Crazy

1 pod, 1 5x8 uhaul, and of course, Becky's garage, and we have begun a new adventure.  Sold the house, bought another one which will be remodeled in the next months and headed to the mountains.  We are temporarily in a rental house while our mountain cabin is finished being updated.  Never would have thought that we would have been able to pull this off, and over the past couple of months, wasn't even sure that I wanted it to happen.  Now, I'm just ready to have my family all snuggled in our cabin for our new adventure. Stay tuned to see how that works out.
Ever since we began coming to New Mexico, I have felt tugged to reevaluate our lifestyle, our stuff, our priorities.  There were times when I would even feel sick to my stomach as we left our 1200 sq foot cabin to return to the 4000 square foot home in "the bubble".  Then we would get back in our normal crazy mode and the feelings would slip away, only to return when we went back to the mountains.  God has never just whispered things to me.  I believe that He speaks in a loud, clear voice about the plan He wants me to take.  As we put our home on the market and sold it the first day, I knew we were on the right path.  As I cleared out 75% of our belongings and got to hear precious stories of God's children along the way, I knew He was clearly telling me that this is what we are suppose to be doing.  The young woman who answered my email on the church website who could use a queen bedframe.  On the day she comes to the house, she goes to peek into her dad's truck and I ask what she has inside it.  A baby! A baby, I say, get him out.  So we get to love on him a bit and find out that they are moving out of her parents' home to an apartment.  Does she need a crib? A high chair? Sheets? Baby toys?  Yes, I had all of those things from BG and had been praying about what to do with them.  God sent me this young woman in need.  I am so thankful for all prayers that were answered.  The woman that answered my email when I asked if anyone knew of someone in need of a girl's bike.  Her brother had just adopted a 12 year old girl.  The night that Todd cleared the upstairs attic and there were 3 tubs of girls size 4/5 clothes that I had forgotten about.  The next morning an email is sent from Bwood moms about a family taking in a little girl and I can't remember what the need was specifically but I emailed to see if they needed clothes.  Yes, and also they could use the furniture I had in the foster care room.  So blessed to be able to share and it makes seeing it go away to someone that can really use it, so nice!
While there have been extremely sweet moments along the way, there have also been headaches.  The main one being my email.  When I woke up in the hotel room on the Monday before Christmas and was unable to get my email, my stomach just sunk.  When I shut off our internet/fios, I also lost my email.  I have never been reminded of how obnoxious technology is until then.  I was very tempted to forget it all but wavered when I knew that technology might be my keyhole to sanity while locked away in the remote mountain community!
As I sit at my computer, I am staring out into the mountains and looking at desert looking plants with no sod in sight!  Because we are "only" at an elevation of 7000, we are considering this to be our base camp prep as we acclimate to this before moving to the cabin at 9000 elevation.  Yes, I did read Into Thin Air after Madeline's sophomore reading requirement.  This may not be Mount Everest, but in my little world, sometimes it feels that way.
We enjoyed Christmas in AR for about a week, the Stanfield family in the rental home in NM for a week, and now 4 of the stanclan remain here while Madeline stays with her Texas family, the Georges, while she finishes up first semester.  We will start homeschooling with Texas Tech as soon as our books arrive, but until then the kids are just enjoying an extended break.
My one big sad part about not being in Texas is not being able to do foster care.  We are on the inactive list until we move back.  We are still very much involved with A's family, almost on a weekly basis. And BG & N are doing great, in addition to their mom, whom we are in contact with almost weekly.  I think Todd would be fine with us not fostering anymore since we are so heavily involved with these 2 families, he doesn't know how we can take on any more!  I'll just have to show him.
We are already seeing blessings here.  As we sat a local restaurant, I noticed a man who directs traffic in the ski valley parking lot and introduced myself.  He then proceeded to tell us about his brother who lives on Lake Lewisville, and then asked if any of us played tennis.  He has 10 courts in Taos!  Needless to say, Lucas jumped at the chance and will be practicing with the high schoolers starting in February.
Camille's skiing got off to a bit of a rough start.  She ventured out in new skis and boots with Madeline and did not have a successful run.  Madeline said she pizza'ed the whole way.  I forced her to take a private lesson.  For those that know Camille, she turned on full force, not going to go, not going to like it, I'm a bad mom, etc., the entire way there.  And since she would be in the Candor group(for those that have read the Divergent series), she didn't hide her disdain even when we got there.  She was peeved that her instructor was named Pablo, and was concerned that he wouldn't even be able to speak English.  He did!! They had a great run and she hugged me and thanked me afterward.  Lesson learned, always start the year with a lesson to brush off the dust balls on the skis. She has also got the snowboard going and will start a local shredders program, along with Lucas, starting this weekend.  Locals, sounds weird.
She is ready to hit the slopes right now!  Going to bundle her up and drive her to the mountain.  A whole 20 minute ride away.  Just think, in a week, she can walk out onto the mountain.  Crazy