Look at how fast George can do the monkey bars!!

George’s Building

Bird’s Building

Bird. In her element.
(My goodness this child is remarkably, well, how should I put this….ME!)

Bird’s Self-Portrait

You can click to enlarge this. I just loved it so. I loved the whole evening!!

Thanks Bird and George!

So, I finally have internet AND cable at home.

Yup.

All this time I’ve had so much to say and little opportunity to blog.

Now I can blog.

And I’ve got nothing to say.

Go.Me.

While I wait for the final settlement on the house in Pennsylvania, I thought I would productively kill time by sharing more pictures. Just what you wanted, right? Well, until we have adorable pictures of Newly’s new baby girl to ogle, you’ll have to settle for more moving pics.

George LOVED the moving truck.

I’d be a little concerned being a passenger with Eli at the wheel!

Before: LM’s Room in the Midst of the Move

(his WAS the first unpacked)

After: LM’s Room All Finished

Before: The Living Room Mess

After: The Living Room

Before: The Kitchen (no, it’s not a greenhouse)

After: The Kitchen. Yep, it’s tiny.

(I still don’t know where to put groceries once we can afford them.)

Before: The Dining Room

After: Dinner Anyone?

Before: Eliza’s Room
(I don’t have an “After” pic, but I promise it just got done! –
All but one box anyway.)

The Hallway

The Bath (I have a half bath in my room, too, thank goodness!)

You Never Know What You’ll Find in a Box!

A Day at Wine Fest (no whining allowed!)

Everyone loves funnel cake!

Even Eli!

(No, he didn’t really eat it, the sugar got spilled on his head.)

This trying to find a job while not having internet at home is a pain in the arse. I’ve learned that you (I) can sit in Fazolli’s parking lot and mooch their free wi-fi. I can drive downtown and go to the BIG library but I have to pay a parking meter that is sucking up our very savings. I can go to Panera’s, but after buying a lemonade (okay, and a cookie) to assauge my guilt, it turns out their connection totally bites and it’s too much of a pain to make my expensive snack worthwhile. Today I found the branch library and here I have sat for the past, well, more than 2 hours uploading cover letters and resumes and completing online applications for every.blasted.company in Kalamazoo. Okay, only seven companies, but it takes HOURS.

I’d love to share pics but I can’t find the card reader. I’d love to write about the fun we’re having, but, well, I’m too exhausted to be having any. I’d love to tell you all about how wonderful life in Michigan is but at the moment we are without internet, without TV and that means NO FOOTBALL. So, no sanity.

Soon.

Very soon.

(I hope.)

We have a church to visit on Sunday, so that’s something. LM loves school, so that’s significant. We didn’t misplace the dog OR the cat in the move. And despite the fact that the buyer’s lawyer is being a MAJOR pain (he seemed to believe I only got divorced last April and demanded proof that’s been 7 years…um, where exactly did he get his data?!) it does seem as though next week (Lord willing) the mortgage, I mean, house, will no longer be ours. That will be nice to have behind us.

Hope you are all doing well. I’ll have to stop and read another day, I have limited time on the ‘puter and job searching is A #1 priority!!

Bear has told me for years that stop signs with a white border are optional.

Apparently he was wrong.

I’ve lived in the state five days and I got a ticket today for rolling through a stop sign. I lived in PA for nearly ten years and never got a ticket. I lived in IL for a gagillion years and never got a ticket.

Five days.

(And yes, I’m going to fight it.)

We’re here. Whew. We arrived at 3 am on Sunday morning and have been unpacking and unloading ever since. We’re 90% unpacked! G and Bear were TREMENDOUS help with the move. Jules had everything ready for us and has been a great help the last few days.

LM had his first day of school today and all went well. He thinks he’ll go back for another day tomorrow.

I’ll make a better post of this later, we’re on Panera’s wi-fi and I need to FIND A JOB. (Priorities!)

But first, I need to know….did Newly have that baby yet?!?

Today’s crisis is brought to you by the Health Insurance Nightmare of America. (Every day it’s something, isn’t it?)

Let’s see, yesterday was my last day – a post all in itself. I had friends come over later to help take apart things (bed, tables, etc.) and to take home some plants (have I mentioned how hard it is for me to part with some of my babies?!) Then we took an hour or so to engage in fantasy football draft. PRIORITIES PEOPLE!! Let’s just say I got Tom Brady but the rest is questionable (Seattle defense?!?)

Today we have finished boxing most everything, returned the DVR to the cable company, signed some papers at the realtor’s office and are now awaiting the piano movers to arrive. G has landed at the airport and is going to enjoy a leisurely lunch and get some work done until we’re able to go pick him up.

And then it’s time to…wait for it…

Move it! Move it! I want to move it, move it!!

Tomorrow it’s MICHIGAN OR BUST!!

Today was LM’s last day with his dad. We had spoken briefly about the arrangements to get him back home but nothing had been confirmed. I called J this morning to verify that I was picking up LM after work. J was terse with me. Short, curt, blunt. He wasn’t much like himself. He thought we had agreed to plans and I was picking up LM after work. I said that was what I understood, too, but reminded him that sometimes LM doesn’t tell anyone involved what plan has been decided upon. He agreed and warmed slightly. I told him I had found his high school diploma amongst my hope chest items while packing and would drop it off. He didn’t seem to care.

I called LM on my way to work. He seemed fine. Said he had said goodbye to his dad the night before. He seemed to think everything had gone well. He was quiet and I couldn’t read him well. I told him I’d pick him up around 6, perhaps a few minutes before. He said fine and that was that.

Around noon I tried to call LM, just to see how his day was going, but he didn’t answer. I thought it odd, since the boy has had his new cell phone glued to his hip since the moment he got it. I tried again a couple hours later. Voicemail.

I didn’t really feel the panic take hold of my throat, I just know that all of a sudden it was there. Fear. What if his dad did something irrational? What if J just took LM and ran? What if he really wasn’t as okay with this whole move as he let on? I know it’s dramatic and irrational, but all I could think was all those times I’ve heard a wife or a mother say during a TV interview, “I never would have suspected he was capable of…”

I couldn’t leave work and I didn’t want to call J. If I was wrong and everything was okay, I would be interrupting his day once again to remind him of how we were leaving. I kept checking my voicemail, waiting for LM to call me back.

At five, while the girls at work begged me to go ask a cute police officer in the fitness center if he was single (for their sake, not mine) I picked up my phone one last time to see no messages, no missed calls. It was then I felt as if I couldn’t breathe. Maybe it’s just too much stress at one time. Maybe it’s just too many newscasts viewed. Maybe it’s just that things seemed to be going well. But I panicked.

I must have looked scared because one of the women at work asked if I was okay, I said, “No, I can’t get ahold of LM.” She knew it was his last day with his dad and she read my panic well. I grabbed my pocketbook and rushed out the door. I prayed the whole 7 miles to J’s house. I pulled in and ran up the walk and heard LM say, “Hi, Mom” as I approached the door.

I don’t know how I kept the tears back. I don’t know how I kept it together. I didn’t want him to know how I scared I was. I didn’t want him to know what my mind had even thought for a moment might be true. I didn’t want him to taste fear like that.

I woke up at 5am and realized what had happened.

Every day I pray on my way to work. 40 minutes of conversation with God more to remind myself that He is in control than to ask for anything on my behalf. I pray that he keeps my heart calm. I pray that he keeps me from being anxious. I pray for peace of mind, for confidence, for security. I want to pray for a job the week I move. I want to ask that He makes the sale of the house go well. But I know that He knows what’s best for me. The things I ask for might be all the wrong things (a lesson I’ve learned well in my life). But I pray.

And I wonder, most days, how do I know that I’m doing what He would want? My pastor recently put it into a concept I could get my mind around. “If it draws you closer to God, it’s God’s plan.” So simple, but it made my choices seem so much easier to evaluate with that in mind. But still, somedays, I wish God had Verizon wireless.

But what woke me at 5am was remembering the day before. Remembering the boy and his mom who came to sign up for swim team. I remember how much I had wished I wasn’t sitting at the service rep desk because I didn’t want to do another registration, but that I happily took their request and registered them. They were really sweet people, an adorable mom and son tandem. They reminded me of LM and myself.

At one point, while the mom was writing out her check, I made conversation with the boy. He delighted me so. He wasn’t perfectly behaved, wasn’t strictly manicured, he was real. and fun and lively and articulate. Like LM. And so I commented on his necklace, a long silver chain with some sort of shield. He immediately took it off and handed it to me so I could look at it more closely. I studied it in my hand, but the design was simple and I wasn’t sure what warranted the closer inspection. I said, “It’s cool.” He said, “Turn it over.”

“Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:9

How it took me until 5am to realize God spoke directly to me through that delightful child I will never know. But words couldn’t have been more hand picked for me than those.

– The story doesn’t need anything more to it to make it remarkable in my opinion, but in conversation with the mother I learned that this boy attends one of the Christian schools in town. I mentioned that LM went to that school but just for one year for preschool. I laughed, remembering that year and said, “That was the first time LM had been in school and he got in trouble because he was hugging all the kids. I never got over the teacher pulling me aside and telling me – in a Christian school no less – that I needed to speak with my son and get him to stop hugging everyone!” I no sooner had the words out of my mouth than this boy says, “I remember that kid! He had blonde curly hair!” Yep, that’s my LM. God made such a small, small world, didn’t He?