Beggining Cont.

So China will be AWESOME. We found out in March and at the end of April we still decided to put our house on the market. At the time it seemed to make very little sense to us but it felt right and we learned long ago to try and work with those particular feelings and promptings. At that point we had no guaranteed job for this next year and still weren't sure if we wanted to stay or move a lot was up in the air and dependent on the house sale.
It is now the end of May we ended up with 3 offers over a 3 week period of time the 1st cancelled 2 days later and was a little discouraging the 2nd came in with a crazy low offer and thankfully the very next morning as Goldilocks would say was one that was just right.
We are past the inspection period and every thing is going pretty well on course to have us out of the house by June 7.
Thankfully we heard back a week or two ago about a couple of jobs so we just had to decide which to take and figure out a place to live since we won't have one pretty soon.
Neither of us was very excited about apartment hunting and one of the jobs was on the Navajo Reservation with teacher housing so we figured why not?

We have never been there but it's a small desert town not far from the Four Corners area. It will be about 2 hours from any medium sized towns and about 6 hours from Phoenix.  We will still be close enough that it wont be a terrible trip to visit family and friends. There is beautiful camp grounds about 30 min away and we have had the goal for awhile to get our boys out camping. AND we will get to experience a whole new culture being with the Navajo people.
 Sounds like a nice little adventure to me :)

Although I am not used to the small town life, I really have high hopes of us having more "family" time this next year. The last few years Clete has worked mostly 12 up to 16 hour work days. 2 of those years he worked every Saturday on top of that. The kids saw him for a few minutes in the morning and on Sunday when he wasn't at meetings. I think this move will definitely take some adjusting but if it will get us a husband and father we can see on a more daily basis I'm willing to make the plunge.
Our oldest is 3 and he already has his back pack packed and has been telling everyone he is moving to the mountains and going camping. It is adorable. Kids can make the best out of any situation so I may just take my cues from them for a bit.
This week Clete is headed up there for the 1st time to sign paperwork and get a feel for things so I will be excited to see pictures and get an idea of what we will be working with as far as housing goes.
Till then.

The Beginning

We are an Arizona family. Mostly actually we are a Mesa, Arizona family. My husband and I were both born here in the same hospital actually. We both went to school here, we were sealed here (to each other not to Mesa just to clarify) both of our sons were born here in Mesa I think that qualifies us as a "Mesa" family.

   For some reason though a few months back I told my dear sweet husband who always does his best to get me what I ask for, that I wanted an adventure before the boys started school. That maybe we should go somewhere away from Mesa for a year or two and see what we think. I showed him pretty pictures of England, Germany, and Idaho just to give him a few ideas to work with.

And then I left him to it. Confident in the willingness he showed in giving me the adventure I was seeking and also a fun learning experience for our boys. We started doing what we could to get our house ready for the market. I saw him start a nightly ritual of putting in applications and researching schools. It was all so exciting! Then to make it better he told me about an e-mail that said he could apply for a scholarship that would take him to China for a month for free!
So we added that to the list of things to try for. After all this could be the adventure we were looking for without all the work of moving and selling our home.
See I LOVE our home. It is in the perfect little Cul De Sac with wonderful neighbors, big yard, close to family, friends, and shopping. Plus as we looked into the China opportunity it looked like it might be possible to take the whole family. What a win that would be!

As he began the application process I started worrying a little less about a moving adventure and focused more on getting through the winter with a family infested with the flu bug. I think it totaled about 8 weeks of sickness in our home. There were boogers and coughing. Fevers and chills. Even vomiting and diarrhea almost non stop for weeks and weeks. I was way less focused on an adenture and more just on survival. Clete had sent in all he needed to and so we just waited and worked on getting healthy again.
 Then one day he got an exciting call asking him for an interview for the scholarship! He was selected as one of the top five finalists! I was so proud and couldn't help but think that if they had the chance to talk to him he would win. Although I am a bit partial... He is a pretty impressive young man though.
They set up the time for the next day and it turned out he was the 1st interview conducted and the other four would be a few days later so we would have to sit and wait patiently for a million years to find out. Sorry four days.

 
Waiting has never been my strong point. Thankfully Clete is almost terribly patient.
Four days later we are in the car driving home from his school when we get the call. They said that they had a lot of great applicants and it was a very hard choice to make. So much so that they ended up asking for a 2nd scholarship so they could take two winners this year and that Clete was one of them! I am extremely proud of myself for still driving us home safely because I really can't help it and I just get excited about things lots of things and this was no exception :D  (see that's me excited)
Yep there were a few details to work out but we had an awesome adventure to look forward to. We found out that I could join him for the two week tour portion but decided the boys should stay here with the grandmas. Thank goodness they love us... the grandmas I mean, my children have to love me its a rule they have promised to abide and I am sure they will honor it for life.
Turns out my brother and Cletes sister decided they wanted a little trip too so they are going to be joining us this summer in China as well!

You'd think that would be enough to look forward to. But no! There is more so stay tuned till I am less tired and can finish this awesome excitement!