The move, reunion, and a vacation

The last few weeks have been insane. We had to move out of our home, move into my in-law's, I headed up my High School 10 year reunion, and then we had a 10 day trip to Utah- all back to back. I was a bit stressed during the process, and I'll be the first to admit that I wasn't the most pleasant person to be around.

About a day before the move I noticed that Sam was drawing at the kitchen table. I went over to see what he was drawing and my heart stopped when I saw what I thought was a picture of me. I timidly asked, "What are you drawing Sammy?"- completely prepared for him to say that it was me. He stopped, looked up at me and said, "A lion. Why?" ...I can't even tell you the relief I felt.


I also thought it best to eat everything in our fridge before our move, so during the last two weeks I didn't do any grocery shopping. The children were not happy about this, so Sam took it upon himself to make up a shopping list of acceptable foods for me to buy. He also wrote down an "apple pie recipe" because apparently he needed one.

Sam's Apple Pie Recipe (translated)
-get some apples
-chop the apples
-boil them
-cover it
-put it in the oven
-take it out

Sam's Shopping List (translated)
-soup
-pancakes
-pop corn
-doughnuts
-macaroni and cheese
-fruit snacks

In the end, "stage 1" of our move went as smoothly as possible. (For those wondering, stage 1 involved moving out of our house, and moving into Andrew's parent's house.) It was a little depressing seeing our home completely empty less than a year after we moved in, but I think I was prepared to feel that way. We adore the family who is renting out our place and it was a huge burden lifted knowing that our home is in such good hands. In many ways the new tenants are exactly like us- LDS, 2 little boys and a baby girl. I seriously wonder if any of the neighbors up the street will notice that we've even moved. Our belongings (along with our minivan) were packed up by a professional moving company, and are now on their way to Switzerland. We'll be heading out on August 16th, but in the meantime, we are enjoying some family time.


The next event to occur was my High School 10 year reunion- which for some reason I decided to organize. With everything going on in my life, I think this reunion could have potentially pushed me over the edge. It probably would have, were it not for my friend Jill. Seriously, I cannot thank that girl enough!!!!!! I basically called her one day last year and told her that she was going to help me plan this thing. Even though she told me every day that she wasn't going to help (and even threatened to poison everyone at the reunion), she took on so much of the load. She took care of everything from the decorations, raffle tickets, finding a place for the reunion and collecting cash...geez, did I even do anything? THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU! Thanks also to Kim, who came despite her many threats not to. :)


And finally, we had our trip to Utah. The main purpose of this trip was to attend my extended family reunion which took place at my grandparent's cabin in the Uinta mountains. To quote Andrew, "it was legendary". Seriously, this place is amazing, and if you don't believe me, just look at the pictures. The cabin is rustic, which is why I love it so much. There are toilets, but because the plumbing is so old, we have to use the outhouses. Of course, there were a few people unwilling to use the outhouses...and one day my sister (I'll not say which one) came running into our room to say that the upstairs toilet was overflowing. When I got to the bathroom poopy water was gushing over the toilet onto the floor. I hissed at my sister to hurry and help me clean it up before our grandpa found out, but before we could even get a towel my grandpa burst into the room demanding to know what happened. Apparently, the toilet water came pouring through the ceiling right onto everyone who was in the kitchen. GROSS!

Some other highlights included a 6 mile hike which ultimately turned into a 12 mile hike (not on purpose), a rafting trip and rescue mission (more on that later), a fishing trip with grandpa, and enough sites and hikes to make our hearts content. We love my family and I don't think that anyone could have a cooler grandpa and sweeter grandma than I do. When the family reunion was finished we were able to stay with Dan and Kristen in their new home. It was fun to be with them and their location allowed us to visit BYU, American Fork Canyon and Salt Lake. My Grandma Walker also came to the reunion, and we loved seeing her as well.

Look at my grandpa, how awesome is he???

Sam on a fossil hunt.

The green river near flaming gorge dam.

Ash relaxing on the upper deck of the cabin.

Here are some pictures of our rafting trip down the green river. There were 3 rafts in our group, and it was the mission of those in Joe's raft to throw everyone in the river. Fortunately our raft had some little kids in it, so we were somehow exempt.

Look at the picture below- I love how I am in deep conversation while Luke is trying to jump out of the raft. That' some good parenting! At least I'm somewhat holding onto him.

Now look carefully at the picture below. What you are seeing is Andrew and my uncle Jon rescuing a woman and two little girls. These people belonged to another rafting group who idiotically thought it would be a good idea to stop their raft in the middle of the rapids and jump off of this boulder. DUMB!!! The men in their group jumped off the rock, and then their raft got submerged leaving the woman and 2 children stranded. We were not far behind them, so we pulled our rafts over and my uncle and Andrew walked back up the river, jumped in, and traveled down the rapids to the rock. There was a dodgy moment when Andrew tried to get to the rock, but thankfully I didn't see this. They ultimately got the raft out of the water and jumped into the rapids holding the hands of the girls and woman. While this rescue mission was occurring, the men of this group were too busy worrying about their lost car keys to give their stranded family members much thought. Nice.

Fishing with Great-Grandpa Stones

After catching fish, my grandfather showed the kids how to clean and cook them. It was a nice little biology lesson.

And lastly, I leave you with perhaps the funniest thing I have seen in a while. While driving through American Fork, Utah we passed this little boutique.... only in Utah.

Family Updates

Afton
This little baby is growing up and she's growing up fast. She is bursting at the seams with her own personality and she continually cracks us up. She loves to imitate her brothers, especially when one of them is doing something annoying, like walking around making some weird animal noise. She starting to show more interest in "girl" things like dolls, but a ball will never fail to escape her notice.

Luke
After seeing several 3 year olds riding their bikes without training wheels, I decided that little man Luke should be able to ride his bike without his the aid of his. Andrew took the wheels off and then we left the bike out for Luke to figure it out. He eventually did figured it out and now its hard to get him off of his bike.

Sam
At the rate Sam is going he will be completely toothless by Christmas. I love his new toothless grin and I love that he is now having a hard time pronouncing certain words with his upper front tooth missing. I had to take the picture below to send in with Sam's application to the International school he will be attending once we move. For some reason I thought it was funny that a photo was required to apply- are they looking for extra limbs?

As soon as I was done taking the above picture, I walked into my kitchen and found the two youngest devouring ice cream...with their hands. I love the guilty look on Afton's face.

The Parents
We recently celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary- and by doing what? Preparing for our move! It's been crazy, but at least we've been doing it together.


The Home
We've been quickly trying to get our home ready for renters, and one of the biggest projects has been fixing the master bathroom. The faucets were leaking, the tile was loose and cracking, and it was in desperate need of a face-lift. A few years ago I found a special epoxy paint made for painting ceramic showers and bathtubs. I've been wanting to try it out, and since I hated the pink tile in our master bathroom, I decided to give it a go. What on earth was I thinking??? The result looks nice, but the that stuff was a nightmare to work with! I've never smelled such horrible fumes-and that was while wearing a special fume mask. The whole time I just kept thinking, "Why did I ever think that this pink was bad????". Take my advice, if you want to redo your shower/tub, spend the extra money and go with Bath Fitters.

before

after

The finished room- with new ceramic floor tile, paint and toilet.
I'm still not sure that I think it was worth it.

Chocolate

Little known fact about me: I eat when I'm anxious.

I've been extremely anxious the last few days, which means that I've been eating...A LOT. Since consuming alcohol isn't an option, I felt that chocolate would help "take off the edge". But with no chocolate in my house I had to resort to digging ALL of the chocolate chips out of the cookie package shown above. It helped a little.

The cause of my anxiousness has been my growing "to do list" (I'll eventually get to making this blog private) and the stress of finding a renter for our home. The good news: We found a renter! The crazy news: we have to be out of our house next Thursday. Next Thursday people!

Wish me luck...I'm gonna need it. That, and some more chocolate.

Visits, Visits, Visits

The last few weeks have consisted of weekend visits from my family and then my High School besties. Both visiting parties hail from South Jersey, and let me tell you- when together, we're a loud, rambunctious group of people. At the end of both weekends my cheeks hurt from laughing so much. It was great.

First up- my family, who came down to celebrate my sister's 17th birthday. We decided to go to the National Cathedral in DC, which my parents had never been to before. It is absolutely stunning inside- but you'll have to take my word for it. I am never able to capture what it really looks like.

Luke kept running up to these candles, and when I would try to stop him, he would say, "I'm just blowing out a couple mommy!"

Happy birthday Becca! Just think- I was married in two years when I was your age! Are you freaked out or what?

The next visit was by my girlfriends Jill, Kim and Lisa. Despite the fact that...

• Lisa nearly passed out on the Metro,
• the Holocaust Museum ran out of tickets TWO people ahead of us,
• it was too late to check out the "Duck Boat",
• and Jill kept insisting on us taking glamor photo shots (I would DIE before ever show them)...

...we had a great time! After several failed efforts we decided to ditch the DC touristy stuff and go shopping in Georgetown. It was a perfect kid-free day/evening and I wish we could do it more often. I love these girls!

We're moving...seriously.

Last August, right after moving into our home, I told a new friend that "it felt great to be settled into the place where we will spend the rest of our lives." She responded, "nothing in life is permanent", and then gave me a look that said, "Jessica, you are a poor, naive fool." I responded with a look that said "whatever lady."

Looks like the joke's on me because it hasn't even been year and we're moving. To Switzerland.

Last January, Andrew called to ask me if I would be willing to move to Switzerland for a few years. There was a position available at an international agency, and Andrew's employer wanted a representative to fill this post (with the understanding that he would return to work once the period was done). The catch was that Andrew needed to first be officially nominated by his work, and then had to apply for the actual position. Long story short, he was nominated, he interviewed, he was offered a position, and we've accepted (his tentative start date is in August).

I'm excited, but let me point out some of my concerns...

• I've never been outside of America. I consider Utah to be exotic.
• I don't speak German, or more specifically, Swiss-German.
  
• I know not a soul in this country- or in all of Europe for that matter.
  
• We have 3 small kids.
• I am not an adventurous, roll-with-the-punches type of gal.
  
• Did I mention the 3 kids?
• Andrew will be traveling...all over the world...a lot. Again, to reiterate my above points-
  
  • I don't speak the language
  • I don't know anyone
    
  • and I will be alone with 3 kids
    

The good news is that Andrew is really excited. He's visited the area twice, and is convinced that the kids and I will love it. I've been reading lots of blogs, and I think once we get adjusted, we'll love it too. The country looks stunning, and the rest of Europe will be at our fingertips. We have so much to do to prepare (like renting out our home), and at the moment I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed. I do know that the hardest part of this adventure will be leaving our family and friends. It is going to break my heart to say goodbye.

Gratefully, as I've learned, nothing in life (especially this) is permanent.

And with that, I leave you with some pictures Andrew took while interviewing. We are responsible to find our own housing, so I have no idea which little town we will be living in. Andrew assures me that this is the basic gist of it though...I guess I'll find out soon enough.

The tram that Andrew will commute on- what a nice change from the metro!