Our kitchen o boxes

Here is our kitchen about 4 hours after the movers left.






Now don't all of ya'll just want to run up here and visit now?

The big move

This move has been extremely stressful for us.

We have no idea what God has in store for us and I am pretty sure that we will not be spending the rest of our lives in  IL.

One thing I do know is that I am already not looking forward to the next move.

I think I will start praying now that the next move will go smooth.

The movers packed up all our stuff and loaded the truck then drove off on June 4th.

We were out of our old house on June 5th by noon.

Our lawyer called us at 5 minutes after 5pm on Friday the 5th to tell us that we will not be able to close on Monday like we thought. Apparently the underwriters decided they didn't want to work anymore.

Wonderful

So we had to call the moving company to tell them the stuff MAY need to go into storage instead of the house on Monday, but we will call on Monday to confirm. We made sure to say MAY need to go into storage because things have changed daily.

Mr. Genius and I packed up our minivan left the boys at my parents house and drove 9 hours to our new hometown.

Monday morning our lawyer called us to say that the homeowners will let us put our things into the garage just not into the house. Since we don't know when we are going to be able to close now.

So we quickly called the movers and apparently they unloaded our stuff on Saturday even though we said we MAY need to move our stuff into storage.

Then the movers said that the next day that they will be able to deliver would be Wednesday.

And then the real kicker, they gave us a quote for the cost of storage.

Are you ready...

Take a guess...

Just throw any number out there...

Now know this, we get a very big discount with Apple...

OK, they told us $2600!!!!!!!!

Isn't that outrageous!

Apparently I need to be in the moving business and make a killing.

So we of course went berserk. There was no way that we were going to be paying that.

And that was how Monday went.

Tuesday we were pushing the homeowners to let us move into the house on Wednesday so we would have to pay for storage anymore.

The homeowners said they wanted a clear to close (whatever that means) and then they will allow us to move in.

After a day of very intense pray, we got the call at 5:30pm on Tuesday that we got our clear to close.

We called the movers to tell them that we got our clear to close and that we are still on for our Wednesday delivery.

I got in the house and waited for 2 hours Wednesday morning....No movers.

I called the movers and they rescheduled us for Saturday!!!!

What the What!!!

Apparently not only do movers try to rip you of every penny you have they think that they are real estate agents too.

Our rep said that in all his years of doing this he has never had someone been able to move into the house early just because we got a clear to close. So he took the liberty to change our moving date to the next available day which was Saturday.

Oh and they charge more for weekend deliveries.

Oh it was On now.

I couldn't talk to them anymore for fear that God would strike me dead for the things I was thinking in my head to say to these people.

So I just got in my car went straight to the paint store and told myself that I was going to make the most of this and paint the boys room.

Um and if the lawyer of the previous homeowners are reading this. Since we technically didn't own the house at this time. I only went to the paint store to get samples. **cough**cough

So we finally were able to close on the house on Friday.

Then on Saturday we got our stuff delivered.

The movers were done at 12:30.

By 2pm our kitchen was already unpacked. The by 10:30pm we had unpacked and set up the boys room our bedroom, den, closets, and laundry room. We didn't get to the office or the playroom. But I thought we did really good for half a days work.

The reason for so much motivation?

My parents were bringing my boys the next day.

So we were trying to make the transition as easy as possible (which is why we were trying to close on Monday and have a full week to get the house ready, but whatever).

The boys did great on the plane!! WhooHoo.

I am glad we had one thing go good that week.

I took a picture of all the boxes we had piled up in our kitchen but we can't find the cord to connect the camera to my computer. Sorry. That will be my project tomorrow.

11 Things I have learned in the past 2 weeks

1. Chicago's interstate exits are not numbered.
They are named after the name of the road you get off on. So you don't know how close or far away you are from you destination... annoying.

2.Don't mess with Wild Man's food.
Wild Man had no problem when we started packing up his toys, nor did he have a problem moving our swing set away. But when I took our kitchen table out at the end of our driveway to sell...Watch out...He totally freaked out wondering where he was going to eat breakfast. Then when our neighbors bought it (Thanks Erin and Mike) and took it into their garage. He asked if we are going to start eating our meals in their garage.

3. Moving companies are a blessing and a curse.

4. Has learned to be a tree hugger overnight.
When you are charged for every bag of garbage you put out but can recycle as much as you want for free. You learn real fast to embrace your inner hippy.

5. Ikea is my new best friend.

6. It is inevitable that when you forget to bring a change of clothes for your potty trained son...there will be an accident.

7. It is more embarrassing for the mom then the bare bottomed child to wait for a change of clothes in the public bathroom.

8. When extremely motivated you can unpack 75% of your home in half a day.

9.The drive from TN to IL through Indiana is the most boring drive in the world.

10. The state of Indiana smells like poop.

11. People in Chicago consider themselves Midwesterners not northerners. In order to make friends I have declined to show these people a map.

Because I can't sleep and I have no shame...

It is 1am and I CANNOT go to sleep.

We close on this house on Friday.

We don't have to be out of the house now til the 5th.

The movers come on June 3rd to pack our stuff.

They load all our stuff into the truck on the 4th.

They will be delivering our stuff somewhere between the 8th and the 11th.

The problem...

We still don't have a closing date for the IL house.

So we may have all our stuff piled up on the driveway until we can get the keys to the house.

I keep trying to give it to the Lord, but then I keep taking it right back.

So enough about all this house stuff.

I have a story to tell.

For the sake of protecting the innocent, the people in this story shall remain nameless.

This story is about a sweet little boy and a crazy mom.

This sweet little boy and this crazy mom decided to stay home from church on Sunday due to sweet little boy have a not so sweet little fever the day before. The fever was gone but to be on the safe side decided to stay away from other kids.

Instead they decided to relax, play together, and run some quick errands.

Now the crazy mom has been on a crazy new diet. It calls for not eating ANY processed food.

Unfortunately the day before the crazy mom went to her darling husband's grandmothers house and had a full delicious southern spread of foods with all things that were processed.

This didn't agree with crazy mom's new processed free stomach.

After feeling as though all things have (cough, cough) passed, crazy momma had a crazy notion to go to the storage unit and see what things that can be cleared out.

After being in the storage unit for about 10 minutes crazy mom realized that the new process free stomach was still mad at her and realized that she needed to find a restroom, NOW!

So crazy mom proclaimed to sweet little boy that this was a potty emergency.

Being how sweet little boy has only been potty trained for 2 months, he completely knew what a potty emergency was and helped crazy mom throw everything back into the storage unit as quick as possible.

Crazy mom and sweet little boy ran very fast back to the car only to realize that crazy mom left the keys in the storage unit!

Crazy mom started to look around for a nearby bush and was totally out of luck.

While sweet little boy buckled himself into the car as crazy mom ran in place and jumped around until she FINALLY found the keys that had fallen into a box.

Crazy mom ran like a total crazy woman back to the car and drove like a crazy driver to the nearest drug store.

Crazy mom and sweet little boy ran as fast as they could to the restroom.

As crazy mom finally sat down on her (clears throat) throne, sweet little boy sees that crazy mom has gotten to the throne a little too late.

This is how the conversation went

Sweet little boy " Aw mom did you poop in your underwear?"

Crazy mom "Well, kind of honey"

Sweet little boy "Aw, mom that is OK, you will do better next time."

...Later on in the day....

Sweet little boy "Mom?"

Crazy mom "Yes, honey."

Sweet little boy "I didn't poop in my underwear... Are you proud of me?"

Mockery it starts so young nowadays.

Chicago Trip part Dos

So the 2nd part of my trip only has to do with the plane ride home.

I do realize that I am not an experienced traveler and I am sure that there are more eventful plane rides.

But this is my blog and I am going to tell my story.

After a hour ride on the Merta from our new hometown to sign mortgage papers (I think I signed away our next child) and then another hour ride subway trip. I made it to O'hare! Don't get me wrong I actually like Chicago's public transit. I am just proud of myself doing the whole thing BY MYSELF!

In the 3 days I was there I have grown in my public transit self esteem!

I met some really interesting people on the trains and never once did I feel in danger.

Now back to the story.

The plane was to leave at 8:15.

We first got delayed to 8:55.

Then we got delayed to 9:15.

During this time the passengers started complaining.

Now let me tell you how amazing our God is.

Next me I met a girl named Megan, in front of me I met another lady named Claire. We started talking together... well, because we had nothing else to do.

I brought up that I live in Nashville but moving to Chicago. I mentioned we were moving to Geneva and Megan perked up saying that she just moved from Nashville to St. Charles 8 months ago.

Let me explain something. There are 3 cities together that local people call the tri-cities. They call them the tri-cities because they run all together that you can't actually tell when you move from one city to another. These cities are Batavia, Geneva, and St. Charles.

I asked her where she moved from.

Guess...

Yep, Murfreesboro.

She asked what church I went to and then asked who the music minister was. When I told her Russ Lee. She practically stood up and said "Ok, Katie. Let me tell you what a small world we live in. My dad use to sing with Russ Lee in NewSong."

My best friend in middle school's dad was one of the original members of NewSong. I ask her if she knew him and she said that her dad replaced him.

Isn't that just neat?!

Her dad is the music minister of Christ Community Church in St. Charles.

I am thinking that God wants us to visit that church...you think?

Well the 3 of us, Megan, Claire, and I had the best time just gabbing while waiting to get on the plane.

So finally at 9:15 we were able to board the plane.

As everyone was boarding the plane a fight broke out.

I cannot make this up.

The fight was between a 3 year old and an elderly man.

I am serious.

The elderly couple didn't speak english and got in the wrong seat. The mom of the 3 year old started talking to the couple telling them they were in the wrong seat.

The 3 year old was a little anxious and stepped on the elderly woman's foot and with her reaction I think it really hurt her. The elderly man pushed the little boy to get him off of his wife.

Well the mom was livid. She demanded that the couple be removed from the plane. So we had to wait for the airport police to come on board and listen to what happen and decide who would get taken off the flight.

Now I am all against childhood abuse but in this case I was more in favor of getting home to my bed.

Needless to say the rest of the passengers were NOT happy with this mom.

45 minutes later we finally pulled away from the gate!

Now of course as luck would have it as soon as we pulled away from the gate a bad storm hit.

One that had tornado warnings in the area.

Wonderful.

We waited 20 more minutes for the storm to pass.

We then had to taxi in line behind 14 other planes to take off.

At 10:54 we finally took off.

Right before we took off the pilot told us to tighten your seat belts.

I thought that was interesting to say but didn't think much about it.

He wasn't kidding, I was literally glued to my seat cuz he took off so fast.

Then the storm was still around us and we flew right through it.

For 5 minutes straight I moved up and down from my seat. If I wasn't seatbelted into my seat I would have hit my head numerous times on the luggage thing above me.

It was actually never a smooth flight.

I was talking to God contantly. Mostly asking that I wouldn't throw up on the seat in front of me.

I didn't throw up but if it wasn't for the seat in front of me I would have slipped out from under my seatbelt from the force of the plane stopping so fast.

Once we got in the air the pilot flew what would have been an hour and a half flight in 50 minutes.

The pilot apparently wanted to get home as much as we did and all of us passengers felt as though we had all narrowly missed death.

We all kissed the ground when we got off the plane.

Needless to say I will be driving the next time I have to go to Chicago.

Chicago trip part Uno

Well I left for Chicago Monday morning and got back from Chicago Thursday morning at 1am (that is another post all on its own).

The goal of this trip was to find a house. I came armed with a list of houses I found online that caught my eye after months of research.

The funny thing is the house we got was not on that list.

Sometimes you can plan your little heart out but in the end all that matters are HIS plans.

If some of you have been blessed to visit Chicago you know that it is a fun BIG city with loads of public transportation.

I spent the majority of my time on public transit.

Mr. Genius and I got off the plane jumped on the blue line subway and got off of the subway and RAN to the merta commuter train to try to make it to meet the realtor. Unfortunately I got there 2 minutes after the commuter train left.

Mr. Genius had to leave to go to work.

I was kind of mad at him cuz he was leaving me ALL ALONE and to be perfectly honest with you
I wanted to crawl in the corner get in the fetal position suck my thumb and cry.

I probably would have if I didn't think someone had peed in that corner.

This totally intimidated me to be alone in Union station waiting an hour til the next train came all by myself.

For those of you that really know me, this is not like me. I think in my old age I am getting more nervous.

I thought for a second to go outside the train station and walk around. I walk outside for 10 feet got scared that I would get lost and not make it back to the station in time. So I just sat right in front of the train that would take me to meet the realtor until they let me on it.

The adventurous Mama, that walked the streets of New York City by herself, at midnight I might add, has officially left my body.

After getting on the train and an hour ride later (3 hours after landing in Chicago) I meet the realtor.

Our realtor, Kelly, and I looked at some houses on my list.

I have been praying that I would just walk into the house that God wants us to have and I would immediately just feel at home. I didn't have that feeling in any of the houses that I had on my list.

One of them I thought for sure that I would love, the problem was it backed to a very busy street.

I was crushed.

I was feeling really discouraged.

So the realtor took me to look at one house in another area that is about 15 north of where we wanted to live.

The realtor drove me through the downtown part of this city first and I fell in love with this cute little city. I knew that this city was my new home.

The problem was that I didn't like the house that we went to see. The backyard was extremely small and it was on a corner with the road right next to it. There were also a few other things that just kept me from thinking that this was the one. It was really a beautiful house but I just couldn't call it home.

So I took the train back to downtown to meet Mr. Genius then we walked over 2 miles to the hotel.

Oh it was 11pm when we got in our room.

I was beyond tired. Yet my mind was whirling over what we need to do. So we looked online at some more houses and I picked 3 more to look at the next day.

The next I went to look at those houses and the 2nd one will be our new home!

It was just as I prayed for, I walked in the house and immediately felt at home. I had a list of things that I wanted in our house, it meet all the items on that list.

Kelly was even amazed that it had everything on my list. She kept saying "This never happens. No one ever gets everything on their list."

And to make this even more amazing this house was company owned. The couple that built this house in '05 got transferred and their company bought the house from them. Meaning with the company not having an emotional connection to the house. We got this house for substantially less then what the original owner's bought it for when they built it just 4 years prior!

Now this is still Chicago prices, so it was still a little hard for us to swallow.

But I have now doubt that the house is where God wants us to be.

Now my prayer warriors I have another prayer request.

We are closing on our Murfreesboro home on May 29th and moving out on May 31st. The problem is that we will not be able to close on the new house until the 2nd week of June. We are really hoping that we can move straight into the new house on the 31st and pay rent until we close. This is not a normal practice, and our realtor didn't even want to ask this. I told her that is wouldn't hurt to ask. We haven't got an answer yet cuz we are waiting until we have a definite closing date.

This would help us with the expense of moving twice and also at that time we would have to start paying for Mr. Genius to fly back and forth and for his hotel room in Chicago. So it will save us that expense as well.

As much as we don't want to leave all our family and friends here in the 'Boro, it feels weird to ask people to help us pray for us to be able to get there as fast as possible.

So thank you so much for all your prayers we truly appreciate them.

Thank you my friends!

Matthew 21:22

And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.

Like I have stated before I have felt a peace in my heart that Chicago was going to be our next home.

It is now becoming closer to a reality.

We had 17 showings the 19 days we were on the market. Isn't that a blessing all on it's on in this economy?

Don't get me wrong I was very close to wanting to stay in a hotel just so the house I would bite my boys heads off for actually wanting to take their toys out to play with them.

Trying to convience them that looking at their toys is just as fun as touching them didn't happen.

I got the "you really are crazy aren't you" look.

With all the first time showings and no more 2nd showings, it was getting discouraging.

I prayed daily...

well actually hourly...

that God would help me to not stress about our house selling. I knew that he wouldn't give Mr. Genius this job and move us away and not take care of a detail like selling the house.

Then last Friday we had a 2nd showing with a couple that brought their parents.

Thanks to my nosy neighbors (AKA my parents) we learned why we didn't get an offer from them.

They were in our house for 45 minutes. I knew that they also had their eye on another house per their realtor's feedback from their first showing. So I figured to be in our house that long they were debating.

When they were walking out of the house my mom saw that they were standing in front looking out at the street and talking to someone.

Mom went to the front of the house and saw that there was a policemen parked in the middle of our cul de sac and talking to them.

Mom runs out of the house to see what the problem was.

It turns out someone in the neighborhood saw a wandering Hispanic man on our street and called the cops. The cop saw those people coming out of the house and assumed they lived there and asked them if they had seen anything.

The father grabbed his daughter (who would be the potential buyer) and said "If this is what goes on in this neighborhood my daughter will not be living in this house."

This of course would be the first time a cop has been on our street. If that cop just came 2 minutes later they would have never seen it.

God most definitely didn't want them to be the buyers.

On Saturday we had 2 more first time showings and Sunday another 2 first time showings.

Monday we got a 2nd showing!

Then on Tuesday we got 2 offers!

Isn't God so good.

We are actually able to sell the house for more then we were asking. And we are able to close exactly when I been praying for, May 29th, and we don't have to be out of the house til the 31st! Oh and we don't have to pay rent to the new owners for those few days after we close.

Isn't He awesome?!

I leave Monday to go to Chicago to look at houses.

I am kind of excited about this part.

I love looking at houses.

We have been looking in the Naperville area because we have heard what a good area it is, but I haven't found any houses that I just love there. They are older and because it is a popular place to live you are kind of paying for the Naperville name to live there.

I have found another area called Geneva. Does anyone know about this area?

Our realtor thinks we will like it. It has good schools, and good shopping. That is all I know. The realtor and I will be driving around next week so I am praying that I will just fall in love with the house that God has for us.

I am also praying that the owners will be willing to also close on May 29th. Along with offering quite a bit less then they have it listed for.

That isn't asking too much, is it?

Also the cousins pictures are all done!

Go to www.eternaltreasuresphotos.com

Click on Client Ordering

Then choose Spottswood Grandkids from the drop down box.

The password is jane. (all lower case letters)

They are just too cute for words.

I can't wait to have these hung up in my house...wherever that may be.

So my sweet friends will you help us by praying that we find the house that God has picked for us. That has great christian neighbors and that they have kids our boys age, and maybe a money tree in the back yard.

I am just kidding about the last one...kind of.