Update

It has been a very long time... Please forgive the following format, but I want to get to it so that I can eventually get back to normal blogging. So in no particular order, since I last wrote at the beginning of December, we have:

Bought a new house. After much to do over a certain power of attorney document, we successfully closed on our house in Illinois. We are now the proud owners of two mortgages. Just for a little while though. Our Petoskey house has been on the market with some activity. If we don't sell within a couple of months, Cori's company will buy it. In the meantime, we get the special treat of paying the two mortgages, as well as two sets of winter month utilities. I can't complain. We are very fortunate to have the buy out on the horizon.


Spent a lovely Christmas with my family. My sisters, parents, and grandmother all came out to spend the holiday with us. The only one missing was my brother. And we missed him. We stayed at a vacation home on Walloon Lake. It snowed every single day which made for an extremely white Christmas morning. It was special spending the week together. I'll post pictures and more details soon.

Faced another miscarriage. The pregnancy was a welcomed surprise. That I miscarried should not have been a surprise as this is not our first, or our second miscarriage. But I had been remarkably sick for some time before the news came, and I was further along than I had been with the others. So it came as a bit of a shock. I waited nearly two weeks before having the D&C. That was a harder decision to make than I thought it would be. We went in the Monday before Christmas. Grace and Grant had lots of family around, and Cori was able to spend the day with me. I'm finally feeling the dissipation of morning sickness and more like myself everyday. The one great blessing to come from this was that during a time when there was a crazy amount of things to be done, I was forced to slow down and prioritize. I got to enjoy my kids in a way that would not have happened otherwise.

Packed up, moved across Lake Michigan, and unpacked (well, we're getting there). The Monday before Christmas our house was boxed up. Everything got loaded onto the truck the next day. We kissed our family good bye on Saturday. We said good bye to our Church family on Sunday and then made our way to our new hometown. The next day we met the movers and began getting settled in. Sara graciously offered to spend her whole break from law school with us so she could help. It has been amazing. With her and Cori around, I am light years ahead of where I usually am at this stage of the game. We actually have the main floor completely unpacked, and there are only four boxes left upstairs. Of course there is a mountain of storage to organize in the basement...

Our access to the internet is a bit limited for the next week or so, but I will post more as I can. We are loving our new home, and feel we have been very, very blessed. I'm always amazed at how things work out. It is a good thing I'm not in charge!

Blessings

My mom who watched the kids, by herself, the whole week while we were away in IL. It was SO NICE for us and the kids that they didn't have to be packed along on the house hunt. Mom kept everyone happy, was cheerful during the crazy snow storms that hit, and brought crafts and movies and fun toys.

A successful trip where in we found a house, made an offer, survived the counter offers, and are in the process of closing. If all goes as planned, we should be able to move in the week after Christmas. Cori started his new job as well with positive review.

Our Church family who took care of my mom while we were away. Every time it snowed, someone showed up to clear the driveway. My mom got other calls and invitations throughout the week. It was very appreciated.

The First Presidency Christmas broadcast It is one of my favorite things of the Christmas season. The messages are heartwarming. I can't get enough of the music. Seeing shots of Temple Square this time of year makes me home sick for UT. The kids have been sick, and so we didn't take them to watch it at church. But fortunately, we get BYUtv at home.

(Image found on Flickr)

An update from afar

Greetings from Illinois. In case you were starting to wonder, I thought I would post a little bit. Cori and I are busy home-shopping and working (well, Cori is working anyway) while the kids are enjoying a week of Grammie Camp. I picked Mom up at the airport the evening our Thanksgiving guests departed, and then Cori and I left for IL in such haste that I forgot to pack my undies. True story.

We had a really, REALLY great Thanksgiving holiday. Our guests were Matt, Stacie and Jacob D* of the Detroit area. Cori and Matt got to know each other working in a group at the beginning of their MBA program. Stacie and I were both working, finishing our degrees and childless and therefore a bit antisocial where the spouse association was concerned. (BYU's MBA program really has a first class organization/support group for wives. Husbands of the program's female students are invited too, but really, it is just the ladies that show up.) But we enjoyed hanging out at football games, and I always liked being around her. Anyway, since we've been in Michigan we have been in better contact with this super couple. Not only did they graciously make the drive to spend the holiday up North with us, but Stacie made rolls, homemade stuffing, and 3 pies (all of which were completely delectable)! We had an impressive feast.




Gracie and Jacob played really well together- certainly as well as can be expected from any 3 and 2 year old. Really, these guys were the perfect guests. So easy going and lots of fun. We ended up having additional guests for dinner 2 of the nights they were with us, and they were so great about it. We played games, took the kids to the movies, made a ginger bread house, and ate pie at every chance. We've got pictures of the final g-house product, but I didn't get them off the camera before we left. Here are a few shots of the initial construction work:


It is really too bad that we are moving away. We would definitely have to do this more often. Thanks again Stacie, Matt and Jacob!

Our house hunting trip has been fruitful. We will know a lot more about our present and future housing as next week unfurls. It is going to be a busy month. I'll post more soon. (Hopefully!)

Where the heck have I been?

I haven't managed much time for blogging these last couple of weeks. I been busy, but not especially more than usual. I think part of my problem is that every time I turn on the computer, I get busy browsing holiday recipes and working on Christmas presents (almost done!). And then before I know it, my computer time is up.

For the record, here is a brief glimpse of what I have been busy doing:

• cleaning our house 4 times a day
• meeting with realtors
• reading the 20 emails a day that I get from Cori, realtors here and our realtor in IL
• snow-blowing our driveway every time I need to leave the house or every time we are expecting company- it has snowed almost every day for the last week and a half
• visiting teaching- which I love
• feeding people- which I love
• practicing and performing musical numbers- which I love
• holiday planning and shopping
• buying a large wall clock (that doesn't work properly) from an estate sale
• playing with my babies- which I love
• crying in my pillow because of a hard day where nothing seemed to go right- Cori made it all better though
• Relief Society lessons and visits- which I love
• making Christmas gifts
• taking pictures of these two

For the most part, I've been busy with really fun stuff. Just too busy to blog. Maybe if I were more like some people who have the holiday stuff all planned and organized before Halloween (Natalie? Shannon? I'm talking about you!) I could have more me time. Maybe next year.

too big for a nap, or, what i sometimes find grace doing around 2:30 in the afternoon

confessions

Friday night Cori and I were supposed to have a date. I had a babysitter lined up. I was going to make reservations for us to eat at a fancy restaurant downtown. After two weeks of being quarantined with my sick babies and all their...bodily stuff I was pretty anxious to put on cute clothes and get out of the house. Gracie's stomach bug wasn't on the same schedule. Plans were quickly unmade. I was so disappointed. But my wise and manly man assured me that he had things under control and told me to go and do something. Anything. So Friday and Saturday night I put on cute clothes and spent some time solo. I did some Christmas shopping. I used gift cards that have been sitting in my purse since my birthday. I walked through some other stores, just because I wanted to. And, I listened to Christmas music. I usually make myself wait until after Thanksgiving. But my life felt so indulgent this weekend that I just gave in.

I feel like I have nothing to do. Of course, this is not true. There are always plenty of things that should be done. But this morning, I woke and got ready for the day a little earlier than usual. After the kids were dressed and we were all breakfasted, I took a look at the list of house stuff I had been working through. One thing left. Grant's closet. Which means going through the tubs of baby boy stuff I have stored in there. And I did that just a little while ago. So then I thought I should start some laundry. But I had finished all the laundry on Saturday. All the bathrooms are clean. All the things I could think of to do had recently been done. This is so not my normal life. But then I started thinking about Christmas. How I hadn't even really made a list for the holiday yet (though I have done a lot of shopping already). I thought of my ideas for our mailer, handmade gifts for the kids, things for family... Then I started feeling a pang of pressure to get busy. This feels more like my normal life. I better get back to our white board and make a new list.

taking shape

Dear reader, this is one of those 'getting written out for posterity' kind of posts. F.Y.I.

We are finally achieving some plan for the coming months. I guess there is a lot of shuffling going on in this division of the company, and it has taken a little while to put the puzzle together. But Cori's official, tentative, if everything goes right, starting date has been set for the second week of December. With the simple declaration of this date the wheels have been set in motion and we have been able to make our holiday plans. These plans include spending both holidays right here in Michigan.

We've asked some MBA friends to make the trip allllll the way upstate to spend Thanksgiving with us, and they agreed! We are so excited to have them stay with us, and I am very excited to work with Stacy in planning our feast.

Then, we asked my family to make the trip alllll the way across the country to spend Christmas with us, and they agreed! I'm so grateful, and very excited for this as well.

In the meantime, we'll be putting this house up for sale, finding a new house in IL, and navigating all the relocation waters. Though Cori will start his new position before the Christmas holiday, we won't move until after it. Cori has begun his work transition. He has been busy getting projects and changes completed. This is the organizational announcement the site leader sent out:

It is with mixed emotions that I announce that Cori has accepted a new position in Honeywell. While I am disappointed to see Cori leave our organization in Boyne City I am also pleased that he has this new and well deserved career opportunity.

Cori’s new role will be as the HR Manager for the NWIL sites located in Freeport , Illinois . An exact start date has not been determined but he is expected to begin sometime in early December. We are aggressively working to find a backfill for Cori in Boyne City and hope to complete that transition before he must leave.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Cori for the numerous contributions he has made to the Boyne City site and our employees. Cori quickly jumped in the mix and became engaged in our business. His candor, fresh ideas and can do attitude was a clearly a positive influence on our site.

Please join me in thanking Cori and wishing him well in his new assignment!

It is starting to feel more real. There is just so much more to do this time around. When we moved from CA we had just 1 kid (although it was almost 2), a fraction of the stuff- or so it seems to me now, and an apartment manager to notify. And then, poof, we were here. Though it is nice having the time to plan now, I'm seeing the emotional benefits of the rip-the-band-aid-off experience of last Fall. It is hard tell my heart to get excited about going while at the same time telling it to stay entrenched in the present.

In other news, the kids and I made choco chip cookies today. It is a good thing I have some self control. I could have eaten Grant in two seconds. With a glass of milk.