The saga continues....

We had the inspection on the house on Friday. The inspector didn't really tell us much that we didn't already know. The house does need lots of work, but most of it is stuff we can do ourselves. The thing that makes me mad is that we couldn't test the plumbing because it wasn't hooked up. The house is winterized. I paid the listing agency to get a plumber in to de-winterize it. But it wasn't done. I am so mad. I called my realtor yesterday and told him to tell the lising agency that the water needs to be on by Tuesday. Lucky for us, the inspector said he would come back and test the plumbing without charging us more. Our realtor is not happy about this and I'm sure he won't be very nice when he calls tomorrow. I hope he isn't. I'm so frustrated with this listing agency. They are not very professional. If the water isn't tested by Wednesday, we will back out of the offer and look elsewhere. I have mixed emotions about it. I can see the potential this house has and see how fun it would be to remodel, but I'm so frustrated and tired of the headaches we keep running into to try to get this deal to go through. AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!! I'll keep you posted on how this saga plays out. I did take pictures of the inside and as soon as I buy another memory disc adapter I'll post them so you all can see just how ugly this house is. It's actually funny just how ugly it is. To think someone thought that they were decorating nicely is so funny!

Random Stuff

I just got back from the women's broadcast at the stake center. I'm curious as to how each of you Relief Society members watched it, at home or did you go to a church, or did you opt out? Dad and I chaperoned the choir while they practiced with 5 schools and the Ann Arbor Symphony this week. It sounded really good. I guess you would expect all of those classical people in Ann Arbor to have a good symphony orchestra. I hope you're enjoying Fall wherever you are. In 2 weeks Dad and I are going to use our yearly October trip to hit as many cider mills as we can in 2 days. I think it will be fun, I'll let you know.

Amazing Race

We put packages in the mail to all of the non-Michigander members of our family this afternoon. We'll see how fast the postal service gets them to you guys. The obvious guess would be Wisconsin but I've heard that eating that much cheese makes you lazy so maybe the postal workers down south or out west will be quicker. The race is on!

new contact info

We've lived here for over a month and we finally have a Tennessee number! Woohoo! We've been going WAY over on cell phone minutes, so we thought it would be wise to give this number out.

Home phone: (901)383-4534

Oh, and our address is 2165 Meadow Glade Ln #4 Memphis, TN 38134

We will be home owners again!

The bank finally accepted our offer on the house! We signed the paperwork yesterday to set things in motion towards a closing date. We are suppose to close on or before Oct. 12th. Hopefully we'll be able to pull it off. I just set up the inspection this morning for Thursday afternoon. If that goes well, there shouldn't be any other snags (at least on our end). If you want to check out our house just follow this link: http://public.mlswis.com/cgi-bin/view.cgi?20070912174159300919000000&id=1

We are pretty excited, except this means that I have to re-pack this rental and then we have to get the rest of our stuff out of storage in Michigan and get it here. It's kind of daunting, but once it's all finished I'll be so much happier. I'm so ready to settled down again. It's been almost a year since we've been in a home we owned. It will be nice for everyone have their own spaces again.

I'm sorry I haven't been writing, especiallly after my big plea for everyone else to do so. Jason and I have been battling a cold for the last week, so we've been a bit lax with many things. But yes, I got a calling yesterday! I am a Primary teacher. I teach the CTRs. Our ward has a very small primary, there are only 25 kids total and my class has 4 kdis-- a 4, 5, 6, and 7 year old. It's a large range of ages, and I'm sure that will make it particularly challenging, but the kids seem cute and I'm excited about it. I am a bit sad to be leaving Relief Society as I'm finally starting to make some friends, but hey, I always love being in with the Primary!

As a side note, Adelyn is 12 weeks tomorrow...I can't believe how quickly the time has gone! Before we know it, we'll have a Harvey and Noah as well! Hutchinson parties will be so much fun. I'm sure Hillary's kids are excited to finally have cousins to play with as well!

So, Jana, what happened with the Bishop?

I just remembered you were suppose to meet with the bishop yesterday. How did that go? Were you able to get there so early? Fill us in.

Last One

So, this morning Eric got an email from the last school he applied to-the one in Missouri. Now that it's all complete, he is focusing more on finishing the secondaries. Cross your fingers and saw your prayers (please) that one will bite this time. Thought you would like the update. Thanks you guys!

Fun to think about

I just looked at the months of messages we have on our blog and noticed that there are two September months. Does that mean our blog has had a birthday?!?!?! Kind of cool.

One more in

Today Eric got an email from MSU's DO school. YAY!!!! He has been waiting for that one for some weeks and we are very excited that it did come. There is only one other school he applied for-the one in Missouri-and we haven't heard from them, but we aren't too concerned about that. And, Dad, if you could put in a good word with the guy that you know that works at MSU, we would be okay with that. Or if there is a way to have one of your friends that's a DO write his letter, we would be okay with that too. He does know some doctors from his home ward that could write his recommendation-he hasn't asked them yet-but, the schools would really like it to be from a DO and there just aren't that many out here, and we don't know any. So, please continue praying that everything will go smoothly and that he'll get into at least one of the three-that would be awesome! Thanks guys!

Survey

I'm sorry the pictures are so big. I can't figure out how to get them smaller. Oh well, it's fun anyhow!

Mac 'n' Cheese crisis

Well, my kids LOVE Meijer brand macaroni ans cheese. Of course there are no Meijer stores in Wi. They hate Kraft brand. Today we are trying our first time ever Wal-mart brand (I know Mom, you are disappointed). We will have to try them all until we find a winner. I hope Wal-mart wins. It's interesting to find out what you take for granted every day. We actually bought a lot of things at Meijer that we will miss. Charlie and I have talked about making Meijer runs once a month in Chicago. We might have to if we can't find comparable things in Wi.

I have a new church calling. The 1st counselor in the bishipbric hit me up right after church on Sunday. I'm the new den leader for the 8 and 9 year olds. I think it's interesting because one of the things I was really concerned about was whether or not this ward would have a good scouting program. Merrit really loves scouts and I didn't want him to go from a really good program in Flint, to a not so good one in Racine. I think Heavenly Father put me in this calling so I can guarantee that Merrit has a good experience. I'm a little apprehensive though. I don't know very much about the scouting program and have a lot to learn before I can make it a good program. I'm ready to learn though.

Chelsea started school yesterday. She had fun and is so excited to go back today. We'll be leaving in just a couple of minutes. Her teacher's name is Mrs. Carrie Belec, but Chelsea calls her Miss Carrie. She thought it was fun that she has the same name as her aunt Kari. The other kids are doing well still too. There is a school open house on the 25th. I'm glad that Charlie will be able to go and meet their teachers then and see where their classrooms are.

Little things

With secondary applications it really depends on the school, but it also depends on how fast Eric gets them back. Chicago wants a recommendation from a doctor and we are still trying to figure out how to get that from a doctor that actually knows Eric-all the ones he works with at the hospital don't really interact on a personal level with the orderlies. The other two schools were MSU and a school in Missouri. Our kind of exciting news is that we just planned a little vacation for us in October and finalized things today. We are going to hit 3 temples in 4 days. First we are going down to St. George and staying with his brother and going to the St. George temple. Next we will go down to Vegas and stay with his sister. We are going to go to the strip b/c I've never been there and the next day to the Las Vegas temple. Then we will go up to Manti and stay there a couple of days in this really cute inn with themed rooms-and of course, go to the Manti temple (I've wanted to go back since I received my endowments there). And then come home. It should be really awesome and since it is fall break at school, all we'll miss is 2 days of work. We are really excited! And we're glad to hear that everything is going well for all those back in MI and WI...and we like, Hillary, that your kids already have parts in the program even though you hadn't even been to church yet-that's awesome. We miss you guys and maybe some of you can come back here after the baby is born *wink*

Teaching Relief Society

Jana said we should type little things as well as big things, so here you are. I was asked to teach Relief Society today. When the regular teacher asked me, she said that it was on marriage and she felt that someone who was more seasoned should teach it! Isn't that an interesting way of saying I'm old. Anyway, there's your little thing, Jana.

Today was a nice day

Charlie and I woke up this morning and said to each other, "Wow, it's weird to not have to rush around and do anything today." For the last year, just about, we have been so busy on the weekends trying to finish our house, Jocelyn's house, finding a job, finding a new house to buy, etc... Today we just relaxed, well besides every day normal housework type things. We also had to go buy school supplies for the kids. We had to buy for 4 this year and man was our cart full! It's incredible how much stuff each kid needed. Good thing Charlie just got paid. We haven't heard about the house yet. I'll let you know when we do. Tomorrow is our first Sunday in our new ward. The primary sacrament program is next Sunday, and our kids already have parts in it. I thought that was pretty impressive on the part of the primary president. She is a really nice person. I can see myself being her friend. She has kids around the same age as ours too. It sounds like her 8 yr. old son and Merrit have a lot in common and might become pretty good friends. I was glad about that. Well that's about it, love you all.

Not much...

I bet if you all guessed you would never figure out what this sculpture is made out of. Well, in case you are curious-it's butter. That's right, this entire sculpture is made out of butter to honor the Utah diary society-we saw it at the Utah State Fair the second time we went. I think it's pretty amazing. Life has been pretty much the same here, except the weather is getting cooler and that's been sooo nice, esp. for me. OH, and Eric has heard back from 2 of the 4 schools he applied to. We're trying not to get that excited this time around, just in case it doesn't work out, we won't be as disappointed. The two schools are Midwestern University-in Chicago- and New England University-in Maine. Out of the two, I would like to go to Chicago because I was looking at the housing market and I think we could actually afford a small house in the Chicago area, where for the same price in Maine all you can really get is a condo/townhouse. We are just tired of sharing our walls with other people. So, now we need to do those two secondary appl. and continue waiting and being patient. But that's about it. School's going fine, just kind of annoying for me, and work for us both is going-we enjoy our weekends :)

Bean Soup

I agree with Jana, though I've been a habitual non-poster myself. So I thought I'd post my favorite fall/winter soup. Kurt and I'll be having it for dinner tonight. The real perk is that you can get everything set the night before and throw it in the crockpot in the morning before leaving for the day.

Bean Soup
Large Bottle or 3-4 cans Northern Beans
1 can diced tomatoes
~1/2 cup chopped carrots
~1/2 cup chopped celery
medium onion chopped
Smoked Ham Hock (this should be especially easy for Jana to find! I miss the good pork selections in the south)
Small package cubed ham -optional (This is the kind that come in the vaccuum sealed bags. You can use leftover ham instead.)
1 good squeeze ketchup


Place all ingredients in crockpot and cook all day. Only needs a couple hours so if I'm home I'll just throw it together in the early afternoon. Before serving, remove meat from ham hock. This step grosses out Kurt since it requires cutting away the fat from the ham hock and you really don't get a ton of meat but it is so, so good. You can skip this step if you've included the cubed or leftover ham. Even if you aren't going to trim the meat I strongly recommend using the ham hock as the bone and the meat add a lot of flavor to the soup. A ham hock is relatively cheap and will freeze basically forever.

I serve this with a loaf of crusty bread for a complete meal. Mmmmh, it's making my mouth water. I better get my grocery list together so I can get this a-cooking.

Yea, we have the internet again!

I'm sad that I didn't get to vote on the poll, but my vote was for Kurt. My kids are enrolled in school and today was their first day. They all said they had a good day and they like their teachers. I'm hoping this is their opions in a few weeks too. Chelsea's first day will be Monday. She is going to a preschool (here they call it 4 yr. old kindergarten) that will be Monday through Thursday from 12:15 pm to 3:14 pm. In Michigan she would've gone full days and that would've been really nice, but oh well. I can't wait to have only Jaxson around for a couple of hours a day. Especially since the afternoon is when he takes his nap.

I have already been visited by three sisters from the ward. They are really nice and one of them invited me and the kids to her house this afternoon. She invited two other families over so we could get to know them. It was fun. I feel very welcome and am excited to make friends (although I miss my friends in Michigan still).

Charlie is liking his job more now. His students are better behaved, overall, than the ones that he had last year. He told me he'd trade his classroom for these students any time. For those of you who don't know, Charlie doesn't have his own classroom. He has to use a cart to take his supplies around to the three different classrooms that he uses.

The house that we tried to buy before went back on the market earlier this week. We put an offer on it late Wednesday and are still waiting to hear back. It was listed at the same price it was at before. We were surprised. We thought that it would be listed for more. It's nice that it's still so cheap, as long as it passes the inspection. Don't worry, we will approach this buy as cautiously as possible.

where has everyone gone?

I miss checking the blog and finding a new post. Where has our family connectedness gone? Are we all too busy to post a sentence or two? A new joke? A funny experience? Something that annoyed you? We don't only have to post when "new" things happen in our lives, but ANYTHING. I miss you guys down here in TN, and would love to hear from you!

Here is something funny we did. On our road trip to TN we tried to stop by Hutchinson, Kansas. I thought it would be fun to visit the land of my old surname. Well, it turned out that with Addie the trip took much longer than expected, and Hutchinson was over an hour out of the way. Darn. We stopped at a gas station somewhere in the middle of Kansas (I think EVERYWHERE in Kansas is just somewhere in the middle of Kansas, it is all so monotonous). They sold several newspapers at that gas station, one of which happened to be The Hutchinson News! Brilliant! Jason and I spent 50 cents just so I could get this newspaper and show all of you. I forgot all about it until I was cleaning the other day. So, here it is!

more from Mrs. Hair

Adelyn was looking particularly cute this morning before church, I just had to get a couple pictures. It's great now that her clothes are finally fitting her!

Jason's introducing Addie to hip-hop culture.

When Addie isn't trying to poot, she's a very happy girl! (Poot; verb, Southern slang for "to pass gas" or "fart." The word fart is considered naughty.)

Our laughing hysterically Frenchwoman.

It has been rather lonely living here. Jason is at school (and loving it, by the way) and I don't have any friends to hang out with during the day (yet!). It's a wonderful thing that Addie and I enjoy playing together!

The view of the Mississippi River from on top of the Peabody Hotel in downtown Memphis.

A Wedding and the State Fair

Here I am posting more pictures...but I just LOVE to take them (just wait 'til baby is here...sheesh, there will be a lot). Following are going to be 2 pictures from Deena's (our cousin) wedding. It's of her and Jeff coming out of the temple. It was weird to see her get married, but it was a very nice wedding and I'm glad that I could go.

Awww...cute. These next pictures were taken just for Jason, but I think you all might enjoy them. We went to the Utah State Fair yesterday-we had an awesome time. But, one of the animal barns only housed poultry. I'm not sure how many of you are aware, but Jason has a thing for roosters (shrug). So, we took pictures of all the roosters that won first prize for their respective color. And let me tell you, these were the biggest roosters either of us had ever seen.

The white and the black ones were our favorites. I hope you guys get a kick out it-esp. Jason.

Today is the DAY!

Well, I just thought I'd let you know that I'm not sure when we will have the internet up and running in Wisconsin. Hopefully it won't take too long. I already have the phone scheduled to turn on on Monday. Our new phone number will be 262-632-6721. Our new address is 3228 Republic Ave. Racine, WI 53405 (at least for the time being). I'm going out of my mind. I hate moving. I'm just about packed though. I only have the computer and TV stuff to go. I've heard that moving and building a house are the two most stressful things for people to go through. I know why. I'll be back on the blog as soon as possible.

Well, it seems that Harvey will have a FULL HEAD OF DARK HAIR. Thanks for participating in the poll. Now I'll have to think of another one. If you have any suggestions, let me know!

Things here are going well. I've decided, after much debate, to cut back on watching the news. Many people have suggested that to me, but it wasn't until a couple days ago that I agreed. The news out here is really depressing. There has always been another shooting, stabbing, burglary, etc. Seldom is there any good news. I know it's like that everywhere, but out here it feels particulary scary and sensationalized. I heard today on the news, waiting for the weather report, that Memphis has finally reached its 110th homicide this year--like they're proud or something. It makes me sick. Don't worry about us, though. We feel pretty safe in our little neighborhood. I have a great neighbor, Phyllis, who came over to introduce herself and let me know that we're here to watch out for each other. It's comforting to know who's around us and that we can all support each other.

Adelyn is finally starting to try and reach things (without much success) and coos all day long. It's so much fun to see her grow!

Thanks for keeping us Southerners updated. I hope the move goes well for the Hicks!

Getting Ready to move! AHHHHHH!

Well, the projected time for our departure is this Friday night. After we pack the moving van, we will drive over to Racine and spend the night. Saturday morning we will unload and drive back to Michigan to return the truck and pick up our kids. Mom has so graciously agreed to keep them overnight for us so we can unpack and set up at least our beds without the kids to worry about. I think it will be much easier. Plus, that way I get to go to church with my friends one last time (well, until I come back to visit).
Charlie started teaching yesterday. So far, so good. He thinks he'll really only have problems with his 5th hour class. There are some kids in there who aren't cooperating already. But if that's the only class that gives him fits, then it's way better than last year.
The kids are excited to start school at a new school. I didn't start them here because I didn't want to RIP them away from new friends and teachers and stick them with different ones. I thought it would be better for everyone if they just waiting until we got to Wisconsin. So I'm going to enroll them next week. I hope it doesn't take too long to get them going.
I'm mixed with emotions right now. I'm sad to leave, excited to be going and frazeled about getting ready to go. I'll be so relieved to just have it be over with and settled (well, as settled as you can be in a rental that you don't plan on staying in very long).
I'll try to keep you posted as I can.