525,600 Minutes

525,600 minutes...how do you measure, measure a year?

One year ago on July 31, 2007 we arrived to Louisville, Kentucky around 10pm. The Mills had a pizza dinner ready for us and helped us move all our furniture and boxes in the apartment (next door to theirs) in about an hour. The love and help they offered us was just the beginning of our journey in this crazy town.

We have learned so much this past year

weird louisville: seriously..louisville is weird. Where do I start? People who are hicks complain that the stereotype for kentucky is hick and they don't understand it. the airport code is sdf? What? People do NOT know how to use their car signals or drive the speed limit or follow ANY laws of the road (ESPECIALLY LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS). I could go on for hours, but it doesn't help the situation. So for better or worse...keep louisville weird!good people, lasting friends:
We really will miss some good friends. Some that arrived recently
(the Hicks - this is their actual last name),

and some we have known (well Lyle has known) forever

and some we have made friends with along the way...
The Findersand the Bakers

There are things we won't be able to do in New York...sad!
Like golf...

it's not like we were any good, but it was super fun to play
(well, it was fun when we were doing good...ha)

Packing up the house...
your house changes a lot after you "live" in it. We had a bare frigidare and now look at what I have to take down. We had bare walls, and now they are full. We had bare and empty rooms and now we have to leave furniture behind. We were blessed in this 2 bedroom 2 bathroom large space and we will MISS it greatly when we are living in a mere 450 square feet. Lyle and I will actually have to share a bathroom (hence we might actually have our first fight as a married couple in new york...lol...yeah right)!525,600 Minutes...how do you measure, measure a year...

It's time now to sing out,

Tho' the story never ends
Let's celebrate
Remember a year in the life of friends
Remember the love!
Remember the love!
Seasons of love!

What a perfect segue into our move to New York.
Ok, so here's the scoop:
We've got our New York apartment figured out (finally), so now we just have to figure out how to pay for it (student loans I wish you would hurry already). If you need my new address please e-mail me at ciara.schofield@gmail.com and I will get it to you.

As you know, the Schofields are nothing ordinary. Why would we change that for our move to New York? You find an apartment, you rent it, you move in right? Wrong. The Schofields have found a more difficult way. First, we went through a few brokers and finally stuck with one. He gave us a steal on rent and described the perfect (albeit small) apartment. We are within one block (that would be about a 1.5 minute walk) from the dental school. It is a walk up on the second floor (sorry no elevator). We have no laundry room in the building (looks like we're looking for a laundry mat). The apartment is getting completely gutted and refinished, so the plus is we are essentially the first tenants in this "new" apartment with new floors, new bathroom, and a new kitchen. The con is we don't have ANY pictures of what our actual place will look like (although we did see pictures of what the apartment above us looked like).

Ok, so next...first our broker tells us the place will be ready for move in by August 15. THEN, the next day he calls and says September 1. WHAT?! Ok, by this point we NEED AND WANT this place so we improvise. We decide to rent another place from him for 2 weeks (and get stolen from with the amount we have to pay) and then move in to OUR apartment on September 1.

Next hurdle, how do we move our stuff to New York if we have NO PLACE to put it for two weeks. Well, plan D (seriously, we had to go through so many plans), we move our stuff out of our apartment and store it with friends right before school starts. Then, Lyle and I will drive up to New York (in a rental car--oh yeah and we still have to figure out how to sell our car...agh) and he will start school and I have a job interview lined up for August 18. We will both live for 2 weeks in our "rental" and then the weekend of Labor Day, Lyle's parents (very generously) offered to fly into Louisville and drive our moving truck up to New York for us so that we don't have to make THAT trek again.

There will be a little bit of a MESS to figure out how to get the truck packed, coordinate drivers proof of insurance and id (crazy regulations I tell ya), and get everything paid for efficiently. So Lyle's parents will fly into Louisville, drive up the (already packed by friends hopefully) truck, and get to our apartment in one piece (without any tickets or incidents).

Then we will move our stuff into our apartment and Marv & Lorna will stay in our 450 square foot palace (note to buy an air mattress that will hopefully fit in the kitchen) until Wednesday when they fly out. I'm sure I won't get much done that long weekend since we will be spending time with them around town, but we will definitely enjoy the break and the familiar faces.

The other VERY lucky thing about the fact that they are coming for Labor Day weekend is that Lyle's white coat ceremony is the following Tuesday (which they will be in town for) coincidentally!

Mainly if we can get to New York and have all our stuff get there we will be happy campers. After getting through all the requirements and copies of this and that for the apartment, we decided it would have been just as difficult to buy a house (I guess we'll be ready for that once Lyle finishes). Now I just can't sleep because I have decorating ideas going on in my head. Ikea.com is my favorite place to look these days because they are (doy) so compact and practical. Can't wait for mom to come in November to help!

So this week will be jam packed full of last minute errands, organizing, arranging, cleaning, packing, and putting the finishing touches on my furniture (stay tuned for pictures)