Internet Coming Friday!

Living without high-speed internet is harder than we all think. We have always had fast internet (thank you Darin) and now living without is tough. Although my cousin, Luke (whose kiddos Im watching) is letting us use his computer for a bit. Thanks Luke, you have been so helpful. Internet coming Friday ---FiOS--

Busy...but Loving Seattle!

We are really trying to get settled in and that means unpacking boxes and figuring out where the heck we are going to put all our stuff! But on a good note we are loving the weather and waking up with the windows open to the chirping of the birds and the cool breeze. I really feel like we are living in a cabin because of all the pine trees and the cool weather. It feels just like we are camping but with a nice warm bed to sleep in at night instead of a sleeping bag.

Here is a list of things we are loving so far:

**Being able to walk down the road and seeing a peek-a-boo view of Puget Sound

**Weather in the 60's and low 70's. Today my weather thingy says 73.8 (in the shade)

**Seeing blue jays in our backyard

**Finding blueberry bushes in our backyard

**Our nice, big home that fits us and all our stuff

**Driving by Boeing and seeing the massive airplanes being built.

**Being able to find the WinCo in Marysville which has normal prices compared to Safeway and QVC

**Having the boys in a bunk bed (finally done with the crib)

**Love not worrying about the doors being shut all the time because there are virtually NO flies and NO mosquitos! My kids are celebrating about this because before this we were staying in Emmett (the mosquito capital of the world)

Things that we are realizing:

**Going from a 3-car garage to a 2 car with a big beam in the middle (I know we were spoiled)is an adjustment

**That ghetto wallpaper needs to be changed

**That a light pink master bedroom is not going to fly with me

**Why they didn't put a single big light in all the bedrooms

**That we really don't need AC

**Our nice big deck in the back yard really needs the mildew scraped off and repainted.

**All the shrubs/roses/grass have not been watered/trimmed for 4 years!!

**That our primary is tiny and CTR 8 is the highest it goes.

Our New Home

We are moving in on July 10th. If you want our new address just email me and I will get it to you. I also lost everyones address due to our recent CAR BREAK IN (don't get me started on that!) while looking for houses in Seattle. My purse and cell phone along with Darins laptop got taken. I will have to hunt down all your addresses and phone numbers down. Thank goodness for email though. On a better note, we are really excited for our adventure and feel blessed to be able to rent a beautiful house for a cheap price!

Found a House!

Okay, so we finally found a house to rent. We wish we could buy, but we are flat broke after selling our home in Boise. We had our two oldest kiddos with us and dropped off Davis at my sisters house in Kennewick. Thanks Kim, for watching him for me! It was a life saver!:)
We arrived in Seattle early Friday morning with a piece of paper filled with houses to look at. My kids were thrilled to drive from house to house looking day after day! Im kidding! They figured out real quick that this was not fun. But I rewarded them with swimming at the hotel and pop at restaurants when they were good. Needless, to say we found a house and just afterward got out rental car broken into. Lesson learned...Don't leave purse and GPS in car even for 10 minutes in broad daylight on Fathers Day even if your in a hurry!! It is Seattle..I know. Now I am super paranoid about even letting me kids play outside in the front yard. We did find a really cool house in a great neighborhood close to the Puget Sound. Excited for all the things to come, vacations and sites to see.

Unexpected!

So we got an email from the storage company who is storing my whole life while we are on hold in Emmett. They quoted us a DISCOUNT of $36/day Uh, helloooo, that is like 1,100 a month just to store our stuff. I don't think so!! So, we may be moving sooner than we thought. It doesn't make sense to stay here in Emmett and save money if really we aren't really saving. If things go as planned we may be renting a van and driving up to Seattle to find a rental and search out our new home. We plan on taking the two older kiddos with us and dropping off Davis at my sisters.

I think im ready to get this show on the road! I feel like Im on standby at an airport waiting till our flight is ready.

Just got word from Darin, looks like we are heading to Seattle next weekend!!

SOLD!!

As of Thursday, June 4th our home in Meridian is sold! If I seem excited Im not really. Its kinda sad actually. Ive never had to move and give up a great life and great friends, with a great ward before. Im pretty much on hold right now. Waiting till we can start our new life in Seattle. We are currently living in Emmett, ID with Darins nephew, Justin and Erin Walker. How sweet they are to allow us to live with them. We have Carson and basically two sets of twins, 5 kiddos under the age of 7. Chelsea and Kelsey are 41/2 and 5. ThenA little crazy at times but really not to bad. They are getting ready to take a 10 day trip to Indiana so we will have some sort of normalcy for a bit.

We are looking forward to driving up to Seattle in July to find a rental house. We are trying to mix a vacation in with it so we are taking Carson and Chelsea with us. Davis will be staying with my sweet sister, Kim. I want to plan a few fun things to do with the kids to get them pumped about living there.

29th Birthday!

Yes, Im 29 today!

Today is a day that i kinda have been dreading. I knew that my first birthday without my mom was going to be hard. I need her right now amongst all the mess in my life. Mom was always the constant in my life and when life was crazy with big decisions she was always there with a calm voice, giving advice and helping me through it. I miss her today!

The stress kept building:

my kids were watching TV at 1:00 in the afternoon,
I was scrolling through houses we cant afford,
kids fighting over tv, its my birthday,
im supposed to be happy,
husbands gone
...then I snapped!

Im not one to totally fall of my rocker but I was DONE with everything!!

It was a hard, hard day. My kids were all crying, I was crying...it was me. I had let my family get to backwards that we were watching tv at 1:00 on a Sat. afternoon. C'mon that doesn't fly at our house. I was always on the computer getting sucked in to finding the perfect house even though we cant move there till July-Aug.

That was the first part of my day now to the second half

After my fall-out I regrouped and started to study for my talk in sacrament mtg for the next Sun. along with Sharing time for Junior/Senior. I gathered my stuff and went outside under the shade of our tree by Myself. I read an amazing talk that totally hit me. It was titled "Finding Strength in Challenging Times" by Allen F. Packer. What an amazing talk. Later that night Darin took me out to dinner at Tucanos where I got a free meal. Before dinner we drove out to the airport and talked for a bit then gave me the sweetest card ever along with Paul Cardall CD. Love that man!!

A day that started out really horrible ended really great! Not the birthday I thought it was going to be but definitely one that I won't every forget.

Buy or Rent??

Now that we have and offer we are constantly looking for houses in Seattle. Some may think that sounds fun but when housing prices are $300-350,000 for the same size house that we have now, its rather depressing. What to do...trying to figure out all the logistics of everything is exhausting but at least I can relax on my house cleaning, picking up contantly. Im not that way by nature so it takes effort for me to constantly clean and get the kids to clean up EVERythinG in sight all the time. For now we have decided to buy to take advantage of the low interest rates but we will see if Darins work does what they say they will do.

OFFER!

My life has been a roller coaster the last month and to say the least a little STRESSFull!! So now Im playing catch-up and going back! So, Im fudging on the date so I can pretend that I posted right when it happened!!

While I was out of town visiting my sister Melanie, helping her with her new baby we had an offer come in. My awesome husband cleaned house and cooked dinner, while my amazing friend, Alyssa watched my two little kiddos. I believe it was May 4th, and after 4 showings in one day a glorious offer came in that evening! It was bittersweet because it all was starting to feel real. Ive known that we were going to move since February but not until August so I pushed it away because it was easier to face. But when the weather started to warm and now the offer came in on our home it is 50% exciting but also 50% scary and sad as well.

We were really happy with the offer we did get and feel that moving to seattle must be right for us.

Keldon David Cain

The sweetest little boy was born on Friday, May 1st. Isn't he the cutest! Melanie had her first baby last week and I was there to help bring him into this world. What an experience that was! Her husband, Chris and I helped Melanie through her labor and gladly celebrated when it was all over. I was able to spend 5 days with Melanie and tried to fill my mothers absence. That was really hard to do. How can I fill such large shoes? When I had all three of my kids, my mom would come for about 4 days to help out with the kids and take care of me. It was such a fun time that we got to spend with eachother.
Visiting Melanie was similar but when two sisters get together with very little sleep and lots of sugar, silliness starts to set in. We shared a lot of laughs intermixed with cooking and of coarse some naps. I tried to help with dishes and a little cleaning but I constantly had to ask myself "What would mom be doing right now if she were here?" I knew what Sherri would do, thats easy, but what would mom do? We shared a few tears together but also felt that she was near, especially while in the hospital. We miss you mother...

Seattle Gardening

This is what Im going to plant in Seattle. They have a bunch of different plants up there. Basically everything that we CANT grow here. Rhodies, Azaleas, Fuchsias, Impatients. I want to find a little house where i can experiment on some of these fun plants. We sold some of these at the plant sale when I was in high school but I remember them not doing very well cause it was too windy then always got too hot!

Sweet Briar



Fuchsia (Mrs. Popple)

Favorite Trees

I love spring! I love it when I see brand new tulips poking their way through the ground. I love it when the bare naked trees get their blossoms. Winter is so blah, and ugly and its such a blessing to have spring, new life and beauty! I have a few favorite trees that I watch on my way home every time I go out. I notice these beautiful trees and always swear Im going to figure out what kind they are so I can someday grow my own.

I have this dream of someday having a huge yard with trees and shrubs everywhere. A pool with flowers and lush green grass. A huge swing set for the kiddos and my garden by the fence. The house I kind of imagine was the home where we took our first swimming lessons. The yard was gorgeous! I can see this home in my head and someday I hope that maybe I will be in one home long enough to work toward something like that but maybe on a smaller scale. to make it come true. But until then I like to collect my favorite trees and shrubs so I know what I like.

Here are just a few of my favorites:


Sensation Maple (this tree has amazing fall color, a mixture of yellow, reds and orange) It get really big too!


Spring Snow Crabapple (these trees are in front of the Meridian Winco and are a globe shape.


Canadian Red Chokecherry (these have white,fragrent, conie blossoms and the leaves turn a red color in the summer


Plum (there are lots of varieties but have pretty pink blossoms in the spring

Babies Galore!

All of my friends are expecting this spring. My sister in law started the prego craze with her baby boy, which was born on April 15th.

Next is Melanie, Im guessing his birthday will be May 1st (cause babies are meant to be born in May, right Mel!)

Then, its Marne's surprise baby in the middle of May...will it be a boy or girl??

Okay, then I believe we have a little break until Maren is due July 3rd.

Holy Cow, fun for me to be surrounded by all these sweet lil babies.


Can't wait to fill in for my mom and be there with Melanie for her first. What a beautiful thing it is to have your first. Its forever etched in your brain and a day and experience that you will never forget.

Beautiful Home for Sale

My life right now is trying to keep my house clean and picked up. I have dejunked and brought a TON of stuff out to the garage for our soon to be garage sale. What a aha moment that is....the less junk you have to manage in your home the easier it is to keep clean. It really hasn't been too bad. We have had 2-3 showings a week so when you have a showing every other day the house doesn't have time to get really messy. C'mon isn't this house cute!! It will sell, right?

Jumping UP and Down!!

Hi Sherri,

I know you mentioned earlier that you would like Nicole’s dresses that she outgrew. Well, I went through all her clothes and I have two garbage bags full of girl clothes. Would you like them for Chelsea? I am just going to donate them so they are yours if you want them!

Beckie

This is the email that I recieved from a friend in my ward. Now, wouldn't you be jumping up and down too! We couldn't wait to get home to sneak a look into the bags. In fact, I couldn't figure out why chelsea was hiding behind the seat but asked "honey, what are you doing?" She revealed her naked legs and with a smirk she sheepishly said "I want to wear this!" She picked out a really cute, teal polka dot skirt which she is still in love with.

After we got home and started really looking through stuff I about passed out from my adrenaline rush. I was literally screaming!! My kids thought I was wierd.
Talk about prayers being answered. We are losing TONS of money on our house but now I don't have to buy ANY clothes for Chels and we are set for Seattle. Oh, I will probably just have to buy one thing...a umbrella and some galoshes :)