lucky


yeah, i totally lucked out with this one. [and by this one i mean taylor ;) ]

today we had a few things go not our way, and right when i was about to go into anxiety mode, i remembered that compared to everything that is going right, these couple little hiccups are nothing.
i wish there were a way to show gratitude enough, i never feel like i've thanked enough before something else goes so completely right for us.

i know at any minute our circumstances could change, we could get some huge, difficult, painful trial. i would feel like a pessimist if i planned on it, so i won't. instead i won't plan on anything, i think we'll just keep doing what we're doing and try our hardest to say thank you the best that we can

so i'd like to say thank you
taylor, for everything, literally everything
family, for the support and love
dc, for being nice to us our first week here
friends, for being awesome and offering us so much
job, for hiring me
school, for accepting taylor
landlady, for letting us rent this cute place
ikea and target, for having pretty much everything we needed for our new place
creept camel crickets, because i googled you and supposedly you can't bite me
funny little harbor freight trailer for getting us and all our stuff across the country
air conditioning, because i probably couldn't live without you
taylor again, because you're sexy and you know it
and you work out
and everyday you're shufflin'

shufflin'





shufflin'

Smooth Move Furguson

i have been called accident prone before, in fact it was a nick name of sorts growing up.
klutz, kinetically unaware, clumsy: at one point or another i have been labeled as such.

usually when a particularly klutzy move is made [i.e.: hips running into door frames and bedposts, tripping over my very own size 5 1/2 feet, or giving my head a healthy knock on  a shelf that has been in the same exact place the last 2 years] a catch phrase commonly used, solely by myself, has been "duh, kelcie"

well, yesterday was an exceptionally clumsy day for me, as have the days before as we've been moving in.
when taylor commented "duh, kelcie" i'm sure i gave him a look, one that said "oh-no-you-didn't-just-use-MY-catch-phrase". his response? "smooth move furguson", to which I immediately retaliated to with a hearty laugh. [if you aren't familiar with the phrase, i pitty you and you should google it]

this whole experience made me think, "what do we sound like to our house mates living above us?" 
i know with a certainty that they can hear just about every noise we make, as we can hear just about every noise they make [slightly muffled of course]. i know we have a weird sense of humor, i know sometimes i'm pretty ridiculous with my language and interesting noises, and i know we laugh a lot...i'm scared to think what other noises they might be judging us based off of..
something to think about

also, there are a lot of bugs here that i don't like. i can handle snakes, and spiders, and scorpions, and basically every bug i've come across in arizona except roaches. but here, i've learned, there are freakin' monstrous, jumping, black, juicy, noisy crickets...and i hate them, no, i loath them, and i'm terrified of them, and the other day i literally almost had a heart attack because one of them jumped at my face and tried to kill me. OK, maybe that isn't entirely true, but taylor did have to go finish my chore because there were like a kagillion [or maybe just 20] of them waiting to ambush me in the little shed outside.

which brings me to my third and final rant of the day:
the street signs in D.C.,
come on, nation's capitol, seriously? my gps is going crazy, i swear every time i go out i miss a turn somewhere, and not for lack of attention, or lack of trying. why can't you label things properly D.C.? if the 95 is the 395, and the 50 is the 66, i need to say left at the fork, but then i have to merge right according to the sign, and don't really turn here because its a one way, and I NEVER HAD THIS PROBLEM IN PHOENIX.

so i guess i have some learning to do. and hopefully i get the hang of it before we're done here, so that at some point i don't have to be detoured 3 times and add an extra 15 minutes onto my drive before reaching my destination.

and now for the pros thus far:
1. I love having less space to clean, its an organizational challenge, but I like it
2. for some reason the west coast news is making the "heat wave in D.C." to be some huge deal, listen up people, its not even hot, it feels great! and aside from the population of mosquitoes, the humidity is not bad at all, in fact my skin is actually enjoying it, and my hairs!
3. the one house mate we've met so far is so extremely sweet and friendly and we're going to be best friends, maybe
4. no carpet to vacuum!
5. everything is super close by
6. we have a couch! that we both fit on together! at the same time! bodies fully extended! woo hoo!
7. its GORGEOUS here! while i love the arizona desert, all this foilage is a welcomed change
8. our neighborhood is stinkin' adorable
9. i have the best handy-man, mechanically inclined, tech savvy, buff, helpful, handsome husband in the world!

i am so grateful that everything has worked out so well so far for us, blessings sure are being sent our way!


D.C.

we made it! we're here! we're moved in! we're ready for school and work to start [in a couple weeks].
We left Phoenix at 3am on Wednesday the 11th and arrived in D.C. at 5am [2am AZ time] on the Thursday the 19th. Some would call that record time.
And it was.
Thanks to a couple captivating audio books, a tiny bit of caffeine, and a stop on Monday night for a little snooze, we made it safe and sound and had everything out of the trailer by 7am :)

we purposefully had low expectations of our place [just so we wouldn't be let down, as we signed the lease sight unseen], but after a little cleaning and a touch of Robinson we love it! 

the only thing it's lacking is a television, which should be arriving via UPS in less than 2 hours :)

needless to say we love it! it's a little sticky, but not nearly as hot or uncomfortable as PHX was when we left [lets just say I went running today at 9am with the sun shining and i'm not dead]

thanks to everyone who sent us off with love and support, visit us! skype us! call us! we'll miss you guys but are SO excited for the adventure ahead!

[video of our cross country trek to come :) as well a Lake Powell and Mezico post]