We found a House!

Yesterday David and I viewed a house that I am so happy to say will be our home sometime this week. We'll be living on the North side of Surrey in the Fraser Heights area. Both David and myself are so excited!! He's just 20 minutes from work and we'll be about 35 minutes to Abbotsford (depending on traffic). It's a lovely 4 bedroom + office home in a really nice quiet neighbourhood. There's a fenced in lawn and beautiful deck in the back. Now we just have to wait and see when the moving truck can drop off our furniture.

We also got a mini van!!

Back in BC

So I thought I should update the blog, since I realized that I didn't even post that we actually did arrive in BC. On Thursday evening, August 4th, we crossed the border and came into Abbotsford. What a strange feeling to know that we just packed up and drove back to BC, for good! Or at least for a long time. Yes, there were some bumps along the way, but all in all it was a pretty good try. I would actually do it again (just somewhere else).

It's been great to see family and friends now that we're back! David is LOVING his new job which is a huge blessing. He's happy with the work and happy with the people. Speaking of David, today is his birthday! I wish I could say that we have big birthday plans. However life has just been so crazy since we got here that we decided to hold off on celebrating until next weekend. Right now we just need to try to get life in order. The thought of planning a party is just too much right now.

Unfortunately, things with the house that we had rented didn't work out (health and safety issues that couldn't be fixed). So we decided not to move in and look for a new place. So we're staying at my mom's house a little longer than we anticipated. The lack of routine and any sense of "normal" has been hard on all of us, especially the kids. We're finding that their behaviour is especially on the "not so good" side these days, making life even more difficult to deal with.

So we're just taking one day at a time right now. We know that God has a great place in store for us, so we're trying our best to be patient and open to wherever that is. If you know of any great homes for rent in the Langley/ Surrey area (about 5 min from the freeway), please let us know. Our stuff is all in storage, so as soon as we find a place we can move in. Not surprisingly, we're all pretty eager for this to happen.

Other than that, we're all doing pretty good. We're ready for this next chapter to start already.

Yellowstone National Park

Yesterday we decided to really enjoy the journey and spend the day at Yellowstone National park. It was a lovely drive to, through and from the park.

We saw some wildlife.

We watched Old Faithful erupt. Very cool, always wanted to see that.

Our family in front of Old Faithful (too bad we're right in front of the geyser).

Who saw a wild buffalo? WE DID!!!

Driving through Montana in the evening was truly beautiful. Once it was dark there was a lightning storm just beyond the mountains, lighting up the whole range.

After a lot of driving and a difficult time finding a place to sleep, we spent the night in Missoula, Montana. Since all of hotels we stopped at were booked up we found a cheaper motel and all shared a king sized bed for the night. Another one for the memory books. Yet another late night (once we found our place all my card orders were finished up for the night), and another early morning.

And we're off...

Mount Rushmore

Yesterday we were able to get back on the road at 11:30am after getting the power steering on our car fixed. We were thankful that all ended up going pretty well in the end and not costing us a fortune. No AC, so we're driving with the windows open and the heat.

We spent the afternoon at Mount Rushmore. The kids enjoyed running around the trails and having a break from the car. It was really neat to see such a famous monument/ memorial site.

On our evening drive Sarah was cleaning her "gross" feet with wet wipes which tickled and made her laugh hysterically. Looks like she's crying here, but I assure you that she's not. Calvin found it so funny that he was laughing and cleaning his feet too.

The setting sun looked amazing over the fields and vast rolling hills of Wyoming. Herds of cattle grazed in the open fields, this is indeed cowboy country.

Break Down

Yesterday we spent the day driving. All was going well until about 7:30pm (a half hour before we were going to stop for the day). Our AC was cutting out and eventually died. Then we smelled a rubber smell and heard some squealing. We pulled over and called CAA (thank goodness), a tow truck arrived in about a half hour which was not that bad. The kids loved the ride in the tow truck! The verdict was that our AC and power steering belt is done. Boo.

We're currently waiting in our hotel room to hear how much it's going to cost to get just the power steering fixed. The shop isn't able to locate any air compressors in the area so that's currently out of the question (and likely our of our budget). You have to know that it's incredibly hot here! We were all dripping sweat after a short time without AC yesterday. It looks like it will likely be a long few days of travel left. Can't say that I'm too excited about what's to come.

In the meantime David's been working on his thesis and had to stay up until 3am working on it. It's due today, so that's been even more pressure the last couple of days. He's got it submitted but understandably isn't happy with the final result.

Please continue to keep our family in your thoughts and prayers as we make the journey back to BC. We're trying to stay positive and have a good attitude, things really could have been so much worse.

Our hot and sweaty family