Pictures

Here are some pictures from the recent weeks!

Saying our goodbyes :( :( 

 

In front of the San Miguel Mission in Santa Fe, NM

Stopped at a gas station somewhere in Texas that had a huge vintage car and collectible museum. It was a random, but awesome find!

Big Texan Steak Ranch...we did not attempt the 72oz steak challenge ;) 

If you look closely you can see Madeline!

Boat ride in Oklahoma City...

Thank goodness for our double stroller. This trip would have been much more difficult without it!

Graceland, Home of Elvis Presley!

Grand Ole Opry

Luke and Madeline were both SO good on the drive. Luke slept way more than we expected. Madeline slept a decent amount and we had a DVD player that we used...well....A LOT! :)

Getting good at the hotel routine

Madeline supervising the movers...

The kids had their first day of daycare/preschool last Monday. They're both doing so good there, which is a big relief to me. 

Madeline got her first real haircut last week. She needed it so bad...the ends were getting stringy. Hopefully it thicken up a bit as it grows back. 

We've had a lot of fun exploring places around us. On Sunday, we went to lunch and Madeline got this massive (kiddie!) ice cream cone! 

AZ to PA

Last time I updated, our house in Arizona was being packed up. Since that update, we moved out of our house (lease started for our renters on August 1), stayed with my parents for 2 weeks, I went to Minnesota for work for a couple of days, George interviewed and got a new job (Recruiter at Ryder), we drove across country from AZ to PA, moved into our apartment in PA, found a new daycare/preschool for the kids,  did tons of unpacking, and started our new positions in PA. August has been a big month for us! It's been exciting and exhausting. It was so hard to say our goodbyes in Arizona. The fact that we had an "adventure" ahead of us helped a little bit.

Since it would take me hours and hours to fill you in on all of the details of the past month (and most of them are pretty boring) I have decided to highlight our cross country trip on this post. As soon as we found out that we were moving to PA, George knew he wanted to plan a road trip. I was skeptical because ya know, we have a toddler and infant...enough said :) Well, I'm very glad he talked me into it because it turned out to be one of the best weeks. We got to see so much of the country that we wouldn't have seen otherwise. Our days were manageable, averaging about 6-7 hours of driving per day. We tried to get an early start every morning so the kids still had a few hours of sleep, but we were pretty relaxed about our stops along the way. We didn't stress about how many stops or how long our stops were. With the kids, we knew stops were going to be frequent. We also tried to plan a longer stop at the halfway point each day. Each evening, we did something fun. I'll tell you a little bit about each stop below.

I made little snapchat videos each day to share with you all. I also have a bunch of pictures that I will post later this week. 

Day 1: Phoenix, AZ to Santa Fe, MN

Stopped in Gallup for lunch, stayed at the Drury Plaza in downtown Santa Fe, walked around downtown Santa Fe, saw the San Miguel Mission (oldest church in the US)

Day 2: Santa Fe, NM to Oklahoma City, OK

Longest day of the trip at almost 8 hours, stopped at the Big Texan Steak Ranch in Amarillo, TX (home to the 72oz steak challenge), stayed at the Homewood Suites in the Bricktown district, walked along the river, got dinner, Madeline and I took a boat ride tour, went swimming at the hotel pool

Day 3: Oklahoma City, OK to Memphis, TN

Drove through Oklahoma and Arkansas, stopped in Little Rock for lunch, stayed at the Hampton Inn on Beale Street, walked around Beale Street, ate at Central BBQ, went to Graceland during Elvis week (in the pouring rain!), Madeline had the best time running around in the rain...it was so fun to watch her :)

Day 4: Memphis, TN to Nashville, TN

Shortest day of the trip at just 3.5 hours, watched the Dave Ramsey show live, met Dave Ramsey, stayed at the Double Tree in downtown Nashville, walked around and ate in downtown Nashville, kids fell asleep in the stroller, George and I listened to live music at the hotel bar

Day 5: Nashville, TN to Roanoke, VA

Stopped at the Grand Ole Opry before leaving town, learned how long of a state Tennessee is, ate lunch near the University of TN in Knoxville, stayed at Hotel Roanoke, ate delicious pizza in the cute little downtown

Day 6: Roanoke, VA to Collegeville, PA

Last day, anxious to arrive so took minimal stops, arrived in Collegeville at 1PM, met our landlord and got the keys to our apartment, went to Costco to stock up on the basics, slept on the floor! 

Moving Day!

Today is moving day! The packers are boxing up all of our belongings as we speak. I feel like we do a pretty good job of keeping excess stuff out of our home, but even so, there are a ton of boxes. Boxes everywhere! I am scared for the other end when we have to unpack all of these boxes. We are downsizing quite a bit so we will likely leave some stuff in storage. Our new apartment in PA has a private storage room which, I'm sure, we will fill up!

A bit more on our timeline...

Today and tomorrow is our pack and load at our home in Gilbert. Tonight, we will start staying with my parents for 2 1/2 weeks. I will be traveling to Minneapolis August 8-10 for some onboarding for my new position. On August 13, we hit the road to PA! Our move in date in PA in August 19.

I am happy that we will have a gap between packing up our home and leaving AZ. It gives us time to get the house ready for our renters (whose lease starts 8/1). It'll also allow us to relax for a couple of weeks. We have put a lot of energy into getting things organized at our house. In fact, I was pretty proud when one of the packers told me that we have one of the most organized homes that he's ever packed. It'll also be nice to have a couple more weeks with family without the distractions of getting ready for a big move. We will have just one small carload of stuff in our possession as of tomorrow.

Overall, we are feeling pretty good about things. George has been interviewing for some positions over the past couple of weeks and should hear more in the next week or so. He is optimistic about the prospects. I've definitely had some moments where I've thought to myself, "what have we done?!?!" but then George calms me down :) One might say that he's a bit more level headed than me. Haha.

Here are some pictures of our apartment in Collegeville. The building was actually an old flag making factory so it is called the "Flag Factory Lofts". It is a building with 10 loft style apartments. The building was just recently re-done. It was a 3 year project and some of the apartments were ready earlier this year and the rest are ready this month. It will certainly be a lot different than what we're coming from!

PA Move!

I will start off this post with some big news....we are moving to Philadelphia, PA. Most of our friends and family know by now so hopefully this isn't a surprise to anyone reading. We are relocating for my job at General Mills. George and I have always had a desire to move out east for a bit, but we thought that it was several years out for us. Long story short, the timing and opportunity were right so to Pennsylvania we go! George will be looking for a new job either in Philadelphia or something that he can do remotely. So far, he has a couple of good prospects. We will be renting our home out. We posted it on Zillow and were fortunate to have found good renters within a week of posting it. The renters move in on August 1 so we will doing our pack/load on July 27 and July 28. Our lease in Pennsylvania doesn’t start until August 19 so we will stay with my folks for a couple of weeks before we hit the road. And yes, we opted to drive out there. I know, we’re crazy to do that with 2 small children!! George had a strong desire to do a road trip and make some stops along the way. I was skeptical at first, but after looking over the plan (6-7 hours max per day and one short 3-4 hour day), I am getting more excited. We are stopping in Santa Fe, Oklahoma City, Memphis, Nashville, and somewhere TBD in Virginia.

Last week, we went out to PA for our house hunting trip. We looked at a ton of places and after factoring in space, cost, location, etc. we decided on a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment in Collegeville, PA (north of Philly). The apartment is actually really big…1500 square feet plus a large private storage room. The one downside is that the kids will have to share a room. Surprisingly, Madeline was VERY excited about sharing a room with her “Lukey Boy” as she now calls him! Haha. I will post some more details and pictures of the apartment in a separate post. 

The move and all of the logistics have been keeping us very busy. That’s my excuse for the long blogging hiatus! Here are some pictures of the kids from the past couple of weeks...

Madeline stayed home while we did our house hunting trip. Emily, Hannah, and Rachel all helped us out with Madeline while we were gone, which we really appreciated! Since Luke is still so little and is still nursing, he came with us. He was a good little traveler, but by the end of the trip, he was very sick of his carseat. 

We were all very happy to reunite when we got home!!

 We stayed at an Airbnb while we were house hunting. The home was a 1751 Pennsylvania farmhouse. The home was amazing and the gardens/property were gorgeous! Here are Luke and I in their backyard!

Back to Work

I accidentally saved this post as a draft -- it should have been posted a couple of weeks ago!

It's been two weeks since I went back to work and things have been surprising smooth. Luke has transitioned just fine and I was able to jump right back into things at work. Luke is going to Gwen's, the same babysitter as Madeline. Madeline was so excited to have Luke join her :) Mornings are the most challenging because I need to get myself ready, Luke ready, Luke fed, gather up my things (coffee, lunch, work stuff), and get out the door by 6:30-6:45AM so that traffic isn't insane.  George is in charge of getting Madeline dressed and fed and he does the drop off (he has less of a commute). I do pick-up in the afternoon. We've had a few rocky mornings (i.e. Luke pooped all over me one morning last week!!), but for the most part we've both been able to get out the door on time. The key is for me to wake up early (5:20 or earlier) and prep as much as possible the night before (coffee, lunches). Are you exhausted yet?! 

We've been keeping the weekends pretty low key which has been nice. Hannah has been looking for her wedding dress (sorry, no pics! haha) so I've enjoyed going with her to look. She hasn't said "yes to the dress" yet, but I think she is getting close. She has one more place to check-out next weekend. Last weekend, we got together to celebrate Emily's birthday. We went over to my parents' house for some swimming and Madeline has been asking about the pool/swimming ever since. 

Two weeks ago, Jeremiah graduated from ASU. Since I was still off of work, Luke and I were able to attend graduation. Here are a few pics from that...

Jeremiah and his family (parents, brother, and grandparents)... 

Sarah Moser also graduated!! Congrats to both Sarah and Jeremiah :) 

Our garden has been thriving the past few months. Last weekend, we picked a bunch of carrots. We also have lots of lettuce, celery, oregano, dill, and basil, The tomatoes are starting to sprout so hopefully those continue to grow. I also planted some sunflowers. They are getting really tall, but no flowers still. 

Our little Luke is getting cuter by the day. I snapped a few pics of him before I left for work the other morning. I love his smiles :) :)

Those who follow me on Facebook already saw this pic. On Saturday, I asked Madeline to grab some toys for Luke. She grabbed the bin of legos and a coloring book and crayons (for herself). Haha!