Well, alrighty then -

I've got a lot of life to catch you all up on.
Let's see - May 19th was my last post. That was, like - 2 months ago!! I don't know that I can go back that far. That's what happens when you don't blog - you get behind and then you forget the everyday details and thoughts and feelings that were going on at the time. Oh sure, I can give you a run down of what's been going on, but without the feelings of the time.
The biggest thing that's happened is we moved from Oregon to Gilbert, Arizona. After being on the market for 10 months, we sold our house in Oregon in April. It was a little surreal how it happened. Over the preceeding months we had had a lot of lookers through the house. Positive comments, but no offers. In my head, I'm panicking - THINKING that we'll NEVER sell it. In my heart, however, I KNEW we would sell it. I knew that when the right people came along - the ones that were supposed to live in our house, that everything would fall into place and we'd sell it. Well, it happened in April and we closed June 8th. I was so happy that this particular family bought our house. They love that house as much as we did. Anyway, Jeff came up and we spent the last two weeks of May and the first week of June finishing up the packing and cleaning. I was glad he was there. He tends to spread calm through our life.
So like I said, our house closed June 8th, but school didn't end for Chad until June 10th. Plus, I already had a job in Arizona waiting for me, so Chad stayed with some friends of ours in Corvallis and Jeff and I left Saturday June 5th for our new chapter in Arizona. It was hard for me to leave. I cried most of the day June 5th. Leaving my house was hard, leaving my neighborhood was hard, leaving my grown kids was hard, leaving my extended family was hard, leaving my friends in the church was hard, leaving my 16 year old son was awful. He and I haven't ever spent a lot of time away from each other - until now. What was also hard was the fact that at this point in time we didn't have a place to move into. We had found a couple of houses, but none felt right. So we decided to go down, stay with my mom and look for a place to live. We also thought that we'd rather move our stuff twice in Oregon (cooler weather) than twice in Arizona (hot weather), so we put all our earthly belongings into 2 large storages and left.
The drive down to Arizona was awesome. Jeff and I took our time and went to San Francisco and ate clam chowder on the wharf. We drove through some beautiful countryside that I had never seen before. We drove through one of our favorite towns - Petaluma, California. We drove down the 101 and breathed in the ocean air. We spent the first night in San Luis Obispo and the second night in San Diego. We drove to a little town in the mountains outside San Diego called Julian. They were featured on the food channel as having the best pies - so we went there and bought 2 to take to my mom's. (Yes, they really were GREAT pies!) We just enjoyed ourselves and the time alone. It has been a hard 18 months, so it was good to regroup.
We got to my mom's Tuesday night and hit the ground running. Jeff had to work the next morning and so I did laundry and unpacked what we brought with us. Thursday I went to my new office and got acclimated for a few hours. Friday I went back to my office and filled out new employee paperwork and got all ready to start on Monday morning. In the meantime, we spent hours looking through neighborhoods trying to find a place to live.
This is where I'll stop - at trying to find a place to live. That was an interesting experience as well. One the deserves it's very own post. Another day...

Happy Birthday, Daniel!

So this is our son-in-law Daniel Linn. He married our oldest daughter, Jeni on October 1, 1999. Their story begins much earlier however - like in 7th grade. Jeni and Daniel went to Hendrix Junior High School together in Chandler. Daniel played on our oldest son, Justin's little league baseball team - Daniel was the catcher. One day we went to watch Justin play and I was very impressed with Daniel's catching ability - he was very good, even at that young age. Upon arriving home from the game, I jokingly told Jeni that I had met her future husband. When she asked who it was, I told her "Daniel Linn". She sputtered and groaned and said, "Gross Mom! No way - not Daniel Linn!" Well, a few months later, they were "going out" - I never could understand how they could be "going out" when they can't even date yet! Oh well....
Eventually, Daniel moved to Gilbert and we moved farther west in Chandler and he and Jeni lost contact with each other. Jeni was 16 when her daughter, Ryleigh was born. Thankfully, she stayed home and finished school and eventually got a part time job at a pizza restaurant in Gilbert. She was working one day and in walked Daniel! Jeni played hard to get for a while, but eventually caved in and they were married. It was hard going at first - they were both so young and they already had a small child to love and care for - but they hung in there and worked at their relationship and their little family. Daniel joined the Army and they moved to North Carolina and then to Texas. He spent a little over a year serving our country in Iraq - something we are very proud of him for. Daniel is a wonderful husband to our daughter. He understands her, supports her and most of all loves her very much. He is a wonderful father to their 4 children (our grandchildren :) ) Ryleigh 11, Spencer 8, Ethan 6 and Olivia 1 1/2. He is presently going to school to be a nurse and then a PA (I think that's right). He works hard at this and is doing very well. He's fun to have around and we are so thankful to have him in our family!
Happy Birthday, Dan! We love you!