virginia, my home

when we told people we were moving to the east coast, we were amazed at the number of people who felt either very strongly that we were doing the right thing, or very strongly that we were crazy. and to be fair, we agreed with both camps. i can’t count the number of times we second-guessed the decision, or woke up in the middle of the night in a panic, positive that it was the wrong thing, the wrong time, the wrong… us. but there was also this indescribable urge to do something that surprised us both, that probably surprised everyone who knows us. because why not? and when the jobs were offered and the contracts were signed we just had to do it… despite the night sweats, tearful calls from family, and desperately heartbreaking goodbyes.

the morning we left saint paul was cool, damp, and eerily dark for 7am. we were sprinkled then poured on for 40% of the day, making me praise the lord for covered trailers and curse the heavens for slick interstates and shooting sideways rain spraying from the u-haul train in front of me. the relatively flat interstate took us across the eastern edge of minnesota, through wisconsin, and lost us west of chicago, were we forked from an impending toll booth to enjoy 45 semi-relaxing minutes snaking through illinois farm country at 35 blessed miles per hour (the corn looked incredible, for those interested). we found i-39 (finally) just in time to connect with i-74 into indiana. i will say again, indiana was not my favorite leg of the trip. those poor pot-hole infested interstates could use some tending, and when you’re following a pontiac/trailer combo with a mind of its own, attached to an eight ton u-haul, those pot holes they help the anxiety run hot. thankfully, the following day was sunny and beautiful as we hurled (such a funny word to use for the snail-like speed we took up for most of our second day) ourselves through the glorious hills of pennsylvania, west virginia, and maryland to rest for the night in a rancid smelling hotel establishment 75-ish miles from home.

seventy-five miles can sound like a dreamscape when you’re used to plowing through hundreds of miles over the course of a day, and i will assure you sights appeared shiny as we crept onto i-70 ready to arrive with time to spare at our new front door to meet the landlord. but the traffic here, it had some attitude to swing our way – a little welcome message for two naïve little souls from south dakota. and to be fair, we were warned. “the traffic out there is the worst in the country!” they all told us. “do you live far from work? traffic’s a mess.” and let me be the one to declare here and now, they were right. i complained about 40 mph through the hills of west virginia, but i was begging the good lord for 20 mph while we followed the parking lot that is your average d.c. area freeway into alexandria. but alas, we arrived on time to meet our incredibly sweet landlord. the helpful gentleman went so far as to describe to joey and me the workings of our over-the-stove microwave – lest it be too far out of our intellectual reach to operate a (gasp) digital microwave. i poke fun, but really this man is fabulous and we feel so lucky to have a landlord willing to so patiently navigate us through our new home.

we spent the next few hours unloading this thing.



and the rest of the day unpacking all of these… ugh, my back hurts just looking at this picture!



the overwhelming feeling of seeing your things spread across the entire house has a way of playing with your mind sometimes. but somehow, we turned that mess of crazy into this.



and the kitchen is finished for now too.



so we took some time off today to explore alexandria. old town alexandria is my favorite spot we’ve seen so far. the colorful brick rowhouses connect precious little boutiques and coffee shops that i could spend hours exploring (and i will!). but we only took a little time down there today, because we got torn away by the allure of visiting mt. vernon this afternoon. here are a few ton of pictures for your viewing pleasure.















joey’s promised his mom a homemade video tour of our new house on zee blog, so you can look forward to that coming soon ;)