Road trip part 1

Sometime last year, we decided to spend a few days at a mountain resort with Adam's family this June. Then a few months ago, we decided that since we were coming all this way, we may as well take some extra time and make a big trip out of it. So we left on Wednesday after work.

Road Trip - day one

 We drove to Sioux Falls (with a stop outside of Mankato for Gabe to play at a park for awhile), where we spent the night. After a quick breakfast at the hotel, we hit the road again.

Road Trip - day two

 We made a stop at a rest stop for lunch (we decided to just pack a bunch of sandwich stuff and snacks so that Gabe could have a chance to run around for a bit during our stops). We drove through part of Badlands National Park, stopped at the Visitor Center to get our National Parks Passport book stamped and to get a couple souvenirs. We made a few more stops in the park to take some pictures - actually a LOT of pictures, but Adam needs to process them before I can post most of them, so hopefully I will do that when we get back home.

Badlands National Park

Gabe outside the visitor center at Badlands National Park

Gabe & Adam at Badlands National Park

After going through the park, we made a stop at Wall Drug. I had never been there and Adam wanted a bumper sticker for his banjo case, so we stopped for a bit and had a snack, since we knew it would be quite a while before we got to our campsite and had dinner.

Gabe at Wall Drug - totally not sure what to think about this....

 Next we made a stop at Mt. Rushmore, walked around some, got our passport book stamped and some souvenirs, then headed on to our campsite.

Mt. Rushmore

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 At our campsite we got unloaded quick and made a fire. Roasted some hot dogs over the fire. Then it was getting kinda late, so figured we should get to bed. But, Gabe was WIDE awake and in no mood for sleep. Adam tried to get him down while I did dishes and cleaned up outside. Then I went in and tried to get him to go down. No luck. He would not stay in bed - usually one of us can lay down with him and eventually he'll drift off, but not this night. Eventually, Adam ended up going out to the van to sleep because it was about 11 or 12 and he was exhausted. So I stayed in with Gabe, trying everything possible to get him to go down. Eventually I kind of gave up and just put him in bed with me and I dozed some while he just sat there playing / watching his iPad. But I don't think he fell asleep until probably close to 1:00 a.m. our time. It was a rough night. And of course he was wide awake by 6:30. ugh...

Our camping cabin at Custer State Park. Really nice area - would love to go back someday and spend some more time there. The cabin had 2 sets of bunks and could sleep up to 5 people. Also had a small table and bench inside. It was super convenient and made packing for our trip a lot easier - not having to worry about bringing a tent and everything that goes along with it.

So, we all got up and went to take showers - helped Adam and me to wake up some, then came back and made breakfast, ate, cleaned up and loaded up the car. We drove south through more of Custer State Park in to Wind Cave National Park. We saw a ton of wild buffalo and antelope  all over the place (pictures coming later once Adam has a chance to process them). We stopped at the Wind Cave National Park visitor center, got our stamps and souvenirs. They had tours of the caves, but the first available one was a few hours out and we didn't think that Gabe would be very cooperative on the tour, so we decided to hit the road. Once we got out of the park, we headed southwest in to Wyoming. It was a beautiful drive and fun to see all the sprawling ranches and all the little towns along the way - including where the Oregon Trail started. In Wyoming we got on the freeway and headed south to Denver. We got to our friends' house on the south side of Denver around 8:00 Friday night and Gabe was thrilled to be out of the car and able to run around (despite 3 girls chasing him around). Saturday, Katie & I hit up some garage sales - lots of great stuff, but I couldn't really but I couldn't really buy anything since we have a full van already. But I did find a punch bowl set for $2, so did have to get that (especially after almost buying one for $10 at another sale). I went and got a massage a bit later - had some horrible knots in my back the past few weeks and the car ride aggravated them horribly. The rest of Saturday, we just hung out around the Moberg's house

Sam was a little tired - fell asleep standing up watching a movie. So cute!

Sunday, after breakfast, we went to a nearby park that had a splash park as part of it. It was the perfect day for it. Gabe had a great time and didn't leave the water area. The girls were all over the various playground areas as well as the water area.

Splash park!

  

Sam was everywhere and nearly impossible to get a picture of. She was loving checking out everything.

Zoey loved the ropes playground

Water! This is the coolest place!

Stick that tongue out

Splash!

So much fun!

Presley having fun on the playground

Keep up Katie! Sam is on the GO!

Aunt Erin showed up to see Gabe. Then, Presley decided to come sit by me. Then she decided to sit on my lap. She was in a cuddly mood. :-)  Unfortunately, it was a bit warm for that... so we went and played in the water instead.

After the park, we spent the rest of the day lounging around the house. My little shadow, aka Presley, sat down next to me while I was working on some pictures and ended up falling asleep on me. So I finished my pictures and took a nap as well. It was a great, relaxing day. It has been such a fun weekend catching up with these wonderful friends. I've especially loved seeing how much the girls have changed and how they are thriving here. We all had a rough time for our short times living in CA but suffering through it together made it easier.
Gabe has been having a lot of fun with the girls - which I am totally surprised by - he has had a few breakdowns because one (or more) of the girls is in his space, but far less than I anticipated.
Tonight, Katie and I are sitting at the kitchen counter, both blogging and having some celebratory wine - 1 year ago, we both got to leave CA and move on with our lives.

Celebrating! Forever friends!

hard to believe...

Hard to believe that about 2 years ago around this time, we were packing up and getting ready to move to California.

Hard to believe that 1 year ago about this time, Gabe and I were back in MN for a visit. Dreading going back to California. Not even the slightest clue that we would be moving back less than 3 months later. Crazy how fast things can change.

Hard to believe, with all the snow we have had recently (which I am totally LOVING!), that last year when we were back visiting, I had to go out and buy Gabe some shorts and T-shirts, because it was so warm out and I had packed snowpants and boots.

some videos of our new house!

quick little update....

this is the basement at our house. There is a wet bar, a couple utility rooms/closets, family room, office, illegal bedroom, bathroom. They had carpet down, but ripped it out after the massive rain/flooding in June. So we will be putting new flooring down some point soon :-)

The upstairs... kitchen, living room, 3 bedrooms, and a bathroom. Gabe's room is the purple one - we've already painted it :-D

Outside - 2 decks (small one off the living room not shown in the video) . The garage on the left side of the back is the neighbors. We have a swing set, garden area and large garage in the back right of the yard. (The round sand area is where they had a pool)

how convenient

So I think the "preset" radio stations in the van are still set to Duluth and Minneaoplis radio stations. :-) Where we are at in CA, we don't get many radio stations that come in - the mountains interfere a lot. So you are lucky if you can listen to a whole song before the station starts cutting out. And of the few stations we get, at least half are in Spanish. So not a whole lot of options. So I don't listen to the radio very often - usually get Pandora or Cities 97 through my phone.

Gabe is famous!!!

Well not really. But he was recently on a postcard, and now he was on the Bakersfield news. His teacher won a grant from the news station, so they suprised her one day during class and filmed a little interview with her. It was funny because she had no idea what was going to happen - just that her boss asked her to have kids stay a little later than normal. And for some reason they had just gone through all the kids' files and Gabe's photo release permission slip was not in his file, so they had me sign another one that morning - having no clue that we would actually be needing it. lol.

So check out this link to see Gabe on the news:
Gabe's News Spot

He's stuffing his face with food - but what else is new. :-)

details

So here are some more details about our big move....

When we came to CA it was with the expectation that the company would be relocating by the end of 2012. (which was down to California, Nevada, Arizona, Texas or Florida) But they have yet to make the decision of where they are going (so it will be at least another 18 months before they move). Most of the engineers want to stay in our current town, which is not what we want. The services Gabe receives are very minimal and to get any private therapy we have to go somewhere 60 miles away. And our insurance would only cover a limited number of sessions.  It's also 60+ miles to Target / Walmart / Malls / decent priced grocery stores. Plus there is minimal fishing and hunting out here - and it's expensive if you can get tags. And we love 4 seasons (although they call our town the land of four seasons - only because they get a couple inches of snow 2 or 3 times a year, but then everything shuts down)

But we really weren't looking to go back to MN yet. Adam loves his job out here and there were really no jobs available in MN in his field. Plus there was no way we could afford the moving expenses to go back, so we were planning to stick with it for a few more years at least, until Gabe got in to school, at which point we wanted to try to be back.

But then about a month ago Cirrus and Kestrel both announced they were funded and were hiring engineers - lots of engineers. So Adam mulled it over for a few days and talked to a few former co-workers to see how things were going at both places. Eventually we decided that if we do want to be back in MN, this may be our best chance, so what can it hurt to apply. So he applied to both. Had phone interviews with both. Both said no reason for him to come up for in person interviews because they knew him already. And both presented really good offers (good salaries and moving bonuses) to him. So then it was decision time... It was a tough decision, but he decided to go back to Cirrus. He'll be going back to working on the jet - which has always kind of felt like unfinished business. And Cirrus seems a little bit more stable from our persepective - which after the big risk we took coming out to CA, we really want stability.

So this has all happened in a matter of a few weeks. He got the job offers a couple weeks ago, accepted one last week, gave his notice this past Monday. And we leave June 2nd. Holy moly. Thankfully we are having the movers pack us up this time - can't imagine trying to pack up the whole house in this short amount of time with Gabe underfoot.

So, speaking of stability... We are also planning to try to buy a house once we are back. So Gabe & I are going to stay at my parents house for a few months while we try to get a mortgage and find a house and close on it. And Adam is going to try to find an inexpensive room to rent (so if anyone reading this has a room or knows someone who does, please let us know!)

survey says....

So, we are leaving California. Leaving the desert. Leaving the mountains. Leaving the 60+ miles to the nearest Wal-mart / Target / Mall. Leaving the sub-par services the county provides for Gabe- which is the bare minimum federally mandated - so basically nothing. Leaving ICON. 


WHAT??? Leaving ICON? Yup. Why??? Well two companies just recently announced they are hiring 100+ engineers between the 2 of them. And they are a lot closer to "home" so Adam applied to both and they both offered him jobs. And after a lot of thought (and decision matrices - [yes - he found a way to scientifically analyze the two...] ) he chose one of them. 


And so we will be moving to........................... ..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

Duluth!!!! 

WAHOO!!!! Adam is going back to work at Cirrus - doing what he originally started out working on. So he excited about that. And obviously we are thrilled to be going back to Minnesota and our family and friends and church and better services for Gabe!