Part 1 of the Moving Series: We Made It!

We're here. In our new home in Colorado. Although the trip & apartment situation did not go as smoothly as I had hoped they would, we are here. We are (mostly) settled. We are learning to find our way around the city. We are enjoying family time. I am loving having some peace in my life after a very chaotic last year.

Here's the run-down about our trip:

We (Derrick, Dylan, my mom Denise, & I) left Saturday, February 4th for our 14 hour, 3 day trip to Colorado Springs. Our original plan was to leave around lunch time so Dylan could nap in the car, then we changed our minds & decided to try to go to pancake breakfast at the American Legion & then leave from there. Our plans changed once more after the unexpected death of Derrick's 2nd cousin, who the family was very close to. He passed away on a Wednesday night & the funeral was Saturday morning. We attended his beautiful service & then grabbed some lunch & headed on our way. Derrick's parents were following the next day with the U-Haul trailer & their truck & we were all planning on meeting up in Colorado Springs Monday.

Because we like to do things the difficult way, we decided to leave the day that a major snowstorm was going across Iowa. We had planned to stop in Missouri Valley, IA & visit with our good friends Dave & Jodi & their kids. With the weather in that area, that was just not possible (or very smart). We contacted another friend of mine about staying with them in Kansas City & just taking the southern route to Colorado Springs. She was excited to see us & we were thankful for somewhere to stay. We thought we had it all worked out...and then the flu struck them 2 days before we left. After talking to her on the morning of the 4th, we decided we would still try to meet them for dinner, but that staying at their house probably wasn't the best idea. We told them we would contact them when we were close & we could make plans. We drove across Iowa to Des Moines & then headed south towards Kansas City. The snow wasn't too bad & the roads looked okay. Of course, the one thing we hadn't planned for was the ice. It had been sleeting & had covered the road. As Derrick was driving down the interstate, he hit a spot of ice/snow slush that had built up on the edge of the interstate. The van started to slide & fish tale. I glanced to the right & noticed 2 semis beside & behind us. I had a flash in my mind of "we are all going to die after getting hit by this truck." And I prayed. I couldn't figure out why God would bring us out to the interstate just to be crushed by a semi. After a few minutes of trying to get the van under control, Derrick finally wrestled it back to where it needed to be. My mom, Derrick, & I were terrified, but so thankful that everything was okay.

Dylan watching a movie. Such a good traveler!

Dylan had no idea what even happened...he was happily watching a movie. If I had been driving, we would have been done for the day...I would have called it quits. But Derrick, because he is either awesome or crazy, pulled over to a gas station, collected himself, rested a bit, & got us back out on the road. The rest of the trip was uneventful, aside from going a little slower than normal.




Eventually we made it to Kansas City. We contacted our friends Tammy & Joey & their family. It was such a blessing to get to see them. We have talked a few times & keep in touch on facebook, but this is the first time we had seen them in 6 years. Their oldest daughter has grown from an early teenager into a sweet, mature, wonderful young adult. Their middle son is no longer a toddler (he was Dylan's age when we last saw them!), but is now an eight year old boy. Their youngest son was not even born when we saw them last - he is just as sweet & fun as the rest of the family!

Amadeus, Dylan, & Amaziah playing in the fort they built

The boys had a great time playing that night & had a wonderful time together at their church the following morning. I loved being able to catch up with the family & discussing some possible career leads for Derrick in the future (although it's a bit early to be thinking about that right now!) We had such a good time with them & can't wait to visit with them again soon!



After a quick lunch, we got back on the road. I drove quite a bit of the way across Kansas & the weather was beautiful. We were definitely thankful for the nice weather after the travel conditions the day before. We drove to Oakley, KS & stayed overnight there. We swam in the pool, watched The Voice & got the last good night's sleep for a few days.

Us at the Colorado border!

Monday we headed back on the road. We figured we would arrive in Colorado Springs between 12 & 1pm. The drive was nice, but honestly, by this point, we were all ready to be out of the car. Dylan had done fantastic & everything had gone pretty smoothly after the rough start on Saturday. We were so excited when we finally got to Colorado! For those of you who have never been to Colorado, the whole state is not covered in mountains like I thought it would be. It looked a lot like Iowa until we got close to Colorado Springs. That was disappointing. They were gorgeous once we got to them though!

After 3 days of driving, we finally arrived in Colorado Springs! We thought things would be all downhill from there. Well, they were; but not in the way we expected. We planned on signing our apartment lease, unloading the van, waiting for Derrick's parents, unloading the U-Haul, returning it, sightseeing. That is not exactly what happened. We showed up at the apartment complex & were told that we couldn't sign the lease yet because the lady had to go show an apartment. We were asked to come back in 15 minutes. We went & got some lunch & came back. There was a sign on the building that they were gone for lunch & would be back. So we waited. Derrick parents arrived. We finally went in to talk to the lady & we seemed to be a burden to her. She took us to see the apartment. It was way smaller than the floor plan indicated. For those who saw our house in Davenport, the apartment was supposed to have more square footage than our main floor did. It was definitely WAY smaller. Our moms saw it & agreed that it just was not going to work. It was also supposed to come furnished with a washer/dryer unit. That was not there. When we asked about it, the lady said it must have been miscommunication, but she could tell us somewhere to rent one. When I told her that we didn't want to rent one because we could have brought our own with us, she didn't really seem to care that much. Since we weren't very impressed with the people there, we decided to take some time & look elsewhere. I may have had a mild panic attack. I didn't want to keep putting Dylan back in the van & moving from place to place. The poor kid had already asked me if one of the hotels was his new house.

Derrick contacted our pastor, who got in touch with a friend in the area who is the maintenance supervisor at an apartment complex. We contacted the complex & found out that they had units available, but that it was too late in the day to show them & that we were welcome to come over in the morning to check them out. So we spent another night in a hotel. I was so worried. There is nothing quite like not knowing where you are going to go with your child. After another evening of swimming, watching the Voice, & restless sleep, we left Dylan with my mom & Derrick's parents to go check out an apartment. As soon as we walked into the office, the feeling was so much better. The lady was so sweet & was apologetic that our other unit hadn't worked out. She showed us an apartment that was awesome, relatively large, & had laundry facilities right outside the door. She ran our background checks around 9:30 in the morning & we were signing paperwork at 1pm.

We LOVE our new apartment! We love it more than we loved our house in Davenport. It is the perfect size, in a safe neighborhood, with quiet neighbors. We don't have our own laundry, but the laundry room is never busy. It's not as convenient of a location as the other complex was, but it has made us branch out & check out the rest of the city. And this is the view from behind our apartment:

Doesn't really get much better than that.