After taking almost four full days to get to Arizona, what should of been a 17 hour trip, we arrived to late to look at houses so we found a hotel and went to sleep. The next morning the kids were excited to see a race car in the parking lot, meet the truck driver and get some stickers… we had just missed the Nascar race held here in Phoenix.

After driving around all day, looking for houses, we couldn’t find anything we could afford, or liked. We decided to find a u-haul storage and at least get rid of the trailer since we had a free month of storage with our rental. Not knowing the area, we didn’t think anything of it when the lady on the phone sent us thirty miles away to the ” closest storage facility”. After driving almost an hour, we gave up and turned around. Then it was to late to go to the apartment someone had called and told us about. So another night at a hotel. This time we scored! The Motel 6 we found had been built by John Wayne, a family hero, as a home away from home for when he was filming in Arizona! It was very exciting!
The next day, we found an apartment that was open. Small but they would take us and they had a pool. Couldn’t beat that or the free month of rent included.
So we unloaded then took the u-haul in to the closest u-haul place. When trying to explain that the reason we had the u- haul an extra day was because they had tried to send us over 100 miles away to return it, I was called a liar, and they tried to charge me even more then the extra day! I had the name of the person I talked to, a confirmation number, and the address and phone number of the facility they tried to send us to… not sure how I could of made that all up! I can tell you, after they hooked our trailer up wrong then this, we won’t use U- haul again!

Well we had made it! Here it was Monday evening, 120 hours after we had left on a 17 hour trip. We were exhausted, but safe. Oh.. and the next morning, while wondering WHERE we were going to get furniture, as we had sold most of ours, then spent the money meant to buy new furniture getting the van fixed, we got a phone call from the rental office asking us if we could use some beds and couches etc. for free… someone was moving out and giving everything away! God had amazed us every mile of our adventure.
~Katie

I need to get back on track with this huh?
So far we are a little over 24 hours into what was supposed to be a 18 hour trip! We broke down and were stuck in Redding Ca for 14 hours. Then we drove until almost one a.m. and stopped at a reststop near Bakersfield where we were just resting for a minute but wound up sleeping for three hours. Oops. Guess at this point, with only two hours of sleep in almost forty eight hours we needed it.
From there we headed up over the Grapevine ( stopping every fifty miles for someone else to use the restroom of course) and into L.A. We headed to family to spend part of the day and were going to continue to Pheonix that afternoon. Instead we stayed for BBQ, we were already too late to get our house so we figured, why not. Then stayed the night, kids all over on the floors.
We got up the next morning, had breakfast gave hugs and took off, for what should of been a six hour drive, lol. Should of known by then! We had now taken over 72 hours to make a 17 hour trip and we still were not there. We left family in Southern California at 11a.m. and didn’t reach Pheonix until almost ten p.m. that night. We did get a little distracted at a museum…. just a little. They had cool airplanes and tanks…
Our first day in  Arizona next post!
~Katie

I figured it would be fun to give you guys a day by day read of our moving misadventure. It took us five days to make a 17 hour drive…. and here’s why:
Day 1: We finally, after waiting a month, received the rear seats for our new van, and only because I called a local auto wrecker to locate some. They were installed at 5:00 p.m. March 2nd. We were supposed to meet the landlords of our new home at 5:00 p.m March 3rd!!! So we tossed everything in the van and took off, hoping to get up and over the Siskyou Summit before it froze. Around two a.m. the van started acting funny about an hour from Redding, Ca. It wouldn’t go over thirty miles an hour. We limped it into town, grabbed the first hotel we found and snuck all the kids and the dog in. The next morning, I prayed, closed my eyes and pointed my finger at the transmission mechanics page in the Yellow Pages… thank God, He directed my finger to a great mechanic that was not only honest, he gave us a great deal! He also discovered that U- haul had attached our trailer wrong, and was amazed we had made it so far without it detaching or flipping over!! So our mechanical problems most likely kept us from a major accident! We spent the day in a hotel room watching t.v. and eating pizza and the mechanic amazingly had us back on the road by 4:00 p.m. We had a meal of Del Taco and headed south!! We passed out in a rest area somewhere in Mid-California at about 3 a.m. It took us that long to get that far because someone had to pee at every town pre rest area!!! And that was our first day…
~Katie

Swimming Lessons

I may be slow… but I just discovered an app for WordPress for Android!! So, here I am testing it! So far, it seems pretty easy! If it works well, I will attempt to post a
review! I have a review for RoadTripzzz car seat mats that I really need to do! I also have a couple of book reviews to finish… so praying, crossing my fingers, that this works!! I just have to figure out how to enter rafflecopter code
~Katie

Monkey Doodlez is really excited to have been selected as a finalist for the Cribsie Awards in the category of Cutest Swim Diaper and they are asking for our help spreading the word about their nomination! They’d really love to win this award!

Not only are swim diapers better for the environment and babies health, they save families money – and Monkey Doodlez sure has some of the  cutest swim dipes on the market – not to mention the fact that Monkey Doodlez swim diapers meet requirements for use in Public Pools – many reusable swim diapers on the market don’t meet these requirements!

I love this one!

They’re holding a special contest to thank fans for taking the time to vote for them.

It’s simple – if they win, they’ll be giving away 10 swim diapers to random Facebook Fans – so they’re hoping you’ll help spread the word and encourage people to cast their vote for Monkey Doodlez!

So here’s the link to share http://cribsieawards.com/category/fashion/cutest-swim-diapers

Have Fun and Good Luck Monkey Doodlez!

~Katie~

Die Young By Hayley and Michael DiMarco

As you all know.. I fought to own my own domain so that I could bring ALL my GFC followers to my new blog with me. Now I find out that GFC will no longer be available to WordPress Bloggers as of March 1, 2012. Upsetting to say the least.

They suggest that I use Google+ instead… I have to say, I haven’t found much about Google+ that I like. There is no way to share my blog posts instantly with it, so if I forget (which I do alot) to post there, Google+ Followers never know I wrote a post.

Right now, my posts do go directly to the Facebook Page, Networked Blogs, RSS Feed and to Twitter. I also have email sign ups and you will get a daily email of any posts that are written by signing up for emails. So there are other ways to follow! You can even follow with Google+ if you really want to!

So from here on out, giveaways will not require that you be a GFC Follower to enter, obviously.  Instead I will ask that you follow (and I will check to prove that you do) either by email, Facebook, Networked Blogs, RSS Feed and/or Twitter to enter giveaways.

Signing up to follow by email is really the best way for me to keep track of the number of followers on the blog, which while it may seem like I need a number so I can brag, I need a follower count to ask for items for reviews and giveaways!

So, if you are now a GFC follower and do not follow any other way, please sign up to follow by email, Facebook, RSS Feed, Networked Blogs and/or Twitter. Whichever ways work the best for  you.

While there will be no giveaways this month, so that we can pack and move, I already have several set up for next month. So please don’t miss out, get signed up, some way! And for those of you that switch from GFC to another way to follow, you will receive extra entries in next months giveaways, just to show my thanks!

Be Blessed…

~Katie~