Job Offer

 The second night Brian was in L.A.  he called me to check in, as he usually does when he's traveling.

Only this time, he was acting solemn and weird. After I blurted on what my day was like, he astonishingly replied, "Nat, they gave me a job offer."
    We were so unprepared for him to hear anything back from a company that quickly. Even more unprepared to hear that somebody wanted to give us a job!  We were both feeling that it was never going to happen by this point.  They offered him the top amount that he asked for for salary, told him about the benefits, and said that they straight up really liked him.  So cool!
   After we discussed this with a joyous air, I jumped on Zillow to the determine the real estate scene.  Oh boy.  Not good. That's when my joy deflated to confusion.  Are we going to take this job?  I think I'd rather wait to hear back from IGM in Charlotte, NC and Johnson & Johnson in Jacksonville, FL.  We could've afforded a dream home in either of those places.

Well, after things panned out, the big companies were still dipping their toes into the interview process, let alone making a decision for hire.  Wavefront in Paramount, CA was ready to party, so we accepted the offer and told ourselves we will make it work.
And now we're excited!

We'll be renting a townhouse with an 8 mile commute to Brian's office in the city of Hawaiian Gardens. Lucky us, there are two pools, so we'll get to swim whenever we want!  Hopefully buying a nice home sometime in the future.   I can't believe our move is only 2 weeks away.  We're all getting a little nervous/ excited to start a new adventure in California.


I'm really excited that we'll be back out west, just a day's drive to family.  Hurray!  Scarlett will starting full day Kindergarten, and I think she's a little nervous about it. She's been waking up scared a lot lately, and seems to be worried about who will be at school.  I know she'll do fabulous, but I worry about her too, its my job.

Our house still hasn't sold since we put it on the market three weeks ago. Its a little disheartening, when we thought that it would sell like hot cakes at the price point and time of year we're selling, but the Lord just keeps teaching us to be patient.  We're all praying for it to sell.

The girls are expecting big things at our new house:  a bunk bed with a slide and ball pit, a barn, a treehouse, a swingset....It's been a little hard to think of downsizing to move to California, but we will certainly enjoy the atmosphere and the adventure.
Here's to change.  I love it. I fear it.  I'm grateful for it.

UPDATE: Here were are in California.  Two months in and we feel like we've always been here.

Brain's first day of Work.  He was nervous. It was cute.

This was before our first Sunday at church. 

Scarlett's Kindergarten Picture

Alice wanted a butterfly just because.  

 Crazy hair day/ward Halloween Party Day.  Doubled as her kitty cat ears

 Hat Day.  Alice also learned how to ride a two wheeler (at 3.5!) so we went riding shortly after this.

 Fancy ladies

x

First experience at Huntington Beach. It was beautiful!

Last Iowa Summer.

  Brian had been bumping into this cool guy with really cool business cards at his last two conferences.  Little did I know that Chris from Wavefront Technologies had "found him!"  Brian, the guy with perfect education/experience  to hire as his main researcher/development man.    Everytime Brian talked with him, he really liked the company and really hated the idea of moving to Los Angeles, the area where the company resides.  His lovely wife agreed.

As I mentioned in the last post, we were starting to learn what true patience is as we waited to hear back from ANY of the companies Brian had interviewed at since turning down the job at Intel in Portland.  While he traveled around from interview to interview, the girls and I just decided to enjoy our last(?) summer here in Iowa City.


 Scarlett graduated from preschool and it was bittersweet.  She was really sad to say goodbye to friends, but it was the cutest little ceremony.

 We signed up Alice for soccer for the first time. She had a pretty solid performance.

 Eleanor kept growing sweeter and sweeter.

 
We hit up every opportunity to swim.

 

We played dress up.

 Played at the park and enjoyed free lunch.

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Went on a last minute trip to KansasCity/ Independence, MO with Great Grandpa Davis.

And did lots of this: Snuggling on the couch and chilling out.

Brian's Grad Ceremony

   
Brian walked across the stage and was hooded as a Doctorate of Philosophy in Chemical Engineering in May.  His parents came for the celebration, bearing many, MANY gifts.  We are so spoiled.  It was so nice to celebrate Brian's accomplishments, even though he's still got the big one to go: his Dissertation.  As of now he's planning to defend at the end of July.

 We sent out these two adorable pictures with his Graduation announcements.  I'm one proud wife.

The girls were very unimpressed with the Graduation Ceremony and they let it be known.  Alice quite publicly. I was happy when I was relieved of child shushing duties and Scarlett was happy she could finally go to preschool.

 Here's the boys.  Most of them started the program the same year we did.  They've been some seriously sweet friends to Brian and all of us.

 Alice just fell on the pavement right before this.  Can you tell?

 Maureen requested a kissing picture. This was us after.  I guess we're not used to PDA so we have to be extra expressive as to not make it to awkward.  For everyone.

We get asked "Where and When are you moving?" anytime we have a conversation with someone who knows us.  At church, we have to give a weekly update. The excitement of the job hunt has worn off a bit since his first interview with Dupont in NJ in March.  He's also interviewed with Kodak in MN  and IGM in North Carolina.  Still haven't heard back from any of them, yes or no. He also has an interview getting set up with a company in LA California, and with Johnson & Johnson in Jacksonville, FL.  So we're looking at a nice spread of the country right now. 

I often forget to mention that we turned down a job at Intel in Portland, OR in February.  Brian had a pretty strong feeling when he interviewed that the work life balance would not work for our family.  They required a lot of extra hours on call, overnights, overtime...not what our family is used to.  Once we saw the offer, we did have a harder time turning it down. It was VERY tempting, with some great moving benefits-- cha ching, cha ching. But after listening to the warnings that definitely came from a divine source, we felt peace with our decision. Money isn't everything, right?

So right now we basically have no clue WHEN and WHERE we will end up.  Which makes it really hard to plan and hope for anywhere.  So I've stopped with the expectations/ timelines/ stress and I'm  just going with the flow baby. In the mean time I'm saving homes like mad on Zillow and thinking about all the new furniture I will one day get to pick out.  I also would REALLY love to get this house sale behind me, but Brian's so calm about that part of our future tasks that its starting to rub off on me. Thank goodness.

Arrival of Eleanor Lily

This pregnancy wasn't too bad at the end.  I like to say it was because I was still puking my breakfast up almost every morning until a little after my 20 week mark.  I'd had enough suffering already.  

I am 37 and 1/2 weeks here. I took these Glamour Shots with the self timer while Brian made fun of me from his table and laptop.  I don't think I could make it in the fashion bizz if I can't even pose in front of my husband without feeling self-conscience.

At this point (only a week before she actually came!) I was getting lot of Braxton Hicks contractions, and having some trouble with bowel movements (ugh), and just feeling overall crampy. I was a little worried baby would come early--her due date was Jan 31st, and Brian was planning a trip to Florida for a conference on the 21st.  I've never been early, so we thought we'd be totally in the clear if he was back at my 39 week mark.. 

Belly on 1-20-2018.  A little less glamorous.

The next morning, 1/21 Brian was packing up for his trip. A colleauge was picking him up at 1:30 to drive to Moline for his 4:30 PM Departure to Jacksonville FL.  I had my usually cramps kick in here and there that Sunday morning, but by 10:30 they were unusually regular. While getting ready for 11:30 church I kept yelling from all corners of the house, "Brian, here's another one!!!"  At first it was kind of funny, but then it started to get real.  We decided to hang home a little longer and cook up some lunch before church. Brian grilled up some delicious pork chops and asparagus, and we ate lunch as the contractions kept on coming. Slowly, we grew less nervous of going into labor on the day of his trip and more willing to accept the fact that he probably wasn't going to Florida today.

So, we dropped the kids off at church to go to their primary classes, asked a friend to take them home in case this was the real deal, and walked around the church.  It only took a loop around with some really nice contractions for Brian to cut the cord (pun intended) and call his boss to cancel his trip and prep him for the presentation that he'd now need him to give. Then we casually/ excitedly headed to the hospital.  

I hopped into the fashion forward hospital gown & robe,got hooked up to monitors and was measured at 3 cm dilated, but 0% effaced. They sent us loose to walk the hospital grounds for an hour at the University of Iowa Hospital.  Luckily it provided us with plenty of space and exploration 

We particularly loved the exhibit near here that had photos of random people from Oxford, IA and told little snyopses of their lives.  Some stories were funny, some terribly sad, all really interesting and the perfect distraction for waiting for baby Eleanor to come.

Baby and labor #3, We're experts now.  After a couple hours of speed walking, squatting, canceling flights, and having a pretty nice time chatting we headed back to the triage room.

Our midwife on call was Jackie-Lynn--its actually Jaquelin, but that name always reminds me the blonde on Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt ,  and she was just as pretentious as the character on the show.  We were quite weirded out by her soft spoken concerns, her ignorance of personal space, and her judgmental tones. When we were talking about Brian's interview in Portland, OR she said, "Oh, so you're going to move just anywhere that HE wants to move, huh?  You just have to pack up and hope you like it?"

I mean....Girl--you don't know me! She also liked to presume she knew my pain level and ever so kindly refused to check my dilation when I asked about it more than once.  The absolute worst part was when I was nearing the end and ready to push and she sat right next to Brian and S I L E N T L Y stared while I made embarrassing noses and didn't feel a hint of my epidural working.  The last hour was pretty rough; Jackie-Lynn broke my water when I was about 8 cm dilated, and my bag of water was cushioning (blocking) baby's head quite efficiently.  My cervix went down to 4 cm, so that jump from 4 to 10 cm in an hour was excruciatingly painful, with very little rest in between contractions. 

Luckily my nurses were super cool and  not annoying, so they counteracted our midwife's personality flaws.  Nurses are heroes, I tell you. Here we are before the anesthesiologist came in.  I really didn't want another resident to do it,  since I had a resident put my epidural in during Alice's birth,  and she was quite honestly the worst. However, something about being in the hospital with experienced caretakers makes me feel unequipped to speak my demands and trust my instincts, and heaven forbid I hurt anyone's feelings! He only missed once, which is better than my other experience, but oh my goodness it felt like I was going to die in that awful bent over position with so much pressure in my back and hips.  It also helped that this anesthesiologist had 10/10 bedside manor in comparison with the last one.

 Still worth it. I like epidurals. You can see in the next picture that we had Chip and Joanna Gaines join us for a lot of labor.  HGTV makes the best background for pain and awkward silences.

 We were getting real excited for the shift change at 8:00 PM.  Lastacia, my regular midwife was coming in to save us, even though Jackie-Lynn had voiced several times that she always does all the work and never gets to catch a baby.  And in true weirdo fashion, she lingered awkwardly in our room for 20 minutes after our other midwife got there.  In my mind, I was thinking, "Don't you have something to do or somewhere to be?  I know for a fact that I am not the only mother in labor here tonight."  Here I am still moaning and commenting in between contractions, that these are gettin' a lil' intense guys. 
  In hindsight, I was probably ready to push for the last 20 minutes, but they kept asking me if I felt pressure in my bottom and I didn't, just intense pressure in my hips so they didn't check me.  Finally our special friend Jackie left, Lastacia measured me at a 10, and we pushed out a baby in 5 minutes.   She cried loudly right away- which was a good thing because there was meconium in my fluid so they wanted to make sure her lungs were working well. She was beautiful, and BIG for 10 days early!

 The girls LOVE baby Eleanor.  They visited me in the hospital quite often and we had a blast eating ice cream, watching Nick Jr. and bathing in the huge jetted tub. 

  And just a few more pictures of coming home from the hospital.  Its surreal coming back to the real world after delivery. I'm always so happy to be home, but miss being catered to in the hospital too.  Why can't people always deliver my meals, answer my every need from my bedside call button and babysit my baby between feedings while I sleep?