Should We? Or Shouldn't We?

Settle in everyone, this is going to be a bit of a long one with plenty of pictures to enjoy. When Mr. Orange was around 5 months old (Feb 2021) Grandma and Grandpa G came for another visit, and this time we got to do some really cool things. We took a trip to the Grand Canyon, and did some hiking and sightseeing in Sedona, and of course took them to some of our favorite parks.

We really enjoyed our time with them and were looking forward to the next visit. The next month my mom came to visit and the boys were able to spend some good time with her and showed her our favorite places.

It was after these visits that my husband and I sat down and really contemplated our life circumstances. We were both raised on farms and just knew as the boys got older that they would love being able to be on the farm, and being this far away it just wasn’t feasible to do often. Since we moved to Arizona we had yet to even go back for a visit, COVID definitely didn’t help that aspect, but also flying with littles in car seats and such is tricky. Not that it can’t be done, but did we want to do one trip a year or be able to go for whole weekends multiple times a year? And so began our quest of moving back to Iowa. We searched and searched for homes, but kept coming up empty. We knew we wanted to be back in the same area we lived before, but just were not able to find anything that would meet our needs. We ended up contacting the realtor we used to sell our old house and had her help us and she found us a new construction option - but it hadn’t been built yet. That made us a little nervous to potentially build a house and never see it until we moved in, but at the time it seemed to be the only viable option that made sense within our timeline, so we signed the papers in April and were set to move back in September just after Mr. Orange would turn 1. As it turned out, the house was pretty much done as far as all the details and finishings. They already had everything ordered, so we weren’t able to customize it to our needs as much as we would have liked, but it was okay - we at least got to choose the color of the outside and we let Mr. Blue help with that. 

We sent a picture in the mail of the boys and a sign with our new address to our parents to officially announce we were moving back, it was well received on all ends, they couldn’t wait for us to be closer again. Now that we knew our time in Arizona was limited, we made it a priority to see and do as much as we could now that things were opening back up even more. We didn’t do as much as we would’ve liked but we still had a lot of fun with the places and things we did do and see. We hiked more, did more sightseeing around Scottsdale and Phoenix, took a trip to Sedona to hike and visit Slide Rock State Park - highly recommend, it was very fun! And just really took the time to enjoy our favorite places and spend time with the people we loved.

But before we set off to move we had a couple birthdays to celebrate. My Aunt and Uncle knew these incredibly generous people who allowed us to use their winter home to host our families and have the birthday parties at and it was then dubbed the ‘Birthday House’. In June we celebrated Mr. Blue turning 3, with a Young Wild and Three theme, and both my parents, Nic’s mom and sister were able to join as well as other family and friends from the area.

In September we celebrated a really fun first birthday for Mr. Orange with a First Year Down, football themed party. This time both sets of grandparents were able to come and we did so many fun things as a last hurrah on top of celebrating Mr. Orange’s first birthday. The day of the party was so fun and memorable to have one last big gathering with friends and family celebrating Mr. Orange. 

After the excitement of a first birthday, then it came time to focus on the move. We did a couple fun things as a family as our last excursions before moving and met up with friends to have our last play dates and to say goodbye. We made sure to visit all of our favorite places one last time: parks, the aquarium, the cafe, and more.

Then before we knew it, it was moving week! We were able to stay in the ‘Birthday House’ while our apartment was being packed up and then gave us the space and ability to clean behind the movers from room to room as they took things out. Our cousins were so gracious to watch the boys for us while we got everything cleaned and finalized and then came our final night in Arizona. We had said our goodbyes to most of our family and friends but had one last dinner with our cousins across the street to say goodbye. They asked if Mr. Blue could stay that night to let the boys (their son is just a couple months younger than Mr. Blue and were attached at the hip - they loved spending time together) have just a bit longer together and we thought that was a great idea.

So we left Mr. Blue for one last sleepover with the cousins while my husband and I took Mr. Orange back to the birthday house for our last night as Arizonians before we embarked on our long road trip back to Iowa. In the morning I woke up long before my alarm and went out to watch the sunrise over the mountains. There is no other view like it and I sure was going to miss it.

We packed up the car, had toys and food in an easy to grab area, and headed to pick up Mr. Blue from our cousins and say our final, and very tearful, good-byes. And then, we were on the road. 

We had picked our route quite a bit before our actual road trip so we could plan out stops for fun and for the night. Our first leg was from Scottsdale to Albuquerque, NM. Along the way we decided to stop at the meteor crater outside of Winslow, and that was really really cool. The inside building had some cool things to look at for the boys and historical information for us to read. The actual crater itself is such a sight to behold. Before we left we had a picnic in the parking lot and then took off for Winslow to see the sights of old Route 66.

We wanted to drive through Petrified Forest National Park but decided time wasn’t going to really allow it. We got to Albuquerque and got some food before heading to our hotel for the night. When we arrived at our hotel we immediately felt uncomfortable as there were some strung out individuals laying out on the ground in front of the hotel as well as other things. We got into our room and it wasn’t much better. We are far from hotel snobs and chose a Holiday Inn like we would anywhere else, but this place was dirty and it was listed as non-smoking but smoke was all we could smell. I didn’t even want to sit on the bed much less sleep on it so we called our friends at our next destination to see if it was okay if we came sooner. We ate our food, packed back up and hit the road to destination #2 - Colorado Springs. To be honest, I was so upset that we missed the prettiest section of our drive since it was pitch black out, but it was definitely better than the alternative. We arrived at our friend’s place in Colorado around 1-2am and went right to sleep. The best part was since we were early, we decided to keep our original schedule, which allowed us to spend the day with our friends on their farm and let the kids run and play all day long.

We left early the next morning with Omaha, NE as our next destination. Since this part of the drive wasn’t as exciting we just mapped out a few places with parks to stop at to stretch our legs and eat.

We were staying at my cousin’s place in Omaha and we were so grateful for another comfortable place to stay with familiar faces. The boys played with their big cousins and had a blast.

We left early the next morning again for our last day of travel - with my hometown as our destination. On the way we stopped at Nic’s grandparents since we hadn’t seen them since before we moved to Arizona. Finally we made it to my parent’s house, our road trip was complete and we were - almost - home. 

We ‘lived’ with my parents for a little over 2 weeks before we could move into our house. There were a lot of pieces of the puzzle that had to be arranged just so for everything to go smoothly. The trailer with our stuff arrived about a week after we had gotten to my parents so we had to meet them and have them unload everything into a storage unit until we could move into our house. We also had to make another trip for final inspections. While at my parents the kids were able to do all the fall things at a farm: feed animals, ride in a tractor and combine, and just enjoy being outside. We went to parks, an apple orchard, visited family, and just kept ourselves busy until move-in day.

Nic started back to work once we got to my parents, so it was mostly me and the boys, but that was okay - we had plenty to keep us busy. Finally move-in day came and we headed that way the night before to stay in a hotel so we didn’t have to get everyone up quite so early. On move-in day we had hired another moving company to go to the storage unit to pick up our stuff, bring it to our new house, and unload it - which was super nice. We also had so many family members that came to help us move in and start unpacking, which we were so thankful for.

That night we were able to sit and just really take it all in - we were back, surrounded by family, in a house that was just perfect for us to raise our family in. Over the next few weeks we continued to get settled in and unpacked. We met quite a few of our neighbors and were overjoyed to find out there were so many boys in our neighborhood around the ages of ours - this was the start to something really beautiful. We started back to the church we went to before we moved and reconnected with friends from there. We also got together with other friends in the area that we had missed, and it was a joyous reunion, as well as introduction to Mr. Orange since most of our family and pretty much all of our friends had never met him. 

Fast forward to now, and there are zero regrets about us moving back. Do we miss certain things about Arizona, absolutely - especially in the middle of winter when it’s 20 below, and definitely our family and friends there. But this was truly the right decision for us and we are glad to be able to raise our kids around their grandparents, in a home with a big backyard, safe neighborhood, and ‘small-town feel’. Making big life-changing decisions can seem so daunting and scary, but God truly moved mountains - both times. He closed doors when we weren’t supposed to walk through them and flung others wide open. Our decisions to move to Arizona and to move back to Iowa weren’t made hastily. They were made with much thought and prayer, but were made with God at the forefront. And the crazy thing is, things went so smoothly when we gave it up to him instead of always trying to forge our own paths and do it all alone. If only we could all fall into obedience so easily - but it’s hard. I will say that I should learn from my own mistakes because each time I have given up control, things have turned out - maybe not always in the way I expected, but God always would see it through. Now that’s not to say that God’s way is always easy and smooth, there have been many times that I wanted to say no - this is not how I want it to go because Gods’ way seemed scary. But the thing is, the times I haven’t trusted him were the times I still felt scared, unsure, frustrated, worried, but most of all - I felt alone. Sure there were times I felt all those things when I let him lead the way - but I never felt alone. I knew he was there, and he always would be. Faith is tricky, but it can be beautiful if you let it. In the next post you’ll learn of our next adventure that had us really questioning the path God was leading us down, and if we were even equipped for it.

XOXO, mischief managing momma

Oldest (1)- Mr. Blue

Middle (2) - Mr. Orange

Youngest (3) - Mr. Green