Big Changes!

        When we first moved to Canyon 5 1/2 years ago, our plan was to stay here until Brock got tenure, which would be at least 5 years.  At that point, we would decide if we liked it enough to stay longer, or if we were going to move somewhere else and find a different job.  It's no secret to anyone who knows us, that we had a pretty hard time adjusting to life in the Panhandle.  I won't go into the details of why, but suffice it to say that if it wasn't for the fact that Brock LOVED his job and we all LOVED our ward, we would have been out of here a long time ago!
        About 2 years ago though, things started to change, and we really grew to love our whole area.  We started to feel like this really could be where we would raise our family, except for one thing: the location of our home is in between Canyon and Amarillo, which means it is at least a 10 minute drive to get anywhere.  Usually, it's more like 20-30 minutes.  We split our time a lot between Canyon and Amarillo, though other than school, church, and work, just about everything else is in Amarillo.  Our doctors are there, we shop there, the kids do sports there, the gym I workout at is there, and Brock and I go on dates there.  Needless to say, we spend a LOT of time and gas money driving.  The other morning, I took the kids to school in Canyon, then drove to Amarillo to grab one thing from a store there, and then drove back home.  That's all I did, but it took me an hour and a half, most of that time being spent driving. While we have grown to love where we live, we decided a year ago that IF we for sure stayed in our area, we would at least move to Amarillo to be closer to the things that make up our life.
        A few months ago, Brock had the opportunity to apply for his dream job at BYU-Idaho.  His dad and grandpa both taught there, and Brock grew up wanting to follow in their footsteps.  However, the ag program at BYU-Idaho has changed DRASTICALLY since Brock was there as a student, and they are putting their focus on growing the horticulture program while scaling back considerably the agriculture side of it.  Brock was very concerned about these changes, but still felt the need to apply, just so he could for sure "weed" it out as an option (HAHA!  Great pun, if I do say so myself!).  As he went through the interview process, it quickly became apparent to Brock and I that he already had his dream job here at WT, and that he had no desire to work at BYU-Idaho at this point in his life.  This all happened in February, and at this point we came to the firm decision that we would stay in this area, but that we would eventually move to Amarillo.
        We would have moved to Amarillo right away, because I feel like the younger the kids are when we move, the easier it will be on them.  However, Brock has been serving as the Bishop of our Canyon ward, and in our church, everything is based on where you live.  Just like a school, you go to the church congregation assigned to your area.  If we moved to Amarillo right away, Brock would have been released and we didn't feel good about short-changing the Lord on this assignment.  Therefore, our plan was to move sometime next summer, because that would be around the time period when he would probably be released.  I began looking at houses off-and-on, just to get a feel for what was available.  Unfortunately, there wasn't much!  We needed something with 5 bedrooms and 2 living areas that was on the south side of Amarillo so Brock could still get to work easily.  This was about impossible to find in our price range!  If there were some available, they were in really bad condition and super old.  It was a little depressing, but we just trusted that when the time came in a year, we'd be able to find something.
        That was our plan, but you know what they say about plans!  All this flew out the window when this happened:

        Over the weekend, Elder Neil L. Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles visited for our stake conference, which was an AMAZING experience.  While he was here, our stake president called 2 new counselors to be in his stake presidency, and one of those is Brock.  The stake presidency presides over 14 different congregations throughout the north part of the Texas panhandle and into New Mexico.  Among his many new responsibilities, this assignment also means that Brock will be released as the Bishop of the Canyon Ward.  While this assignment became official last weekend, we have known about it for a month now.  When this call was issued to Brock, we realized  that if the right situation presented itself, we could move much sooner than we had originally anticipated.
        Last week, during one of my non-serious house searches on the internet, a house suddenly showed up that met ALL of our requirements.  It was in the perfect location and was only a few years old.  I had looked for houses for a long time but had never seen this one, even though we found out it has been on the market for several months.  I requested a showing, mainly because I was curious about what it really looked like.  I wanted to see if we'd actually be able to buy a house that was big enough for us, but still in our price range.  My in-laws were here visiting for stake conference, so they went with me to check out the house.
        I walked into this house and absolutely fell in love with it!  There's plenty of room for us and there's LOTS of storage space (a necessity in my book, but so hard to find in houses these days).  It's at the end of a cul-de-sac, walking distance from parks and schools, close to all the stuff we do in Amarillo, and the drive time for Brock is about the same as it is from our house now.  It was PERFECT!
        While my in-laws and I we were looking at the house, Brock was at work turning in his promotion and tenure packet.  He's been here 5 years now, which means that he is up for tenure.  He had just turned everything in (I don't think the timing is a coincidence) when I called him and asked him to come look at the house.  He thought it was great too, and after a trip to the temple that night and a second visit to the house the next morning before Brock's meetings for stake conference, we decided to put an offer on the house, contingent upon us selling ours.
        Obviously, our house was not ready to be put on the market, so we spent the next several days working non-stop to get everything squared away.  Now this is what our house looks like this morning:

        It is crazy the way this is all happening, but I just can't help but feel that the Lord is orchestrating all of this.  There are just too many "coincidences" happening here, and I feel like the Lord just plopped this house in our laps!  There are still so many things up in the air (we're still negotiating with the seller, but feel good about how that's progressing, and obviously we have to sell our house), but I really feel like this is going to fall into place so nicely.  Only time will tell, but I am extremely hopeful that things will be resolved soon.
        Our only regret in all this, is that we are going to have to say goodbye to our dear Canyon Ward.  We love those people so much and have grown close to them as we have served alongside them.  They are humble, strong, salt-of-the-earth kind of people and they have been so good to us through the years.  I'm glad that we are only a couple of minutes away from them, and that we will see them at stake events, but it is still hard to think of telling them goodbye.
        At this point, we are just watching and waiting, while we try to keep our house clean enough to show (not an easy task with 5 kids).  Only time will tell where this will all end, but for now, we are happy to know that the Lord is guiding us, and seems to be leading us in a direction a little different than we had planned.  That is a good thing, because if having Flint taught me anything, it's that the Lord's plans are always better than ours!  We shall wait and see how everything unfolds!