4 year house anniversary

So I just realized earlier today that four years go this last week we moved into our house. That's pretty much a record for us. Zach probably talks about moving every other day. Today he said he wants to move into a house with an elevator (apartment? big huge house? we're not sure what he was referring to) We rented a house from my dad for about 4 years after we were married, but that was never our home. We never belonged. (to the ward or the neighborhood) Everyone else had lived in those houses for years and years, and all had high school kids I probably had more in common with. I spent those four years "playing house" with my little family. Despite the fact that the house was small and inadequate, (one bathroom, no built in dishwasher) it was cheap -300 a month as long as one of us was going to school.

Our next house only made it three and a half years. (It seems longer-but that's actually a good thing in this instance.) As if it was meant to be, almost the moment John graduated from Weber State University, we found out he would be laid off from work or we could transfer down here to Arizona. It was one of those things were everything just fell in to place and you KNEW you were making the right choice. He got a raise, we could afford to buy our first house, and after two whirlwind days of house hunting the moment I walked into the house I knew it was the right one. It was one of those things where the previous sale had just fallen through only the day before and the family was home and the realtor went knocking on the door to see if we could see it. We nearly made an offer on the spot. Don't get me wrong, the house wasn't that fabulous, but it was just right for us right then. Life wasn't all that peachy with the move either. I mean I was depressed. For like a whole year. I knew it was the right choice, but I wasn't all sunshiny about it. It was hard, but I think I grew more as a person/adult/mom than I could have imagined. And we made some awesome friends. After 3 and half years of living there, it was time to leave, we were growing out of that one, poor Zach was sleeping in the office with all of John's computers and junk, so we built a new house just two miles down the road. My new house was bigger and nicer, and better for our family, but I still cried when we left. It wasn't so much the house itself as it was the people I felt I was leaving behind. Without any family in the state our neighbors and friends became our family and it was hard to leave. -It's always amazing to me to look back or look around and see the hand of the Lord in my life and that I might not always be in control as I think, but that's a good thing. The good news is that I have managed to keep in contact with most of them and got to spend time with a lot of my good friends this week. It's been an exceptional week in that respect. (most likely more on that later)

I got my Realtor's license, sold our last house in an incredible 4 days (it was the market, not my amazing skill at selling houses- I've since let my license expire, it wasn't for me) and we moved into our current house. A friend of mine asked me the other day if this was our "forever house" I think so. Maybe. Possibly. Most likely. I'm living like it is. There are no plans for the immediate future. John has been offered jobs in many cities in the country, in fact his office is technically in St. Louis, MO and he has told me before that I could pick any city to move to because it doesn't really matter with all the traveling he does, but I think we are good here. I love it here. Our friends from Vernal kept lobbying for us to move there while they were here staying with us. He's a doctor so I countered with all the new hospitals that are open and the new medical office complexes that he could walk to if he opened a practice there and bought one of the houses in the neighborhood. Since he's a doctor he said that if we moved there we could pretty much get all our doctor visits for free, he'd be willing to come over and check ears and throats, and prescribe any medicines (I was harassing him all week to just write me a prescription for a muscle relaxant for my back, cause my prescription expired, but he has ethics-he doesn't want to contribute to any deliquency I might decide to take up- aargh! I hate Dr.'s offices) except he said I would have to get my own doctor for "female stuff" cause that's just too weird. But we are happy here. We sure wouldn't mind a basement with a home theater and a big game room or a snazzy gourmet kitchen for me, but that's just a fantasy at the moment and we could still be very happy here for many more years. We have great friends and neighbors, good schools, parks nearby, the new mall is open and the shopping gets better almost daily, I pretty much never have to leave Gilbert again. The only exception to that is the Chandler Fashion Center mall, they have Godiva, See's, and Williams-Sonoma.

(I've been really lousy at trying to keep any sort of journal the past 12 or so years, so I think I am trying to make up for it with this blog- I am sure there will be many more posts similar to this one in the future)