Long Month, Lots of Changes

Since my last post, my little world has changed in big ways. B came home and was gone again just as quickly after his graduation. He made the three day drive from North Carolina to North Dakota in February.

My awesome dad helped me get our “winter home” in North Carolina ready to get it put on the market. He worked his butt off painting and scrubbing and sanding and washing until it looked good as new.

After what seemed like the longest weeks of my life, my house was empty and clean, my car was loaded with all my remaining things, three dogs, one toddler and my mom.
As we loaded everyone and everything into my car in the drive way of my house I would never see again and getting ready to head down the road, leaving behind my home, my town and my dad I burst into tears. I was so ready to get gone and yet was so sad to go.

Saying goodbye to my dad was incredibly hard, which is some ways was a little surprising to me and in others just as I expected. He of course in all his Italian manliness was a big ole ball of tears. Not only was his daughter leaving, but she was taking with her his almost two year old grandson and did not know when he would see either of them again.

We left on Tuesday March 9th, drove and arrived at the Grand Forks Air Force Base on Thursday afternoon, driving, through West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and finally North Dakota to get to the base.

J-baby, my two year old nephew did so well! Thank goodness for portable dvd players and Sponge Bob Square Pants DVDs! J-baby will be staying with B and me for a bit while his mom works on getting back in school and getting a good job. Not only did J-baby do surprisingly well, but the three boxer babies did amazing as well! Mom and I were both so surprised how well everyone did.

The first night on base we all stayed at the on base hotel. The next morning, Friday, the moving truck pulled up at 9:00am and unpacked everything from our North Carolina home and brought it all into our new house.

Overwhelmed, but excited to get some sort of normalcy, we all worked so hard to get things livable and in some sort of order.

Mom stayed through the weekend and on Monday afternoon J-baby and I drove her to the Grand Forks airport. As soon as I pulled up to the drop off zone, I burst into tears. Haha! I think I actually called the airport stupid! Like, it was its fault that we were there and that my mom was leaving me.

My final goodbye, to my last piece of home, again proved to be much harder than I expected. I remember telling her goodbye when she dropped me off at college, somehow, this was much harder! Haha, I think I pushed her out the door so many years ago and now I didn’t want to let her go. J-baby and I both cried all the way home from the air port.

I have been here now for almost two weeks. There is not much to do here. The base is nice, but small. There is a wonderful parent/child play center here on base that J-baby loves to go to. He gets severe ADD when he enters the doors and runs from one toy to the next after playing or riding it for about 10 seconds. The gym here is huge and I hope to get my butt there more often.

Today, I made my first friend. A new mom to the base with a 10 month old adorable little girl came into the children’s play center today for the first time. We will be going to the gym later this week, for mommy/toddler swim time. Does anyone see a problem with that last sentence? Yes, I will have to get into a bathing suit, in a public area.

Now that the house is coming together and J-baby is used to being here with Blake and I, things are moving pretty smoothly. I am applying for every job opening I can find and hoping to get work soon, at least until our house sells.

Since we are settled and our internet has been hooked up here, I hope to update more frequently and add pictures for my posts. Tomorrow I am going to post J-baby’s 2nd birthday pictures…so stay tuned!