Finally...an update with pictures!!

This has been an amazing whirlwind of a week. Scott and I were commenting on Saturday that it was hard to believe we'd only been in OKC for a week....it feels like months! Good months, but busy months!!

God is so good. We were frantically packing our moving truck on Thursday, July 1 in an attempt to leave by lunch time. My wise hubby said, "Let's wait. We don't HAVE to be there today. We're gonna get there around 7:00 or 7:30...we won't know if the office will still be open (it wouldn't have been!). We have no idea where we're going. Let's just wait." And in my ever-submissive way I agreed. I am soooo glad we waited!! We had a relaxing afternoon, Katelyn and I went to eat at Chang's, and we finished packing without killing ourselves.

So Friday morning we got on the road around 9:00. It was still crazy those last few minutes of realizing things we were leaving (isn't it always a little crazy in those last few minutes?!?). We were having a nice drive up there and Scott realized that we needed to make sure our apartment had electricity turned on before we got there (again, wise man!!). So he called our landlord and she said, "Who are you? I don't have any apartments ready." Now, mind you, I'd talked to her at least 4 times during the week. Oh dear!!! So I called and she said, "Oh yes, I have an apartment ready for you. Your husband just called." What?!? Oh well....she DID have our apartment ready, so all was fine!

We pulled in to our apartment complex around 2:30 or 3:00. This is what our kids saw as they waited for us to sign our lease papers:




You have to factor in the scary-ish looking people milling around...all looking at the new people with all the kids who are moving in. Add to that the newness of it all and the realization that we really are "doing this" and it was a little overwhelming to our children. We came out from signing the papers (they had been with Katelyn) and everyone started crying. We stopped right then and talked and prayed. We reminded them that we are in the center of God's will. That He's called us and He's protecting us. We talked about the people around us who need Jesus. I think it helps that our children feel "called" too, they're not just "along for the ride" with their parents. Ok, technically, I think Nate, Annie and Garrett are along for the ride....but they're loving it! Ü

So we drove around the building looking for our building. Here's a few more pictures of our apartment complex:

This is where we park. Our kitchen window is the thin one on the right. We park the car, open the window, and unload our groceries! Yep, that's a wall ac unit you see...more about that shortly!

I wanted to post pictures of the walk to our apartment...but I can't take them right now. I guess I'll post those tomorrow!

We went in to our apartment and we were pleasantly surprised!! They had just put new carpet in...a very nice touch!! So I'm not worried when my kiddos play (or sleep!) on the floor! Here's a view from our front door:

Benji is on the computer (YAY for internet as of yesterday!!) That's our big family room and you can kind of peek back into our little kitchen. Here's a view from back by our kitchen looking toward the front door:

Speaking of our little kitchen...here it is. It's pretty funny because you can't open the dishwasher and the fridge at the same time. And the appliances are so close together that when you open the oven door it pops the refrigerator door open! lol!!


So we're in a 2 bedroom, 1 bath apartment. Really that works ok with us. It's a little tricky in the morning when everyone has to "go" -- but we're figuring out a system.

Here's our bathroom. It has a little dividing wall between the sink and the potty so TECHNICALLY someone can potty while someone brushes their teeth (although we've hung a mirror over our kitchen sink for people to do contacts, brush teeth, apply make-up and brush hair).

Here's the kids' room. We are so thankful for how big it is. We imagined a room where you kind of walked sideways to get between the beds....but in reality there's about 6 feet of "play room." Also a very big closet! Again, God is good!!

You can just barely see the bottom corner of the other bunk bed on the left....

And finally, the master bedroom and closet. As you can see we have plenty of room to walk around our king size mattress (something else I didn't think we'd be able to do)!!

Another funny thing about our apartment....see that strange glow in the far corner of our room? By the wall and the window? That's the overhead light in the room. Not in the center of the room...but in the back left corner.

And, for the grand finale.....our air conditioning unit. This is actually pretty effective...but pretty funny looking. Our apartment stays quite cool! I'll let ya know what our first electric bill is like!

So, I guess that's it. Tomorrow I'll post more about what our days look like. Basically, it's classes in the morning and ministry in the afternoon. Each day I'll post a little about what kind of ministry we're doing on that particular day.

Thanks for praying for us and for supporting us. Prayer requests would be: relying on God daily, strength to do all that each day requires, and patience with each other. If you'd like to support us financially that would be GREAT. You can find out how by looking at the top left side of this blog!

More tomorrow....