The Shafferland Shuffle...Official Move Edition!!

A very happy NINETY-TWO MONTHS to Ryan today! It's our first monthiversary in Grabill! :)

It has been a full, full week, and we are just grateful to be fully here IN our new home this week! Here's a peek at our move-filled week.

* Last Sunday morning we visited our friends' church in Decatur. I told you last Monday the really cool God-moment story that came out of this visit, but it was a great day! Their church had an outdoor baptism service, and we really enjoyed being part of it. Our friends Jon and Julie invited us over to their house for lunch after and we had a great time there! That evening we participated in a game night with our tenants, and I lost with great finesse. Apparently I'm no better at games in Grabill than I was in Kokomo.

* Monday was our last day before our move, so we spent a lot of the day doing final cleaning and prep on our new apartment. I took all my "before" pictures (yay!) and we tried to make sure everything was completely ready for our move! That night we had a meeting with our department at Gateway Woods - and some potential mentors. We learned a lot in the meeting, and that was helpful! (And there were cookies which I managed to not consume all by myself!)

* We drove back to Kokomo Tuesday morning and reunited for good with Braeya. She was super happy to see us! We picked up our moving truck and had a great crew of friends spend the evening with us, helping us load it. We got it all loaded in three hours! I was excited about that! And about two hours after they left, we discovered we'd forgotten a piece of furniture - and it was our coffee bar, of all things! Can't leave that behind!

* Wednesday morning, we got up super early to get all the last minute stuff done, and then my friend Amber stopped by with Starbucks for us. We gave Braeya her calming meds and took our last pictures with our Kokomo house. Then it was time to get in the vehicle caravan and head to Grabill to become official residents!! We had a fantastic crew waiting on us when we arrived, and they got us unloaded in an hour and a half flat! Jon and Julie were part of that crew, and they stayed and helped us with some initial settling in.

* Though we were (and still are) far from settled, we were back to work on Thursday. Braeya checked out the new office while I did some work, and while I did a store-run with one of our tenants, Ryan cleaned out the WillowBridge van. It looked brand new when he was all done! Our new co-workers, Tim and Justine, brought us an amazing pie as a housewarming gift - and they got to meet Braeya while they were over.

* Friday morning, Ryan helped one of our tenants fix his bike, and I did another store run with another of them. We took a little time out to put together our new bed, and then Friday night was the virtual auction for Gateway Woods. Everyone kept telling us they were so sad we didn't get to experience the huge, real-life auction that takes place every year, but they had to go online this year because of life in 2020. We had a viewing party with our tenants, and everyone brought food to share!

* Yesterday was a dreary, rainy day here, which made me glad it wasn't auction day! Woulda been kind of soggy! It was our first day to be fully in our role as the lead couple at WillowBridge, so we spent the day with Tim and Justine, figuring out a plan for the immediate future in balancing all our responsibilities. We also worked on unpacking our clothes into our new closet space! Ryan took me for a Culver's date for dinner - and that gave us the fuel we needed to dig in and work hard on the unpacking project some more. We didn't quit working until after 11 p.m. but we felt so much better about our apartment at the end of the day!