Well, today is the loading the van day. We won't actually start driving until tomorrow, but the computer will be taken off-line today so this will be my last post until Monday. I'm glad the day is finally here. I want it to just be overwith. I'm getting more excited about the move now that we are so close. It's been hard to say good-bye though. There are several women here that my friendship with has really blossomed over the last couple of months and I feel short changed a little bit because I didn't get to enjoy those friendships for very long. I've vowed to keep in contact with them though I plan on coming back to visit. This is such a great city and it will be fun to come in the summer and enjoy all the touristy-type things to do.

The plan is to pack up the van at 10 am. A woman in the ward (one of those friends I didn't get to enjoy long enough) has asked to watch our kids for us to get them out of the way while we work. She is such a blessing for us. It will be so much easier to get things done without them around. After the van is packed, then Charlie and I will finish cleaning the duplex. We've scheduled to check out with the landlord at 6 pm but we're hoping to get finished before that and do it earlier. Then some other friends have invited us for dinner. After that, the same woman who is watching the kids this morning has invited us to spend the night at her house. We accepted because we will have a much better trip after sleeping some and leaving in the morning. So we will leave for Michigan sometime tomorrow morning, hoping to arrive sometime in the late afternoon. The Flint ward went into the house we will be moving into and cleaned it from top to bottom on Tuesday. We are so grateful! They are great people! One of the ladies from Flint wants to make us dinner for Friday night. Then Saturday morning at 9 am we will unload the van and set up house. The power is suppose to be on sometime tomorrow and hopefully the water too. Cross your fingers about that. According to the water department the water is on to the house, but it isn't coming out of faucets. So we are hoping that we just have to turn it on from the street to the house. But that valve is in the crawl space which is flooded right now. As soon as the power is on, the sump pump should be able to pump out what's left of the flood and then we should be able to get to the water valve. Sounds a little complicated, but I'm just thankful to have some place to go.

No word yet on jobs for Charlie. We feel it's probably better that he hasn't gotten any calls yet so he could be here this week to help with the move. I wasn't very excited to do a move on my own again! It's been so much better having him here to help. We hope he'll have some interviews after we get there.

Congrats to Les for the job! We are so excited that you guys will be able to move back to Michigan and be close again. It was really hard to be so far away. I'm glad that we'll be close again. See you in Michigan.

Well, that's about it. Our phone is suppose to be turned on on Monday, so I'll check in then.
Love you all!

Bradyn loses a tooth

Happy Father's Day and more

Just a quick Happy Father's Day to all you fathers out there!

Friday was the kids' last day of school. We're pretty excited for summer vacation to be here finally. We've started to pack, some, but have lots more to go. Here are pictures of the kids with their teachers...

Chelsea had team teachers, Ms. Jesalyn and Ms. Carrie

Alexis with Mr. Jarr, Merrit with Mrs. May and Makayla with Mrs. Keiper

Alexis had a 5th grade graduation dinner last Tuesday night. They received advancement certificates and some special awards. They handed out the certificates first to everyone and then had the kids with special awards come up again. Alexis won the Student of the Year award for her classroom. She got to go up on stage twice and both times she went up the stairs she tripped up them on her flipflops. She wasn't hurt, but it was hilareous that she tripped twice! :)

I'm Coming Home

So I will be coming home for a visit at the beginning of July. I fly into Flint on the 1st and then I fly out of Flint on the 11th. I am excited that I will be home for the family reunion! Mom is going to try to set up a time to get a family picture taken while everyone is at home. It has been six years since our last family picture, so I am also excited for this. My summer has been good so far, I'm just working and relaxing. I own the first 4 seasons of NCIS on DVD and a lot of my day has gone toward watching all the shows, but I finished last night and I now I need to find something more productive to do with my time. I got my friends Jamie and Victoria hooked onto the show and they are now watching my DVDs. I look forward to seeing all of you in a couple of weeks.

Some news

Charlie got a call today for an interview. We aren't really that excited about it though because it's for Beecher Schools. They are just as bad as Flint schools, maybe even worse. They are a fairly unsafe environment. Charlie feels like he could probably teach there, but I'm not so sure about it. They wanted to interview him on Wednesday. He told them it would be really hard for him to make it then, so they are trying to reschedule. They will get back to him to let him know if they can or not. He told them he'd try to be there if they can't reschedule. So we'll see.

I forgot to say that we sold Charlie's car. I listed it on Craig's list and we sold it the very same day we listed it. We were pretty excited. Then Charlie was looking at Craig's list today and saw that his car was on there again. Aparently the guy who sold it is trying to re-sell it. He bought it from us for $400 and he has it listed for $950. We thought it was pretty funny.

We are still trying to sell the Windstar. It's listed in the local paper. I thought about listing it in the Milwaukee paper but it will cost about $150 for a 2 week listing. I'm not sure I want to cough up that much money for an ad at this time. Maybe I'll do that once we move. I was just hoping to not have to move it with us. But we will.

I found out today that I've been released from my callings at church. The primary president called this afternoon to tell me of the changes. The people they have to replace me will be great and I'm excited that they are the ones who will be coming in after me. I'm also relieved that I'll be able to help them transition before we move. I was feeling pretty bad about letting the kids down by moving, but I feel a bit better now knowing that I'll be able to help the new people transition in. So there is a married couple with a new baby taking over in scouts. They will be there on Wednesday to observe. I'll probably even offer to do next week as well since I already have it planned. Then one of the sisters I visit teach is taking over singing time. She is suppose to come in on Sunday to observe. She is a little more reluctant about the calling than the married couple are. I hope I can help ease her worries and concerns. I really like her a lot and know she has a lot to offer. She's going to be great. I just hope she can see that too.

Charlie hasn't been released yet. I'm sure it will happen soon though. They have already taken his home teaching route away from him. It's all a matter of time. With us not having callings, it will be easier for us to move the last weekend of the month. I'm thinking we could load here on Friday and then unload there on Saturday. I was thinking we'd have to stay for that last Sunday so I could do singing time but now I don't have to worry about it. The timing actually will work out better if we don't stay for that Sunday. Although, I'm sad to not have an extra Sunday here with the friends we've made here. I'll let you know when our plans are a little more solid.

We made it home safe from our long weekend in Michigan, and are glad this is the week of school. We probably won't start to pack much until school is out. I'm envisioning a whirl-wind of a last week with the last minute packing we'll have. There is just so much that we can't pack yet because we use it too often. It's kind of frustrating. Oh well, I am kind of an expert at packing now (isn't that sad?).

Cute pic of Audrey