2000 Miles and a Couple of Unwanted Pets

We're now pretty much settled in our new place.  It is so nice to be living in house with room to breath and spread out a bit.  We've still got a few boxes to sort through and a room to prepare, but the rest of the house is quite livable.  This place is such a blessing!  Before we moved in, our only reservation was the living creatures we might be sharing a space with.  On one of our first visits in the house, we found a dead black snake in one of the glue traps in the basement.  So far the only thing we've found in the house that we slightly object to are ... frogs.  Within the past month, we've had to remove two small frogs from the house.  The first one was on the hood of the stove in the kitchen.  The second one the kids just found on the living room floor.  We are prepared for this though.  To remove the first one, I took an empty Cool Whip bowl and coaxed the frog inside.  Since that worked so well, I labelled the bowl "Frog" and my son used it to remove the second one.

Earlier this month, we took a 2,005 mile road trip back to PA.  Now try to imagine a road trip of this magnitude with three children under the age of 8, plus a wife who is pregnant!  I thought for sure that the trip would do me in before we ever got to our destination, but honestly it wasn't that bad.  That said, I don't think I'll be in a hurry to make a trip like that again when baby #4 arrives!

We crammed as much as we could into the trip and found that there were still people we wanted to get together with, but time just wouldn't allow it.  Suffice it to say, The Vagabonds without a doubt have the nicest and most generous friends and family ... and that is still probably an understatement!  We could never begin to give out enough "Thank-yous" to all the people who made our trip so special.  It was a privilege to have so many come and share in the celebration of the baptism of our daughter on Sunday morning.  And we had a great time visiting with friends afterwards for lunch ... even with a few surprise guests that we weren't expecting!  It was so wonderful to get to relax and visit friends in their homes, and it was a wonderful treat for me to get to play some Texas Hold 'em on Tuesday night!

The latter part of the week was spent visiting family, which was an extremely rushed but necessary part of our trip.  It was such a joy to be able to visit with my grandmother and allow her to spend an afternoon with our kids!  The trip back was largely uneventful - which is just the way I like it.

Another great blessing has come our way.  This next week, I'll begin working at a new part-time job with a local hospital.  I'll be driving truck and delivering restocking supplies and linens to one of the main area hospitals off-site facilities.  This will only be 20 hours per week, but it will allow me to make as much as my wife does in 33 hours at her current job.  This arrangement will also require her to work only on the weekends (more or less) and reduce her hours dramatically ... a great blessing as we look forward to baby #4 coming in December!  The other great thing about this position is that, even though I'm only half-time, I'm still eligible for medical/dental/retirement benefits!  If that's not enough, I received a call from the HR representative a couple of days ago telling me that they wanted to offer me more money than we had originally agreed to!  So, I got raise before I even started working - not bad if you ask me! :)