it's REALLY happening....

after living in oregon for 8 years we are going to say goodbye to the state that we said we would live in for only 5 years! it only took us three years longer to really make it happen! we have loved living in this beautiful, green state, but it is time for us to move on!

 

as many of you close to us know, we have been talking about an impending move for the last, i don't know, has it been 2 years now? you've listened to us as we planned to move to chandler, arizona which was a happy middle ground to be closer to family (mine in orange county, california, mitch's in albuqurque, new mexico).

 

then, we decided we didn't want to be in arizona so mitch took the gmat and we applied to byu to get a second masters for mitch. when he got accepted, we thought about what it would mean for our family. reality finally set in, thank goodness, and we decided we didn't want to be starving students with 3 kids and no income for the next 2 years. so, those plans went out the window!

 

our ultimate goal was to get closer to family (and away from the rain), which seemed like an impossibility! for one, my family is in orange county, california where you need to make more than a small fortune to own a very small home (although that is changing slowly). mitch's parent's live in albuquerque, new mexico, a city that, from the beginning of our marriage, i said i would never live in!  so, you see the problem!

 

as our plans continued to change, the only thing that stayed the same was that we knew we needed to leave oregon! with each passing year, the rain got to us more and more! don't get me wrong, it is gorgeous and green and there are trees everywhere, but we are sun lovin' people. as the rain slowly, drop by drizzly drop, creped into our brains we continued to just crave to be closer to family.

 

for sometime now, mitch has been wanting to make a career change! he has been working as a chemical engineer for intel for the last 8+ years and is fabulous at what he does, but he wants to be his own boss. he doesn't want to work for someone else. we've known that this was not the end all and knew we would be making changes in the near future. he had started looking for a career change within intel to get him closer to his end goal. with patience, the perfect opportunity opened up here in oregon, but like i said before, we wanted to move closer to family! then, he found out that the same position was opening up in albuquerque, as well.

 

well, back in february, for some reason, i began to think about albuquerque quite a bit. it wasn't the horrible city that i had vowed never to live in, instead it became beautiful and i realized and accepted without difficulty that that was where we were supposed to be. so, i casually mentioned to mitch that he should apply for the position in albuquerque. when mitch told his parents that he had applied for a job in albuquerque his mom's reaction was, "but i thought mahina said she'd never live here!" mitch's reply, "i know! i was surprised too!"

 

he applied and we waited. being that it was a construction managing position and he was a chemical engineer, we were unsure if he would even get the position. but after a long wait and many prayers, mitch got the job!

 

so, this time it REALLY is going to happen! we REALLY are going to move, and we REALLY are going to move to the city i said i would never live in, but it feels so right and we know that this is where we are supposed to be for the time being. we are very excited for the move (and for the average 300 days of sunshine per year). of course, it will be very sad and hard to say goodbye to all of our wonderful friends, especially after having 8 years to cultivate such great friendships! but, hey, we've got blogging to keep us close, right!?

 

so, now we are back to the business of putting the house on the market, selling the house, packing up the house, and leaving. thank goodness mitch doesn't start until the end of september. so, we have some time, but i am not naive and i know that the time will fly by and we will be gone before we know it!