On the move

After weeks of packing, we finally loaded up the truck and made the 465-mile journey to our new home in Virginia.  It was sad to leave our home in Augusta.  We had so many friends there, and so many people in our situation that we could relate to (poor students with kids).  Medical school was hard (haha doesn't that make it sound like *I* went to medical school?) but we absolutely loved our time in Georgia.  Yes it was hot and humid and there really isn't much to do in Augusta, but we had people we loved there, and we made some great memories.  Such a fun time of our life!

But, life goes on and I am especially excited for THIS chapter because it brings a PAYCHECK!  (still waiting for the first one, but still.)

Anyway, back to the move.  We rented a 24' Budget truck.  For weeks, Garrett stressed that not all of our stuff would fit in the truck.  I knew it would be fine... we had spent weeks helping our friends load up their trucks, and we have (much) less stuff than some of them have.  Besides, we were already getting rid of tons of stuff not only for the truck space, but because we lost 350 square feet of living space when we moved here.

So, on a Tuesday morning some people from the ward came over and helped us load the truck (a surprisingly great turnout for a weekday morning, thanks everyone!).  We were DONE in about 1.5 hours and spent the rest of the day doing last-minute packing, errands, and cleaning.  The plan was to leave at 5:30 on Wednesday morning.

We rolled out of the driveway around 5:45 the next morning - 15 minutes behind schedule, but not too bad!  We were lucky enough to be moving to the same city as some of our best friends, the Egberts.  We decided several weeks ago that we would all caravan to Virginia.  It made it a lot more fun since we all had walkie-talkies.  Rob did a great job of warning us when a great mullet was on its way to pass us in the left-hand lane! (Thank you, North Carolina).

Garrett did a great job driving the truck, and towing his sedan behind.  That's Rob in the background with his Penske, towing his truck with the canoe on top.

My view for 465 miles.  Garrett set the pace for us all.  At first we thought that we'd have to go 55 the whole way (there's a governor on the truck), but thankfully Garrett found an override button that allowed him to go 70 - woo hoo!  Made ALL the difference.

My rear view - Haley was behind me and Rob was in the back of the caravan.

We only made one stop, somewhere in NC for lunch.

The girls did great in the car! I thought it would be rough because we don't have movies or anything but they did really well (although they didn't nap, which was annoying).  And we made great time.  We got to our new hometown in just about 8.5 hours - not too bad considering we took a long break about 2/3 of the way through.

When we arrived at our destination we decided that we'd go straight to the truck place and drop off the hitch and the car.  That way, when Garrett returned the truck later that night, he'd already have his car there to drive home.  Would you believe that that dang car wouldn't start to even take it off the trailer??  He'd been having some problems with it the week before we moved, and I told him that the last thing we want to do is haul a no-good car all the way up to Virginia.  I told him that it probably would break down in the first week we were there.  I was only too right... we couldn't even start it to take it of the trailer.  So, we pushed it off and left it there overnight, and I drove Garrett back the next day to fix it (YouTube has saved us hundreds of $$ over the last few months. Seriously.).

Anyway...... we got to our apartment complex and some people from the ward came to help us unload the truck.  It took a few hours but it went great - we were so thankful for the help.  It's amazing how much stuff you can have, even if you don't REALLY have a ton of stuff.  Does that make sense?  Let's just say, I'm glad we got rid of so many things before we moved.  I don't even remember half the things we ditched - that's how "important" they were to me.

So, that's our story about our move to Virginia.  WHAT A DAY!!  It was fun (traveling with friends and walkie-talkies), it was challenging (unloading boxes and dealing with 2 whiny kids with no naps), and it was awful (dealing with the car not starting when we got there).  And sad (I got some family news that was very upsetting).  Thankfully it's OVER and now we can just move on with the new chapter of our lives here in residency!  Let the games (and paychecks) begin!

I'll post some pics of our apartment complex/neighborhood soon!