wanted to spend, but acceptable in every other way. Finally, success! We also went to see a house in Irmo that I had been able to negotiated down the rent into our budget if we signed a 2 year lease. Did you know you can negotiate your rent? I didn't until my friend Jessica told me. This house was newer, in the ward we wanted to go to, GREAT schools, nice neighborhood, and had a garage- something we weren't even trying for.
The end of the day left us with two great options and two more that we hadn't even seen yet. Then I called the utility companies asking what the electric bill averaged for each property. The house in Forest Acres was older and the bill was $200 more than the one in Irmo, putting it completely out of our budget.
In the evening the realtor on one property we had yet to see called and told us they had just leased it out to someone else. Frustrating! We decided to go ahead and sign the lease on the house in Irmo even though we had one more house to see in Lexington because we didn't want to lose it. The final house to see would become a back up plan.
After a crazy morning of grumpy kids, trying to get our daily limit raised at our bank so we could get the funds out for a money order deposit, thinking I lost my wallet at Target- we were done. We had wanted to take the kids to the zoo, but didn't have enough time, and everyone had been pushed to their limit that morning. So we went to a place full of bounce houses. Isn't that what you would do?
Rowan was his own worst enemy when it came to air hockey.
We needed to decompress that morning and this did just that. After we relaxed a bit, we got the money order and put down our deposit. On our way back to the hotel after looking at the place one last time, the realtor for our last showing (the back up place in Lexington) called to tell us that the tenant had changed their mind and would not be moving out anymore. Which is just as well since we found out their electric bill had been $400 in the winter.
I'm hesitant to put up pictures in case something else crazy happens, but we were approved for the lease and will be moving in June 1st. The backyard needs some work, but we are really happy with the place overall. It's a 3 bedroom, 2 bath home with a 1 car garage and fenced backyard. Rowan will be going to one of the best schools in the state, the crime rate is low, the neighborhood is really nice, the ward is great and we back up to the YMCA. Did I mention the people who invited us over for dinner mentioned that the garage sales are great around here? ;)
Steve started to play a "Stephen Cartwright" ploy with a hidden bunny instead of a duck in each picture, but as you will see, Nadia did not take kindly to that.
Walking into the living room.
Kitchen/dining room
Two bedrooms and hall bathroom (Nadia melting down)
Master bedroom and bathroom (Hello garden tub and dual sinks! The master bedroom also has a nice walk in closet)
Everytime I look at these pictures, Guns 'n Roses "Welcome to the Jungle" comes into my head. There's hardly any trees (the one and only downside to the house), but the yard is really overgrown.
