Our First Week of Training

            On Monday, May 13, we began our first week of training. Most of it could be categorized into three parts: 1) human resources, 2) school liability prevention, and 3) behind-the-scenes operations. We had a welcome breakfast and introductory courses regarding the school and its heritage. We filled out all the necessary employment paperwork. We learned that most operations that occur on campus are provided by school employees. And we heard some presentations from the Chocolate Workers Union of which we are a part.

            The main two training all-day training events dealt with learning to drive the long 15-passenger vans by which students are transported and learning First Aid and CPR. I had just been through the CPR training for my work at Carrington College in Boise, so this was easy for me, and JaNae picked it up without any problems, too. The driving training was a little more stressful. By the end of the day, both of us had killed a few cones, and there had been some frustration, but in the end we both passed and moved on to the next thing.

            This weekend brought a welcome rest. We slept in and took naps on Saturday, then spent the rest of the day attending to outside needs that can’t be met during the busy training schedule.      On Sunday, we attended church at the Hershey Ward again. Then, we returned to the motel for another needed rest. Tonight, we received word that our things that have been transported from Boise will be arriving tomorrow, so we’ll probably spend tonight and one more night at the motel before making the attempt to call our house a home.

An Impromptu Day Trip and Our New Place

From Lexington we drove to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. We stayed at a hotel converted from General Lee’s headquarters. We took Friday to enjoy some sightseeing in this historic town.

 

 

We left Gettysburg then headed the hour or so to Hershey. When we arrived we raced in and took care of the final HR item remaining, our fingerprinting. Then we headed over to pick up any mail that might be at our new place and see just what our housing situation will be like.
 

Our place is adorable. We’re both so excited about the space and the chance to make it our own. It was described to us this way:
 

“Old farm house (1/2 duplex unit), formerly called “Old Farm 69” – has a barn adjacent to the home with some cute cows. (Don’t worry…other folks take care of the cows!)

“Multiple entrances to the home – back door by parking area, side door into living room area, and front door also at living room area – not typically used except to go to front porch of home. If entering through back door, you go into a small utility room, which is where the clothes washer and dryer are located. Entry from this room into kitchen area, then living and dining room areas on first floor, with the ½ bathroom located in this area as well. There are actually two interior stairways to the second floor. (sort of neat!) One off the kitchen area-back corner, and a second in the living room area.

“All bedrooms are located on the second floor, along with the full bathroom. While I call it a three bedroom, it actually has another smaller room in between two rooms that you could call another ½ bedroom. The former occupant…used this ½ bedroom as a nursery when his son was a baby. There is also another room that is used as a walk in closet off the one bedroom.”

 The Outside:

 

             The Inside: 

 

Our new next-door neighbors even came out to greet us:

Thankfully the neighbors next door, and across the street, have been very quiet and not pestered us at all when we’ve visited. Glad they know how to keep things to a dull roar.
 

We are looking forward to moving in and making this new location our home. The only challenge is that our things are taking their time getting to us. Everything left our house on Friday, May 3 but only to a local warehouse where it was unloaded and sat waiting for a national driver to pick it up. The first driver scheduled didn’t have room. The 2^nd could only take ½ our things (NOT acceptable!), so we think the third driver picked everything up sometime around the 10^th or 11^th or May. On Sunday, May 12 Amanda & Jake met the truck in Morgan to load our piano. After that we have no idea what route it took or when we were to expect it.
 

We had the option of staying at our place on an air mattress until our things arrived. Luckily, Dan realized that we’d want more than that while we were there –kitchen supplies, desk, chairs, maybe even a tv – so we opted for staying at a Residence Inn not far from campus. That’s been a blessing. It’s a studio room and has a full sized fridge and stove. So there’s some space for us to move around and feel at home. After training has ended, we’ve taken advantage of the pool and workout room to get in some exercise.
 

Thankfully, on Sunday, May 19 we received a message that our household goods are ready to be delivered tomorrow. FINALLY THE WAIT IS OVER! Now to figure out what is most urgent to get washed and put away while we are in the middle of our training. I suppose it’s better during the training than after we’re trying to be houseparents.

 

 

P.S. Whoops, the fuzziness was from a finger print on the lens that I didn't find for several weeks.

Heading East

Along with packing we started planning our trip east. We arrived on Saturday, May 4^thin Ogden at Amanda & Jake’s home. Sid joined us and we spent the weekend together. It was great to be together as a family again especially since it will be awhile before we’ll all be together again.

 

Every time we passed a moving truck Dan would wonder if it held our stuff. Come to find out, none of them would for another week!

Either the caffeine or need to use the bathroom will keep us awake while driving.

State border #1: Idaho to Utah

 

Sunday May 5^th my family joined us at Amanda & Jake’s for a bbq. It was fun to see them again. It was the first time Dan had met one of my nieces and the first I’d seen her in about 18 months. Crazy to think that’s our life now.

 

Monday dawned with the goal of Denver for the night. We’d decided to take pictures as we crossed the state borders with the intent that we’d be in the each of the pictures. As we headed into Colorado neither of us were paying close attention so we had to hike back to the boarder ¼ mile to capture our pictures at that border.

 

 
Border #2: Utah to Wyoming

Border #3: Wyoming to Colorado. 

 

Denver was reached and we stayed with Dan’s cousins and met their three darling children. We had a great visit and enjoyed reconnecting but had to get going quickly in the morning since our next stop was Columbia, Missouri.

  

No sign for border #4: Colorado to Kansas.

Gone are the mountains.

"Everything's up to date in Kansas City..." 

 

Today was full of new territory for us. We drove through St. Louis and the southern tips of Illinois and Indiana. Even though I grew up in the Chicago area, I didn’t spend much time in other parts of my home state. We included a stop for dinner with Dan’s Uncle John and Aunt Norma (aka Elder & Sister Trimming). His cousin Jenee and her boyfriend Rich drove down from Cincinnati to join us. It was great to visit and catch up with them as well.

Drove through a portion of 3 of 4 of these states in one day.

Maybe we should take a little detour on I-270???

 

 

Potty stop in Missouri, JaNae can sniff out a mall in any state she's in!

 

Missed the border for #6: Missouri to Illinois (of all the ones to miss!!!).

Border #7: Illinois to Indiana

 

Another stop to see family!

 

We left Uncle John & Aunt Norma’s and headed to Lexington, Kentucky for the night. Welcome to Southern Hospitality. We went to breakfast the next morning and had a fun visit with the staff and other customers. Dan and I left smiling at the dialects and “come back and see us now” that we heard; truly kind, welcoming people.

 

Border #8  Indiana to Kentucky (a make up for missing the actual border).

Border # 9: Kentucky to West Virginia

Border # 10: West Virginia to Ohio (this one was done just to say we'd been there).

Border #11: Ohio to West Virginia

 

 Almost missing the Colorado border sign should have tipped us off that the goal was going to be more challenging than we’d anticipated. Kansas had construction right at the border so the sign was nowhere to be seen. Missouri was as we crossed the river and it was missed. We didn’t see a sign into Illinois (another as we crossed a river). Going into Kentucky we crossed a river I tried and failed at getting that one too. Dan had the camera as we crossed the border from West Virginia into Maryland and missed the sign there too. Had it been safe, we would have turned around or walked back to get the border signs we missed but several were in the middle of a highway and on a bridge making that goal impossible. Oh well, we had fun trying anyway.          

Border #12: West Virginia to Maryland

 

Very interesting fog in Maryland.

 

Border #13: Maryland to Pennsylvania...FINALLY!!!

 

Some of the amazing scenery and signs we saw along the way:

About this point we learned the our things were still in a warehouse in Boise so we decided to spend an extra day on the road and visit Gettysburg...To Be Continued...

Agriculturally Speaking

I only cracked two eggs...

We're hoping that this means were in for a long stretch of good luck!

Packing it All Up

            On Tuesday, April 23 we received the phone call that we were hired as new houseparents for  a boarding school in Hershey, PA. Our start date would be Monday, May 13. We’d done our homework and passed the hurdles required to be offered this new position and opportunity. (Hurdles included two phone interviews, background check, quick trip to Hershey, PA for an in-person interview, reference checks, 2^nd background check, in home visit and interview by private investigator, and physical including lift tests.)

            The day of my physical I received a message from my friend Holly asking if we were home and she said that she had something for us. When she arrived she handed over some poppy seed muffins. We got a good laugh at the attempt to get us to fail our drug tests after the tests were over.

            We’d been fairly confident that the job was ours, however, we’ve had other positions we were confident about that fell through. As such, the phone call saying we were hired was a relief to receive.

            After hanging up the phone we began the process of packing up our place in Boise. We had a number of things we’d not unpacked from our previous move which made things easier but boxes still needed to be gathered and filled.

            Dan and I would spend a good portion of the morning packing together. Then he’d go to work and I’d find the energy to keep packing for 3-4 more hours. 9 days after we started packing the movers showed up to collect our things. The day before they arrived we received a call asking if they could come a day early, luckily we had 99.5% packed so having movers show up a day early wasn’t a big issue or stressor.

            The day the movers arrived three sisters from our ward were there to help with the cleaning. By the end of that long day we were all packed, cleaned and checked out of our apartment.

A Funeral, New Do, and Amazingly Quick Trip

So much has happened in the last couple weeks and there's lots to update therefore the need to recap quickly is important. The sooner I update and catch up, the sooner I can move forward, just keep that in mind and keep it simple.

On February 26, 2013 Dan's Uncle Harold passed away. He was the last sibling of Dan's dad still living. The other siblings all died between the ages of 60-70 and Uncle Harold lived to 82! It was great to meet him a few times and hear his crazy stories and funny one-liners. We will miss you but we know you have had a wonderful reunion with family and friends he's not seen for years.

The last time I had my hair done I asked my hair dresser to style it some way we've not done before. This is what I ended up with:

It was fun and I felt like a million bucks. Too bad I won't be able to replicate it. After pulling all these bobby pins out I wasn't surprised that I'd started to have a headache.

 

Dan's previous post gave basics of the interview process for our new job. When we flew out we had a layover at O'Hare airport. It was fun to be back "home" even if it was for a few hours.

 

 

 As we flew I took some pictures from the plane:

Chicago from the air.

 

Our potential new landscape.

 

We arrived at the student home a little after 5:00 pm and the interview process began. We stayed in the student home in a hotel-like room over night and the next day had a tour of the campus. We were also interviewed by a couple employees and signed a preliminary offer letter. With just a few hours remaining before our return flight, we visited Chocolate World before heading back to the airport. A little of what we saw and did with the few hours we had to ourselves:

Downtown Hummelstown, Dan leaving a note for our host family, Hershey's Chocolate World, the middle school on the hill, the student house we stayed in, and the landscape around the student home.

It was a quick trip but we still enjoyed ourselves.

 

Here is where I'll end for tonight. Remaining to blog (packing, drive east, new job).