Daniel Webster, a NH native, once wrote, "Men hang out their signs indicative of their respective trades; shoe makers hang out a gigantic shoe; jewelers a monster watch, and the dentist hangs out a gold tooth; but up in the Mountains of New Hampshire, God Almighty has hung out a sign to show that there He makes men." Growing up visiting my grandparents in New Hampshire every year, I have always felt like a New Englander at heart, always wanted to live here -- it truly is my "happy place" -- and always loved the "Old Man of the Mountain" to which Daniel Webster referred.
We moved here a year ago on November 21, 2014. My husband had been working and living up in New England with my relatives for three months while I stayed in New York trying to sell our house. He worked the day before we moved and then drove to my dad's house in NY where the girls, the dog and I had been living for the last month. He arrived sometime around 2:00am and slept until around 9:00am. We got up, packed our things in our two cars -- our good Toyota Sienna and our little 2001 Dodge Stratus that we hoped and prayed would make the trip! We all went to breakfast at the diner with my dad, something he and I had enjoyed at least once a week while we lived with him and my step-mother. It was bittersweet -- we were excited but also sad to leave our family and knew that my dad was devastated. Fortunately, he and Gramby had plans to come out to NH just the following week for Thanksgiving, so that helped!
We headed out -- me and my little girlie in the van, my husband and our eldest daughter in the Stratus. I remember that the Stratus did not have a radio -- there had been a short in it years earlier that drained the battery. The mechanic did not agree with me that that was the problem, but I finally got him to humor me and disconnect the radio, just to see -- hmm... never had that problem again! ;) But, never replaced the radio, either! Our eldest played music on my husband's iPhone and chatted away to keep him entertained on the 6 - 7 hour ride. It was a fairly uneventful ride -- I was so thankful that the Stratus made it all the way!! I remember that it was dark when we crossed the Vermont border into New Hampshire, and I remember seeing the big sign that welcomes you to New Hampshire -- in English and French! And I'll never forget my husband calling me on my cell phone as we crossed, just so he could say, "Welcome home!" It was very touching because it was a childhood dream coming true for me, a nearly 20 year dream for him coming true (he's wanted to move here since the first time he came with me to visit my family), and after 3 months of living apart and the stress of that and the stress of selling our house -- those two little words meant more than I can say!
We had our dog, Mabel, with us, and I had searched around to find a hotel/motel that would allow us to have Mabel for one night. I found one but it was an hour past our new town. On the way to the motel, even though it was getting late, I followed my husband and he quickly drove us past our new house and through our new town -- a drive he had taken many times in excitement of our arrival. We made it to the motel and grabbed the kids, dog and the bare minimum for the night. After a somewhat restless night between the excitement and nervousness of closing on the new house the next day, and the DOG jumping back and forth between the beds (!!) we woke early, got ready and raced an hour back to our new house for the final walk through. It was so exciting to see an empty slate -- and a little overwhelming -- I knew right away that we had some work cut out for us to make it our own -- and a LOT of paint!!!! After a quick trip through with the realtors, we went to their office for the closing. The girls sat SO patiently as all of the paperwork was signed, and then we were handed a big check from the closing of our house in NY (long story -- that house sale was a nightmare...) and we went right across the street to our new bank and made a deposit. Then off to our new home where Auntie Sandra and Uncle Bill were waiting to greet us! They live 90 minutes North of us and my husband had lived with them for over 2 months while he was up here working. Every time he took a trip to NY to visit us, he would head back up to their house with a van-load of our belongings. Auntie & Uncle brought a truckload of our things with them and quickly helped us unload everything into the house. Then my husband had to go back to work for the afternoon and Auntie & Uncle headed home.
The girls and I were on our own for the afternoon -- I think I started cleaning and they helped where they could and explored, etc. It was Friday, and the 18-wheeler with all of the rest of our belongings would not arrive until Monday or Tuesday! At that point, we had the kitchen island (which is a permanent fixture) and the 4 counter-height chairs that came with the house. That and air mattresses -- that was it for furniture those first couple of nights! No computer, no tv, no phone -- we were roughing it for sure! We didn't even have a fridge -- it had died before we closed on the house and we needed to find a new one quick. That took 2 weeks (!!) and a lot of headaches to get a fridge -- who knew we lived "over the mountain" from all of the big stores and deliveries are made once a week. Thankfully we had coolers and it was November in New England -- the whole backyard was our "auxiliary fridge!" I remember our first dinner in our new house was a little roasted chicken, salads, and a banana cream pie that my husband brought home from Market Basket -- our new grocery store. On Saturday, my Aunt Pam, cousin Matt and his girlfriend Deb came over bright and early to help. I had visions of painting bedrooms -- in particular, the girls' -- before all of the furniture came, but my husband was at work and no one else was too up for helping me with the painting, so instead my cousin took down an overhead light and replaced it with a new one we had purchased and he also took down the most unattractive, hard-plastic, accordian doors that covered the closet in the girls' bathroom -- we had all decided those needed to go quickly!! Deb and I worked on lining all of the drawers and cupboards in the kitchen -- so helpful! My husband came home and we all had pizza and visited. I think on Sunday we ventured out to Lowes - 30 mins away - and started looking for a fridge. This is when we discovered that you don't just buy and fridge and it shows up the next day or day after that when you live in our town... Especially not late in fall -- apparently trucks only go "over the mountain" once a week and we'd missed out! We moved on to other stores including Sears where after what seemed an eternity (our girls were SO patient!) we finally settled on a fridge that I didn't love but that would keep food cold... And we were given a delivery date but told "although, if it snows, they won't come over the mountain!" Oh my -- hadn't realized how "in the mountains" we lived until then! Long story short, we never got the Sears fridge but eventually got the one I wanted -- French doors on top, freezer on bottom -- about 12 days into our NH adventure. We got quite used to going outside to get the milk, and we ate a LOT of take out!! I do remember going to the grocery store and buying just what I needed to make a home-cooked meal for my family and what a wonderful feeling that was!!
The 18-wheeler with all of our belongings came on one of the coldest days in November and my husband was working and my Aunt Sandra drove 90 minutes to show up early and help me set things up as the movers unloaded everything. It was an exhausting day -- box after box after box, question after question -- that day is kind of a blur! I remember feeling like I was on an episode of Hoarders at the end of the day -- there were SO many boxes!! Could barely walk through the kitchen/dining room! Some things fit perfectly -- the piano had been a big issue when we were planning to move and the spot I moved it into is absolutely perfect for it! Some things, not so great -- I would never choose the layout my couches are in under normal circumstances, but that's how they fit in the room. The movers were great -- they unloaded everything, they put the beds together, the dining room hutch, dining room table... Auntie and I placed the area rugs and made decisions about where the big stuff would go. Grandpa and Gramby came two days later and we had some things put away by then -- I think the guest room where they slept and my 8-year-old's room were both in pretty good shape! Gramby spent Thanksgiving vacation unpacking boxes in the kitchen and setting the kitchen up for me. They also helped us find our fridge and we went to Lowes again and I spent a small fortune on paint, lights, and a snowblower!! We all drove up to Auntie Sandra's for Thanksgiving and my my husband had to work -- he was working around the clock this time last year! He ate an early dinner with us, took a brief nap on the couch and drove 90 minutes back to work. I remember he got home late that night and got a call from the alarm company and had to drive back to work at around 1:00am -- I was so worried about him!
After Thanksgiving, the girls started their new schools. They were both nervous on the first day and when I picked them up at the end of the day, my eldest told me she wanted to go home -- my heart sank and I refrained from telling her we WERE home! My little one seemed to have done better and the next day when my husband tried to walk her in she said, "I'm ok, bye Daddy!" and walked in by herself! It took 3 days for my eldest to feel better about school -- that was due in large part to Lilly, a girl who came up to her on the 3rd day and said, "I could use some more friends, would you like to be my friend?" I still tear up thinking about that -- I can't tell her how much that meant to my daughter and in turn, to me! She started making friends, particularly with the kids in band -- they were pretty impressed with her when she was ready to be in the Christmas concert a week after starting school! The girls were getting acclimated to school, we were all getting used to our new town, and I got the girls started in Sunday School and we began attending church every Sunday -- something we were not great about before moving! Through church, the girls met some other kids and I began meeting people too -- now I help out with Youth Ministry, here and there, and I teach Sunday School (my 8-year-old's class) every Sunday. My little one is also in a Girl Scout troop this year, making friends, and I help out with the troop which has been nice! I find when we go into town, we almost always see people we know which makes us feel like we are not the new kids, but are really becoming part of the community.
Things have not always gone smoothly -- the job we moved here for ended up being a disaster. My husband worked incredibly hard to turn this failing store around -- we didn't find out until after we'd moved that he was the 6th store manager in the 3 years the store had been open! -- only to be let go the day after Easter. And actually, over July 4th weekend, he got a text from the person who turned out to be the 7th store manager (his replacement) who wanted to talk to him because he could see that he too was going to be let go soon! Thankfully, we made it through that incredibly difficult time -- no one had a job in our house! -- and within a month's time he had gone back to the same job he'd been doing for 7 years prior, only here in NH! He's doing very well there and we are so thankful and look at the previous job only as the thing that got us here, and we truly believe that's all it was meant to be. We see the value in his current job -- it's stable, the people are great, they are happy to have him, and when he leaves for the day he is done -- no being on call around the clock! We are already looking forward to a much more relaxed holiday season than he had last year!! And I have found a part time, flexible job working at home as a virtual assistant -- it works perfectly for our family right now!
It has not been smooth sailing, and at some points we've felt that our will was being tested to see if we were cut out to be here, but at this moment, things are going pretty well and we're happy where we are!
Last weekend, my Sunday School class and I made these adorable little make your own mangers - a craft that I found on Pinterest! I teach Sunday School to 8 third graders (my own third grader included!) and I am always looking for easy, not too messy things for us to do during class! This craft only involved brown paper lunch bags, newspaper (1 piece crumpled in the bottom for stability and space filler!), yellow tissue paper cut into strips, a print-out from the website that originally posted it (link below), scissors, tape and crayons. The website has the picture of the star and the baby Jesus in color, but my class likes to color, so when I printed, I chose to print it "grayscale" so it came out in black and white and then my class added their own colors! This came out so cute -- we made enough for each child to take one home, and we left one extra on the table in the rectory for our pastor to enjoy!
