a simple twist of fate

Sitting at my computer, in my new home, while my kids play outside is bliss. (Yelling at them every five seconds to keep the door shut is not.) But life's good. We have a job. We have a home. We have each other.

For those non-family members who don't know the tale of us moving home let me tell you the story.

First, when Chris lost his job we decided we would not be visiting Arizona for Christmas. We were fine with it at first but after a week of job hunting the depression set in. We needed to be with family. But then our car started being stupid and we needed to pay for those repairs and the trip down to AZ was definitely out of the question. Chris's mom and sister's put together a garage sale and earned some money to pay for us to come down. (It was the first of many charitable gifts given to us). Had we not come home for Christmas, we would probably still be in Colorado stressed out and jobless.

On the day we left, we were pulling out of the driveway when Chris pulled back in, ran inside and turned the heater off. It's something we always did in Arizona before leaving on a trip. We're jobless, why pay to keep the empty house warm?

We came back home January 2nd. The house was 32 degrees and we were freezing. There was no running water and the toilets were frozen. I knew the pipes were frozen but being a dumb arizonian I didn't know the severity of what that meant. We called our landlord but it was 10:30 pm and she didn't answer. It was warmer downstairs by the furnace so we all bundled up and went to sleep downstairs. I woke up 3 times with Fiona during the night and I could hear the water running. I didn't know it was the water but it sounded like a bathtub running and how you can hear it from another room. I thought it was the heater. I was lazy, and exhausted, and cold, I didn't want to go upstairs to see what the noise was. At 7:30am Asher woke up and started to go upstairs. I tried to stop him cause I knew he would go outside to play in the snow but I wanted to keep sleeping. As I ran up the stairs after him the sound of the water running grew louder. I threw open the basement door and it was raining in the house. No. POURING IN THE HOUSE! I screamed for Chris and immediately went into panic-I don't know what the heck to do mode.

We started calling our landlord, her handy man and my Dad to find out what to do. We got the water turned off but... it was bad. We got a restoration company out right away and they turned on millions of fans to dry out the house. They said they were going to be able to save everything dry-wall, carpet, everything. We were so happy. We got a hotel for the night and the next day we got the call saying it would no longer take 2 - 5 days to dry the house but that everything had to be replaced and it was going to be 2 - 4 WEEKS. We couldn't live in a hotel that long. We couldn't ask a family to take us in for that long. We didn't have a job and no hopes of getting one soon.

We had to move home for help.

We packed up the kids and drove both cars home. Flew back a few days later and packed up our house in two days. Our amazing ward came and helped us and this was another huge blessing. Here is what the house looked like when we got there...

$35,000 worth of damage. And a million dollars of heartache.
We were now jobless and homeless and it was a very humbling experience to say the least.

We spent Wednesday packing boxes. 
We spent a wonderful evening with our family away from home the Morby's. Amazing people!
Thursday we loaded up the moving truck. I had to give up so many things. When we had to pack all our worldly possessions in a 26 foot truck a lot of sacrifices have to be made. At this point I was ready to throw all my crap out I was so sick of everything.
We spent Thursday night walking the streets of downtown looking for soemthing to buy to take with us.  I wanted a Colorado T-shirt but never found one that said COLORADO.

Saying goodbye to the first home I ever felt content and happy to call home.

We hit the road early Friday morning. The drive home was tons of fun with Chris and Fiona. I could do anything with him and be okay.

I cried at the Arizona border. I cried when I saw the dessert. But I'm going to learn to love Arizona.
I promise.

Thank you again to Longview Ward for coming to our aid when we needed help. Living away from family is hard, especially when you have depended on them your whole life. But when you live 1000 miles from the nearest family member you have to learn to depend on your ward family. Longview was so good to us. THANK YOU!

Home

After 3 months and some change of living with Chris's parents we have signed the lease and got ourselves a rental home!!! Holy cow, this has been quite the roller-coaster ride for us. We were ready to rent a 2-bedroom apartment for 18 months till we could buy a house again but decided it would be worth it to pay a little extra for a house. We found a house in Gilbert, Recker and Warner, to be exact. It doesn't have much of a backyard but right outside the front door is the community pool and park. It's also the biggest one in our price range. We get the keys today and will be moving in slowly till Saturday will be the big moving day.

Soooooooooooo excited to stretch our legs out and have our own place again. Chris's family has been so wonderful and patient with us and we'll be forever grateful for them taking care of us during one of the hardest times of our life.

THANK YOU!

blessings

Obviously since Christmas my life has turned upside-down, which is why you haven't heard from me! As much as I haven't liked the changes that have come to my life I have a lot to be grateful for.

Blessing number one.
Chris starts his new job tomorrow at South University doing the same thing he did at {sigh} UOP. He actually got 3 job offers in one day! Lifelock called at 1pm (we cheered, danced, and had some sparkling cider) and then at 2 pm South University called and took all the fun out of getting a job offer. Not that I'm complaining that my husband is a high commodity but that we now had to make a decision about what job would be better for our family. Better pay vs. Something New. After listening to the wise words of the BFF we took the better paying job.

Blessing number two.
Chris finished his undergrad March 14th! (And I'm 4 weeks away from mine!) We both graduate on April 30th so keep an eye on your inbox for a grad announcement!

Blessing number three.
We have been living with my in-laws for 3-months now. They have been so patient and loving and wonderful and accommodating to us. We have been lovingly coined the "mini-richards". We took over Chris's sister's bedroom, Asher and Fiona sleep in the walk-in closet and Jocelyn and Cecily sleep in the girl room with their 3 aunties and LOVE IT!

Blessing number four.
My etsy shop is flourishing. It's a total dream and I can't believe it's happening but I love it! Once I'm done with school, and have my own place I can concentrate on it a little more. My brothers' catering company has employed me as their scheduler/lead server again and it's been so nice to be able to pay the bills while Chris has looked for work.

Blessing number five.
Somehow Asher made it alive to his 3rd birthday.

Work in Progress.
I'm not a sobbing mess when I think about Colorado anymore and my beautiful city of Fort Collins. I can even talk about it. I'm still struggling with looking at photos. It's stupid but those who know me know how much I loved my experience in Colorado and how hard it was for me to say goodbye. I'm going to blog again, I'm going to scrapbook again, and I'm going to learn to love Arizona. I just might not be able to listen to the song "Dream" by Priscilla Ahn ever again but I've got Chris, my freakishly-awesome kids, and amazing friends and family to keep me happy.

Just to tease you until my next blog entry, here is a photo of my family room in Colorado when we went back up to move home.