After about an hour of failed attempts to get into my old blog, I threw in the towel and started a new blog. I am hoping against all odds that I will make it back home (someday) to find my old name and password. I have great history with that blog you know......
Anywho.... I haven't blogged in 6 months and am not quite sure where to start....so I'll start with the world's longest vacation. We left our house in the city with the tiny kitchen, steep driveway and almost no back yard on June 22. We drove through a humid Arkansas, and beautiful Tenesssee, to arrive in a sleep deprived stuper of silliness at Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA where Steve is getting no less than three Masters all leading up to his Masters in Divinity. Tri-master Saenz his is new self dubbed nick name. We arrived in the parking lot of the bookstore at 9:20PM after circling the campus several times to ensure that I take a million blurry....almost focused...ok not really, pictures of the campus out the window of our brand new used minivan. I swore I'd never own a minivan, and I still don't because I somehow managed to remain completely out of Steve's transacation with Carmax. Once safely in the parking lot, we opened the door to the van only to have all of the kids toys spill out into the parking lot along with Steve and I giggling and dilerious from the trip just trying to make it through the doors of the bookstore before it closed at 9:30. We had two tired kids and 10 minutes to shop and Steve completed his mission of school parafanilia in 9 minutes and 55 seconds. Loaded up on school spirited goods, we spent a restful night in tiny beds and drove on to Lynchburg to see my parents. It was a super great trip. We saw many a fort, landmark, water taxi, house, museum; my dad and sometimes mom trucking us to every attraction our eager eyes wanted to see. We stayed for about 11 days and then it was time to make our journey towards home. I say towards because we have yet to actually make it there. I hated to leave. It's not just that vacation joy that fades when you leave somewhere but it's the hard reality that I wont see my family for another 6 months. I'll miss the crazy life of being in a big house with a big family perpetually coming and going. The sounds, the space, the food, the unconditional love...it's a tough thing to leave behind.
On our way homeward, we traveled through the Carolinas, Alabama, Mississippi, Lousiana, and finally back to Texas. Once in Texas, we drove straight to the Katy Mills Mall, where we met an entire food court full of relatives. There's nothing like getting out of a car smelling like stale fries and New Orleans and walking straight into the arms of people you barely know. Fun stuff... We spent the weekend doing family reunion type stuff and even got to venture to yet another museum. This is about the moment when things got a bit...expensive? Back in May I realized that I spend an hour and a half a day commuting (in the passenger side) of our car. I go to work, go home, play with Nathan and Kalea, put them to bed, and go to bed exhausted. I got an amazing offer to be able to talk about my faith and career publically, but missed it because I didn't have time to check my e-mail. The best plan of action? To get an iphone. I was suddenly able to do everything I needed to do in the car. Next to the van, it was probably the best purchase we made. My phone was awesome for the trip until a new problem surfaced. Steve has done the bulk of his Masters work on the road. We tour America by day and by night he would leave the kids and I alone to sleep in the hotel while he spent the night hours in the hotel's business center. This venture was interesting and time consuming especially when the hotel either lacked a business center (at these times the work had to be done on the iphone) or if the hotel offered wifi to laptop owners and dial up on the computers in the business center. People do weird things on vacation, but a sleep deprived person jumps past weird into the abyss of are you crazy? Steve's student loan was more than he needed for school, so with his trusty Liberty Card, he went out and bought not one, but two laptops. Then he tried to extend our vacation.... I love the laptop, but a gal's got to go home eventually. Perhaps that will happen tomorrow?
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