Saddles, T-squares, and Sippy Cups

Chris left for Milwaukee and the kids and I toughed it out in IN for a week before he came back the following weekend.

(One of the major blessings and tender mercies of this month was that Chris was able to stay with his cousin John. It was quite "lucky" that John, who is in the midst of his first year of residency, had an 8-5 schedule for the month of September instead of his crazy, exhausting ward months where every 4th day he has a 30 hour shift. We are so grateful for their willingness to take on Chris for about 3 weeks! You know what they say about guests-they are like garbage. After a bit they start to stink!)

That first week was a long, long week. And the weekend with him home was a short, short weekend!

Before he left on Sunday I overheard Chris telling Noah that we were coming up to visit him in Milwaukee that week. Really!?! Surprise, surprise!

I planned a bit (when and how was I going to do this on my own?) and bagged a bit (of snacks and treats that I could throw to the back of the van while driving) and finally we took off Tuesday morning right after feeding Sage. We made great time and even with our two quick stops for a new movie and to prop up a bottle for Sage.

We stayed at a hotel with a great little kiddie pool and spent the evenings with daddy.
We stayed two nights and drove back the third morning. Again, I was amazed by how awesome the kids were for the drive. I felt so empowered making that three and a half hour drive with three kids by myself :)

We made it to the weekend when Chris came down again-poor guy always left after work and always hit Chicago at rush hour. One of his tasks for the weekend? Bring back all the things we had de-cluttered out of our house and stored at a very generous friends house! (Another task was to re-home our cat, Malcolm, but our farewell is for another post.)
Why? Because the movers were coming!! Tuesday the movers (Gotta love that word! More later about why I really did love my movers!) came and started packing us up.
They packed Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday and part of Thursday. It was kinda tough doing three kids with more and more of their stuff packed up but the boys loved the big truck and were allowed a tour of the trailer and the cab.

As for Sage, she was an angel through it all. I think how all this could have been if she had been like the second-it would have been lunacy. Mine! Stark-raving-commit-her-to-an-institution-mad! But I know that Heavenly Father knows what we need and it was this:
The sweetest, most easy going, and undeniably adorable little girl! She is a very good traveler, riding quietly or sleeping, and has been very obliging in being smaller in size than her brothers at her age. She slept in this moses basket till she was just over 4 months old. I felt so blessed that she still fit! Her bed was small and portable so that even in hotels she had a consistent, familiar place to sleep. This was her preferred sleeping position.

Ok, so that gets us up to about September 30th, when we were supposed to close on the house. Due to lack of communication from an appraiser we had to push that back a day. We successfully closed on October 1st. However, since we couldn't get a closing time till the afternoon the movers wouldn't be able to unload our stuff till Monday. Yay, one more weekend in a hotel! (Can you hear the sarcasm oozing out of that last statement?)

But lets say the glass is half full and remember that this meant I got to clean the house before unloading day. And seriously, I would wait all weekend for my movers. They were so awesome! I was so happy to have movers-what woman with a 3 kids under 4, one being a 4 month old baby, wouldn't be thrilled? But there was certainly some trepidation. Who hasn't heard the horror stories? Fires in the moving truck, lost belongings, long waits for delivery, etc., etc., etc.

Merchant's Moving is a little different than the big national chains. They are family owned and take extreme pride in doing excellent work. They only hire full-time employees and never use temporary or contract labor. Our belongings were the only things on the truck and should there be a hitch in the works they will keep the things on the truck for one week. After that it would be stored in their secure warehouse. The same workers pack, load, drive, and unload on the other end. I had a moving coordinator that took care of scheduling and whom I could call with any questions or concerns throughout the process.

I was feeling way better about things and with good reason. They were great. I happily filled out a survey telling them how smoothly things went and how pleased I was with the jobs that each person had done. I concluded by commenting that the only way it could have been better was if they had sent two moving truck magnets for my two boys instead of one.

Just a couple of days ago I got a letter in the mail from the president of the company and these:

I told you they were great!

Before Chris left to start his job at Bucyrus in Milwaukee, we had one last hoo-ra at the lab.

Oh, the hours we have spent here. On rainy days, visiting daddy, or just visiting the machines.

For our boys it doesn't get much better than this.

I thought it would be fun to do some sort of 'then' and 'now' pictures about our start and finish in grad school, but as it turns out, I don't have pictures to do that. I couldn't find a picture of me and Chris (or even just Chris) with his skid steer loader that he did his MS project on.

We didn't have this guy when we started, though.

And this was his PhD excavator.
But we couldn't even seem to get all of our kids in a picture to show how far we have come in five years!
Goodbye Maha lab. We will miss you and your grand toys. I mean machines, yeah, machines.

there was
Just kidding.

For real, before the hunt, there was a thesis defense.

While the kids and I were in TX, Chris slept well all through the night and worked all day on his thesis. After three mad weeks we decided he needed more time.

Two weeks after that and he took a break to come help me drive home. When we arrived home there was still more to do. He worked hard to split his time between the kids and the thesis. Finally, and just in the nick of time, the thesis got done enough to defend it.

It was a miracle. Yep, a real, honest to goodness miracle. The first draft his advising professor read received this critique "I have always liked everything you have ever written. But this, I don't like this at all."

We were shaking in our boots after that. And not for the last time, as it turned out.

There was the chapter that Chris hadn't done the research for yet. Miraculously, Monika decided that 'not included' was better than 'poorly done'.

Then there was the time a pump fell off the excavator. The one of a kind, custom-made-pump that would require 30 days to replace. We won't mention the price. Providentially, the only thing damaged was a coupling that was in stock, over-nighted and cost about $30.

Or the day the excavator broke down twice. Actually, it was the last day that Chris had to take measurements that had to be included in the thesis. Prayerfully, he was able to diagnose and correct both problems with a minimum delay and gather all the data he needed.

But finally it reached a defensible status. It was a big day that we had been working towards for three years. By no means the end of the road (I'll be sure to post about Chris being hooded!) but a huge step nonetheless. Chris wore his best suit and I stressed about refreshments. He presented to a full room and did an awesome job. I know, because he actually talked about his work in a way that I could understand. (A useful and uncommon talent for an engineer!)

After we were dismissed so the real grilling could begin, I went to work putting together a small table of brunchable foods for his committee to enjoy afterwards. Not knowing how much time I had kept me hopping to get it all together.

I remember in my teenage years watching my mother host huge gatherings of people, making huge quantities of food and making it all look so effortless. I am reminded each time I have to do something like this, how not effortless it is for me! I stress and worry and rearrange plates and try to make it nice (it is a reflection on Chris not just me!) and then Dr. Lumkes comes out, grabs one bite and leaves.
Talk about deflated. No comment on the food and a rushed aside about how it is going to be a little longer since one committee member arrived late and had way too much to say.

The waiting continued until finally it ended. Success! He had passed! They ate the food and Monika talked about the cake that Najoua had brought back from her wedding in Tunisia. Oh, well. They ate it.

This is turning into a long post, but I gotta finish the day.

That afternoon Chris had to pass the defense created by his fellow grad students. This included wearing an excavator costume, basketball with the real excavator and bottle cleanup with the mini water-powered hydraulic demonstration excavators.
Then that evening, we went to dinner at Monika's house. It was our last time at this annual event. I was given roses from Monika's garden for being a supportive wife (aka the little woman who lets her husband work like a dog for most of three years:)
And that was the end of the day.

"It was the ending of an era, the turning of a page." At least it felt like it till he went back to the lab and worked like a dog some more before leaving to start the new job in Milwaukee. But that is for another post-Milwaukee, not the working like a dog part.

The last week of August we drove up to Milwaukee and went house hunting.

We saw this house first. It seemed a little cramped, the side yard was right on a busy road and the neighbors behind had a huge trash pile in the back yard.

We saw this house too. It is a cute, old farmhouse with the most beautiful, large yard. It didn't have enough bedrooms.
And this darling bungalow had five bedrooms but only 1 and 1/2 baths and radiator heating. Haven't totally figured out how I would do that with babies around learning to walk. Oh, and the area was not our favorite. It was getting a little discouraging.
We concluded the first day with what I called the "not-cute-bungalow-that-ticks-all-the-boxes." Sorry, no picture. It ticked all my boxes except initial curb appeal and backyard. The kitchen was huge and the layout worked out pretty well. The basement went on forever and would have stored all our storage stuff for about three lifetimes! It was in the best school district and had a studio over the garage that Chris could make into the ultimate play space. There were somethings that I wanted to change, like the laundry room in the master bedroom, but I ended the day with hope.

We finally got the see the one we were perhaps "most" interested in the second day.
This house ticked all the boxes too. I wasn't really in the market for a split level and still worry that most buyers aren't (no, I don't think we will live in this house for the next thirty years) but it seemed to have all we needed and then some.

Wanna take a tour?

This is the living room, on your right as you walk in the door.
Want another view? The door you can just make out on the left is the front door, the door facing you on the left is the coat closet and the door on the right is the door to the garage. Beside that, behind the pony wall, are the stairs that lead down.
Down to the playroom, as we call it. The hallway leads to the boys room.
The downstairs bath.
And the laundry room,
complete with sump pump.
If you take the stairs up you will come to the kitchen and dining area. Apparently, it is true. Kitchens and baths do sell houses.
Down a hall off the dining area is the upstairs bath. See that towel rack? Someday it will be a door to the master bedroom.
And perhaps one of Chris' favorite parts is the .5 on the garage. Not pictured here: the built in workbench.
In all we saw something like 19 houses in two days. We had a couple that could have worked, with a little work. Chris was pretty won over by this house the day we saw it. Totally renovated (except the windows:( it was alluring to think that we wouldn't have to anything to the living spaces with Chris working all the time and me with three little kids. For me, though, it has actually taken a bit more settling in.

All of this was made possible by the letter S. For Stephanie, my amazing, magnificent, brave, generous, insanity-defying sister-in-law. (What else would call the woman who took on three kids in a hotel room for two days?)
And entertainment and company was provided by the letter J. For John, pictured below with baby Cole.
And the letter K. For Karisa, John's better half:), mother of cuties Benson and Cole, and generous hostess.
Yep, they were there too. But they didn't see any houses. They did finally get to meet cousin Benson and found out that he has wonderful toys and an enviable playroom.