Omaha to Spokane...

Well, I used to be really good at sending out updates on our family in email, but I have not sent one out in a long time, and thought I would just post our update here instead. Maybe I'll send one out later anyway...we'll see.


Most of our friends and family know that the end of May/beginning of June we moved from Omaha, Nebraska to Spokane, Washington. On May 31 we had to be out of our dark little basement apartment in Fox Run, and we were going to be able to get our keys and move into our new townhome in Indian Canyon in Spokane on June 4th. So we decided to make a whole trip out of it. We got the Penske moving truck on the morning of the 30th and figured we would pack it up and clean up the basement hole that day and drive out to begin the journey early the next morning. I had already arranged a hotel near Mount Rushmorfor us to stay in the night of the 31 and 1st. I had arranged a hotel in Bozeman, MT for the 2nd, and a hotel in Spokane the 3rd. Then we could just go in and get our key early the 4th and move in and return the truck quickly. We had also arranged with our new ward to have some guys come help us unload the turck at 5 pm on the 4th.


Wes and I worked on loading and cleaning the basement from like 6 am until about 9 pm nonstop on the 30th, and still figured we had about 2 or so hours of work left, so we decided to go to our hotel in Omaha and come back to finish in the morning (the drive to Mount Rushmore was only supposed to be like 7 1/2 hours or something). So we finished and drove out about 12:30 the next afternoon. Wes was driving the big 22' Penske truck with the car hitched on the back. We quickly realized the truck had a "governor" on it that made it unable to drive over 65. So, it took us longer to get to all the places...

About 9:30 or 10:30 PM, we got to our hotel near Mount Rushmore. It was a downpur when we got there. I ran in the hotel lobby, carrying and dragging all 3 sleeping kids to check in while Wes tried to drive around the block and find a place to put the truck. As I was trying to sign the hotel paperwork, Wes called on the cell to tell me he was stuck and needed me right away. So, we quickly finished checking in, got in the ven and drove to where Wes has gone. The parking area he had gone into came to a dead end, and Wes was stuck with the Penske in the lot between 2 rows of cars. I came around to where he was, parked the Van out of the way, but in sight with the sleeping kids init, and we tried everything we could to back up the truck out of there. You might not know this, but you can't back up a truck with a hitch on it, at least not this kind, and it even said so on the hitch. We quickly realized that this hitch don't lie-it wasn't possible!

So, still in the pouring rain, we had to take the car off the hitch (which requires taking chains off the bottom/frame, and off the front wheels-which were kinda stuck as they were soaking wet!)! But we got it off and out of the way, then we unhitched the towing device and the two of us rolled it out of the way. Then we were able to back the truck out, reattach the towing device and park it where the hotel had told us to. We decided to wait to put the car back on the tow-er in the morning (it was about midnight by then).

We went to bed finally. In the morning we woke up, ate our hotels free breakfast and went up to Mount Rushmore. We had planned to stay up there and hike for a while, but our van kind of overheated on the way up, so after about an hour looking at all th stuff (with our kids going nuts), Wes and I decided that we better be responsible and try to get the van looked at and fixed before we had to drive further the next day. So, we left and drove back into town. The van was miraculously doing fine all the way back down, and we decided it was ok and that we would just take it easy the reat of the day and try to leave really early the next morning to get to Bozeman.

THe trip to Bozeman, and on to Spokane were fairly uneventful (there were the times of near overheating when we were stuck in a one lane canyon near Coeur D'Alene and stuff, but fairly uneventful). And we arrived in Spokane on Sunday July 3rd. As I was checking into our hotel I got a call from a family in our new ward that knew we would be there that day inviting us to a BBQ. So, we went over there and met half the ward on that first Sunday afternoon. It was a great way to meet a lot of people in the ward in a low key, fun setting.

THe next day we got into our apartment complex and it was so much better than our hole in the ground in Omaha! Not to say it is perfect, but I like it much better. We started to unload the truck at like 8 am (as soon as we signed all the paperwork adn got our keys and stuff). We unloaded all day (at Wes's insistence that he wanted it mostly done before anyone came to help at 5 pm). I kinda grumbled as we carried heavy items in all day, but I did work hard and try to help. It's a good thing to cause 5 pm came and went and nobody came to help us. By about 5:45, the van was empty of all but 3 thiings, 2 dressers and a heavy hope chest. I was dying by then, and shaking head to toe and literally about fell over getting the first dresser in the house. I was bad enough that we determined that I could not help anymore, but we needed some help getting the last 2 things in the house. So, we called our friend in the ward that had the BBQ and asked him if there was just one person we could call to come help us with these last couple things. He said he would be right over. So, a bit later, he and another guy came over and helped us, and their wives showed up with pizza and soda for everyone! It was SOOO nice! I really appreciated that! Thank goodness for the Molines and the Spencers!

We started to learn our new town and get used to everything for the next week or so, had some friends move in from Omaha, and started getting to know new people in our ward and in Wes's program.. THen the last week of June, I went to Disneyland with the kids and the whole family (I will blog about that seperately), and got back with mys sister Mel on the 2nd of July. We hung out with Mel here until the 6th. And now we are just finally getting the chance to settle in here.

We have a great ward, and we have park play days (basically like playgroups) once a week this summer, and we try to do other fun stuff through the week, go on walks, swim, go to parks, just hang out... We've met a lot of new people and are enjoying getting to know new friends. Spokane is beautiful and we really feel lucky to have matched into a transitional year where we still get to spend a lot of time with our daddy Wes! That's all for now!