Moving In

Blog Post About January 2021

We were enjoying cool weather with 30% chance of snow at the exact same time the South got deluged by so much snow that many of you lost power. We lose power all the time during cold weather, but we are more prepared with propane heaters (and our pipes haven't ever frozen over). We were really feeling for a lot of you during this time. I hope you have since recovered.

Ahhh! So good to be back in the city... HA!

We left our friends' house early one morning to start "moving day," and drove down this two-way street. This is normal, but I forget to post pictures like this. The neighborhoods are parked like this each night, so when you meet a car coming, it makes for VERY interesting driving!

So the movers got busy loading all of our stuff into trucks and taking it over to the house. 

I was a little concerned about where all the screws ended up that were supposed to be available to put all of our furniture back together again.

Also, you get a look at all our well-designed bathrooms. 

This is Caleb's, and he still chooses to shower downstairs in mine and Doug's rather than have a wet bathroom floor every day, and I don't blame him.

Caleb's room.

They found all the pieces!

Check!

Karis' room.

They found all of her parts and pieces, too!

Check!

Mine and Doug's room, on the other hand, took them over four hours, and there were a lot of frustrating statements coming out of this room.

And since one of my drawers still has a hard time closing, I'm guessing they did NOT find all of the pieces for this room.

Although it looks pretty complete.

This is the master shower downstairs, which four out of five of us choose to use because we decided to leave this toilet unused.

Keira's room. Check!

Doug got creative with a shower curtain, and Karis actually uses her shower. It helps that the shower is not BETWEEN the toilet and the door like the others.

And Keira does not use hers.

One more toilet that gets to stay dry.

We had an old sink counter and a couple of bathroom counters from previous houses that held us over until we could get new cabinets installed...much later.

By the end of the day, when I called Kylie, things felt a little crazy!

January 21, 2021

Hopefully you look better than we do after a day of moving? :)

Here Comes the Rain Again, Not to Mention, My Tears

Blog Post About Summer 2020

The storms didn't stop.

When we left Memphis to drive to Nashville, we still had a lot of rain.

A LOT!

September 1, 2020

Welcome to Nashville, Kylie!  😂

September 1, 2020

We were privileged to be able to stay at the parents' house of a young lady we knew from our time in Africa. 

After a good night's rest, Doug and I got up the next morning to help Kylie get the things she needed to check into her apartment. Caleb and Karis stayed at the house so they could get some school done, and Keira went to the zoo with the children of the young lady (now married) we knew from our time in Africa.

September 2, 2020

The apartment looked pretty clean at first :)

We had never met these girls before and we didn't know anything about them, but we quickly learned one of them liked Vienna sausages (see cabinet), two of them came with jars of Nutella, one of them really liked microwave mac & cheese, and they all liked junk food a little more than Kylie.

Roommates can be an interesting situation. 

Different beliefs, different hobbies, different schedules-kept can cause tension.

It was a good year of growth...maybe for all of them.

How did this Happen??

Blog Post About Summer 2020

And the day arrives that you never thought possible...

Your firstborn is leaving home for college, and all she are taking is what you gave them for the first 18 years of her life. 

What?!?

August 28, 2020

Compared to what I took to college, she really didn't have that much stuff. 

One day after we left the house, my friend Leah sent this picture of our picture from 2007 that she found. 

It twas perfect timing as I was saying goodbye, and I was so appreciative because all of my children's baby pictures are in boxes, waiting for the day we set up house in America.

2007

We took the long, slow way to Nashville so we could see people along the way.

First stop: Waco

We took the grandparents to eat Middle Eastern food.

August 28, 2020

Then we headed to Dallas where we stayed with some friends who were like grandparents to my children while we lived in Africa. Jan and Lynn are like family. We took vacations together, went on safaris together, and spent many nights eating popcorn and playing Uno.

August 29, 2020

Then next morning, early, we went to get Kylie's car inspected, and then headed towards Arkansas.

We met a family for lunch near Hot Springs, and pretty quickly a storm rolled in.

We were also meeting a family from Jonesboro for dinner, but knew we couldn't make it there and get to Memphis (where we were spending the night) in a decent amount of time, so thankfully, this sweet family agreed to meet us in Memphis for dinner.

I can't tell you how glad I am that they made time for us and that it worked out for us to see the Rainwaters on this trip! We met them in Africa, too, and they are always such great encouragers.

On October 17th, a month and a half after this picture was taken, Greg went to sleep, and he didn't wake up. He was loved by so many and changed a lot of people's lives for the better.  What a privilege it was to know him!

Memphis: August 29, 2020

His and Tammy's beautiful daughter started college just last month (August 2021), and she and her mother have been amazing testimonies of what a life hidden in Christ can be.

Needless to say, we got to our friends' house in Memphis a little late, so we didn't meet their kids until the next morning.

Jessica is a friend from our days in Mississippi, and she and her husband let us stay a couple of days while we saw some other people in Memphis, Caleb and Karis did some online school, and before we made the drive to Nashville.

This is one of her daughters greeting Doug the next morning

August 30, 2020

And getting all the scoop from Caleb while he ate his breakfast.

Her older daughter teamed up with Keira for a reading session in a fun tent.

 

 We are so blessed to know so many people from so many places! They make life a lot more fun!

We found it, Now let's Move!

There were no commercial flights arriving or departing from our country, but occasionally a charter flight would come available. When one did, Doug booked Karis, Keira, and me on it. We were going to leave June 21, 2020, so we could get Karis back in time to quarantine for two weeks before she went to ballet camp. And since the chartered flights were more expensive, only half of us flew, while Doug waited to see if the airport would open up and he could get something cheaper for the rest of them.

Two days before we left, on June 19, 2020, we found a rental that fit what we needed!

 

Perfect timing, too, because on June 20, 2020, Doug had already hired movers to come and get our belongings to take to storage.

We still went with this plan because we knew the new rental would need to be cleaned before we moved into it, and since we were going to be in America for about 6 months, we didn't want to clean it and have it sit and collect dust while we were gone.

You've heard the term, "It takes a village?"

Well, we took the village and we used them.

A friend who had been stuck in our country for quite a few months because of Covid offered to be at our house while the movers wrapped and packed everything into the truck.

Then I was on the other end of the truck, at the storage house. 

I showed the men the three rooms we were allowed to move into, and I made sure they stacked things well.

So instead of a stacking job looking like this, I would kindly ask someone to make it look like

this.  And so on.

Then, another friend was with me to translate. The movers spoke a language that I do not know.

In the meantime, our first friend stayed at the original house for most of the day while the truck went back and forth.

During all of this, Doug was at the police station in our new neighborhood, registering us to live there. There was a lot of waiting around and moving to different buildings for different pieces of paper. It was almost 4 hours before he ever made it to the storage house.

And our children had taken our need-to-live items (including all of the suitcases that would be going to America) and moved us into a guest house for the time being.

Then, at the end of the day, I took the girls back to the house we were leaving and let them take pictures in their old bedroom they had shared.

Ahhh...now to get all the luggage weight right so we some of us can get on the plane tomorrow.

The Party's Over...Literally

I don't know why I can't find time to blog, but it doesn't seem to come first in my list of "to do" items each week. So, since I mainly blog to have a record of our time here, I can't just skip to present day. That means you'll have to bear with me for who knows how long until the timelines of my blog and my real life match up. 

For now, I'm back at the morning after Kylie's graduation party, which is ironic, because we are currently getting ready to start KARIS' senior year.  Crazy!

The morning after, the decorations were were taken down, and we pulled out all the boxes we had been hiding in the basement while the party was going on.

Time to pack.

Before and After.

(If you don't remember, our landlord had asked us to leave so he could try and sell the house.  

Present day (2021), we are 14 months from our move out, and he actually did sell it last month.

Doug told me a doctor bought it and gutted it, so I went to see for myself. 

Sad day.

December 4, 2018                                                                                                                                                                                                        August 10, 2021

They have taken out every tree on the outside and inside of the gate, and torn up the garden that was there. It was also sad for me to see my laundry room tile on the street.

August 10, 2021

Back to 2020, even though we were packing, Doug still made time to cut Karis' and Caleb's hair! This wasn't just a "quarantine cutting." This is something he does all year long for any of us that needs it.

Caleb got a LOT cut.

At this point, we still hadn't found another home to move into, so while we were still looking, we also had a plan put in place to store our belongings in an unused house of a friend if we never found another rental.

Because we were trying to get to America to get Kylie ready to go to college, we decided to get our rugs washed, dried, rolled up and bagged for the months we would be gone.

We took them to a big, open cemented area, and some men rolled them out, told us how much it would cost, and then they were dragged away to be hosed down.

And even though summer 2020 was a relatively mild summer here, it was still warm.

And as you can see, it was almost as hot inside as it was outside.

June 6, 2020

So, Doug, Keira, and I decided to camp in the yard for a couple of nights, and it was actually not bad. The temperatures dropped a night, and it was a lot better than being in our bedrooms.

It was quite the pressure situation.  

Packing. 

Not having a new house to move into. 

Needing to get to America, and at the moment, no way to get there (see picture below).

So, we kept working and kept praying.