John and Kylee: 2022

I don't think I ever really talked about what happened with getting the new job. So it all started out because our best friends moved to Utah AND we felt like we were outgrowing our current house. We knew we needed to move. We were even looking casually at houses in Ahwatukee, Chandler, and Mesa. We knew we needed to finish the master bathroom first, so moving didn't feel that imminent. However, The Davises moving left kind of a hole. Our biggest 'root' to that ward and area had just moved away. We joked around about moving out of state. Wouldn't it be fun to more to the Pacific Northwest and experience an entirely different climate? We didn't really think that would happen, but the point is, moving was definitely on our radar.

When John was graduating college for the third time, his best buddy from grad school got the job that seemed like the ideal. We thought we wanted to live in Utah Valley forever and not move away from Utah. Joe (John's friend) told him that he would get John a job at that company in a few years. Never did we ever think it would actually work out. Unbeknownst to us, their CFD guy quit his position to move back to Idaho. John was contacted by Joe and encouraged to apply for the position. John met with Joe and some of the others in the company when we were in Utah Valley for the kid's concert in Spanish Fork. A couple of phone interviews later and John had a job offer! What?? We didn't really think he would get a job offer. And if he did we didn't think it would be a good enough offer to consider taking it. At best we thought we might be able to leverage a nice raise from Honeywell. Imagine our surprise when the details of the offer came through. They asked us how much they needed to offer us in order to get us to stay, and then they offered about that much. Plus at this job there is a yearly bonus! John took this back to his boss at Honeywell and wanted to know if they had a counteroffer. They asked us how much they would need to offer us to get us to stay. Whew, that was a stressful couple of days!! We factored in the offered raise and the bonus and got a pretty astronomical number. Well, obviously they didn't give us that and but they did offer a nice raise. We could have taken it (most likely we would have taken it if the Davises hadn't just moved), but it was just too good of an opportunity to pass up. Not that it was an easy decision. We prayed and prayed. We made a pros and cons list. We were so distracted on our drive up to Lake Tahoe we couldn't hardly even see straight (not really, but you get the point). But eventually we decided to take this new opportunity.

Okay, we decided to move. Now what? Well, we knew that we needed to finished our bathroom remodel. (See the previous post.) But there was a lot of other things to do. And, guess what, other happenings of life didn't just stop. We had to still live--make dinner, be parents, put our kids in school, etc.

Well, lets take things one step at a time. The most pressing item was school. Our girls were going to start in person school. That was the plan. But maybe there was an opportunity here to make life easier. First, Holland and Miriam started back at Monte Vista.

But instead of Eliza starting at a new middle school where she would have to get used to an entirely new school, but only stay there a couple of months, we decided to have her do the beginning of year continuing at KDA. This was helpful for so many reasons. First it just made life easier. Instead of me having to drive her both ways to school everyday, she could just log on to her computer. Next, she was super available to help out a home during lunch time or on her breaks. When Darcy was napping I could run to the store because Eliza was home. She helped SO MUCH! So grateful for that girl.

At first masks weren't required at school because of an order from the governor, but a judge blocked that order and so our district started requiring masks that same day. They got used to the masks pretty quickly.

Ugh, looking at these pictures is making me homesick for AZ!

Mrs. Etringer was Holland's first first grade teacher. Ms. Stokes was her second first grade teacher. Apparently, Ms. Stokes is going to be her second grade teacher also. It is kind of sad to see her picture with the mask on, but I am also proud of my girls having enough grit to do something that is uncomfortable for the benefit of others.

Darcy started throwing food on the floor during meals times and coming back for leftovers later. So gross. We had to sweep 3x a day.

A sweet get well note from Holland, "Dear DaDy, I no you will feel much better in the morning. I love you Holland."

Oh boy, this was pretty special. So in the middle of this chaos (moving, bathroom remodel, trying to find a new house) our air conditioner stops working. We ended up borrowing a window unit from the Wellings. It made such a big difference in that room. We tried a swamp cooler up stairs from Lana Williams, but the added humidity about killed us.

It was out for about 2 days until we got it "fixed" (how about that for foreboding?). The plumbers were working on our bathroom without AC. I felt so bad! The Price family let us crash in their spare rooms, which was so nice of them! We told them we were moving that night. I still can't believe we moved. It feels like a funny dream I will wake up from.

You have my heart! She is the cutest.

We had an incredibly wet summer so we didn't get in the pool as much as we might normally had (plus moving, traveling, house project, etc.).

John is such a good daddy.

The girls had some non swimming bathing suit fun.

One day when Miriam was watching Darcy for me, she dressed Darcy up in a lot of dress ups and took some photos of her. Miriam was so proud of how cute she was. :)

Holland writing a story. Maybe retelling? It is pretty cute though!

Holland got an Awesome ticket! Man, she lived for these. I think it is an amazing idea for her teacher to take time to do. Talk about positive reinforcement!

School picture day!

Getting some things ready for the move. Like getting a small acid free box to store my grandmother's wedding dress in. Apparently Darcy is like a cat and wants to sit in small boxes.

This was kind of our last fun family activity at that house. Harry Potter day! There are broomsticks and snitches as decorations.

We had roasted chicken and potatoes with peas and salad.

Butterbeer and pumpkin pasties as dessert!

Darcy likes hanging out in the Mother's room at church. There is a convenient chair and mirror to play on.

Ellie made a delicious dinner herself. Homemade rolls, pulled pork, coleslaw. It turned out so good she wanted to take a picture!

She can barely reach the piano!

Daddy's last day of work at Honeywell! So crazy!

Havarti basil tomato sandwiches makes everyone happy.

John had to get started at his new company in person for the first week. He was 478 miles away. It felt further than that.

We had planned a house hunting trip at that same time, but we had actually already had an offer accepted on a house.

Okay, so buying a house in another state. That felt stressful. We decided to move around the last week of July and were given until November 1st to be in the office full time. So we had to finish our bathroom, get ready to sell, sell our house and buy a new house. People do this all the time, right? The problem was that the house market was BANANAS! Plus we wanted to buy our house before we sold our other one so we didn't have to be homeless for any length of time.

Our realtor in Phoenix recommended one in Utah to work with. He was okay. Not amazing or anything. John's brother Matt went around with him looking at houses. We put offers in on two houses before the offer on our Provo house was accepted. Putting in an offer felt like a really big deal. We did so much research into the area--schools, crime, commute, neighborhood. Not to mention there were some things we really wanted in our next house that felt like non-negotiables. But if the housing market is loco, you can't really be that picky. Getting our house still feels like a bit of a miracle.

Like I said, we put two offers in previous. We were on the fence about two other houses when John came up to start on his week of in person onboarding with the new job. He took a look at both of those houses and didn't love either option. On a whim they stopped by this house in Provo. We weren't that serious about it because there wasn't great information about it online. The photo was a partially constructed home. The address was wrong. We actually think this worked in our favor because there wasn't nearly as much competition for this house. I mean, we still offered a bajillion dollars, but it really felt like "the home." I am pretty sure it was no small miracle that we got this house.

So Darcy and I headed up for a house hunting trip, but it was almost more like a house confirming trip. We looked at a bunch of different houses since we were still to back out at that point, but there was no question that this was the best house of the lot. We did offer more than we had planned on, but my mom said that she wanted to give us some money that we could put towards making sure we got the house that we wanted. That was so generous of her.

Cute baby looking out the plane window.

Nice view of the Grand Canyon.

In addition with helping us offer a little bit more, my mom also lent us some money that we paid back after we sold our house so we didn't have to take out a jumbo loan. She and my cousin McKenzie also came down to stay with the kids while we were on this little house hunting trip. We weirdly stayed with Nathan's parents for our trip. John's parents thought they had covid and it was too far to Ogden. It felt a little awkward, but it was fun to see Nathan and Erica.

Seeing the house in person for first time.

Funny side yards. Our lot is so strange. It has an offshoot that is a sewer easement. It makes our landscaping a little trickier, but I hope it will be great.

It's weird to look at the kitchen now and see what it used to be.

Bedroom

Here is the easement area. I hope it isn't that full of weeds this summer.

Ahh! The sign is up. It is getting real!

Daddy's birthday wasn't celebrated properly. We got Cafe Rio and a pie.

Murder is code for good. I about died with laughter at this one.

First tooth lost!!

We promised Miriam that we would go swimming at a pool with slides for an experience birthday present. We had to hurry and do it before we moved! That was a fun day.

This was all of the clutter we moved to the garage for the listing photos.

First time going to the temple for this beauty.

It was a special experience. The temple president and matron came and met with us personally. Because of Covid protocols we had the entire baptistry to ourselves. It was amazing and special and beautiful.

Eliza: It was so amazing to go to the temple for the first time!! It was really beautiful inside. The baptismal font was really pretty with a mosaic inside and on the backs of the oxen. It felt really good to do this service for my ancestors. I liked seeing the temple president and matron, and it was an overall amazing experience!!!!

We decided to list our house and do showings while we were at Lake Powell. That way we didn't need to keep it picture perfect while we were living there. Unfortanely, it also meant that we had to get everything ready for a trip to Lake Powell, while also getting everything picture perfect. But it was more than picture perfect. It had to be real life perfect. We cleaned and organized everything--the kitchen cupboards, the closets, even our extra stuff piled in the garage, everything. We cleaned everything we could think of. It looked good! Our realtor had about 20 showings scheduled for while we were gone. We barely drove away before the first one came. We had people ask if we would accept pre-market offers. We watched people on our video doorbell come and go. It was such a weird feeling watching people come in and out of our home without us being there. Everything was okay though. Well, except....our AC went out again while we were gone. As best we can figure, it actually just went out on the day we came home, so it just seemed extra warm to the last couple of showings. Our realtor went above and beyond to check out the AC to see what was wrong, calling a repairman to come late at night, and showing around another client who were interested in our home.

We ended up getting 5 offers, and took the one from our realtor because he gave us such a good deal on his fees. We were both repeat clients so he was trying to reward the loyalty or something? It was really nice though. The only hiccup of the whole process was that the appraisal came in low! Ugh, that was awful. I know the market was crazy spiking, but he totally didn't take into account all of the upgrades we had done to our home. Our realtor filed an appeal, saying that the seller and the buyer both want it to appraise for more. (There was a clause that said we could back out if the appraisal came in too low.) We listed our house for $499. The offer was for $525, but it appraised for $510. The appeal made them bump the appraisal up to $515, which was just high enough that we couldn't back out even if we wanted to. Fortunately the buyers also said that they would pay $5,000 over appraisal. So the final selling price was $520. We bought that house for $271 just 6 years before! What an insane market!

When we went to Lake Powell we were barely getting started on that process. Our house was pristine and we were watching people come and go from our doorbell. That first day was a little crazy because there was trouble getting the house boat. They couldn't find our reservation, and we waited and waited. Finally they just gave us their top of the line houseboat. Talk about an upgrade!

It had 4 bedrooms and felt a lot bigger in every respect. That being said, the fuel price to refill it was bonkers.

We stayed in Gunsight Canyon and loved going around that area again. The water level was so low it felt like a completely different lake.

Walking up the sandy stream.

We thought it was fun to find a couple of springs up this canyon.

Trying to do a family selfie.

The end of the road--a pool of water.

I love the formations caused by erosion of the sandstone.

Cutie!

We love these kind of hikes.

Back at the fancy houseboat, there were a lot of good times.

Kayla and Cortney brought their rubber docky. What a fun water toy!

They also had paddle boards.

We loved the little kayaks too.

The water levels are at a record low because of the drought. It was pretty crazy to see the change of landscape from a few years ago.

Across the canyon to where we camped last time right after Grandpa died.

Eliza and the gunsight!

We enjoyed climbing around this rock outcropping.

I spy two little cuties hiding in the rocks.

I love the little random arches and windows.

We loved having a nice place to keep our little miss.

Up another canyon to a trickling waterfall.

How far can we climb up?

I love a baby at Lake Powell.

Padre Bay is huge!

Cuddling with Daddy.

Cuddling/nursing with Mama.

Fanciest houseboat we'll ever be on.

We went over to the last campsite to see if we could find the tower of rocks we made for Grandpa.

The water level sure makes a difference.

Maybe this is it?

Trying out the "hot" tub on the roof. Too bad we couldn't get it to heat. The wet suits just came in handy.

Pretty luxurious.

John and I played a lot of Dos at night.

This darling baby had a window that was just right for her.

We love watching out the window.

This is the upper floor. Quartz on the mini kitchen top.

The view from the back. What a fun trip!

A different kind of view from the back. I love her squishy baby bum.

This might have been her only time at the park.

I drove by Erica's old house. It was weird to see someone else's decorations there.

Holland's adorable drawing.

We just barely missed the reopening of the renovated Mesa temple. We moved on the weekend that the open house started, so we visited the weekend before just to walk around the outside. We loved these giant canna lilies.

One awesome moment was when we were walking around the outside and we saw Elder Gong! He had just stepped out of the temple with a few other people and they were clearly inspecting all of the preparations for the openhouse. He waved at us through the fence and we felt pretty cool. Not every day you run into an apostle!

We spent some time in the new Mesa Temple Visitor Center. My kids loved the coloring wall.

There were interesting displays and information around the center. The model of the temple that is reflected in this picture was fun to examine. We also spent some time looking at the giant touch screens that had a whole bunch of fun family history features (famous people we're related to, etc.).

The kids area was very fun also, but by then we had run out of time so we couldn't spend too much time there. Definitely a lot to see and do.

I love being their momma.

They got a braiding book from the library and practiced fishtail braids on me and Holland.

Ellie is almost done with online middle school. Here she is doing PE.

Another braid design.

I love that baby so much. She took her first step on moving day at 17 months old. Probably because I was too distracted to stop her. :)

Ellie loves picking out outfits for her.

Getting closer to moving. The kids loved the box maze!

We gave Miriam the gift of doing a zipline for her birthday. We thought we had to hurry and do it before we moved. It was so nice to drive out there and do this fun activity. It was near where we had hiked a lot. We had been going at full steam for so long, we cherished this little break. The zipline was actually on a chair, so it wasn't that scary, but it still made my heart pound when Holland and John first got pulled up there. It was fast!