Welcome to small town America. It’s been a wonderful place so far for the Hovaters. We’re all still reeling a bit from saying our goodbyes in Little Rock, but I can’t imagine how much harder that would all be if we weren’t the beneficiaries of such a gracious and enthusiastic welcome-week.
We’ve been fairly disconnected from the internet over the past week, so I have a lot of things I’d like to share via the blog, little snapshots of what our move has been like so far. They’re starting to become more distant memories.
Big Truck
I have a CDL, and am used to driving a big church bus, but even with that I was amazed how easy it is to get a big honkin’ truck from uhaul, and even one towing a trailer big enough to put my pick-up on it. The lesson here is, anytime you’re on the road and you see the word uhaul on a truck, STAY AWAY! Remember that it could be any fool with a drivers license, and that is most likely their first time to drive anything near that size. That are almost certainly a nervous amateur.
Micah’s Cry
On our move day, we left fairly early in the morning, and did pretty well holding ourselves together emotionally all day. Being met by an army of new friends to help us move in helped a great deal, but when everyone left, there was a very tender moment when Micah, our sweet 3 year old, started crying, saying, “I want to go to my house.” When we said, “This is our house”, she responded with the heartbreaking, “No, I want to go to my home.” Ouch. That really stung, partly because she was saying what all four of us were feeling somewhere in our hearts. This was our most tearful moment.
Loving the “New House”
After that first night, the girls have been all about going to “the new house”. They love playing in their new room, and while getting them to actually sleep in their beds is a chore, that’s not anything new. They just laugh and play and giggle, and their ease of adjusting is certainly making it easier on Kelly and me. Kids can be so flexible (sometimes).
Night Out
The Harden girls sweetly agreed to babysit for us the first Friday night we were here, and of course that raised the question, “What in the world do we do in Tullahoma on a night out?” ultimately, we settled on a trip to go see Robin Hood at the local drive-in theater. It was a great adventure, and such a nice time to unwind with each other. We needed that.
