525,600 Minutes at Home

As of today, we have lived in our West Jordan home for one full year.

(FYI, that's 525,600 minutes -- our kids sing the song of that in musical theater -- and it is a strikingly appropriate song to talk about life this past year, listen and see.)

One year ago today, after having all eight of us live in my brother and sister-in-law's basement for just over six weeks (I still cannot believe they were so patient with us), we were finally able to move into our new (to us) home.

The family room became our bedroom.  Seriously, who lets 8 people invade their house for six weeks?  My brothers are amazing.

This was, without a doubt, one of the hardest things our family has ever done.  We had not been planning to move, the prompting to go came suddenly and unexpectedly.

We love you West Valley home.  So many fabulous memories here.

We had lived happily in our small but beautiful West Valley home for almost exactly 14 years and we LOVED it there.  It's hard to describe the incredible people that surrounded us in the neighborhood and the way they watched out of us and our children.  This was not a handful of nice neighbors, it was a family.  There is no other word for it.  We were sooo blessed to be part of that place.

And so when we suddenly felt strongly that we were supposed to leave, while the idea of a bigger house was tempting (you mean maybe opening the door to the fridge or dishwasher might not completely block passage through the kitchen) the idea of leaving these people was devastating.

One year later, that part is still hard.

Anyway, we put our West Valley house on the market the first week of August 2017, and in less than a week it had sold (it really is a great little house -- we were very very happy there).  I was thrilled to learn that it was a family with five children who would be moving in (I knew the house would be happier if it was full of kids).

So we started looking for a new house.

And we looked and looked and looked and looked and looked.

It was a nightmare.  We left a perfectly functional, move in ready, place behind and we could not seem to find a new house that didn't require major work before it would be serviceable for our crew.  So we kept looking.  We stopped counting when we toured our 70th house.

There were a handful of times that we found a house we felt could work, made an offer immediately (the market was ridiculously competitive) only to find the house was already under contract.  That was pretty frustrating.  We had followed the impression to go, we were doing everything we knew how to find a new home, but it just wasn't happening.  We didn't understand what more we were supposed to do or where we were supposed to look or just what we were doing wrong.  We felt pretty deflated as night after night we toured house after house only to continually find nothing.

And I'm sure my brother wanted his house back (although, like I said, he and his wife are amazing and they made us feel welcome the entire time we were there).

Then, one day near the end of September we got a call from our realtor telling us that the contract had fallen through that day on a house they were selling.  He wanted us to see it that day before they put it back on the market the next morning.

We said sure, but really we didn't expect much.  We walked into the house and it was perfect.

Like, literally perfect for us.

More space, six bedrooms, a large yard, bigger family areas, a garage, an en-suite bathroom (I refused to move without that), a sprinkler system, enough room to walk through the kitchen even when the fridge is open (that was a biggie).  There were no glaring issues that needed immediate attention before our family could tumble into the home and begin a new life the moment we had the keys.

And on top of that, it was beautiful.  More than we ever dreamed of for our family for sure.  And on top of that, it was in an incredible neighborhood (we didn't know that until later, but still).

Notice that although it wasn't necessarily in the time-frame WE wanted, God helped us be in the right place to find the home He wanted us to buy at the exact moment it was available.  Even when we felt semi-abandoned as we were temporarily homeless and blindly wandering through every empty house in the Salt Lake Valley, God was there helping us until just the right moment.  Looking back we can so clearly see His hand in every piece of this journey.

While we still miss the amazing people from West Valley and try to connect with them when we can, we have absolutely fallen in love with the amazing people here in West Jordan too.  This area is full of children and teens so our kids have more people their own age to hang out with.  That is nice.

Our boys created a front yard arcade/carnival this summer and lots of kids came to play.  So fun!

Mostly, I think over and over, how did we end up so lucky as to have lived in the two best places on the planet?

So, today we celebrate one year in this home.  I hope it will be followed by many much more (like all the years from now on because I REALLY don't ever want to move again).

A giant heartfelt thank you to all the people in West Valley who made it so hard for us to leave, and a huge, grateful thank you to everyone in West Jordan who has reached out with love and kindness and is slowly becoming a new branch of our family.

It has been an eventful year.

We'll see what the next 525,600 minutes have in store for us.

Finally Fall

(Imagine these words are being sung in dramatic fashion because that's the way they are in my head)

I AM IN LOOOOOVE WITH FALL!!!!

(don't worry, Josh, I am in love with you too)

When the days get shorter, and the temperatures get cooler, and the leaves start to turn then I am in HeAvEn!

It is my favorite time of year.

Anyway, fall in our house means a few things.

1. Canning:  We grow a bunch of tomato plants every year even though I am the only human around here who eats tomatoes.  

The nice thing about tomatoes is that they taste great fresh...but they also turn into other tasty things if you put them to work.

We smoosh these babies up and then turn them into a nice thick tomato sauce and also a fabulous salsa.

ALSO -- one tiny brag -- our salsa can now be officially called "award winning salsa" because at Josh's school there was a salsa contest and our salsa won "Best Traditional Salsa" and tied for "Best Salsa Overall."

Come over sometimes, we'll probably even let you try it!

2. Whitmer Family Weekend:  Often in September we get together with my brothers and their families for a weekend at my parent's time-share at East Canyon.

While we were there, we took a drive to the hoppin' town of Morgan for a family bowling event.  My mom rented the entire alley (it wasn't exactly huge -- but very well kept and the people were kind) and we all bowled our little hearts out (most of us stink at it, but it was fun anyway).

3. We took a trip to the mountains:  I really love the canyons in the fall, but this year we got the bonus of being able to take the kids out of school for a day to go to my brother's property to ride ATVs.

It was so.  much.  fun.  

What a great way to spend a day (and the gorgeous fall colors during the drive were definitely a plus).

4. General Conference: Fall means LDS general conference.  I always look forward to hearing the words of God through living prophets and I always come away uplifted and wanting to be better.  

I was so sad to hear of the death of Elder Robert D. Hales.  I have long appreciated his teachings.  I feel very thankful for leaders who seek guidance from Heavenly Father to try to help me and my family to grow.

Generally, we have conference packets and games for the kids to play to help as they listen, but this year we tried something new.  

We picked some words that might show up during the talks and labeled bowls of candy with those words.  The kids could take a candy each time one of those words was spoken.  They opted to create tally sheets and then fill their sack with candy following each talk.  

Hopefully, some of the messages sank in more than simply the words that were said.   

5. Family Photos:  Often in the fall we try to take a new family picture.  It is hard to get us all together at once, so we try to arrange once a year for everyone to set aside a time to take pictures.  Nothing fancy, but enough to help us remember that we love our life together.

It is always good to be together.