Nampa at last!

Yay! We finally moved! Have I ever said how much I hate moving? Well, I do. But I'm very glad to be away from our crazy landlord in Meridian. We had a few more run-ins with her before we left, however. The first involved a big Tonka dump truck that Hyrum liked to wheel his stuffed kitty around in out in the back yard. It was old and rusty, so we kept it tucked away in a hidden corner of the patio. As we were packing up, we found out that Dana had thrown it away because it didn't "show well." I love how she thinks she has ownership of not only the house, but the way we live our lives and even our personal property.

The second incident is a slightly longer story involving our back screen door and a forced entry. Basically, I like to lock the screen doors just for added security. Dana wanted to show the house to a prospective buyer and couldn't get a hold of us while we were at Mike's company picnic, so she forced the door open and broke it in the process. When we did the final walk through with her, she said she didn't remember doing it and it must have been the wind. So that will probably mean that she'll charge us for the damages.

She also conveniently doesn't remember that she got angry when she couldn't get a stain out of the dining room carpet and wasn't patient enough to wait for the professional steam cleaners to remove it and ended up bleaching the carpet white in that spot. Add on top of that the window that she broke while spraying the outside of the house with a pressure washer. Of course, she doesn't remember that either. I really wish we had picture documentation of all the damages she has done to the house while we were living there. Even if she takes our full deposit, I'll be ok with that. I just want to be done with her once and for all.

We're liking our new place so far. It's a little bit smaller, but not too bad. We had some difficulty with the move. We had plenty of help from our old ward in moving out of our old place, but no help at all moving into the new place. After moving what boxes and furniture Mike and I could do alone, we finally had to just call it good and leave the rest in the garage so we could return the truck. My brother James came out the next afternoon to help Mike move the rest of the heavy furniture in. We were so grateful since we know how busy he is with his wedding just a few days away.

Here is a video of the new place. Please forgive my voice. I've been sick for about 3 weeks with a nasty summer cold. (Let's hope this works. This is my first attempt at an embedded video.)

So that's the apartment! The biggest thing we miss has been having a yard for Hyrum to play in. I think he's getting pretty bored too. Last night while I was on the phone with my friend Sandi, I heard evil laughing from the kitchen and ran in to find Hyrum with the sink sprayer hose thingy spraying, well, everything. He had soaked the entire kitchen, two computers, the cushions on the bar stools, the carpet in front of the breakfast bar, the couches and end tables in the living room, the laundry I was folding and now have to dry and fold all over again, the living room carpet, and even the ceiling. Wow, that sprayer has good range. He had a lot of fun until he got caught. He got in BIG trouble!

Our neighbors are... interesting. There are tons of kids who live in these duplexes and they come over from time to time. On the day we moved in, 7 of them came to visit. I haven't let any of them come in to play with Hyrum since that first day though since one of the kids stole one of Hyrum's favorite trucks and he was quite upset about it. Most of the other neighbors who don't live in the duplexes are all related and own a family farm type of thing. It's not really a farm as much as it is a cow, some goats, and some chickens. They let Hyrum come and pet the animals and seemed very nice.

Emily got her first teeth! She seems to be getting more too. Either that, or she's just inexplicably cranky... I'll take some pictures and post them later, but it's hard to get her to show her teeth.

I got an email the other day about my 10 year high school reunion. I can hardly believe that I'm that old already! It's been kind of neat since it has given me an excuse to make contact with some old friends. They had only found 60 of us when they contacted me, and they didn't know where most of my friends were. Luckily, I do! Or at least I know who might know where they are. Boy, I wish I had kept up with them better. However, I've talked on the phone to a few friends since then, and my old friend Kristy is coming over for a visit today! I'm pretty excited to see her! She lived very close by when we lived in Meridian and we never saw each other even once.

Well, I've got lots to do today since it's Labor Day and Mike has the day off!! YAY! This is the first time in a long time that he's had a day off from both jobs, so we have lots of plans. Mike might post later on with another video he took once he figures out how to convert it. And hopefully we'll have some Labor Day fun pictures of us and the kids. Also, be expecting a surprise announcement from Mike! My mom already knows, but Mike hasn't told any of his family yet.