I should have gotten around to a short post earlier than this but we did, in fact, make it to Minnesota.
Last Monday some very wonderful friends came and helped us load all of our belongings into a POD--a portable storage device. The POD was shipped separately to Minnesota and will sit in storage here until we have a place to live at which time the POD guy will bring all our stuff right to our driveway. It's a great way to move and I highly recommend it.
We did, however, make some fatal errors in this move. We knew that we would be separated from our POD for as long as a month but I was not very organized about packing and did not pack for the road trip and our month at Grandma's before our friends arrived to load the POD. Not having that stuff out of the way paralyzed me into a state of indecision about a lof of the odds and ends in our apartment so a whole lot wasn't packed on moving day. And the only person who knew what should go in the car rather than the POD was me and I only knew in my head--I didn't have it written down or anything. Oh, and I had the flu or something. I was incredibly sick and remained sick for the entire road trip. And I'm pregnant. Sorry if you're hearing that for the first time but we ran out of time for personal phone calls.
Our friends were incredibly patient and understanding and loaded the POD for us including such items as: Eric's wallet, the checkbook, my maternity clothes, the kids' toothbrushes, Joseph's pajamas, the cable I need to get pictures from my camera to this blog. You get the picture. I don't at all blame our friends. Its 100% my fault that these things didn't make it to Minnesota. But it made for a stressful start to the trip.
We had a rainy, but picturesque drive through the mountains the first afternoon on the road and we stayed the night in the first hotel over the Ohio River. The next day we set out for Madison, WI and spent hour after hour driving through farm after farm. We'd been sad to leave DC and I was miserably sick and the morning was not at all fun. The kids and I got a good afternoon nap and then Eric got some friend Walleye for dinner in Gary, IN. By the time we hit Chicago we were all feeling somewhat human again and feeling like we were withing strking distance of what will be home for the next year. We hope to visit Chicago a bit. The kids were asleep by the time we hit Wisconsin and the final leg of the trip was made more pleasant by a stop at Culver's for frozen custard--Eric's first attempt at turning me into a Midwesterner.
We spent two nights in Madison hosted by Eric's grandfather. He's living in a very lovely retirement community/assisted living/nursing facility where he has his own apartment and he put us up in one of the guest suites. We visited him, visited some other family members, bought me some clothes, and tooled around Madison a bit. Eric lived in Madison until he was fifteen so there was lots to remember. The kids had a really great time visiting with the older generation of Iltis/Dobbs family. Margaret was not at all shy and took to everyone really quickly. She calls Grandpa, "Frapup."
Thursday we set out for St. Paul and discovered that the midwest flooding had been farther north than we'd realized. Field after field was underwater though the freeway was passable all the way through. We arrived at Eric's mom's house in time for dinner and we were very glad to have the trip behind us.
We're staying in the Tuthill basement for now and being well-cared for here. Lots of good food and help with the kids. Eric started work yesterday and is feeling good about his new job. I'm getting to know St. Paul in a more intentional way. We have an appointment to see a house on Friday that seems like a really great place so we hope to have our housing finalized by the end of the week as well.
I have a few pictures but I'll need to consult with the resident techie here to see if there is a way to get them off my camera, so stay tuned.
