Greetings from the Sunshine State! In case anyone didn't know Andrew and I moved to Florida on October 3rd (an AWESOME B-Day present for me!) Not only was I able to celebrate my birthday in five states (road trip from NC to SC, GA, AL, and finally Florida), but I was able to celebrate in my state of birth something I haven't done since I was born 25 years ago!
I know what you guys are thinking, wait, Florida? How did this all come about? Well as some of you know Andrew recieved a call a few days before we were married on May 1st about a company that was interested in hiring him for a job in Fort Walton Beach, FL. We were excited so Andrew filled out all the necessary paperwork, updated his resume and we waited anxiously for news. At first they thought he would start in June, then July, then August and finally at the end of August we thought we reached a dead-end. The recruiter that was trying to hire him apparently couldn't as Andrew's job would be officially through the original company's sub-contractor. He told us (on Friday the 13th, no less) that he forwarded Andrew's resume to the HR person for the sub-contractor and that we would hear back on Monday. I was pretty sad because it seemed like a brush-off to me. "We'd really like to hire you, but..."
Luckily we were in Salt Lake getting ready to go into the temple for an endowment session so that disappointment was soon replaced with peace. As much as we would have liked to move, we knew that the Lord was in charge and we would move whenever he wanted us to.
Andrew did receive a call the following Monday and thus started on that company's application paperwork and the following interviews. We knew there were a few people lined up for the job and therefore competition much have been pretty tough, once again we just thought "We are happy here, we both have jobs, we have enough to fill our needs, if it happens it happens."
Fast forward to September 10th when Andrew is called by the HR person that he had been working with . He wanted to let Andrew know that all the paperwork was in and they were just waiting on a decision from the higher-ups and that we would know by Monday. We held our breath and said our prayers all weekend! Monday, nothing. Tuesday, nothing. Wednesday, JOB OFFER! Apparently they had misspelled his email address to which they sent the contract and they were starting to wonder why Andrew hadn't replied. Needless to say we printed off all the forms, signed them, and emailed them back that night!
Andrew and I gave our two-weeks notices the next day and started the moving planning for our first job move! Andrew was to report at his new job Monday, October 4th. That gave us plenty of time to pack, put our stuff in storage and fly to my parent's house in NC where we picked up my car from highschool so that we would have something to drive in Florida (it was so nice not to have to drive cross-country with no where to stay!)
We packed up all our stuff with lots of generous help from our best friends and had a little farewell party for Andrew right before we left (since I'm going back to teach in January I thought it would be fun to have a party just for Andrew). Clark drove us to the airport and we flew to NC.
It was SO GREAT to spend my 25th birthday with my parents as we thought I wouldn't be able to visit in 2010 at all! Actually, we celebrated it a day early because Andrew and I had to drive to Florida on my actual birthday. We made sure to do all family birthday traditions...
Playing "hot and cold" to find the presents....
Taking the "presents" picture.
Blowing out the candles! My mom was nice enough to make me my FAVORITE carrot cake (she made a special un-frosted one for me and frosted another one for everyone else!) I had lots of extra cake to feed me while we were in Florida for about a week!
We stayed on base a few nights so that we could check out places to live. We ended up staying at the place we found on the internet-- The Reserve Apartments in Gulf Breeze, FL. It's about a 20-30 min drive to work for Andrew which isn't bad (compared to driving from Provo to Salt Lake everyday!) We LOVE IT HERE!!!!
We have done way too much in the past two months to catch up in words, so I'm just going to use a ton of pictures because, well, they are worth 1,000 words that I don't have to type! HA!
Being "tourists" in Navarre (the city that is right next to the one we live in)...like 5 minutes from our house...
Navarre Beach...we the beach on the other side of the bridge is AWESOME! We go there a lot (see pictures below...)
Columbus day at the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola (the base where Andrew will go for reserves).
Our first 5k ever (and so far, our only!) We did really well for our first one, ran/jogged the whole way! At least we didn't stop (even though we may have wanted to at times). We are looking forward to doing more of these when I get back in April.
Our first haunted house all by ourselves (we've been to lots but always with Cindy and Clark). It was the WORST EXPERIENCE EVER! I HATE scary things but am okay if Andrew is in front of me and Cindy or Clark are right behind me so that I am "protected." I freaked out in the first room and buried my head in Andrew's back and tried to pretend in my mind that I wasn't really there. NEVER AGAIN!
The fine establishment where we do our laundry (until we move our washer/dryer out here!)
HOCKEY! The Pensacola Ice Flyers are only 30 mins from us and we really like going to the games! The tickets are really cheap compared to the Grizzlies which makes us want to go to many games!
Our Halloween costumes (Dr. Sheldon Lee Cooper and Dr. Amy Farrah Fowler from the Big Bang Theory). We went to our church Halloween Party (which was really fun, even though we are really new to the branch). People even knew who we were dressed up as! I made name tags just in case, but people recognized Sheldon's "green lantern" shirt.
Andrew splurged and bought "fresh from the factory" peanut butter cups! They were really good (we still have some left, thankfully!) and have been a good motivator for us to go to the GYM! HA!
One of our many walks on the beach. We definitely are "long walks on the beach" kind of people... as corny as it sounds!
Our first year carving pumpkins together....
Dinner at one of my favorite Chattanooga restaurants-- Mellow Mushroom! It was really nice to eat here, made me feel closer to home...
More hockey! We saw a fight this time, and let me tell you the gloves came off!
Blue Angels airshow on Veterans Day in Pensacola.
Andrew, Gru, and a minion!
Love the social sanctioning going on here! We occasionally see cars with this bumper sticker.
Another beach walk...
But this time with Portuguese Man-of-War all over the beach! We kept our distance!
Our newest addition to our family-- my dog CHLOE! We brought her back with us after Thanksgiving in NC. We bought her a new bed at Costco in NC (oh how we miss COSTCO!) We call it her Princess Bed because it has a mattress in it that I think the princess from the princess and the pea would love!
She is my constant companion which is nice since I'm home alone during the day. She even helps me do the laundry! She's sitting in a chair at the laundry mat keeping me company...
Aside from Chloe, our favorite acquisition from our Thanksgiving trip to NC was our Cracker Barrel rocking chairs! Here's our little model Chloe showing how comfy they are! For our friends outside the south, rocking chairs are a Southern Institution and Cracker Barrel chairs are pretty much the epitome of that institution! We are excited to be rocking on these for MANY years to come!
Okay that's ONE LONG POST! I am going to make it a goal to update this more often as I think one of my worst regrets in this life would be not keeping a journal. It is so nice to sit back and remember the good times and that's what I think this blog (at least for us) is for. Who needs New Year's Resolutions? I make December resolutions!
For those looking forward to the next post....WEDDING PICTURES!
Love you all,
The Wight House
