travel day two

DAY 2: Gallup, NM to Springfield, NM
Miles: 966
Time: 15 hours 2 minutes

New Mexico homes: how'd you like to live here?! Oy!

it's never a good sign when your phone/GPS doesn't know your location. Oh, New Mexico!!

Mooooooo...

Sadly, it was too dark to see the Missouri sign when we crossed the border so we didn't get a picture.

This was by far our longest day.

Things we did to entertain ourselves, because, as you can imagine, it gets quite boring looking at the same landscape!:

• Karaoke sessions
• Smashing fruit by the foot into a ball and shoving it your mouth 

• playing I-spy
• playing an adapted version of "slug bug" and look for different state license plates instead 
• looking for local attractions, like Tim McGraw Blvd and his hometown in Oklahoma
• imagine what our lives would be like in the small towns we'd pass through. (see pic above from New Mexico!)
• driving
• driving
• and driving some more! 

xo, 

t & j

travel day one

DAY 1: Long Beach, CA to Gallup, NM with a 3-hour detour to the Grand Canyon

Miles: 665

Time: 10 hours 16 minutes

Leaving California

Devil Dog...as in a MARINE!

We had to make a stop at the Grand Canyon...we've never been. It literally took my breath away. It is incredibly beautiful and vibrant in color. 

xo, 

t & j

moving day!

It's been one week since our moving day, which went quite smoothly but it was chaotic at times. From the pictures below you can see the before and after of our apartment. Thank goodness for movers!! They packed our kitchen four times as quickly as I would have! We had to continuously make sure our stuff was packed in the appropriate location: POD for storage or our jeep for Sara and Bill's. Needless to say, a few things got past us....like Lynne's planner that she left at our apartment, the dishes we were bringing to Sara and Bill's, our camping gear, our pillows and comforter...oops! It was probably for the best because there was absolutely no room in the jeep. Jordan had to re-pack it several times to make it work. Love that man! 

After the packing came the cleaning....about 6 hours of it! I definitely took apartment moving-out cleaning to a whole new level. Mostly I was disgusted by the amount of dust that had collected on the tops of the kitchen cabinets. Naturally, we packed our chairs and I didn't have anything to stand on and reach soooo I climbed on the kitchen counters instead. It was quite the challenge and I ended up with a massive black and blue bruise. awesome. 

Enjoy the pics! 

GAHHH random stuff EVERYWHERE!! Where does it come from!?

We must have thrown away 5+ garbage bags of stuff, in addition to our donations. 

Our Jeep loaded at capacity: 

Our POD loaded to the brim: 

You were good to us, Apartment. We will miss living here but are excited for our future home...

... and now we're off to O-HI-O!

partying and packing, oh my!

Another update from the Riddell's!

Our little sister, Lainey, threw us a Bon Voyage going away party on Saturday. J and I would like to thank everyone who came out to party and say goodbye, especially Mary & Mark for hosting the event. We had such a great time! We love you all and will miss you very much, but will see you soon! You are always welcome in our home, no matter where we are living! <3

In other news...

The POD gets dropped off tomorrow. Jordan has been staking out a prime parking spot in front of our apartment building for the massive storage unit all day.

Wednesday, May 8th the movers come. Jordan and I (and some of our near-and-dear friends) have been packing up some boxes here and there. We've done more than I thought we would, which is beneficial for us because we save money in labor...apparently there isn't an all inclusive moving package? totally bogus. At least we don't have to pack the t.v's, dishes, and other breakable items! Plus, they load all of our pre-packaged boxes. In the meantime, I have to separate what will be staying with us at Sara and Bill's house and what goes into storage which makes packing all the more complicated and annoying.

Thursday, May 9th the POD gets picked up. We will most likely spend the rest of the day cleaning the apartment for our apartment inspection the next day, Friday, May 10th, at 11am.

We will be sleeping at Jordan's mom's house (Wed, Thurs, Fri nights) since our bed will be packed in the POD, but now that I think about it, maybe we should watch over the POD until it gets picked up...??

We will start driving on Saturday, May 11th and our goal is to be in Ohio by Wednesday, May 15th. Our plan is swing by the Grand Canyon for a quick stop and some pictures and then head east!

Here are some pictures of our disastrous of a house:

With love,
T & J

the end of an era...

It's been almost 2 weeks since my last day as a substitute school psychologist in Fullerton Joint Union High School District. It's surreal...one moment I had a full caseload at 2 high schools with kids who relied on me and the next moment I'm turning in my keys, sleeping in past my normal wake-up time of 5:30am and preparing to move. The school psychologist who replaced me at my first site is new-ish to California; this is her first school psychology job in California so I'm happy to pass the torch to her and give her this opportunity. Unfortunately, the district did not have my replacement ready at the second high school. Aside from building rapport with the kids, my replacements can walk in and know exactly where I left off. I did my best to prepare them and explain the cases with my counseling logs and notes.

On my last day at each high school, I threw the kids a pizza party. This was my way of saying thank you and it helped ease my guilt of leaving. The kids had fun and appreciated my gesture. You never really realize how much others appreciate you until you leave. It was heartbreaking to hear the kids say, "Mrs. Riddell, I don't want you to leave!" Thankfully, they understood why I was leaving and wished me well. Although, it probably would have been easier for me if they chased me out with torches saying how they couldn't stand me as their psychologist...I am thankful for the time I had with them and hopefully I had a positive affect on them and their lives.

I have one more session next week with my ACES/in-home behavioral therapy client. I have been working with the family since November and training the parents to work with their daughter who has autism. I trained my replacement yesterday and she will come out next week as well. Regardless of how well I think the new therapist is trained, it is going to be very difficult to say goodbye. I told her yesterday that I was moving and Ms. E was going to come instead of me. Sweet girl, she just repeated everything I said but I hope on some level she understood.

In the meantime, I have been taking care of the menial tasks for moving:
-scheduling the cancellation of services for water, gas, electricity, cable, and gym memberships
-writing termination letters for our apartment and renters insurance
-scheduling our move-out inspection
-forwarding our mail
-coordinating with the movers
-scheduling an exit-interview for work
-visiting my hair stylist one last time!
-packing 3 years of graduate school binders and books
-purging my closet of clothes I haven't worn in years
-donating clothes, books, furniture
-getting my jeep inspected for a cross-country trip
-planning said cross-country trip with the help of AAA
-eating as much mexican food as I can
-andddd trying not to have an anxiety attack, especially because J is out of state working

*this is what 3 years of grad school books and binders looks like!! (with some trashy novels & love stories and cookbooks as well)

The good news: I just applied for a school psychology job with Cleveland Metropolitan School District! cross your fingers for me!

This weekend Jordan comes home and we have our going away party :)

More pics and updates to come soon!

xo
T & J