Moving Adventure

The morning after Halloween, we threw the last items in our moving van and were off to Cedar City.

 

This is outside our townhouse for the last time. We had cute little bunnies in our grass and cows across the street that are missed.

 

 We made really good time and were going to arrive in Cedar about 9 or 10 p.m. that night.  We were about 40 min outside of Grand Junction, just outside a little town called De Beque when Mark turned on his hazards.  My mom and I thought he was joking that something was wrong until we were driving behind him going 5 mph for a minute or two. Luckily there was an exit coming up so Mark pulled off to the side of the road and let the truck crawl as far as it would go. Unfortunately the truck didn't make it all the way off the exit.  When we got out of the car, black liquid was overflowing out of the truck hood.  We were shocked because Penske gave us a brand new truck with only 6,000 miles on it!  We had such crazy luck!

 While we were waiting for Penske to help us we walked to a Subway in a nearby gas station.  Usually I don't love eating at gas stations but I was SO grateful that we ended up there.   We were so blessed to have that happen on an exit instead of the middle of nowhere--which is where we were usually driving.

It was a long time until Penske figured out what the plan was.  Lucy was especially loopy from lack of sleep. 

 Here I am trying to control Lucy in Subway. She was acting so crazy and loopy at one point that she ran straight into a wall and fell backwards on her head.  It was rough for her and me.

 The plan was finally figured out at about 9:30 p.m.--4 1/2 hours after the truck broke down.  The plan was to tow us to Grand Junction,  put us up in a hotel for the night, and then they would switch all of our stuff over to a new truck early in the morning. We were really looking forward to finally getting to Grand Junction and leaving De Beque until we tried to start our car. Our battery was dead--of course!  It went a long with our streak of bad luck.  The Penske tow guys had to also jump our battery before we could leave.

 Unfortunately, our bad luck didn't end there. The next morning our moving plans changed again because the new Penske truck came four hours late.  Apparently our new truck was coming from Denver and the Penske workers forgot to leave the keys for the driver since he was picking up the truck after hours.  The driver had to wait until Penske opened so he could get the keys. 

 In the meantime we had to check out of our hotel.  My mom and I ended up sitting on our hotel curb waiting for the Penske movers and for Mark to replace the battery in our Subaru. At least I had good company. 

 

By the time we were on our way again it was the middle of the afternoon.  Lucy was tired again and started screaming when we were still 2 hours away.  We didn't make it to Cedar City for the second time because of this and decided to stay with my sister in Richfield for the night.  She was probably really sick of us by then since this was the third time we had stayed with her within a month.  She is great--she acted like it was no big deal--for the third time. 

The next morning we were finally able to move in.  We had great help from my parents, a couple of neighbors, and my sister and her husband.  We were done moving in by the afternoon.  All we had left to do was drop off the Penske in Las Vegas. My dad was nice enough to volunteer to drive it with Mark while my mom and I stayed back and unpacked.  Our streak of bad seemed to have ended until about 6 p.m. Lucy pooped and I realized all the diapers I had were in the car.  The car was locked which wasn't a big deal until I saw them sitting on the seat and the only spare set we had was with Mark in Las Vegas.   My mom and I loaded Lucy in the stroller and walked to Walmart to get diapers and food for the next day.  By the time our shopping spree was over, the stroller was loaded down with groceries and a curtain rod hanging out the back.   It was a hard walk home with a loaded stroller, tired kid, and a huge hill. I owe my mom big because her knee was swollen by the time we returned.
 Mark and I were so grateful for all the help my parents gave through the move!  They helped with driving, moving, cleaning, entertaining Lucy, and cooking.  It was wonderful to have the help!