Never Thought We'd Be in Utah...But Here We Are

Well, here we are in lovely Orem, Utah. The drive up here went amazingly well considering we had a four year old and a one year old, a truck full of stuff and a car full of more stuff. I think God really helped the girls do well and Bo and I to stay awake and drive safely. We did have one little incident though...The drive from Northern California to Utah is full of nothing. Nothing but land. So we're in the middle of nowhere and I'm trying to keep Naiya occupied so I gave her a bottle of Excedrin with a child proof cap to shake around. She loved it and it kept her entertained for quite a while. Later, I looked back and she still had the Excedrin bottle, but it's empty. What?! Child proof cap, shmild proof cap! So I called Bo in the truck and we pulled over to the side of the highway and started frantically looking for the pills and trying to figure out how many should still be in the bottle. We ended up finding all but 2 and we figured she'd probably be fine even if she did eat 2 of them. But yeah, that little episode freaked us out a bit. Side Note: I actually ended up finding the other two pills later in the car. As we started to get closer to Salt Lake the highway opened up into 4 lanes with some traffic and cars merging all over the place. Ahh, just like home. :) It's funny because both Bo and I said that we felt the most relaxed and at ease when we got to the 4 lanes.

We have been totally blessed since we got here. We had about 10 guys from our new congregation at church show up and get all of our stuff unloaded from our truck in no time at all. Our Elder's Quorum president (the one in charge of the men's group at church) lives a few houses down our street and has been over multiple times to help with everything from moving boxes to fixing sprinklers. He has made sure we have been included in social stuff too and has had Bo over with the guys to play cards and video games and his wife took me out for a girls night with some friends too. They have totally helped us feel more at ease here and have shattered our stereotypical ideas of what it would be like to live with Utah mormons everywhere. :) Not that it would be bad, we had just pictured people being kind of sheltered with not a lot of outside life experience. We were totally wrong though. Everyone has been great and most of the people we've met here have actually moved here from other places. Our Relief Society president (the one in charge of the women's group at church) lives across the street from us and has stopped by several times to welcome us and see if we needed anything. They also brought us dinner on our first night here. Our home teacher (the one assigned to check in on our family each month to make sure we're doing ok) has already been over several times to mow our lawn for us. A little girl from down the street that is Melia's age brought over some apricots she had cut up herself, some cookies and a letter she made for Melia. So sweet. It's definitely kind of weird to have almost everyone within a 10 block radius be in your congregation at church, but it's kind of cool too. We have felt so welcomed and included immediately in everything. This is definitely the most convenient place we've ever lived. All we have to say is "We've been meaning to water our lawn, but we've been so busy lately." And later that evening there will be someone there watering our lawn practically. :)

Our ward (congregation) at church is surprisingly normal with a good mix of young families and older people. After visiting our friends' ward (Fawn and Dave) who had an ocean of babies and kids, Bo and I were scared that all of the wards in Utah would be like that. But we were pleasantly surprised.

It feels so great to be living in a real city again where there are a ton of things to do. We have a Walmart and a Super Target--not just a normal Target--a huge library, a kids' water park, a miniature golf place, parks, natural food stores and everything else you could ask for all within a few blocks of us. Best of all, there are sidewalks and lawns with grass! :)

Another cool thing is that we have lots of old friends from So Cal that live in Utah now. We already got together at the Saavedra's for a BBQ and the Votaw's came over and totally helped us unpack. Plus, Bo's sister Azure lives here and has come over with his mom, who drove up with my mom and stayed for a two week visit, to help with the kids. Also, Bo has cousins and an Aunt and Uncle who live here too. It was fun getting to know his Uncle Gary and Aunt Sherri and the kids better when we lived in Paradise and I'm looking forward to getting to know Uncle Craig and Aunt Kathie's side of the family better while we live here.



As far as our actual house goes, we are loving it! We have never lived in a place where we had enough space to put all of our things and here, we have more than enough. We have the most awesome walk in closet in our bedroom! I think that might be my favorite part of the house. That or the kitchen. After 2 years of cooking on a single burner, an old oven upstairs that burns hot in the back and cool in the front because the door doesn't shut all the way, and having to use the top of the washer and dryer for counter space, this is like heaven! I actually have counter space! Yay! The sunsets here are beautiful and we can actually see lake Utah from our house.





Melia's favorite part is definitely our backyard. She absolutely loves it and asks if she can go out and play in it every chance she gets. I have to say that I'm loving it too. It's so nice to be able to go outside without shoes on and have grass to sit on and smooth pavement to walk on! You may be thinking I sound way too happy about lawns and sidewalks, but when you've had it all your life and then you live without it for 2 years, you really appreciate it when you have it back. :)



A close second favorite thing for Melia and Naiya is their own bathtub. We only had a shower downstairs at Grandma Adeline's house, so the whole bathtub thing is new for the girls and they are loving it! They have so much fun in there and it's fun watching them too. :)

Overall, things are good with us. It's been A LOT of work trying to get unpacked and get things situated, so we've been pretty exhausted and kind of stressed, but I think that's just a part of moving. It will continue to get easier. :) Hi to everybody back in Paradise! :)

Farewell to Paradise

Well, the time has come. We've been in the small town of Paradise, CA for two years now and it's time to move on. I have to say that these two years have been kind of like a refiner's fire for us in a lot of ways. We moved away from everything we knew to live in a small town, which was a totally foreign environment for us. I don't think we've ever completely gotten over the culture shock. :) But I think Heavenly Father had this in mind so that we could be away from the distractions and learn some important lessons. We've had to face things that have been, well, let's just say that to call them "challenging" would be an understatement. But we've learned SO MUCH and have emerged changed and better than we were before. We've learned to "let go and let God" in more ways than I can say.
First of all, we came to Paradise broke. More than broke. We were in a messy financial nightmare. Over these two years, we learned to live without credit cards for the first time. To create and stick to a budget. The difference between wanting and needing. How to tell ourselves no. That the kindness and generosity of people all around us is abundant and humbling. That no matter how impossible and bleak a situation may look, God is in charge and works everything out for our benefit. That we are safe and loved.
Healthwise, I came to Paradise very, very tired. All the time. Over the past few years, I've gotten into holistic medicine and it has helped me immensely. I used to get sick all the time and now I rarely do. A lot of things had improved for me, but my energy levels were still really low. Here, I was able to work with many amazing people in the field of holistic health that I really feel like I was led to. It's also way cheaper here than in So Cal, so I was able to get more help. These people helped me learn a lot about myself and my body. I finally processed and released deep grief concerning my dad's death that had been weighing me down that I wasn't even aware that I had been carrying. This was not only an emotional relief, but a physical one too that allowed me to have more energy, feel more joyful on a daily basis and be able to enjoy the present moment more. I also conquered a sugar addiction--and when I say "addiction", that's no joke. I used to be desperate to get my sugar fix every day and now I don't even miss sugar at all. That's amazing for me. I've incorporated many more whole, healing foods into my diet and recently gave up eating meat. I've basically done an overhaul on my health and I'm feeling a lot better. And the journey continues.
I've also changed my thinking about a lot of things to have a more positive peaceful perspective. I grew up feeling really bad about myself and I had this huge fear that Melia might somehow end up feeling like that too. So I was constantly worrying about doing things "right" with her and worrying about her relationship with Bo, etc. I've been able to let that and many other things go and see things in a better, more relaxed light. I've been able to relax about a lot of things and it has allowed my relationships with family to improve. There are many, many lessons that God has helped us learn here and, even though it's been really hard, I'm so grateful. We are emerging from Paradise pretty near perfect now. HA HA! :)

Anyway, here are some things we will miss and not miss about being in Paradise.
We WILL miss:
Grandma Adeline. She has been nothing but loving, giving and generous to us and we will miss having her around.
Our family in the form of Aunt, Uncle, cousins, semi-related cousins, and adopted family members.
Our friends from church, the community and work.
The beautiful trees and flowers.

We will NOT miss:
The huge amount of bugs.
The lack of lawns and paved sidewalks.
The dirt and spiderwebs everywhere.
That everything closes at 5pm. :)
Having to drive a long way through nothing but bushes to get to a "city".
The lack of variety of stores.
The lack of variety of people of different ethnicities.
Being in a small town.

Sorry, but the fact is we are city folk through and through. One thing's for sure though--it's the people who have touched our lives here who have made these two years well worth it. :)

What's Going On

Ok, so I've had like zero time lately to blog, but I need to because we have major changes happening in about a week and a half. We thought we were going to move to Utah sometime toward the end of the year, but all of a sudden it's happening now. My mom put her house on the market the first week of June and had a crazy amount of offers almost immediately. There was even a bidding war and it ended up going for above market value and she doesn't have to pay closing costs. My only explanation is that God was helping because her house is...well, it's a nice little house, but it was built in 1940 something and it's just that, little. Anyway, when she went into escrow, we all of a sudden realized we needed to have another house to move into at the end of escrow. So we finished unpacking from our trip to So Cal and then found ourselves packing to fly to Utah in a couple of days to find a house. Crazy! Long story short...we found a great house that fits the needs of my mom and us really well. It's a beautiful 2002 6 bedroom house in Orem. My mom will have the basement level and we'll have the upstairs. We are really excited! More details to come...