We Are In New Mexico!

With the help of ward members, we were able to get everything loaded onto the truck and the house cleaned in order to leave Augusta, Georgia by Friday January 23rd. We packed everything ourselves and loaded the truck, but had ABF drive the truck for us. We also had Travis' car shipped to New Mexico so that we were able to drive together. Are we crazy for driving across the country with three children? One being only five weeks old? Maybe, but Tara was so good the whole trip. She is such a blessing. When we were pulling out of our drive way on Friday ready to go pick up Katelyn from school and be on our way, tears came to my eyes. We have lived in Augusta for over five years and it is really hard to just leave after all that time. But as we were on our way to go pick up Katelyn and only a few houses down the street, Alia asked if we were moving and I told her we were and she said, "Not without Katelyn." I thought it was so cute! She really does love her sister! When I picked up Katelyn from school, she just kept hugging her teacher saying she didn't want to move and her teacher actually cried she was so sad to see her go. Katelyn also hugged one of her friends, it made me cry knowing how hard it is for her to leave. Anyway, that first day we got to Birmingham, Alabama.

Saturday was our long driving day going all the way to McKinney, Texas where Travis' sister lives. We drove across the Mississippi River on our way there. Katelyn made sure I took a few pictures of the bridges. We were able to stay with Travis' sister for a few days and let the kids get a break from the road and to have fun with their cousins, Landon and Blake. We were able to go to church on Sunday with them and spend Monday with them as well.

Tuesday we were on the road again, but not for long because we stopped about an hour later to visit one of my best friends in all the world. I have known Annika since we were about three years old, but we hadn't seen each other for almost five years. It was so nice to see her again and visit for awhile.Then we were on the road again. It was not a good day for driving though. There was freezing rain almost the whole day and we had to stop several times to scrap the ice off our windshield. Also, I don't think I have seen so many trucks and trailers that were turned over on the side of the road or that had run off the road in my whole life. I think they were just going way too fast for the weather conditions we were having. It was pretty crazy! But we made it safely to Midland, Texas that day.

I don't know if you can tell, but everything was covered in ice.On Wednesday, we were on our last driving day and made it to Las Cruces, New Mexico. But our GPS led us out in the middle of nowhere. We had to drive about 15 miles off our course just so we could fill up with gas and the gas station was a really old one with only two pumps in a little town called Dell City where I think it said there was a population of only 413. But we did get some good views driving through the Guadalupe Mountains.This is when we were driving through the Franklin Mountains in El Paso, Texas.We finally made it to New Mexico!On Thursday the truck arrived at the house we are renting and we had some members of our ward that helped us unload everything in only one hour. They were awesome! Anyway, we are still trying to get everything unpacked and put into it's place. I will post pics of the house later.