Many hands make light work...

It’s been almost two weeks since we’ve settled into our new place. What an adventure it was!

So last Thursday night my parents arrived after driving up that morning (leaving at 6am, arriving around 7pm.  They’re awesome!) My parents have moved 8 times, not including moving my brother, sister (twice) and me (twice) in the past three years.  I’m pretty sure they could move in their sleep. 

Also on Thursday night Chris and I went to the realtor’s office to get our keys. That was a very cool moment for us. Another step in our marriage journey.  

A short walk later, Chris and I arrived at our new place. This was my first time seeing it since Chris had found it while I was visiting family and friends in Tennessee two weeks prior.

The apartment exceeded my wildest dreams and put the pictures on Craigslist to shame (my only look at the apartment until we got our keys). I hope I'm not reversing strides made in the feminist movement (ha ha)..but my two favorite things about our new place are the kitchen and our washer/dryer.

I love having more counter space!

No more trips to the laundry mat!

 All day Friday was spent packing up boxes, loading up the car, driving to the new place. x3. Unfortunately, Chris’ work schedule was super crazy the week we moved so he wasn’t able to take the day off.  We packed up as much as we could the night before so when my parents got to our place on Friday we could start taking things over to the new place.

Packing up boxes ( almost all of these are books!)

The beginning of many trips across town.

Mom and I getting groceries.
(The only time I will ever have a cart)

That evening my parents and I went to Foodtown for a Sneed family tradition.  Started when my brother moved to Atlanta almost four years, my parents’ housewarming gift has always been to buy the first round groceries when someone moves into a new place. It was so nice to be able to stock up our kitchen! 

Saturday morning Chris and I, and the parentals  made a few more trips to the new place, transporting little items before making a stop at Lowe’s to pick up a microwave, vacuum cleaner and some other things.

Scoping out vacuums. (Man my hair's gotten long) 

That afternoon the movers came, loaded everything up and off we were to the new place. At the end of the night the last thing to be unloaded was our sofa. Knowing that we had a difficultly moving it last time, we knew it'd be a challenge for the movers. They tried to bring it through the front door and up the stairs but it wouldn’t budge because the hallway was too narrow.

In a last ditch effort, they decided to hoist it over the balcony. Using tools Chris had gotten as a wedding gift (Thank you Greers for saving our couch!), the legs were taken off  and low and behold, the couch fit through our balcony door and is now in our living room! Yay!

Our awesome movers prepping the couch to be hoisted!

 At the end of Saturday my parents, Chris and I celebrated with pizza and some pretty awesome cupcakes! So thankful my parents helped us move in :)

Magherita pizza

Cookie dough, Brooklyn blackout, Red velvet & Carrot cake.
YUM!

After all of the moving craziness and unpacking, we are so thrilled to be settled into our new home and looking forward to all of the memories we will create here!

2nd floor residents!

LOVE>DISTANCE

             Tomorrow is a big day for Chris and I. We are getting the keys to our new apartment. We can’t wait to settle into our new digs, which will be our home for the next ____ years.  We don’t know. We both have moved around quite a bit since college, grad school, etc. We’ll certainly be glad to be in one place for a while, to build our lives together, to build our careers, our family, to plant our feet at a church to serve and to worship. Exciting times lie ahead.

            An interesting coincidence God thing is that a girl in my bible study group that I’ve been attending (I got involved with this group through a friend I went to Dobyns-Bennett with. It’s a small world.) lives within walking distance of our new apartment and the church she invited Chris and I to attend with her and her husband (also named Chris, and also super tall!) a month ago is in between both of our apartments. Very excited about that!

Our new neighbors!

            This move into a new apartment made me reminiscence about the time Chris and I spent apart invested in our relationship.   I remember when Chris told me he was moving to New York, in March of 2011.  He called me late one night while I was finishing a homework assignment. “I just bought a one way plane ticket to New York, “ he said.  Cue the tears. I wasn’t sure what to think. He had told me he was thinking about moving but hearing those words made me realize that it’s really happening. Of course there’s the “I want to be supportive” thought but then there’s also the selfish part that wants him close to me. He was making the decision for us though, for our future. I knew a move to New York could mean that we would be moving into the scary territory of long distance.  We had been an hour and a half apart seeing each other on the weekends, but that didn’t seem too bad at the time.

            I got advice from a lot of people about long distance relationships, mostly unwanted and mostly all bad advice. I had so many friends graduate last week and I know some of them are going to have to deal with a now long distance relationship as one or maybe both accept jobs in different cities. So here are my feelings on long distance, take them with a grain of salt.

1)   Don’t listen to people who only offer negative advice. Whether or not your relationship survives long distance has nothing to do with “my sister’s college roommate dated a guy for four years and then he moved away to start a job and ended up cheating on her with some girl he worked with.” Your relationship is different and just because other people’s long distance relationships didn’t work out doesn’t mean yours won’t.

2)   I’m lucky that I had several role models for long distance relationships in my life who helped me a great deal. One lady who was in my couples Sunday School class with her husband and Chris and I before he moved, told me about when she spent a year in Indonesia while she was dating her now husband. It was difficult but they made it work. They recently had a baby girl to add to their bunch and are now a family of seven!  Also my sister and her husband dated for five years (!) long distance while she was finishing school. I remember one time I asked her how she knew her husband was the “one” and she said “I couldn’t see the relationship ending.”

3)    Expect long distance to be difficult, because all relationships take work, but realize the reward in persevering. By far, the most difficult time of our long distance relationship was the two weeks after I graduated ETSU and right before our wedding. We were so close to ending our chapter on long distance but I swear those two weeks felt longer than the entire two years. I was feeling a lot of pressure from different people about wedding issues. I was being pulled in a lot of different directions. I needed and wanted Chris to even just be in the same room with me and he wasn’t there. It wasn’t his fault, it wasn’t my fault, it was just the circumstance. Don’t let circumstance end your relationship because the circumstance is temporary.

4)   Realize the importance of building a relationship that is not solely based on the physical aspects of the relationship.  (You don’t have to test drive a car before you buy it. Well you should if you’re actually buying a car…but you know I’m not talking about a car, right?)
True love is worth waiting for.

5)   Try new things, pick up a new hobby. I ended up going away for a long weekend to San Diego for a conference when I was a senior in college and took another three week trip to Rome, Italy when I was in grad school. I probably wouldn’t have done that if Chris and I had been in the same city. Long distance can be a blessing if you choose to let it.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s difficult, but I think about our life together now and am so glad we fought through the hard times.

Chris and I spent almost all of our dating relationship apart. After a particularly difficult night with many tears I’m sure, my husband said this “When we’re in our 80s and have been married 60 years, we’re going to look back at this time and think two years is nothing.”

 That’s why I love that man of mine! A voice of reason. So as we move into our new place this weekend, we celebrate the work we put into our relationship and the joy it brings to both of us that we didn’t give up on each other.

I have found the one my soul loves. Song of Solomon 3:4

A bonus of long distance relationships is that the time spent together is extra special!

Remember that trip I took to Rome? Someone was there to meet me at the airport.

And ask me an important question....

A trip to TN...and we're moving!

This was taken on my flight back to the city. Not a fan of the prop planes or turbulence :( 

            

I just got back to the Big Apple after a well-spent week visiting family and friends in the good ole state of Tennessee. The ride descending into TriCities was absolutely gorgeous. The beautiful mountains were in the distance. My parents came to the airport to take me home. Well first we met my husband’s parents as a sort of “welcome home” dinner.

East TN is beautiful!

Afterwards we went home , turning on ‘Muddy Creek’ road. Indeed we are back in the south. There’s a cow pasture on that road as well. (Sidenote-my parents actually called 911 to report a cow in the middle of the road a few years ago. True story. That does not happen in New York.)

            Unfortunately I spent some of my week visiting my orthopedic surgeon’s office. All of the physical activity I engaged in over the past few months really took a toll on my right knee. I ended up making the decision to see my doctor in Johnson City. He’s the one who did my surgery in 2007 after two other doctors said nothing was wrong. He’s the best. So I had an appointment Wednesday, MRI on Friday, results on Monday. It was rather nerve racking, especially with the prospect of having surgery and knowing it would have to be in Tennessee. It was a long stressful weekend waiting for results.  I’m happy to report I do not need surgery, just physical therapy and taking it easy for a few weeks.

            Let me just take a minute and say that being in a long distance relationship as a girlfriend and even a fiancé is not comparable to being away from your husband. I missed him so much while I was Tennessee. The first night in my room I pulled my suitcase and my laundry basket onto the left side of my bed because it felt so weird not having him there. Of course when I took an afternoon nap, Rex was more than willing to be my cuddle buddy. 

           

  Even though I missed my husband so much (how exactly did we go 2 months at a time not seeing each other for two years, I'll never know) I was glad that I was able to participate in a number of things while I was in TN. One of which was my  “hooding” ceremony at ETSU for the class graduating in May 2013. I graduated a semester early but had made strong friendships with these girls so it was nice to celebrate with them. After our ceremony we went out to catch up and sang karaoke (Spice Girls “Wannabe.” There’s no video of it. Thank goodness.) It was really fun!

Class of 2012 and 2013!

            Another fun thing I got to do was to visit the new Y and Aquatic Center. Almost two years ago I started volunteering with the Kingsport YMCA as a part of their Communications/Marketing team. I was able to go to a donor’s event with my parents and father-in-law (who's on the board) and see the building that I had been hearing so much about. It's awesome!

I was a teeny tiny part of the Y team. It's incredible to see the handiwork of so many people finally pay off and to see the finished product. Kingsport will be blessed by this facility.

            On Sunday I went to our home church, where Chris and I got married in January. It’s a special place to us. While I was there I taught Sunday School to my 7th and 8th grade girls and sang in the choir, just  like old times. It was a blessing to be able to reunite with old friends. (I did hear “so…do you have a job yet?”  more times than I can count.  Remember during my last blog saying I wanted a job before I went…yep that was why.)

            

During our Sunday service we had a special guest speaker, Abby Rike. Abby was on the Biggest Loser. Her husband, five-year-old daughter and two week old soon were killed in a car accident six years ago. Her testimony and book (which I finished in six hours on a two plane rides deserves its own blog post which I will write after this one.) She is an incredible lady and gifted speaker.  

Abby and I after she spoke.

Her beautiful book! A must read. 

That Sunday evening was the AmazinGrace 5k race. I had planned on walking the whole thing but around mile 2 my knee was not having it so I rode the medic golf cart until the start of mile 3. Then I hopped off the cart and walked to the finish line. I finished last but I still finished. 

My parents 

Dad and I! (Representing Beantown! woot woot!)

            

The highlight of my week came from seeing people I hadn’t seen in a while such as my parents, my in-laws, my husband’s grandparents and special friends who are like my family. I am very blessed!  Check out the adorable picture from my five-year-old friend Abe! 

So onward to this week, which will be a busy one indeed. WE'RE MOVING! To another apartment in Brooklyn. After spending months looking at apartment listings, Chris noticed one last Wednesday that not only was in our price range but also had everything we had talked about (2^nd bedroom, dishwasher, washer/dryer (thank you sweet baby Jesus!). A true diamond in the rough. He saw it in person that Friday and after a little bit of drama (we had it, then oops, no we didn’t. ) He finally signed the papers and we’re moving next Saturday. My parents are driving up to help us with the move. We're so excited and are so thankful for an answer to prayers. We can't see this opportunity as anything other than a God thing, who's timing is truly perfect. So our adventure as newlyweds in the Big Apple continues....

I know we have so many people praying for us and it's a huge blessing. Please continue to pray for my knee to heal, a job opportunity, safe travels for my parents and a smooth move for us. 

Philippians 4:6-7 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.