The move and the first week here...

I am not sure if I mentioned that we made a big move. Bryce has purchased a partnership in a CPA firm in a town about 4 hours south of where we lived before. We are temporarily living in a small apartment until we can get our house sold and buy or build a new house. This big change and move came after a lot of fasting a prayer, A LOT! It was really hard to move away from our amazing neighbors and our family. Thankfully though it isn't so far away that we can't come and visit often.

 

With house showings, Christmas and Mac's birthday getting ready to move was a bit more overwhelming than I had anticipated. Because it was so overwhelming I tried to just shrug it off as no big deal. Then we started packing and I realized we had way more stuff to pack than I had originally thought. The tricky part was the fact that we were moving to a smaller place, an apartment, and so we couldn't take everything with us. Then was the part of not knowing how much we would be able to fit in the horse trailer we were borrowing from Bryce's brother. 

Brenley's mom was a total rockstar and is pretty much the Queen of Get-er-done! She packed up our entire kitchen and cleaned it from top to bottom. 

Thankfully the weather and roads were amazing driving over the mountain which was another huge concern of ours. And we got here to K Falls with no problem. Brenley's parents, who helped us move, helped us unload and her mom helped unpack quiet a bit. The place is much smaller so trying to find places for everything has been a bit difficult. But over all we really like the apartment. We are upstairs and the kids are already tired of me telling them to stop running and rough housing and yelling because we don't want to disturb the neighbors.

Oak trying calamari (octopus) and loving it! YUCK!

We went out to eat quite a bit the first couple of days since we weren't settled in enough to make anything in our kitchen.

Oaklee had a big girl bed waiting here for her. She had still been sleeping in her converted crib at our house.

The days have been sunny and the afternoons have been in the mid 40s. Totally winter weather I can handle.

We found a park close to our house and we have gone to it a couple of times already.

Everyone at Bryce's firm has been dying to meet us so we went and saw daddy at work. When we walked in the receptionist was beside herself with excitement to meet us and even had made little treats for the kids. I think her and I will become good friends since we have kids the same age. 

I took Oaklee out on a date to see Frozen on New Years Eve, where it felt like they had the AC on in the theater and really thought we were going to freeze. But we loved the movie.

We didn't do anything for New Years Eve and were in bed by 9pm and then we were woken up at midnight with the noise of fireworks. We were able to watch quite the firework show out our bedroom window. Then I had trouble going back to sleep for a few more hours.

Oaklee woke up on New Years Day all out of sorts and crying. Then a few meltdowns later we were able to get out the door on and adventure. When we left the house we had no clue where we were going to but decided to go south of K Falls since we hadn't been that direction yet. About 30 miles out of town we came across the sign for Lava Beds National Monument and decided that sounded really fun. Especially since next week we plan on doing a unit study on volcanoes for homeschool.

After driving on what felt like the longest road in the middle of nowhere we finally made it to the ranger station. And it did not disappoint! They pointed us to an awesome cave that the kids could go into and Mac was in heaven, Oak kept on saying she was scared and didn't like it but never showed it. It was pretty cool. And we plan on going back during the summer to explore a few more of the caves there. 

The sunsets here have been pretty cool. This was taken through my bedroom window.

And I think Oak's New Years Day meltdowns were due to her getting sick because at the end of the day after putting her in bed she ended up with a 103.3 temp and had she pretty much kept us up all night. Hopefully that is all she gets! I have seen the horror stories all over blogs and facebook of the nasty stomach virus.

We also went to our new Ward this last Sunday. And it was great! Everyone was so friendly and they were so excited to get a family who would be long term. I seriously could hardly walk through the hallways without someone stopping and introducing themselves.

We so far have enjoyed it here. I think what we love the most is how close we are to Bryce's work. He can be home in ten minutes instead of 30 to 40 minutes. He will be able to come home for lunch sometimes if he wants to. I love that idea!

December in photos

I have added a few November pics because I missed them last month.

Thanksgiving at my parents house.

Mac playing with bones from the Turkey. So gross!

Making bead necklaces and bracelets.

Cute face!

Go BEAVS! Civil War...such a close game!

Last date night before Bryce would be going back to K Falls for TWO WEEKS!

Funny girl.

Dressed for church!

Ah, the faces she makes.

Melt down about clothes. Usually that is how her meltdowns start.

McCoy with a new haircut. And i love my red heads!

Concentrating very hard painting her bird house she was meticulous about painting.  

All snuggled up, so cute!

Crafting it up at Grandma's

When we were at my parents house for a few days, this boy would climb on my lap every time I sat down and stay and snuggle until I was ready to get up. Not normal for him, but I think it was because daddy was gone.

Missed this man so much. Hated that he was away for two weeks straight. But loved that we could Facetime.

Grandma had some fruit smelling markers and Oaklee's nose looked like this most of the time from smelling them.

So we had just barely gotten home from my parents house and it was 20 degrees outside with a few inches of snow and Oaklee goes straight to her room and changes into this.

This girl wakes up with the greatest bed head.

Getting some good winter coats before we moved to K Falls where it gets really cold.

Mac spends most of his time playing legos and this is what we did early one morning.

Grandma C got Oaklee this new dress. She tried it on and asked if she could wear it to bed and to avoid a meltdown I said yes. The look on her face when i told her that was priceless. And she pretty much wore it for a week straight.

The morning after she wore her dress to bed. She got up and put tights on and was ready to go for the day.

This was also the day daddy was coming home after being gone for two weeks. We were all really excited!

No matter how many time I remind Oaklee about only coloring on paper she seems to forget and scribbles else where.

Super Hero.

I somehow didn't get this photo in McCoy's birthday post, but his birth mom sent him this for his birthday. Along with Christmas presents for all of us.

McCoy Wrench hands!

One morning I woke up way too early and couldn't go back to sleep. I was frustrated until I remembered that we had just put up our tree. So I went and sat on the couch and looked at our pretty lit up tree.

Oaklee had an obsession with Hubs' old Palm Pilot (yes you read that right) and she would be playing with it and just start giggling. When we asked her what she was doing she replied, "Texting my boyfriend!"

The last day of school before winter break they had a turkey lunch and family was invited to come and eat with the kids. Since I knew McCoy wouldn't eat it and i didn't really want him to with his allergy so I picked him up early and we went home for a bit and waited for DQ (a special treat) to open (since the school has lunch at 10:30). Then on the way to DQ McCoy's 4th baby tooth came out. It was very exciting!

Little munchkins in my bed early morning.

A friend offered to watch my kids for a bit while I did some packing. I stayed for a bit before I left them there because our house was being shown. While I was there her sweet little friend Penny got out her princess makeup. Oaklee loved it and caked her face. I couldn't help but laugh every time I looked at her.

At the same friends house McCoy got to play their Xbox Kinect. He loved it. I think he had been playing probably for about half hour before I got there and another half hour after I got there. It wore him out so much that he fell asleep on the couch about 5pm and slept for about two hours and then he struggled to get fully awake for another 30 minutes. Then was asleep in his bed by 9:30. We need to invest in one of those after we get into a house, I am not sure our downstairs neighbor would appreciate it.

While daddy was living away from us, the kids got in the habit of jumping up from what ever they were doing to come sit and snuggle with me everytime I sat down. 

These cousins accidentally matched at church. That's what happens when you share a Grandma who buys lots of clothes for her grandkids.

I was dropping Mac off at Grandma's to play with his cousins. I wasn't planning on leaving Oak because there wasn't much adult supervision. She really wanted to stay so I asked my teenage niece to keep an eye on her. Because I wasn't planning on leaving her she wasn't prepared with the clothes to play outside. When I got there she looked like this. She looked so stinking cute!

Daddy trying on some of Oak's Christmas gifts.

The kids got these adorable little tents from some good friends. They asked to sleep in them that night, and how could I NOT let them?! 

Oak drew this adorable turtle!