Weep Not for Roads Untraveled...

Leaving CO was rougher than I thought it would be. I often told Tristin, "I wish people would forget we even existed here, it would make goodbyes SO much easier," but then I realized how selfish and ungrateful that sounded. We gained SO many friends and met so many people we dearly love. Life wouldn't be the same without them. They deserved a proper goodbye, as did we.  Our last month there I kept joking with T about tying him to the car and driving to Disneyland where we could ride away our sadness.I kept my cool til my very last working day when I was alone and everyone was out of the office. As I packed up my massage room I had a fat pity party for myself followed by some happy Owl City tunes.  I never knew I could love my clients so much but what shocked me was their love in return. They had become a part of my great big Colorado family and so saying goodbye every day was probably harder than saying goodbye to South Africa 10 years ago.  I hate even admitting this but I didn't even stay for my last Sunday in Young Womens. Saying goodbye to my girls would have been too hard...so I left after sacrament (selfish, I know!!!)

Our last Room Mate get together! You guys were the bomb.com

The packing Crew

However, we survived the sadness and heartache. We packed our truck in 45 minutes, left a day earlier than planned and said goodbye to Boulder as we drove away in the rain.

But don't feel too bad for us...we spent the next 10 days in Grand Cayman, burning all sadness away with sunshine and salt!

 *more pictures to  come*

Soon after our Cayman trip it was back to reality. We met with a mortgage officer, started looking for homes to buy, fell in love with a few and finally decided on one.

Thats right, folks, we are moving up in the world and are becoming home owners soon. Just the other day I bought our very first fridge for the house and we were SO PROUD of ourselves!!! By Thanksgiving we will be ready to move in and say goodbye to the boxes of stuff that are sitting around our temporary bedroom right now. No point in unpacking boxes to just pack them again, right!

Tristin has started his BYU PhD program, along with work and is a VERY busy boy these days. I'm lucky I get to see him at all. Even on the weekends he's working on research projects or papers for his classes. Full time school plus 35+ hours of work a week is not easy but trust Tristin to be able to do it. The hubster is brilliant and continues to amaze me more every day. 

My Shy Guy

What is even more amazing to me is that he loves the work he's doing at the BYU Advisement Center (Hi Kerry), loves his professors, loves the research groups and projects hes doing and loves his cohort in his program. Everything here was just SO easy! No struggles, no large obstacles, no nothing!

Dessert at the Grad Night Dinner. Peter, from the cohort, won a half semester scholarship and did a cartwheel while receiving it! It was brilliant! the Psych Department was definitely the loudest!

People keep asking us what it's like to be back. The truth is this: sometimes it feels like we never even left and that CO was some sort of strange dream.  But then I'll get a loving text message or phonecall here and there from CO friends that remind me that I really DID exist there once upon a time and that there are still people there that love us...I left a few footprints and people still feel them. That, to me, is a warming feeling

It's good to be back in Utah Valley. I've missed my family and forgot what a luxury it was to have them around ALL the time! Even my little nephew knows and remembers me now. He now allows me squeeze him and give him kisses ALL THE TIME!! (obsessed much? Maybe...)

Even with that messy face I wanna eat him alive!

Family hike

Life continues to unravel gloriously every day. I know this is where we are meant to be.  I've felt the "pull" of Utah Valley calling us home for a long time and even though I was scared to come back, it was worth it.