an update from Iowa

We made it to Iowa!

Probably anyone reading this already knew that... seeing how we left Spokane more than three weeks ago. But I feel like I am a bit overdue for an update here!

Packed up our apartment on the 1st. Had a whole lot of great friends come and help us. It was so lovely to have them all together, and it was a lovely day. Felt like a wonderful going-away party, only better, because by the end we were all packed up and our stuff was all in the moving truck! We stayed a few nights at Reuben & Josie's, then tore ourselves away, and off to Iowa we went!

My dad and Keith's dad both came with us for the journey. They drove the moving truck so Keith and I could ride together, talk together, and take care of the kiddos together. I was incredibly, immensely glad for that! I was really looking forward to the talking together part of the long journey, but hadn't really thought about how much we'd need two parents to take care of the three kiddos.

The kids did great. It was a bit rough for Ezekiel on the last stretches for a few of the days. We spread the trip out over five days, and that helped a lot, but the first and second day were the longer ones and they were rougher. Priscilla and Abraham were great for the whole journey. They especially loved getting to ride with Grandpa Steve and Granddad Jim in the moving truck, and having pools at our hotels helped too.

One of my favorite moments came on the first day. All of the kids fell asleep as we were driving over the mountains from Idaho into Montana. Then Rilla woke up, and the first thing she did, before anything else, was to begin singing "I Have Decided To Follow Jesus." It was just so sweet, and so perfect for setting out on this major life-changing adventure. Soon we were all singing it together and it was just one of those holy moments.

We didn't make a lot of stops, as we basically just had to keep going past the cool stuff whenever Ezekiel was asleep. But we did have a great dinner at Famous Dave's in Missoula on the first day, and we went to the Battle of Little Bighorn in eastern Montana on the second day. I had planned the trip so that the third day was our short day, so on that day we went to Devils Tower in Wyoming and all seven of us walked around it together. That was really fun and probably the highlight of the trip. I have a lot of great pictures from that one! On the fourth day, we went to the Dinosaur Park in Rapid City. And on the fifth day came the best part: arriving at our destination!!

We arrived in our new town on Friday evening, June 7th. There was a crowd waiting for us and it was so wonderful to be welcomed home by so many friends! They had everything unloaded from the moving truck within an hour (!!) and then had a big potluck dinner waiting for everyone too. Various friends had stocked our cupboards and refrigerator with food... what a blessing! I might as well introduce them on my blog now, since I will be mentioning them again... Cinnamon had stocked us up with all kinds of delicious gluten-free snacks and baking supplies, and Melinda had left loads of gluten-free goodies for me! I just found the last of them yesterday, actually, so they lasted a long time! (And I gained five pounds the first week we were here, trying to eat them all before they went bad. True story. Nobody bring me goodies anymore, okay?) Lots of other people brought us food too... even supplying us with dinners every night for the first week! What an incredible blessing!!

And there is of course loads more to the story of the last few weeks... but I'm out of time.