Our last days leading up to the big transition from Texas to Indiana were very long, tiresome and stressful. I think we got everything done but probably not exactly how we wanted to. We moved most of our stuff from the house to the storage unit on December 18th and it was 85* outside! We were in shorts and t-shirts and sweating! It cooled off to 75* the rest of the week. Definitely going to miss that weather!
With Thursday, December 20th being our last night in San Antonio we decided to hit up the RiverWalk one last time to see the Christmas Lights and have dinner. We ate at Rita's (we had a Groupon that still needed to be used).




After we left the RiverWalk we headed to our hotel. While we were on the Interstate we heard a loud pop.....it was our tire. We were able to make it off the Interstate into a shopping area where we found our tire completely sliced open and flat. It was starting to get chilly that night and Derek and i didn't have coats with us......Derek was even in short sleeves. Luckily we had a tool set with us and a spare tire. Two security guards also stopped to help so it went by quicker than it could have. We finally made it to the hotel around 10:30pm or so. We got the kids in their pj's, in their beds and a load of laundry in the washing machine. Derek took off to finish up with the last of what was to do at the house (mopping floors and paint touch ups.) I stayed with the kids and finally got a shower in! When I got out of the shower at 11:30pm all of the kids were still awake! I had to turn all the lights off to make it pitch black and threaten to take Avery's blanket away for everyone to quiet down and actually go to sleep. Derek didn't show up back at the hotel until 4:30 am Friday morning. I got the kids up and ready at a little after 6 and took them down to breakfast @ 6:45 where we had the place to ourselves. Derek made it down there just as we were finishing up so I ran up to get all of our stuff and our laundry that was still in the dryer in the laundry room (actually some man was up there folding it all). We got Avery to school on time and Allie was a little late but they weren't counting tardies that day. It was just hard to find her class because they were having an assembly in the gym.
Once the kids were in school we had tons of errands to run. The first thing was meeting our property manager at the house so she could get pictures, then I took the truck to a tire place to get tires replaced while Derek took our last load to the storage unit. We made it to Avery's Christmas party, a little late and in work clothes, but we were there that's what counts!
 |
| Avery and her best friend, Mia Jaye |
 |
| Avery and Ms. Bellah |
 |
| Avery and Ms. Carnavale |
Once we left Avery's school and said all of our goodbye's we had to go back to the tire place b/c a light was already coming on again talking about tire sensors which we just replaced. Ugh! In the end, it wasn't a safety issue and we didn't have time to mess with them screwing more up. Derek was already on his way to base to drop a laptop off and his truck off and I had to go pick him up. From there we had to drop off our at&t internet box thingy and get our vehicle weighed so we could get reimbursed for some of our storage fees. After doing all of that we basically missed all of Allie's Christmas party. Luckily whe wasn't really expecting us and she was all smiles when I walked in. We are really going to miss Kuentz. The school was great and Allie has progressed so much, especially this year with her teacher, Mrs. Ratliff. She was awesome. She started crying thinking about it being Allie's last day. We'll miss her.

After school we went back to the house one last time and loaded the last of our things to take to Indiana and picked up the UHaul trailer. Like I said, we got on the road about 4pm. Not good timing for San Antonio traffic and Christmas vacation traffic to boot. We got stuck in some nasty traffic. We also had to stop by the Distribution Center to pick up a few things........traffic that was is even worse! We were just outside of NorthEastern San Antonio at 6pm! We decided to stop and eat dinner in hopes that traffic will have died down some. We left @ 6:30 and it wasn't quite as bad but it got worse again as soon as we hit Austin. Once we got to Dallas we were diverted off the interstate b/c there was a huge wreck where a semi w/ combustible material crashed and caught fire. A trip that usually takes us 17-20 hours w/ stops took us 24 hours. At least we made it safe!
And for a few random pictures:
 |
| we did somehow manage to still make Christmas Cookies (4 trays of them!) |
 |
| took some time out from packing to watch Rudolph |
 |
| this picture cracks me up.....at story time! |