Welcome to Bellefonte

Nathan and I went out on a date last night.  Yep, we hired a babysitter to watch Hannah while we spent some time together.  We decided to keep things simple and inexpensive as our budget is all out of whack due to our recent move.  So, we went to see what our little town has to offer.

First, we fed the ducks at the local park.

Then we decided to walk around the park before we ate dinner at a local Italian restaurant.  Bellefonte has its own natural spring and that is how this town got its name (in french, "la belle fonte" means beautiful fountain).

Look at how clear that water is.

The word that I use to describe the city of Bellefonte: Charming.

This was too funny and I had to take a picture of it.

Bellefonte has many buildings that feature Victorian architecture.

Nathan wanted a picture of this house because it was so odd.  This is the cemetery gatehouse and home of the cemetery's superintendent.  How would you like to live here with your backyard facing an old cemetery.  Creepy.

Also, Bellefonte is the county seat of Centre County.

And since the county seat is here, that means the infamous Sandusky trial has been taking place at this courthouse.  There have been lots of cameras and media attention in this little town lately (as you can tell from the photo below).

Afterwards we ran a few errands at the mall and Home Depot, and then we went and got ice-cream at Penn State Creamery--yum!

Press picture in front of the County Courthouse courtesy of the Washington Post

One goal accomplished

Today I finished one of my 2012 goals: I have read all 7 of Jane Austen's novels.

R Sense and Sensibility

R Pride and Prejudice

R Mansfield Park
R Emma
R Northanger Abbey
R Persuasion
R Lady Susan

For Christmas last year I asked for the collection of Jane Austen's novels (thanks Mom).  I have read a few of her books and I loved them, so I figured I would probably enjoy reading her other novels as well, which is why I asked for the book.  Some were more enjoyable than others, but it was a fun project to undertake and now it's completed.  Yeah!

(Camber...this next part is mainly for you because I know that you did this last summer, and I know you are interested in knowing my "ranking" of Austen's novels).

Here are my favorites:

1. Pride and Prejudice--nothing beats this novel.  N.O.T.H.I.N.G!  Mr. Darcy is the best!  No questions asked...number one.
2. Sense and Sensibility--loved it. Colonel Brandon is the bomb.
3. Emma--okay, Emma is snobbish but she sees the error of her ways and changes in the end. Besides, she marries Mr. Knightley who I just want to "wrap up in my pocket" (if you have read this book you'll get that phrase in the quotation marks).
4. Persuasion--this is a short, quick easy read with a happy ending.  Captain Wentworth is great, but he is no Mr. Darcy.
5. Northanger Abbey--this book was okay.  It was kind of weird, but it was so easy to read because it was short.
6. Lady Susan--such a different writing style than the other 6 novels, and super short!  Only 43 pages long.  Okay novel.
7. Mansfield Park--I did not like this book.  It took a LONG time to get interesting which made it kind of drag.  I don't think I'll ever read this one again.  Once is good enough for me.

Our home

Here are the photos as promised.  We still have a few odds and ends boxes that need to be put in their proper place (mainly on storage shelves in the basement).  We ran into a few stumbling blocks this week and just couldn't get to them so you'll notice there are a few boxes left in the pictures.  Sorry.

We are renting the home that we are trying to buy.  All of our money is tied up in our Iowa condo.  As soon as that sells then we can purchase this home.  This house has 3 stories.  The main level (1963 square feet) is completely finished.  The basement and the upstairs are not finished...yet.  We hope in the next several years to finish at least one of those levels.  But both of them completed will make the home about 5,000 square feet total.  So, there is LOTS of room to grow with this house, and I love that!

One other note before you see the pictures of the house: because we are renting at the moment we can't paint the house, hang any curtains, put pictures on the wall, or replace the blinds in the windows.  So please excuse the very bland, boring walls and windows.

OK...here we go.

Here is the outside of the house.  I think it is funny that the home we are living in is yellow, with a black door and window accent shutters.  Those are the Iowa Hawkeye colors and we are now living in Nittany country which is all about the navy blue and white.  Ironic!

And yes, every body's lawns look as crummy as ours.  The soil here is awful and there has not been much rain this season.  At this point we can't do too much about it due to the timing in the year, and also because we are renting the home.   By next spring, I hope that my somewhat green thumb will be able to whip this lawn into shape.

The entry way.

The kitchen.

I get a pantry!  YEAH!

And this is our brand new fridge.  I specifically put this picture in for my friend Larkin, who wishes she could have one of these 3 door fridges in her home.

The dining room.

I love how much natural light comes into this house.  I almost never have to turn on any lights with all sunshine coming in through the windows.

The outside view from the patio.  These pictures do not really do it justice.

The family room.

The guest bathroom/Hannah's bathroom.  I love having 2 bathrooms now.

Hannah's bedroom.  Yes, I know that cardboard box is a major eye sore.  The thin paper blinds in the windows right now do not block out any sunlight which meant that Hannah kept getting up around 6:00 am each morning.  Well, we hated that so we took a portion of the refrigerator box and put it in the window to block out some of the sunlight.  Now, she usually sleeps till about 7:30 am.

The spare room, which is the office and my sewing room.

The laundry room.  I love having this room.  It is so practical.

The master bedroom and bathroom.

Well folks, those are the pictures of the house.  We are looking forward to painting, finish decorating with pictures and curtains, getting a king size bed, improving our lawn care, etc. When things get settled down over the next 4-5 months I am hoping to learn how to get "crafty" with furniture.  My sister Emily has done some fabulous things with her home in refinishing furniture, reupholstering, or taking an older piece of furniture (i.e., a chest of drawers) and make them look brand new.  I think maybe I'll start with a bedroom set.  I'd like to have some real bedroom furniture.

That's a load of garbage

I'm sure many of you have seen the movie The Wizard of Oz.  You know the saying "Toto, I don't think we are in Kansas anymore?"

Well...I know I am definitely not in Kansas!

I asked my neighbor last week when trash day was.  Her reply: "Oh, you have to hire someone to pick up the trash."

WHAT!??!  What city doesn't pick up your trash?

OK then.  I called a trash company the other day and hired them to come and pick up our garbage.  $25 a month.  I'm still not sure if that is steep or a good price.  Yesterday I received this booklet of payments in the mail and I couldn't help but scan the cover of this booklet and blog about it.

You'll notice I highlighted two things -- one in pink and one in blue.


Ashes: what kind of ashes are people throwing away?  The only type of ashes that I know about are cigarette ashes and human remains.  Creepy.


Hunting season: early Saturday pickup before BUCK!  WHAT?  Are you telling me that I am going to be seeing deer carcasses out on our street waiting to be picked up by the trash?  Gross.  We never saw this type of garbage in Iowa, and there is NO WAY you'd see that in Southern California.


Another side note about garbage: we don't have a garbage disposal too.  Weird.


Where did we move too?

From Iowa to Ohio, to the ER, and then Pennsylvania

We departed from York Place in our respective vehicles on Friday June 29th at 7:34 am.  For the next 7-8 hours we would be on the road heading for our stop in Toledo to stay the night.

The first part of our trip was quite uneventful.  Nathan drove the Penske (with the little civic in tow) and with Kronk in the cabin.  I drove the van with Hannah in the backseat.

Hannah did great!  She had her moments like every child does on a long car drive, but I was so impressed with her and how she handled it!  Kronk however did not do so great.  Nathan said he howled for about the first 2 hours of the journey, nonstop.  Poor guy.  He was scared for the entire trip.

I had to get a picture of the truck with the tow-dolly.  I think I took this photo at our last pit stop in Ohio as we were just getting ready to enter Pennsylvania.

I would say that about 3/4 of our driving time was spent in rainstorms--crazy, midwest rainstorms which can be brutal.  In fact, there was a period in Indiana that the rain was coming down so hard you could hardly see what was in front of you.  At some point we must have taken a wrong turn because somehow we ended up in Michigan, which added about a 45 minute detour to our travel route.  Oh well.

After we checked into our hotel we ate some dinner, and then decided that we should get settled for the night.  As Nathan was doing some prep-work on Kronk's cat carrier, Hannah had smashed her finger in the bathroom door.  It was so mangled and deformed that Nathan grabbed her and said "we are going to the ER!"

We got loaded into the van and drove off.  Hannah was crying hysterically as we were trying to navigate to find the hospital.  The receptionist at the hotel gave us bogus directions.  I then googled on my phone "hospitals near our current location" and it took me to some physical therapy facility.  Seriously?

So then Nathan told me to call 411 which I did.  The information lady first gave us the address to that same physical therapy place we were just at.  I told this woman that this location was not a hospital and that we desperately needed an ER!  She then texts me the address of a vetinary clinic.  GRRR!  I was so mad!  My daughter is not an animal, she is a human who need to go to the ER!

After that I just decided to call 911.  They guided us to a firestation that was just a few blocks away.  The firemen looked at her finger and encouraged us to go get it x-rayed, and they gave us proper directions to the hospital, which was less than 5 minutes away.  Thank you firemen!

So, after about 45 minutes of driving around we finally arrived at the hospital.  Hannah, of course, was no longer crying.  In fact, she was fine.  Her finger had regained it's original form, though it was swollen and a little purple, but she was favoring it slightly.  We still however wanted to get it x-rayed to be sure so we took her in.

Let's just say that Hannah was by far the most entertaining, charming patient that evening.  Everyone in that ER facility loved her (who wouldn't really).  Look at this picture.  She was so excited to be there.  It was as if nothing had happened to her finger.

The diagnosis: the nurse said there was a slight fracture, but the doctor said that there was no fracture.  Hmm.  Since when are nurses supposed to diagnose things?  I thought that was a little odd.  We just decided to watch and see how Hannah did.  If her finger was not better in a few days, and if she was still favoring it, then we would do some follow up care in PA.  (By the way...her finger is fine).

One of Hannah's nurses bandaged her little pinky up with pink tape (the kind of tape nurses wrap around your arm after they draw blood from you).  Hannah wasn't quite so sure about it and didn't really care for the bandage.

Check out this nurse!  I HAD to get a picture of her.  She was wearing one of those nursing hats from the 50s!  And she had bright blue eye shadow on, like the kind we used to wear back in the 80s.  Ah...it was classic!  She was such a sweet woman, and Hannah was entertained by her (actually, we all were).

And this is what I-80 looked like once we entered into Pennsylvania.  Lush green trees on both sides of the road.  It was beautiful!

At times when we would be coming out of a pass you would drive into this valley of never ending tress.  It was so pretty, and it made me happy that we get to live here!

We arrived at our home around 3:00 pm on Saturday June 30th.  Our neighbor, Sarah, was kind enough to take Hannah for the next several hours while Nathan and I, along with a few members of the Elder Quorum unpacked the truck.


One thing that was very hard to deal with right when we arrived was that the home was dirty.  Yep, our landlord did not really clean the home, which frustrates me.  After just a few moments of walking around I noticed that the bottom of Hannah's socks were black!  So, I had to quickly run to the store and get the swiffer sweeper tool and sweep the hardwood floors.  Then, later that night I had to clean both bathrooms so that we could all take our baths/showers because they were not clean either.  Ugh.


This last week has been a real challenge because not only are we trying to unpack and get settled in, but also because I have been trying to clean this house from floor to ceiling.  It's a newly constructed home and I don't think anyone has properly cleaned away the construction dust, which has been hard on Nathan's allergies.


So, I promise that I will post pictures of the house by the end of this week.  We are almost finished unpacking and cleaning.  We have just one room left to unpack and when that is all over with I promise I'll take pictures and post them for you all.

The end of an Iowa era

**I'm sorry.  I know it has been a while.  We just got our internet hooked up today and I only had time to do one blog post.  There are a few more posts coming, but I had to get to a few other things today (like downloading our finacnes and balancing our budget).**

Ok.  Now onto the post.

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After six years it finally happened.

We moved from our little condo in Iowa.

It was surreal.  But most of all, it was bittersweet.

We packed the Penske truck on June 28th.  The temperature was of course the worst it has been all year long.  At 7:30 am the real feel was already 87 degrees.  Before we disconnected the internet I took a screen shot of what the weather was supposed to be like on moving day.  Yep--a real feel of 115!

At 6:05 pm I checked the temperature on my phone and it said it was 105 degrees!  Ugh.  It took us a little longer to pack the truck because we had to keep taking water breaks so that nobody suffered from heat exhaustion.

Thank you to the Bells, the Reeves, to Lael, and to Dan for helping us pack the truck.  It was a service we will never forget.  And thank you to Brookie for watching Hannah.  It would have been impossible to pack the truck with her running everywhere.  

The more we packed the truck the more I felt our Iowa roots being uprooted.  It was sad.  After all, this was our first home that we "owned."  This was the longest we have ever lived in one place.  And, this was Hannah's first home.  It was truly the end of our Iowa era.

This I had to take a picture of.   The first night we stayed in our condo in Iowa we slept on the floor because our bed was in storage and we couldn't get it till the next day.  Well, for our last night in Iowa we had to sleep on the floor again.  As we started getting ready for bed I went to go blow up the air mattress and I noticed that there were no batteries in the pump.  We had the batteries packed in the Penske.  Ha!  In a way it's kind of funny.  Not too funny though because we got a horrible nights sleep! 

The next day, we packed up the rest of our belongings, said a prayer of gratitude (and one for safety), locked the front door and slid the key underneath it, and left our condo in Iowa at 7:30 am for the last time so that we could start our next chapter in life.  We also shed a few tears in the process.

On a happier and funnier note:

This is Hannah enjoying the boxes before the big move.  By the way, we only had to buy ONE BOX for our move, and it was a wardrobe box!  We got so many boxes from my former employer, from Nathan's employer, and from fellow ward members that it stocked us for our entire move!  Thank you everyone for helping us out.

And this is Hannah's new face that she has been making lately.  It is so funny.  You just have to ask her "do you want to go outside?" or "can you go find Pooh-bear?" and she makes this face.  It's too cute.