I am sitting here in my house with no pictures on the walls, no decorations watching strangers pack up my life. It is overwhelming. We have spent the last several weeks slowly weeding out things that we didn't need, and then more recently, the last 4 days quickly and frantically getting rid of even more things we didn't need, want, or even know that we had half the time. It has been crazy deciding what we need for the next 3 weeks before we leave for the island (Texas weather clothes and island clothes), what we need immediately when we get there (things we are shipping to my coworker), what we need in 8 weeks on the island (things the packers are packing and taking...including my van), what we want when we come back (storage) and what we don't need at all(garage sale, Goodwill, trash). It has given me a true appreciation for people that move every couple of years, like my sister-in-law and all military families.
It has been an exhausting couple of days entirely. Matt even pulled an all-nighter last night to make sure the garage was properly sorted into shipping/storage piles. He is now passed out on the couch enjoying the cool breeze that the open windows are offering him. I finally left the house for the first time in 4 days to run errands...of course associated with the move (everything these days for us is associated with the move). Grandma has taken the kids to the park, and suddenly, I am here with not that much to do. How did that happen? It is not that I have nothing truly to do, it is just that for the first time in several days I can sit for a second without thinking "Oh crap, I forgot to do this, or that or the other." Now those thoughts are coming every few minutes. It is a welcome change.
So today they are packing us up, tomorrow they are moving it all out, and we begin cleaning for our renters to move in on late Wednesday night. And then we are living with the in-laws. It is for about a week and a half. We are so fortunate that they have a pool and a playroom for the kiddos. Anybody want to do a playdate in Dallas? On the 12th-16th we go to Hot Springs, Arkansas. My mom has rented a cabin in the woods so that my sister-in-law with my niece and nephew in tow can meet us there and the kids can say good-bye to each other. It is going to be so nice, but so hard. Then the 16th after we are dropped off back in Dallas, I say good-bye to my mom. It is making me tear up just thinking about it. I have been able to push leaving her to the farthest part of my brain so that I can handle all this moving stuff...but typing it now brings streams of tears down my cheeks. She has been such a help...such a God send...not just for the move, but for my life and I sad that I won't be able to see her until February. But that is the silver lining, at least she has plans to come visit every 6 monts. The time will go faster than I realize.
There is so much excitement in this adventure, I have to remind myself. We are going to an amazingly gorgeous place, emersing ourself in a totally different culture, and learning a new language. We are also going to have such an amazing opportunity to get to know people going through the same thing. I am looking forward to meeting my FB friends Donna Posey and Jill Bowman (my future co-worker). It is nice that I am already familiar with folks over there. There is comfort in that.
We are also going to have the opportunity to introduce our family and friends to all that we discover there. My mom is planning to visit February, my brother-in-law and sister-in-law already have plane tickets and hotel reserved for May, my mom and stepdad in August, and my in-laws in September. It will so great to show them "our" island.
We are sad to say good-bye for now to friends and family, but excited for all the adventure to come. Please pray for smooth travel and transition for us. We will take all the prayers we can get!
Monday, September 28, 2009
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Meant to be...
I am a firm believer in the philosophy that everything happens for a reason...it is not always a good reason, mind you, but there is a reason nonetheless. So I found it incredibly exciting when I threw in my hat for the position in the Azores and things slowly fell into place that this is exactly what I needed to be doing.
It was initially confirmed by a sermon that my pastor gave regarding "big adventures." It seemed as though he was talking right to me. Don't limit yourself, don't miss out on new things, and always be willing to open the door and hear him out if Mr. Opportunity comes knocking. Another sense of confirmation came when I did a little research on the internet and actually found the person who is in the current position that I would be taking over, Elizabeth Scherple. She was impressed with my detective skills. But honestly, I am not a super sleuth. All I needed was the Air Base website and the division name that I would be a part of...and low and behold, there her name was. Not wanting to over step bounds and contact her using her base email, I checked on the fabulous social network of Facebook...maybe you have heard of it :) ...and there she was. I just shot her a quick message introducing myself and inquiring about the island, job, etc. Boy, was I delighted not only when she responded back, but she has kept an updated blog on her entire 3 and a half year experience on the island, with pictures included! We corresponded back and forth on the ins and outs of all things job related and living related on the island! She has been a wealth of information, and as a speech-language pathologist herself she likes details and loves to talk! Oh, and she was also the person that conducted my phone interview a month later...talk about already establishing a rapport!
Fast forward a few weeks, and yet another little touch of God, showing me this is all going to work out...renting our house. We were feeling the time crunch of renting our property come the beginning of Sept. Matt and I had already talked with a neighbor of ours about renting vs. selling and had settled on renting in hopes of coming back to Coppell after my assignment at Lajes is complete. Usher in a crazy couple of weeks where Matt accummulated 70 hours of comp. time, me working evenings and my role playing a single mom...boy do I have a lot more respect for those women...we had not had time to put our house up for rent because of all the chaos in our work lives. One night an amazing friend of mine (fellow Stringfellow board member, church member and all around bad ass) texted me asking about the specifics on our house. Come to find out that the new youth minister at our church was looking for a place here in Coppell and wasn't happy with what he was shown. She had instantly thought of me and our house as the timing of us going and them coming seemed to fit. A phone call later, a friend of the new youth minister was coming to look at our house to tell him all about it. Then his in-laws came in that weekend to look at it and by that afternoon we had renters! Only had to super clean my house once! YEAH! The thought of having to keep a spotless house for viewing while managing kids was not a pretty one in my head. We were delighted that it all worked out.
Finally, working out things at work...Matt is going to be able to do some contract work with his department at UT Southwestern Medical Center while we are gone. And I found a fantastic replacement for me to work with the patients and families that I see. She began shadowing me last Thursday and may be ready to go on her own next week, leaving me able to finish up working by Oct. 2nd.
All the cards are falling into place. It is still stressful. There have been a fair share of hiccups with paperwork, red tape, and timelines, but everything seems to be okay as long as I am doing my part to get things completed and submitted in a timely fashion.
So our next week...Movers come Monday/Tuesday to take our household goods and my van, Tuesday/Wednesday clean house for renter, Wednesday move in with in-laws, Oct. 9th finish work (at least for now), Oct. 12-16 meet mother and sister-in-law in Arkansas cabins to say good-bye, Oct. 21st fly the heck out of here. And lots of saying good-bye to family and friends in between! We are going to miss everything Texas and Coppell, but are excited for our adventure!
It was initially confirmed by a sermon that my pastor gave regarding "big adventures." It seemed as though he was talking right to me. Don't limit yourself, don't miss out on new things, and always be willing to open the door and hear him out if Mr. Opportunity comes knocking. Another sense of confirmation came when I did a little research on the internet and actually found the person who is in the current position that I would be taking over, Elizabeth Scherple. She was impressed with my detective skills. But honestly, I am not a super sleuth. All I needed was the Air Base website and the division name that I would be a part of...and low and behold, there her name was. Not wanting to over step bounds and contact her using her base email, I checked on the fabulous social network of Facebook...maybe you have heard of it :) ...and there she was. I just shot her a quick message introducing myself and inquiring about the island, job, etc. Boy, was I delighted not only when she responded back, but she has kept an updated blog on her entire 3 and a half year experience on the island, with pictures included! We corresponded back and forth on the ins and outs of all things job related and living related on the island! She has been a wealth of information, and as a speech-language pathologist herself she likes details and loves to talk! Oh, and she was also the person that conducted my phone interview a month later...talk about already establishing a rapport!
Fast forward a few weeks, and yet another little touch of God, showing me this is all going to work out...renting our house. We were feeling the time crunch of renting our property come the beginning of Sept. Matt and I had already talked with a neighbor of ours about renting vs. selling and had settled on renting in hopes of coming back to Coppell after my assignment at Lajes is complete. Usher in a crazy couple of weeks where Matt accummulated 70 hours of comp. time, me working evenings and my role playing a single mom...boy do I have a lot more respect for those women...we had not had time to put our house up for rent because of all the chaos in our work lives. One night an amazing friend of mine (fellow Stringfellow board member, church member and all around bad ass) texted me asking about the specifics on our house. Come to find out that the new youth minister at our church was looking for a place here in Coppell and wasn't happy with what he was shown. She had instantly thought of me and our house as the timing of us going and them coming seemed to fit. A phone call later, a friend of the new youth minister was coming to look at our house to tell him all about it. Then his in-laws came in that weekend to look at it and by that afternoon we had renters! Only had to super clean my house once! YEAH! The thought of having to keep a spotless house for viewing while managing kids was not a pretty one in my head. We were delighted that it all worked out.
Finally, working out things at work...Matt is going to be able to do some contract work with his department at UT Southwestern Medical Center while we are gone. And I found a fantastic replacement for me to work with the patients and families that I see. She began shadowing me last Thursday and may be ready to go on her own next week, leaving me able to finish up working by Oct. 2nd.
All the cards are falling into place. It is still stressful. There have been a fair share of hiccups with paperwork, red tape, and timelines, but everything seems to be okay as long as I am doing my part to get things completed and submitted in a timely fashion.
So our next week...Movers come Monday/Tuesday to take our household goods and my van, Tuesday/Wednesday clean house for renter, Wednesday move in with in-laws, Oct. 9th finish work (at least for now), Oct. 12-16 meet mother and sister-in-law in Arkansas cabins to say good-bye, Oct. 21st fly the heck out of here. And lots of saying good-bye to family and friends in between! We are going to miss everything Texas and Coppell, but are excited for our adventure!
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
How did I get to this point?
All this craziness started with a couch...a wonderful friend of mine, Heather, was turning her second living room into a playroom and was looking for a home for her couch and big chair. As she is very generous of heart, she thought of me and offered it to us for free. It matched our decor perfectly, as she knew it would (she has a good eye for those things). So what to do with our old set...craigslist it! We had a woman come and look at our furniture. She mentioned that she wanted it for staging to sell her home. After inquiring where she was moving, and hearing Idaho...Matt and I began to dream...Idaho...ahhh! Mind you, it was the beginning of June in Texas and we knew what we were in for with the heat, so anything up north would sound good. Well that got our minds wandering about an opportunity that I had inquired after 3 years ago with a company called Sterling Medical. The find therapist jobs working with military families stationed a the various American bases overseas. 3 years ago when I applied, I didn't have the experience with the age group birth to 1 year that they were looking for. The recruiter had mentioned liking my resume, so that if I obtained that experience to please reapply. Since that time, have had the opportunity to increase my experience with the needed age group.
So there we were, thinking of cooler places climate wise and cooler places asthetics wise...and we decided to check out the website. Low and behold, a Germany position was available, so I submitted my resume...not really expecting too much and not really taking it seriously as we enjoy Coppell and the life that we have established here.
Well wouldn't you know it, I got an email back asking me to complete an application, convert my resume into a more government friendly format and submit a technical interview (lots of questions about my experience, that frankly would have been easier to answer in person that to write down, but what are you going to do). I received this email days before Matt, the kids and I were about to leave for a 2 week trek to TN, KY, VA, NC, and GA to visit family and vacation. I decided to focus on packing and getting ready for the trip, figuring I would have lots of down time in the car to work on everything. Well, it didn't dawn on me that all the down time that I was counting on would be filled with entertaining the kids, answering questions, taking potty breaks, getting snacks ready, making lunch, etc. Needless to say it took me the whole trip to get things done.
Once I finally submitted everything, I got an email back asking if I was interested in the current positions available in either S. Korea (nope, too close to N. Korea), Turkey (nope, too close to Iran and Iraq) and the Azores (uh, where?). What?! Where was Germany...England? Apparently, I took long enough that those positions were filled. Feeling disappointed, I originally told them no, but asked it they would keep me in mind if another Germany position came available. Then, curiousity got to me and I googled the Azores. Once I started researching these islands, I fell in love. Island living for a couple of years, I could do that. Matt agreed that he was up for it, so I threw my hat in.
And that has been just the beginning...
So there we were, thinking of cooler places climate wise and cooler places asthetics wise...and we decided to check out the website. Low and behold, a Germany position was available, so I submitted my resume...not really expecting too much and not really taking it seriously as we enjoy Coppell and the life that we have established here.
Well wouldn't you know it, I got an email back asking me to complete an application, convert my resume into a more government friendly format and submit a technical interview (lots of questions about my experience, that frankly would have been easier to answer in person that to write down, but what are you going to do). I received this email days before Matt, the kids and I were about to leave for a 2 week trek to TN, KY, VA, NC, and GA to visit family and vacation. I decided to focus on packing and getting ready for the trip, figuring I would have lots of down time in the car to work on everything. Well, it didn't dawn on me that all the down time that I was counting on would be filled with entertaining the kids, answering questions, taking potty breaks, getting snacks ready, making lunch, etc. Needless to say it took me the whole trip to get things done.
Once I finally submitted everything, I got an email back asking if I was interested in the current positions available in either S. Korea (nope, too close to N. Korea), Turkey (nope, too close to Iran and Iraq) and the Azores (uh, where?). What?! Where was Germany...England? Apparently, I took long enough that those positions were filled. Feeling disappointed, I originally told them no, but asked it they would keep me in mind if another Germany position came available. Then, curiousity got to me and I googled the Azores. Once I started researching these islands, I fell in love. Island living for a couple of years, I could do that. Matt agreed that he was up for it, so I threw my hat in.
And that has been just the beginning...
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