The BIG move

June 9th, 2015 was our last half day to work in Jerome so we were prepped and had the truck mostly loaded and ready to pull out as soon as we could. We had found a place to live when I interviewed and we were so ready to get to our new home, Gillette, WY and start getting used to our new surrounding and let them kids settle before they had to start at a new school and go to daycare, since Grandma Teeter didn't move with us.
We made it to Shelley, ID that night and parked the truck at my grandparents house. We spent the night with family and had a bittersweet morning on the 10th. I can still remember that morning clearly because unknown to me it would be the last morning I would ever hug my Grandma King before she would pass in less than a month. We woke up quite early to get headed on the road as we knew it would be an at least 10 hour trip with a U-Haul and me driving the car loaded with 4 kids. The day was pretty uneventful and went quite well, until we arrived. I don't know if I just thought because things were all exciting and happy in my mind that that meant there wouldn't be any hard parts or if I was in denial, but clearly I wasn't expecting to find the house filthy (as they had told me they had a cleaning lady clean it), a broken window with duct tape on it (not a fun conversation with the landlord who never did fix it), a broken garbage disposal, wet carpet from cleaning (though they had over a month to do it), no help to unpack (I dropped the freezer trying to help Tyrell unload it and wasn't much muscle for anything else), 4 really grumpy kids who needed a bath (but the tub was filthy), phones that didn't work so well (poor phone company for area), no dinner, and not much money to just throw in the towel and get a hotel. I had to drive to Wal-Mart for cleaning supplies so we could at least shower and got flipped off because the turn lanes here are very different than Idaho and I didn't understand them so I went the wrong way. By the time I got home the kids were asleep in one room in sleeping bags on the damp carpet, Tyrell was exhausted, and I felt like I had a lot of work to do. I began cleaning the shower so Tyrell could use it and then unpacked a lot of the kitchen so we could eat in the morning. It was well after midnight when I finally fell onto the mattress on the floor and used whatever stuffed animal I could find for a pillow. I cried for my mom and mother in law more than I had ever thought I would. Things did get better, but it took a few days. The summer was actually one of the best summers we have ever had, as you will see.