A "Little" Break

Yes, I have taken a "little" break from blogging. I've been lax, but very busy. We have been in Illinois now for almost two weeks already. The first week we just tried to get settled, looked at a million houses, and then over the Memorial Day weekend we went to Michigan. We got to go stay with my grandma and visit with my aunt. We put flowers on my sister's grave (which I haven't been to for about 10 years or so) and showed the kids off to as many relatives and friends as we could find, so we stayed plenty busy. My cousin graduated from high school so we were able to go to her graduation as well.

This is a picture of us spending entirely too much time in the car for a long time.

Then on the day after Memorial Day (which was Tuesday) Kendall started his new job. This means that we are no longer homeless and unemployed, just homeless. He trained all last week and I think he's going to really like it. It is interesting that we were trying to get him hired at Caterpillar, and eServ hired him, but he is working at Caterpillar as an independent contractor. So he is meeting lots of new and interesting people and trying to learn all the ropes. They are a very fun company with lots of fun activities and discounts for everything you can think of.

The home buying process is much slower and more painful than we had thought. The property taxes out here are anywhere between 2 and 5 times as high as those in Utah for a similar sized home. We have found a couple of wonderful homes that we can't afford because the taxes alone are $400 a month or more. So we may be waiting for a couple of months before we find something that is right for us. We were really gung-hoe at first, but now we are just tired. So we will continue to live with my family for a little while and save our money like crazy. We are also trying to decide if we should get a cheaper home that needs work to build equity, or if we should get a nicer one, but we haven't decided yet, so the options are almost endless. Avri's input is that it needs to have a sandbox, so when we look at one we don't like we just have to tell Avri "it doesn't have a sandbox" and she says "I guess we will find a different one." If only it were that easy.

The kids all love living with Grandma and Grandpa. They are starting to get used to the schedule that everyone goes to work in the morning and it is just me and the kids, but by the evening the house is full of people to play with. So far, the favorite activity is riding on the riding lawnmower with Daddy. But they also think the swingset is great.

Mercedes is getting so much more personality these days. She coos and tries to use her voice quite frequently now and she is smiling all the time! She is quite the charmer and everyone tells us how beautiful she is. She is getting lots of love with all of the family around, so she is loving life.

We miss all of our friends and family back in Utah and we think of you often. I will try to be a little more frequent about my posts so that they aren't so long. Keep in contact, we'd love to hear what all of you are up to.

Job Offer

Well, Kendall flew to Illinois on Monday morning for a job interview with a place called eServ in Peoria. He had his interview on Tuesday morning and then flew home that afternoon. He felt good about the interview and they said that they would contact him before Monday with an offer. So that night we checked the email and the offer was already there! So he is starting at his new job on May 27th, less than 3 weeks from his interview!! That means that we have a little over a week left in American Fork to get the whole place packed up. Because of travel arrangements (we will give the short version of a complex matter) we will be leaving on the 18th, which is only a week from Sunday. It doesn't give us much time and we will be doing everything in crisis mode at top speed. The good side of this is that we will have a whole week in Illinois before he starts his job, which we will use to look for houses. (No we don't have one yet.) We will live with my family until we can find a house and all of our stuff will just be in storage for a little while, but hopefully not too long. So we are taking all of the help that we can get with babysitting and packing so that we won't be leaving things behind and Kendall keeps reassuring me that everything will be just fine. So that is our update. Once again, life is busy, but life is good too.

Our busy weekend

Immediately after Kendall's graduation we drove down to St. George, arriving way past the kids' bedtimes. While we were down there were were able to go to a family reunion and a wedding. Kendall spent the weekend driving all over Southern Utah with my Dad looking for interesting rocks (which they did find along with lots of pretty scenery and some cool lizards as well). It was a busy weekend and we had fun until Saturday night when Talmage woke up throwing up all of the hot dogs that he had scarfed down for dinner. So we spent the whole night cleaning up one mess after another at the condo we were staying in, since Talmage is still too young to understand how to throw up in a bucket. Here are some pictures from our trip (I will leave out the sick part :) ).

Sunday we drove home and then that evening we were able to bless Mercedes at Kendall's parents' house. We decided to just have a very small, non-traditional blessing, since this was the only time my dad would be able to be a part of it. We only had our immediate families there and the grandparents that were able to attend. It was very relaxed, which was a nice change. Kendall gave a beautiful blessing and Mercedes just slept through the whole thing as well as dinner afterward. But she looked beautiful.

(Talmage is not in the picture because he was still really sick with a very high fever, so Grandma stayed home with him so he didn't get everyone else sick. It's been 5 weeks since Mercedes was born and we still don't have a picture with all five of us. It's too difficult to get us to all look decent at the same time. :) I guess that is life with 3 kids.)

GRADUATION

It's been a long time coming, but on Friday, April 25th, 2008 Kendall graduated! He graduated not with just one degree, but three! We are very excited to be able to move on to the next stage in our lives, one which does not involve school (at least for a couple of years).

Kendall received a bachelors in Technology Management (which is the equivalent to Manufacturing Engineering); he also received an associates in Facilities Management and an associates in General Studies. I'm so proud of his hard work. He was able to get 3 degrees in 6 years, all the while working full time and we've had 3 kids in that time frame as well. He has accomplished so much. Now we are looking for a great job for him and a house to live in near that job. This is very exciting since our 2 bedroom apartment is feeling quite small. April has been exciting and very busy!!

Asparagus Problems

As we sat down to dinner the other night, I was excited to have a nice dinner -- grilled pork, rice, and asparagus. Avri didn't quite share my excitement. I asked her what was wrong, to which she replied "I don't want to eat Junior Asparagus!" I guess watching Veggie Tales isn't doing quite the good that I was hoping!

The rest of the clan

We all think Mercedes is kind of our newest toy.

Avri has been a great big helper and she loves "her" baby. She has declared it her job to get diapers, pacifiers, blankets and anything else.




Talmage also loves the baby. He kind of thinks that she is a doll, but he is more gentle than I thought he would be. He does still get a little jealous, but overall he does very well.

I thought this was a cute picture of Avri. Her hair is a bit of a mess, but she is awfully happy about finally having her little sister here.

Our New Mercedes

I finally got around to getting some pictures uploaded of our new little Mercedes. This one is a little blurry, but I still think it's a cute one.


Mercedes is turning out to be a pretty good little sleeper, which Mommy is extremely grateful for. With three kids now, naptime is non-existent for Mom.



These were some of her first little hospital pictures, taken right after her bath. She has a perfectly round little head, no swelling in her face, just one little stork bite between her eyebrows that turns bright red when she cries (i.e. when she isn't wearing anything or if you use cold diaper wipes on her rear end). She is just a perfect little angel.

As you can see she doesn't have much hair, but most of what she does have is in the back and it is very dark. However, her eyelashes and eyebrows are light, so we will see what time does to her coloring: dark like Avrianna or blond like Talmage?

My brother made a comment as he was holding her in the hospital that she smelled like the temple, meaning clean and pure. I thought that it was an interesting comment, but very appropriate since her perfect little spirit is completely clean and pure. We feel very lucky to have one of Heavenly Father's little choice spirits added to our clan.