Our Last Full Week

I woke up today with a sore throat and cold feet, but when I rolled over in bed my heart was filled with so much warmth seeing my hubby and Micah snuggling next to me. (Micah snuck in early this a.m.) Matt flew in last Thursday to embark on a fun filled weekend in Las Vegas with some of his closest guy friends. He got home Sunday night and had a flight out today to Pittsburgh for training, part 2. We have so much ahead of us this week with the move. Movers come on Thursday and Friday to pack everything up. Saturday is our last dinner with family and friends and also a pre-birthday celebration for Mylie's 5th Birthday. Then 3 days later we have our final move flight to Ohio. It's all so surreal. I keep telling Matt over and over "I just don't know what to expect". Our lives are going to be so different in Ohio. But before I look forward, I want to look back at the past few weeks, months leading up to our move. It has been such a joy to see all our family and friends get together for lunches, dinners, weekend getaways, parties and so on. God has directed our lives on such a precious path which has lead us to meet so many incredible people along the way. Each stepping stone in life is filled with people, wonderful people, and as we reach out along the way those people have impacted our lives incredibly. Matt and I are so grateful to all our family and friends for loving our kids and us. Thank you for your words of encouragement, hugs and laughter through the years. Thank you for taking the time to call us on the phone or send us an e-mail. Thank you for your prayers during good times and bad. But most of all thank you for your LOVE. I was reminded today during our prayer and devotion time about a verse. Micah asked to read the book of Romans. He was looking through my bible and asked "Why do you have so many notes and highlights on these pages"? Seeing all these notes and highlights made Micah want to read a chapter from Romans before bedtime. One of my favorites popped out and I wanted to share it tonight with you: Romans 12:9-10 Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves.
So again, thank you for your "sincere love" and whether we are near or far apart, we will be devoted to you in brotherly love.
Good Night from Corona, CA T minus 7 days.

XOXO

Sunday, March 4th "Family Fun Day"

On Sunday we woke up bright and early at 10:30 a.m. (that's 7:30 a.m. PST, early for mommy on a Sunday). We attended a local church called Grace Chapel. The pastor was really good and we enjoyed the worship.  Not much different than CA.

After church we drove down to Cincinnati downtown. After looking up some ideas for things kids to do, we headed over to the Cincinnati Children's Museum. The Museum Center of Cincinnati is beautiful. It was an old train station and still operates Amtrak. Inside the museum center are three museums, Museum of Science and Industry, Museum of Cincinnati History and the Childrens Museum. We ended up buying a family pass so we can come back and visit the other museums. We had a really fun, kidish time there.

Next we drove to downtown Cincinnati for lunch. We ate at the Cincy Grill...super yummy. Ater driving around downtown we noticed that half of the city is very run down with old vacant buildings that seem to be from the 20's. And the other half is nicely kept up with beautiful historic buildings and also newly renovated buildings. I can't wait to show our family and friends that visit us.

We ended our day running a few errands and then decided to drive to the rental properties we were considering in the evening hours to see if it would help us make a decision. I'm so glad we did. After narrowing down our top 2 options there was a clear difference in the neighborhoods at night. One had no street lights and the other did. We called our agent and confirmed our decision to rent the "Kelso" home. We are going there today again to take some more pictures and video so we can show Grandma Nani when we get home. God is so faithful and I just knew He would open the right door for us.

Yesterday-12 Houses in 1 Day!

Yes, just as the title reads we saw 12 houses in Ohio yesterday. It was a long, long, cold day. Good thing we were bundled up. It wasn't easy to do, but our amazing Realtor by the name of Sandra found us 12 pet friendly homes for rent. Of the 12 we only liked 4. After driving what feels like the entire state of Ohio (really only a 15 mile radius from Matt's work), I have to say that Ohio is much more inviting than I expected. Well, I actually didn't really know what to expect. It truly is a beautiful state. There are trees and lakes and ponds and just a whole lot of breathing room. It's kind of refreshing. We are fortunate enough that Matt's school is located in a very populace area. As far as stores and restaurants go, you can find all the comforts of CA right here in Ohio. It might seem silly, but that fact alone makes Ohio more welcoming to me. :) All I need is a Target, Sam's Club, good grocery store and Trader Joes! Matt also pointed out a beautiful mall equipped with all the necessities like Nordstroms, Macys, Crate & Barrel and much, much more. You can all now rest assured I will be well taken care of over here. HAHA!
Enough about the stores and shopping, back to our house hunt. We saw many amazing homes, but because of the size of our family, 2 dogs and wanting room for guests to visit us we had to be picky. We have 4 homes on our list and all of them are quite uniquely different from each other. It's going to be a tough decision, but with prayer I know God will open the right door for us. So tell me what you think? Here are the options:

House 1: "Kelso" Matt's favorite

This house is stunning. 5 bedroom/5 bath very secluded with a beautiful rushing spring behind it. All you hear is rushing water when you walk outside. Our first steps outside, Matt and Micah spotted a deer running behind the house. Seriously. This is the perfect nature lovers house. It sits on almost 3 acres of land. Matt's commute would be around 15 min. Not bad. And check out the giant kitchen with wood beams! Ahhhmazing!

Next is "Russell". He's a custom house. Freakin awesome kitchen and master bath. And the backyard has a spa, pool, fire pit and playset! 5 bed/3 bath. Close to Matt's work. Only downside is it's in an older neighborhood.

Third: The West Chester House
4 Bed/3 Bath, nice lot with playset in the backyard. Downside is it is a 25 minute commute for Matt to work.

We'll update everyone soon on our final decision. Praying God opens the right door for us :)



Journey to Ohio to House Hunt

The adventure has begun. Micah, Mylie and I flew into Ohio last night. We arrived later than anticipated. It was a long journey for all of us. The night before our flight left I got an e-mail from our airline letting us know that one of our flights into Ohio had been cancelled. It took 2 hours for customer service to switch our flights. We ended up having to take a later flight out of John Wayne Airport. We arrived 2 hours before our flight time on Friday because although we had confirmed seats, our seats weren't together, and I wanted to talk to the agents at the airport to see if there was anything they could do to get us together. The good news was that they were able to switch people around for us so we could sit together, the bad news was Chicago was having a terrible storm and our flight was delayed 3 hours! And to top it all off Cincinnati was having a storm too and issued a tornado warning! Crazy huh? But after 5 hours, 3 subway sandwiches, 2 gift shop toys, and 2 brownies later we were on a Jet plane to Chicago anyways and praying our flight into Cincinnati wouldn't be affected.

Let me back up a bit to our first steps onto the plane. You know how the Captains stand inside the plane, by the door and greet you as enter? Well, they must have seen the amazement in Micah and Mylie's eyes as they entered because they quickly introduced themselves as the airplane pilots and asked Micah and Mylie if they wanted to go into the cockpit and see the control center. Micah politely shook his head yes, while Mylie had the look of fear on her face. The Captain was kind enough to get down to Mylie's level, take her hand and tell her he had a special friend he wanted her to meet. There was a lady pilot getting things ready in the cockpit. As you all know "princess Mylie" loves everything girly so as soon as she saw the lady she was smiles and giggles. My kids will never forget their kindness and it really put them at ease for the flight.

The kids did so great on our flight. They were amazed by the speed of the plane during take off and giggled as there tummies did flips inside them. Mylie kept saying "mommy, my tummy tickles!" The higher we got into the air, the more happy-nervous Micah got. He said "it was all kind of freaky" being up so high. Micah has been on flights before but the experience is so much different for an 8 year old. They loved the experience. It was so fun listening to them discuss amongst themselves how little the houses looked, that they could see there home in Corona and how they couldn't believe they were rising above the clouds. Micah said "I'm getting hotter the closer we get to the sun"! HA! I had to laugh. Although this flight was long the kids entertained themselves and were very well behaved. Some of our neighbors on the flight acknowledged their good behavior when we had landed and were gathering our bags to exit the plane. I couldn't have been a prouder mommy.

Since our flight got in so late, Micah, Mylie & I had to sprint from one end of the airport to the other and Chicago O'Hare is huge....so through people movers and escalators we ran as fast as a 4 and 8 years old could. Only to be the last people to get on the plane and apparently they were holding the plane for Madrid Party of 3! I'm just glad we made it in time or the next flight wouldn't have been until the next day. After we all plopped in our seats, got situated and caught our breaths I had a minute to check my phone. Luckily Matt had sent me a text message saying that the storm had passed through the Cincinnati area which was very reassuring.

Our flight from Chicago to Cincinnati was less than an hour.  It went so fast I can't even remember what we did. lol!

Overall our journey to Ohio was the perfect adventure for us. We were so happy to be greeted by the best hubby & daddy in the world! :)