Two Months, Three Homes

Who doesn't love moving?  We sure do.  Packing, cleaning, and loading-Then carrying heavy boxes up and down stairs, unpacking, and organizing--just to do it all over again!  Seriously though, the past few months have been full of all of the above and now we are finally settled...at least for the next 6 months. 

Mark had to move in April so he moved into our first apartment about 2 months before we got married. Meaning, in less than 3 months, we lived in three places and I actually lived in FOUR places...that includes moving ALL of my stuff THREE times.  Here is a quick overview of these four places: 

#1: 500 North

 I lived here for 2 wonderful years with so many great roommates and in a great ward! 
 It was such an amazing house!

Mark was living in King Henry for those 2 years. 

#2: Manavu Apartments

This was our first apartment.  It is men's housing during Fall/Winter so while we got a sweet deal, we had to leave in August.  We had two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a large living room, a large kitchen (so nice!), and a washer/dryer.  It was pretty dang cheap and it was furnished- those couches we're a small piece of heaven.  

 #3: PEAY Apartments

In the rush to move out of Manavu, we viewed a friends apartment here, quickly looked at one below them, and signed the contract.  The whole 10 days we lived there, it was a disaster zone because we never really felt excited about moving in.  

Why only 10 days?

Granted that the place looks really nice, a series of events gave us different feelings about the place.  First of all, there was a set utility rate for the whole complex and unlike our friends above us, we did not have a dishwasher or A/C. 

Then, as we were moving in one night, we opened the front door and scurrying across the floor was a very large cockroach. 

 Sick.

  

A couple days later, I figured I should clean out the kitchen so we could move into it.  Not only was the whole apartment pretty dirty, but I found that EVERY drawer and cupboard shelf had 5-7 dead cockroaches.  

Super Sick...at least they were dead?

Later that night, I heard dripping in the bathroom.  In the corner above the tub was a large paint bubble from the tenant's tub leaking above us.  A few minutes later, our tub was scattered with drywall, caulking, and paint.  

Seriously?!

One night, as I was brushing my teeth, a small cockroach crawled out of the sink.  Proof that there were still live ones living somewhere. Later that night I got up to go to the bathroom and when I turned on the light, there was a cockroach chilling out on the handle on the pest control spray I had bought.  Very funny.

Ok, that's pushing it.

Finally, because we had no furniture, we had been sleeping on the floor.  I fell asleep on our "bed" around 11 as I was reading a book and Mark was out in the living room.  I slowly woke up around 12:30, with my book on my arm and sitting on top of it, about 5 inches from my face, was the largest Daddy-longlegs spider I have ever seen.  Mark came running when I let out a blood-curdling scream. (Even he admitted it was a big spider!)

That was the last straw.

I was officially miserable in that apartment.  

It didn't feel like home and neither one of us ever felt very excited about it.  

Then it seemed like the heavens had opened.  It was Wednesday and we got a call saying that an apartment we had been hoping for had unexpectedly opened up.  That was it- we were getting out of there.  We put the apartment on Craigslist and called management to explain our situation.  Management was understanding and were willing to let us out of our contract IF someone else could sign it on Friday.  Management was changing on Saturday so it had to happen now or never.  40 people contacted us in one day (no exaggeration) interested in the place and we had 15 couples come look at it Thursday night.  

Everything was going perfect...apparently too perfect.

We then found out that the apartment we wanted was actually somehow no longer available.  We were so frustrated! What were we supposed to do?  We really didn't like where we were and we had this small window of opportunity to get out of it scratch-free. What were we to tell everyone who was interested in it and the management?  Thursday night we went to bed having no idea what would happen in the morning but with all the faith in the world that it would work out.  We woke up Friday with school and work to get to and figured we had to just suck it up, apologize to management, and try to make the best of living there.  As we were getting ready, Mark had a spark of an idea to call an apartment complex we had heard about but that was usually  full.  There was one apartment opening up!  When?  Saturday! 

We rushed over to look at it.  It was a tiny studio apartment- a big change from the two two-bedroom places we had been. BUT it was clean and cute, the complex was great, the tenants were all young married couples (compared to the hispanic family population at PEAY), the management was super friendly, and we both felt excited about it.  A good feeling.  

As it turned out, everything had worked out.  There was definitely a point of doubt and confusion but looking back, it actually worked out perfectly.  We love our new apartment which brings us to....

#4: Perrett Apartments 

Our Bedroom, living room, and dining room...oh AND guest bedroom.  (Our couch is a futon.)

     Left: The living room and entrance to the bathroom.     Right: The dining room and home office.  

Our adorable little kitchen, fit with it's own small fridge and mini-oven!

Mark's first day of his last semester! 

One Last Note:

With each move we were able to go through a lot of our stuff and get rid of everything we don't use.  Down-sizing was definitely necessary. With the first move we took about 5 tubs of stuff to D.I. and sold stuff to Plato's Closet.  Moving from PEAY, we figured we would just put our stuff outside with a  "FREE" sign and at the end of the day we would take the rest to D.I.  When I got home from work, the huge pile was nonexistent and one t-shirt was left on the ground!!! I was stunned.  So after we had moved out and shut the door, we put out our last box of stuff and the children who were out playing came running...  It was quite adorable.  

Parting with those white heels wasn't so bad after that little girl loved clomping around in them.  

And that little boy may be the first person I have ever seen pull off those boots that well.