TX, No TX. BA, No BA.

This is kinda long.

Ok, for those of you that may have caught the occasional random and vague facebook status update referencing our ridiculous living/moving situations. This is to clarify all those questions.

For starters, I have always known that when I “grew up” all I wanted to be was a mom. Not that being a mom means you can’t work. I didn’t mean that. But I have always dreamed of being a stay at home mom. I’m not really sure why, it has just always been something I felt like I was going to do. I have always, always loved children, maybe that’s it. Anyway. Knowing this, the decision to quit my job was not hard. That, and it was, for lack of a better way to describe it, a horrible working environment. So, it was not difficult AT ALL when Derick said he’d gotten a job in Texas, for me to quit. I was ready the second I birthed my kid. (in all actuality, I was ready from the time I was 36 weeks pregnant due to circumstances that I will not be discussing on a public venue such as this… but know, that I was VERY READY to get out of where I was) That being said, when I was able to quit, I did not work one day more than I had to. Actually, we needed insurance for the month of June, so I made my last day June 1st, to ensure that we were covered through the rest of that month. Don’t get me wrong, I meant every word of loving the girls I worked with and loving the job that I did. It truly was my passion! There are other things involved in that job that were very corrupt. Very. Enough of that.

So, I quit my job on June 1st. Derick started his new job on June 7th. We had the house on the market the weekend after we found out that Derick had the job. So, from about mid-beginning May, it was on the market. We could not afford to rent in College Station because it’s a college town and the apartment market is practically monopolized. So, Jake and I had to stay home in Broken Arrow, while Derick drove 7 hours to College Station, TX to begin work. Derick was put up in a hotel while he worked there. He worked for Halliburton as an engineer… frac-ing. Don’t ask, that’s about all I know. Things were going great. He was really liking the job. We just needed to get the whole family unit to TX. We needed the house to sell.

We had TONS of lookers, but no buyers. If you have never heard of burying the statue of St. Joseph, let me explain.

Most commonly, a statue of St. Joseph is placed inside a protective cloth and buried upside-down in the front yard. People differ as to whether the statue should be upside-down or right side-up, and whether the yard should be the front yard or back yard, but worrying about such things is unecessary. Then a prayer to St. Joseph is said. Anyway, when the house is sold, God and St. Joseph are thanked, the statue is dug up and given a place of honor in your new home, and you, of course, tell others about the power of St. Joseph's intercession.

Ok, so obviously I, born and raised in deep Southern Baptist roots, have prayed to no one other than God the Father and his Son, however… I don’t believe Catholics are sacrileges or anything… so I decided we’d try it! Why not?

I had a friend from my former place of employment that had spoken of a lucky St. Joseph. She agreed to let me borrow him. Derick was home for a couple days and we all were driving to Fiona’s house to get her statue of St. Joseph, when we received a phone call from a realtor that was showing our house. She had a buyer and they were going to work up an offer! We didn’t even have to get the statue, it had already worked out.

We got the offer, and after some negotiation, we had a deal. The only problem was that it was VA loan. I don’t know what kind of experience you have with VA loans, but they are not fun. We had to wait 30 days to close. Which was fine. We had waited 2 months (which I understand is really nothing in the market we were in, but when your husband is living 7 hours away from his wife and baby… it’s way too long) what’s another month? That gives me time to get everything packed up, since I’d be doing it all by myself.

Starting in August, Derick started the mandatory training program through Halliburton, which happens to be in Duncan, OK. They put him up in a rather nice duplex with a couple other fellas. This allowed us to be able to come and stay there too. He was there for 2 weeks at a time. Funny story, the closet in the master bedroom that Derick was staying in, was actually a safe room. I mean, Duncan, OK… I guess it’s pretty normal for a safe room out there. It ended up being Jake’s room. :) It worked out pretty well. But it’ll be funny to tell him that he slept in a closet for part of his first year!

 Jake and I were in BA around the beginning of August getting things prepared for our proposed closing date of August 13th. I received a phone call on August 10th with the news that we would not be able to close in 3 days. So, I had to cancel all plans of moving. Cancel the uhaul, cancel the help we’d acquired to get things on the uhaul, and mostly, cancel the plans to move to TX. 

I almost forgot to mention that we had a contingency on a house in College Station. It was contingent on the fact that we sold our house. The contingency ran up at the end of August.

The details surrounding the BA house were that the buyer’s loan was not working out. They needed proof of employment from him and he could not follow through with that because he was IN Iraq when all this was going on. We were thrown options like, he doesn’t wanna deal with this, he just wants to lease-back your house until December when he can have enough pay-stubs for proof of employment. He wasn’t returning to work until the beginning of October, or something like that. So, I’m freaking out, thinking we aren’t going to close until December. My entire house is packed away in boxes in my garage. I sold all our living room furniture. So, even if the deal fell through, I still have a huge mess to deal with!! Alone!!!!

Derick continued going back and forth from College Station to Duncan, every 2 weeks. We stayed in Duncan as much as we could. When we were not staying in Duncan, I took up residence at my parent’s in Fort Smith. I was lonely… very, very lonely in BA.

Something came through, about mid-late August and the buyer was going to be able to close in September. We had a proposed closing date of September 10th. Praise the LORD!!!! (I am sparing many, many stressful and crazy details, but that’s the long and short of it… the buyer came through, but we learned our lesson… we will never accept an offer from that has to do with VA, EVER, not good, not good experience, horrible!!)

Somewhere around the last week in August, Derick was in Duncan. Now, at this “training” in Duncan… They don’t tell you, when they hire you, that you will be taking tests in Duncan, much like school. If they did not make 75% or greater on these tests, they failed. If they failed 3 times… they were FIRED. That’s right. We were about to uproot our lives and buy a HOUSE on that risk. Thanks for that information, Halliburton. So, during this last week in August, you can imagine the stress Derick was going through. His family is hundreds of miles away. His wife quit her career to stay home, since his was stable… so we thought. Now he has these stipulations weighing VERY heavily on his shoulders. Derick would spend HOURS studying for these tests. It was much like the days of college where we didn’t see or talk to him much because he was studying so hard. It was so sad because he worked so hard to get graduated and now was being treated like a child and being tested all over again. Derick failed a test. The next weekend he came home. Jake and I went outside to greet him. Derick reached for Jake, who usually smiled from ear to ear and was giddy with excitement when Daddy got home. This time, however, Jake just looked at his Daddy like he didn’t know him.

That sealed the deal for Derick. He was done with Halliburton from that moment on. He already knew he would be in the field for hours on end, keeping him away from us at wild and crazy hours. That, and things were just obviously not in the cards for us in TX.

Derick took another test the following week and failed again. I was completely and utterly devastated. I had no idea what we were going to do. I didn’t have a job. We were about to not have a house. Our only source of income was in big time jeopardy. After much, much freaking out on my part, Derick and I started to put our minds together about jobs for him. Because, if (not if, when) he failed another test… he was fired. He still had 13 more tests to take. Things were not looking good.

For some reason I happened to remember a guy that gave Derick his card waaaaay back when Derick was still working at the bike shop in Tulsa. This guy had said that he wouldn’t be hiring in May, when Derick needed a job, but to call him in August if he was still looking for a job. I could not remember the guy’s name, or the name of the company, but I remember D telling me about it and showing me the card. I remember throwing away that card, too, just weeks before as I was sorting through things. While we were talking, I blurted out “NORIA!” “That’s it!” Derick said. From there, I got on google, found the company, found the name of guy Derick spoke with. The company website had a phone number. Derick called him. He was on vacation and was having his office calls forwarded to his phone. He answered, spoke with Derick, and set up an interview the following weekend. CRAZY!! This job did finally give D an offer, but it was after he was offered the position at another company that he took. I believe this came through when it did, if for nothing other than boosting our spirits.

During this time, we decided that we would definitely not be making a good decision by getting involved in a mortgage in TX if we knew we weren’t for sure going to be there. So, we canceled the contingency, thus forfeiting our earnest money. Bummer, but it’s better than being stuck in a mortgage!!

Around this time, Derick got a phone call from a former colleague telling him that he was pretty sure that the company that Derick did his senior design project for would be hiring a design engineer soon. (Design engineering is actually what D really wanted to end up doing.) Derick followed that lead and got another interview. This company actually put into production the part that Derick helped design for his senior design project. There was already a good working relationship and people within the company already knew good things about Derick, his knowledge base and his work ethic. The position, however, had to be approved. He had an interview with the head of engineering, who had to discuss with the CEO, then go to HR, HR had to present the numbers, that had to go back to the CEO before a final approval. I am NOT good at waiting!!!!! (keep in mind, Derick is still working for Halliburton… in fact, he’s in the field at this point, IN Texas) After much, much waiting, Derick got an offer!!! That very same day, Derick quit working for Halliburton and headed home to Fort Smith. This is where Jake and I had been staying since selling the house in BA (which was final on September 10th) and D being away.

Derick took 2 much needed weeks off between jobs to spend time with Jake. He never, ever wanted that boy to not recognize him again. So, he took a job where he will be working 8-5, M-F, with holidays off and little to no traveling. WHAT a blessing!!!!!

We went that next week to look at houses. We looked at 7 the first time we looked. The last house we looked at was not even on our list, our realtor just wanted us to see the layout. We LOVED it. We went back a few days later and looked 5 others and that one again. We still LOVED it. We made an offer. That house sat on the market for 4 months and the day we put our offer in, 2 others came in. I long decided not to stress any more, since I had been made very, very well aware by God that I was NOT in control of ANYTHING. So, we sat and waited… our offer was accepted. We were able to work things out to where we could close on November 5th (today). Everything was working out perfectly. A little too perfectly, obviously. If I have learned one thing in the last year… you don’t EVER want things to be too perfect. Because just as things start looking great… bad things are looming very, very near!! This is always the case for me, anyhow.  Derick started his job, and is commuting to and from FS to Muskogee… every. Single. Day. UGH…

Well, we had everything ready to go. I was packing up all our belongings here at my parent’s house. Derick had gotten a uhaul ready, my dad took off work, my mom took off work. At around noon, yesterday, I got a call from Derick telling me that there was a glitch (there’s the whopper I was waiting to be hit upside the head with). We may not be able to close tomorrow, but they’re still looking into it.

Ok, here’s the deal. FEMA came through in 2008 and made a PREMILINARY map on flood zones. There was an error in their zoning that put our house on the very edge of a floodplain. There are 13 other houses in this same neighborhood that are affected by this. FEMA is supposed to be correcting this issue, but they have yet to. Big shocker, right? The city of BA civil engineers have ruled that it is, indeed, NOT in a flood zone. Wagoner County has also made the exact same ruling. FEMA is dragging their feet and is supposed to have it corrected by early 2011. Well, the company that is processing our loan goes by FEMA. Perfect. They are requiring flood insurance. Our quote yesterday was OUTRAGEOUS!!! The sellers were aware of this discrepancy and withheld it from not only us-the buyers, but also their realtor! Anyway, we are very upset. We are working on some kinks. But we are ultimately trusting God. Is there any other option?

Nope.

Jake climbing over the barricade we've made to keep him in the living room.