Save arrival, unpacking, and settling in.

Well folks, after literal, actual years of anticipating this move, we have finally arrived. We left Kansas City for good on Friday morning, August 11 to begin the long journey to New York — or at least, 3/5 of our family did. Jarrod had trouble completely packing up the UHaul in time (and I was working right up until we left, so I was no help at all) so he stayed behind an extra day with his traveling companion Ambrose to get the last of the books in. (Ambrose was pretty upset at first to miss out on an extra day at Grandpa and Nana’s in Indiana, but he got over it once we were gone, and apparently got to watch all the TV he wanted on Saturday to make up for it.)

The trip to Indiana was long, but it went about as smoothly as a 9 1/2 hour drive with a 4-year-old and 2-year-old who’s about 70% potty-trained could go. Great weather, good traffic for the most part (Chicago was Chicago, of course), and zero accidents from the toddler — although she did figure out that she could get me to stop if she yelled that she had to pee. Oh, and both girls napped for exactly 15 minutes each. How.

In any case, with losing an hour between Central and Eastern time + all the stops, we rolled in to Indiana with just enough time to say hello and goodnight to everyone assembled at my parents’ house (Grandpa, Nana, aunt Becca, great-aunt Loie), bathe, and pass out. I laid the girls down in their respective sleeping spots and didn’t hear a word from them after.

Saturday was a big Indiana day! The first thing we did was help Grandpa gather eggs and pick mushrooms and hazelnuts.

Then the rest of the welcoming committee arrived and accompanied us to the Amish zoo, where the girls played in some corn, petted a whole bunch of animals, and then went on a ride to feed the bigger animals.

After that adventure, we were all ready for lunch, so we drove over to Shipshewana and got ourselves some Jojo’s pretzels. Theda was enchanted by the man making pretzels! (Although she wasn’t an actual fan of the pretzels themselves.)

Following lunch, the girls enjoyed a spin on the carousel and a look around the toy store…and I had fun in the candy store, of course. (A word to the wise, pickle-flavored cotton candy, while fun, is not in any way tasty; maple-bacon isn’t that great either!)

By that time, we were ready for a break, so we enjoyed the rest of the afternoon at home while we waited for the rest of our travel party to arrive. Theda helped Grandpa make kebabs, and we enjoyed a nice Shantz-homestead dinner. Finally right at sunset, the guys arrived! Grandpa and Jarrod built a little fire, and we all roasted s’mores while we watched for shooting stars from the Perseid meteor shower. I only saw one good one — but I did, apparently, see a Starlink launch crawl across the sky like a giant illuminated caterpillar.

Sunday was a day for catching up on rest — we mostly stayed in, and in the evening Grandpa made homemade corn tortillas from, believe it or not, corn he’d grown himself. Plus “frozen mashed potatoes with gravy”, which the kids soon discovered was actually homemade ice cream and salted caramel sauce from aunt Becca.

On Monday we all said our goodbyes and, after an obligatory breakfast at Rise ‘n Roll, were off to continue our journey eastward by 8 a.m. It was another long day of driving; we parked ourselves in Pennsylvania for the evening as planned. Sharing a hotel room with two queen beds and five bodies was an experience in patience, but we eventually all got to sleep.

The next morning we were up bright and early and made the hour-and-a-half drive to a small church halfway to our destination to attend liturgy celebrating the Feast of Dormition. Then we drove another hour and a half through misty, enchanting weather (it reminded me of the Blue Mist on the Amazon Trail…anyone?) and, after a quick last-minute potty stop, arrived at our new place!

First impressions: more space than expected! The floor plan we were sent didn’t match exactly the layout of the apartment, and it turns out the seminary family I’d been stalking online whose blog I’d been following to see what the Lakeside apartments are like was the previous tenant! So I was fairly familiar with the setup. The kitchen is larger than the floor plan kitchen — which is good, because I was already sweating about the size of the kitchen relative to the amount of kitchen stuff we have, even post-paredown — but the tradeoff is that the nook I’d planned to put the dining room table in is really only big enough for the kids’ work table. So our living room space is a bit reduced because of that. But one thing I was pleasantly surprised to discover was that a couple of the closets had shelves installed by a previous tenant, which helped up the available storage space.

Jarrod arrived in the U-Haul shortly after the girls and I arrived (we had fun in the playroom right outside our apartment for a bit while we waited), and he and some other available seminarians made short work of unloading our belongings into the new space. I went on an expedition with the kids to grab some pizzas for the helpers; our first New York slice was not, in fact, from Sbarro (yes, that’s an Office reference) but from Frank Pepe’s. Tasty! The kids played in the playroom while I started unpacking a bit and Jarrod chatted with new friends. Eventually we headed over to the hotel we’d booked for the night (a wise decision, truly), and passed out after what had been a pretty long day.

And that was our trip! Since our arrival we’ve been unpacking and setting up like mad. The apartment is almost all the way there, with everything out of boxes and all the pictures hung. A couple more things need to be hung and arranged, but we really worked hard from Wednesday through Sunday; Monday I had to go back to work, and while I was really worrying about whether I’d feel ready, I definitely was in a good mental and physical space when Monday did roll around.

Some other highlights of our month since moving in:

• We’ve explored the city a bit and have started to learn how to live as city-dwellers…it’s different than your typical midwestern town, or even Vegas! Shoprite seems to be our most convenient grocery store experience — and we discovered the hard way that there’s no such thing as disposable shopping bags here. Each trip we take to a specific spot in the city is a learning experience. A Target pickup meant navigating an underground parking garage to get to the entrance; a Costco trip meant driving to the second floor of the Home Depot parking lot. We are figuring things out as we go!
• One hugely nice thing has been a bike path/closed road area that runs for about a quarter mile just past the parking lot before it hits a closed gate. I’ve been doing some sprint circuits out there while the kids bike and play with chalk. It’s so peaceful and green.
• I finally figured out how to help the older kids take the next step towards pedal-biking, which was exactly what they needed to make the transition from balance-biking to pedaling click. Theda took off like a rocket, and Ambrose started pedaling a couple days earlier. It is so cool to watch them pedal like big kids! Now we just need to get Liesl pedaling and we can go on family bike trips! (That’s a joke, she’s years out still. She loves her Puky Wutsch 4-wheel bike but hasn’t figured out the little balance bike yet.)
• We visited Carvel for the first time, and now Jarrod officially wants a Fudgy the Whale cake for Father’s Day. Done.
• Jarrod and I walked all the way back to our apartment from our pizza/Carvel expedition (his parents had the kids) in downtown Tuckahoe. It was the most gorgeous half-hour walk; we shamelessly ogled the older houses along Scarsdale Road on the way back.

So, life has been pretty good. We are getting settled in, and the apartment is really starting to feel like home. Jarrod’s parents are in town now but will leave on Monday to go back to Kansas. Ambrose will start school the following Thursday, and Theodora will begin preschool the week after that. I’ve been working from home since we arrived, but hope to go into New Jersey soon after the kids are in school to meet the folks there.