summer days

lazy mornings, nancy drew, and maple creamees.

welcome summer!

expectations

I expected this move to require a lot of work. I expected to be frustrated and overly stressed occasionally. I expected that I would feel lost for a while. I expected to provide emotional support for our girls as they transitioned to a new home/school (surprisingly, they haven't needed much). I expected Vermont to feel a little foreign and mysterious. I expected to feel cold and damp. What I hadn't counted on was the combination leaving me feeling completely disoriented, which caused some moments of panic... "what the heck were we thinking!"

Fortunately, the anxiety has subsided significantly. I've scrubbed and unpacked the house enough that it's starting to feel like home. We've met our friendly neighbors (a family a few doors down with a little girl, and a family across the street with two young boys). We are able to sit outside in the evenings and chat while the kids play. One of our neighbors also works at IBM so he and Jacob are able to car pool. We have a fantastic ward with amazing people. We've been invited to do play dates, BBQ's, and dinners. The cold rainy weather has changed, and Vermont is warm and green. We feel so lucky to be here. It took us 5 days to unload our furniture between rainstorms.

The ramp we put together to move the piano into the house. We moved it by ourselves (go us)!!

drug store easter.

exploring our forest for the first time.

just behind our house.

gathering acorns.

Lake Champlain flooded from all of the rain.

sign of spring.

germinating.

(note Ella's pockets stuffed full of various treasures collected in the forest).

wish.

petals in the road.

spring!

Lake Champlain at sunset.

dilly-dahle U.S. tour 2011:

11 states in 11 days.


After signing the contract for our new house we flew back to Denver in time to do some laundry, grab a few hours of sleep, pack back up and head to Idaho for a quick trip to meet my sister's new baby, Christopher. We rented a minivan so that the 4 of us, plus my parents, could travel together and my brother could come back with us. It was a fun, busy weekend, that wasn't nearly long enough. We are so glad that we were able to go.

meeting Chris.

celebrating my mom's birthday.

blessing day.

family photo.

cousins.

Before we left Rexburg, my brother was able to give us a behind-the-scenes tour of the conference center at BYU-I where he works as a sound technician.

Then it was 10 hours in a crowded van back to Denver to do laundry (again), and finish enough of our taxes to file an extension, before packing up our own little car and heading east.

After a quick stop in Nebraska, we made it to Illinois to spend some quality time with Jacob's sister and her family. It was a fun, relaxing couple of days. The girls stayed busy playing with their cousins. We really only saw them when they decided they needed to eat.

picking dandelions.

pizza night.

pink panther marathon.

aunt Irene.

making s'mores.

We really wished we could have stayed longer.

The last couple days of our trip were long. We were ready to be in Vermont, and tired of living out of suitcases. The last day was particularly rough. We were driving into Burlington, not knowing if we were going to be able to get the key to our house. We had planned to spend the night in our new house so that the moving company could deliver our truck, and the gas company could come turn on our gas first thing in the morning. Our landlord was out of town in Hawaii, but planned to leave the house key at his wife's office with the receptionist. He told us to contact her when we were ready to pick it up. We called from New York to schedule a time to get it from her, but she had no idea what we were talking about. We tried to contact the landlord, but couldn't reach him. The most frustrating part was not knowing if we needed to arrange for a hotel, and cancel the moving truck delivery etc... Finally, around 6:00 PM, as we were arriving in Burlington, the landlord called us back. He had left the key, but hadn't told the receptionist, so after another half hour of phone tag we arranged to meet her to get our key. Phew. It ended up just fine, but the uncertainty made for a tough afternoon. We made one more quick stop at a store to buy a space heater, and a blanket. Unfortunately, we couldn't find a space heater. At 40 degrees, with no heat, we spent a chilly night on the floor, huddled under the blanket.

We set up our i-pod on the front window of our car to record a time lapse video of our trip. We basically recorded the entire trip. This video is our first look at Vermont. It starts just as we cross into Vermont on route 22A heading north to Burlington.

Welcome to Vermont from Heather Dahle on Vimeo.

Here is the girl's first look at our new house...


All in all, it was a great road trip.

And a few more photos from the road...