New Years Eve

This New Year's Eve we hung out in the morning for a little bit, then headed up to Muskegon to celebrate with James & Charity! And the best part? Josh's parents came up, too, and babysat ALL FOUR KIDS so we were able to go on a date and then to a party. 

Here we are at dinner. And then...I don't have any more pictures from the rest of the night. We had fun at some of James & Charity's friends house. Thanks for letting us come, too. This was one of the first years we haven't seen our friends on New Year's Eve so it was nice to have something fun to do to keep our mind off of that.

First Basketball Game

We were all excited to go watch the Olivet girls AND boys basketball games Friday night. 

 Gabby was really into it...I think she may grow up to be a basketball star. 

 Brooklynn loved it, too, but she really liked just coloring. She also learned that it's really fun to climb underneath the bleachers when Mommy drops her camera underneath. It's also fun to repeatedly throw cups and other miscellaneous things underneath, just to have another excuse to go back underneath. 

Happenings...

Thanksgiving was great. The drive back was ROUGH...part of why we wanted to move before Christmas. I still have all the pictures on my camera. We got back, made the decision to move two weeks from then and it's been a whirlwind ever since. The move was successful. We managed (barely) to fit all our stuff into a 26 foot truck. We then fit almost everything into two storage units and are still living out of suitcases. We realized that we HAVE our computer and our tv but no cords to set them up. (so funny, kind of) So really it might be several more months before I blog about Thanksgiving.
So BIG NEWS for those of you who don't yet know: Josh got the job we were hoping for. Literally we found out the last few hours in our apartment. He probably wouldn't have been able to accept unless we made that crazy decision to move before he got the job. OR we'd be making the drive for Christmas then moving a few days later. Or missing Christmas completely. It is just such amazing confirmation that this was the best decision AND that it is what God wants for us.
We decided to find a temporary place to live IN Goshen instead of commuting from Fort Wayne (especially in the winter months). It turns out my Mom knows somebody in Goshen that manages an apartment triplex for a missionary family and one of the apartments is open Jan 1. AND they are fine if we live there just a few months. So most likely we will be living there...maybe even by the end of the week. We just need to go look at it to make sure.
We had a great Christmas! We started in Olivet with Josh's family. Then we headed down to Fort Wayne with my family. Then we went back up to MI again. Right now we're in Muskegon with Josh's brother & family for New Year's. We decided to stay until Wednesday so they could watch a football game Tuesday night. Then we will (hopefully) drive straight to Goshen Wed. Morning to check out the apartment and finalize Josh's job. We went last week, too, but they accidentally put his criminal check through IN instead of PA so they had to do it again.
So the plan is to hopefully start soon, live in temporary housing for at least three months, and then buy a house hopefully soon after that.
We are all enjoying being closer to family. Brooklynn especially has come out of her shell. It is so fun to watch her play with her cousins.
I think the hardest adjustment do far will be my handling of the mall...it is REALLY small.
It still feels a little bit like we're just taking a long Christmas vacation.
This is one of the park in Goshen. I can't wait to take the girls there when it gets nicer.

Playing in the Snow

Visiting Goshen

So this is our new town! We were so excited to visit to see where we were going to be living. Josh had a meeting with his work so we all decided to go to visit. During the meeting we went to McDonalds playland and also visited a mall. (If it deserves to be called a "mall".) When we dropped Josh off for his meeting we got to go in and meet his new boss and even get a tour of the building. It is really nice! 

Here is good old, flat Indiana. I love it.

Here is Everence from the outside. Isn't it a nice building?

I was really excited to see so many fast food places....so we're not entirely isolated from the world. It has quite a bit of stuff.

 After we picked Josh up we drove to our new house to see it. We weren't able to go in yet but at least we got to see the outside. We would have the top floor. And it's only half of our rent from PA. Sweet. I told Josh I could live here regardless of what the inside looked like; after all, it's only for a few months, right? He still wanted to be able to see the inside to make sure so we'll have to come back.

 Since Josh was back we drove around a little more to see more of Goshen. Here is "downtown." 

 This is Shanklin Park...what a cute place! Brooklynn is going to be so excited. Both of the girls were sleeping at this point so we just kind of drove around, and then headed back to Olivet.

Flexible Brooklynn

Here is Brooklynn showing off her flexibility...it is quite impressive. No wonder everyone wants to see this girl in gymnastics. As soon as we find a place here we'll look into it. 

Brooklynn's New Barbie Car

Brooklynn LOVES her new Barbie car. Thanks to James, Charity & Betsey for getting her such a great gift. She continues to ride it all through the house. I can't wait until spring to show her how she can even ride it outside.

Learning to Climb

Here is Gabby learning how to climb the stairs. This is one of her new favorite games.

More Christmas