A Year Ago Today

How can it be? Already a year has past.

It all started with (I think) an amazing Christmas present to our children that began our journey. The emotions were so mixed. Comprehension, happiness, shock, realization, sadness, nervousness, joy. And that was just Courtney and I!

After a few more loose-ends (Cari, shots, leaving our house and goodbyes), we were hitting the road … but in two weeks we had to:

1. Pack up our whole house into one U-Haul and CRV. How great was everyone who came to the Potluck Packing Party!
2. Fix flat tires. This was five minutes from our house.
3. Drive household goods through a winter storm from NJ to Georgia. Which was a lot trickier than what I wrote about. And included a looong stop at a Cracker Barrel to see if it was finally going to stop snowing.
4. Unpack those household goods with the GA Crew and return the U-Haul. We couldn’t have done it with some wonderful help.
5. Pack up bags for NJ and luggage for The Adventure. (Alisa remember me sitting on your den floor agonizing on how to fit everything? One luggage and a backpack per person – plus our Kermit bag!
6. Drive back up to NJ from Georgia (again through a winter storm, how lucky!) At least this time we were all in the same car.
7. Spend a scant few days with our friends, so we could say good-bye again.
8. Catch a plane to Liberia, Costa Rica.

Oh, and pull the kids out of school, make sure our curriculum was working, get all our medical stuff together, quite our jobs and did I mention say good-bye? Those good-byes were the hardest.

But were we ready! And excited! How much we changed on this trip is amazing to see. Take a look at how much Chayton grew up.