It's about time...

You'll notice that there are no pictures to go along with this post (which is out of the ordinary). That's mainly because I don't have any pictures loaded on this computer. However, it's also because there are too many words to describe the past several months which leaves little room for pictures.

It took a few weeks to get over our travel hangover. 2 weeks on the road staying at a different place each night is a LONG time. I had to go to work the next day, and I was exhausted. It was a rough recovery, but we made it through. Only after a few months did I get to the point where I looked back on our journey and thought..."Wow! That was incredible. Let's go travel again!" I'm not quite sure Cari is at that point yet, but it's understandable since she's..... PREGNANT!!

That's right! We're going to be parents. What an incredible, God-blessed summer we've had. We actually found out Cari was pregnant a few weeks before our trip, but didn't make the "formal" announcement until July, and since I haven't posted since June, I didn't include anything here. However, despite our plans to try to start having kids AFTER our trip, God's will was done in His perfect timing and we were blessed with a little bean BEFORE the trip. There's no romantic or surprising story about how we found out -- Cari just peed on a stick one morning and BAM.. two lines. This put a slight twist in our trip though; two weeks in the car on many curvy mountain roads with a pregnant woman in her first trimester definitely makes things a little different. Cari was a rockstar though. She didn't start to feel too bad until midway through the trip, and even then she was off and on (mostly on). Luckily, she was able to enjoy our experience on the road with very little difficulty.

We are now down to being less than 4 months until our sweet baby BOY will come into this world. We've been to the doctor multiple times, seen our little man 3 times, and adjusted to the life of "parents-to-be" (as much as one can adjust to that lifestyle). Cari is most definitely showing, but she's feeling much better and we're both learning a lot about the process. It's simply miraculous that God has constructed such an intricate design in child birth. I find it hard to fathom learning about the details of our baby, created from next to nothing, growing inside of Cari for a specified amount of time at a specific rate and not believing in Jesus. My heart breaks for those who cannot experience this process and those who experience it but don't know or understand God's love.

In other news, we are back on the east coast!! Our original goal of making our way back here has been realized. I received an offer for a job in Fidelity's quality management organization, a job which was posted in North Carolina (where I used to work). After being offered the job, we made the decision to use our own money (again) and move back to be closer to family. Similar to our move to Albuquerque, we were incredibly blessed by the outpouring of friendship and love that we received. We had a small army of men helping load our 16-foot Penske rental, which we accomplished in under 2 hours. We had an empty apartment full of close friends and family with who we enjoyed pizza and beer during our last night. When we arrived in NC, we had several old friends (many of who we had not talked to since we left NC) help us unload into a storage facility which we accomplished in under an hour. What an amazing blessing! Thank you to all who helped and who might read this one day..

While it took a lot of planning, the details of our move were relatively simple. We wanted to make sure to spend time with as many of our close friends in ABQ as we could before we left. The last week, we enjoyed some of our favorite restaurants, such as Sophia's Place, went to a beer festival, had one of the most incredible dining experiences ever at Cocina Azul, and just remained in community as much as possible. We packed for several weeks before the move -- our apartment was full of broken down cardboard boxes and packed boxes stacked high. We even made a fort for Belle! :) On the afternoon of Friday, Aug 31st, we loaded the truck with some great help. Additionally, Cari's mom, dad, and sister flew out to ABQ to help us drive back. We took off early Saturday morning and spent a long 15 hours on the road before making it to our less-than-stellar Best Wester in Clarksville, AR. After a short 6 hrs of sleep, we drove another 14 hours and got the opportunity to see and stay with my aunt, uncle, and cousins in Asheville, NC. It was great to see some familiar faces on the road. Finally, we arrived in Cary, NC at Extra Space Storage early afternoon and moved in to our storage unit before going back to my parent's house for a "thank you" cookout to all those who helped. No tornadoes, hail, or dead batteries during this trip, so we count it a success!

Since then, we have been living at my parent's house. It has been yet another blessing that they've allowed us to stay there. We are in the process of looking for a place of our own, but the process is relatively slow given our already busy schedule. Being back on the east coast and near family is great, but it's much harder than we thought it would be. We never thought we would miss ABQ, but we do...mainly because of the people. We became close with so many great people, and now we have to start that process over again. But, we believe God led us back here to be closer to family for the birth of our first child, so we know He'll provide local friends for us in His timing. We've also been able to enjoy a plethora of UNC athletic events (soccer, volleyball, football), experience some amazing southern sweet tea and BBQ, and take in a few events/activities that we wouldn't have had the opportunity to be a part of (First Fridays in downtown Raleigh, Green River Ordinance concert, Tiger Conservatory).

That's all for now (yes.. "all")! I'll try to keep this thing updated more as we experience new things "back home." Prayers are with my sister who will be having her second child, Camden, in less than a month!!