While on our way to Oklahoma

Over the past month, our little family has made home in a local hotel room in Moore, OK.  This was never the plan, in fact, we had an apartment deposit paid for and spent several hours in our new apartment for a night until the next morning-- we realized we may be on the wrong side of town!  But before I delve into that drama let us rewind back to mid-February when we pulled out of Idaho to venture over to the other side of the country.

We left Boise on the 19th of February after noon.  Chase came home from work and looked at the map and thought, 'maybe we should leave tomorrow morning'.  I had been packing the car all day and was preparing to leave that hour. Because of that, and a feeling I had that kept nudging me to get on the road ultimately persuaded us to head out then. Chase quickly changed his mind and agreed that we should get going 'just in case anything happens along the way'.  

Not 30 minutes on the road we started to feel a foreign shaking, swurvy feeling in the car.  We thought it could've been gusts of wind, but that shakiness accompanied a sliding feeling similar to the feeling you'd get if you were sliding on ice. The roads were completely bare and there wasn't much wind, so we were left a little confused but we kept going thinking it was probably alright.  The previous week, we took the car into a dealership  to get the oil changed, tires rotated, pretty much an overall check up in preparation for this long trip, and since they said "everything looks great" we figured it wasn't a car issue.  So we kept driving but Chase definitely felt the need to be extra cautious.  

We continued to drive but anytime the road even slightly swurved or we had to take an exit the car was swuvring and sliding.   We rotated the weight in the back of the car a couple different times hoping maybe the weight was distributed unevenly.  After reading in the car manual, after we noticed the "trailor-sway" light blinking on, Chase eventually slowed down well under the speed limit which prevented most of the sliding feeling we were experiencing.

After 4 hours of driving, we got to Ogden, UT and we felt impressed to top off the gas before turning onto a freeway that would be taking us through the mountains.  All along the way we realized we were being guided and directed.  We took an exit towards a gas station but it took us up a weird hill and onto a toll road.  Chase was slightly annoyed that we had to pay money to go get gas so he was about to turn around and take another exit further down the freeway, but I had a strong feeling that we should get the gas NOW.  

We paid the toll and then drove a few miles up the road to a gas station. But, as we pulled into the gas station Chase noticed a weird clanking sound under the car--this sound just started to happen at that moment.  The girls  and I went in to use the restroom while Chase was investigating. He drove the car in circles in an empty parking lot trying to figure out the sound.  We both got under the car and checked it out, but everything looked good and nothing seemed out of place so we were in the car ready to head back towards the mountains and onto our journey, but at that moment I decided last minute to grab some food for dinner.

 So I jumped back out of the car, ran back into the gas station to grab a couple corn dogs I spotted minutes earlier.  I went in and all the corn dogs were gone.  I asked the man at the cash register about them (since that was the only food in the area that I knew my girls wouldn't fuss about), and the man's response was that he just threw them away. He offered to make more so I said that would be great and called Chase to let him know it was going to take several minutes. Chase decided that was fine and he was going to drive around a little bit more to see if the clanking sound continued. 

This was a blessing because it took 10 minutes for me to grab the grub, which was JUST enough time for the TIRE TO FALL OFF.  

I was just about done paying for the corn dogs when Chase calls me and says ," the tire fell off and I'm stuck in the middle of a road right behind the gas station."

I got out there and see it's hanging off of the car at a 45 degree angle.  The car wouldn't move!  Not 3 minutes later a cop pulls up behinds us and was incredibly nice to sit there with us as we call the car insurance, call for a tow truck, and then wait for a taxi to take us to a hotel that night.  Long story short (I know, too late), the tow man and cop were a blessing.  We didn't have to take a taxi because the tow man and cop didn't want for us to pay for that, so I rode in the cop car and the kids and Chase rode with the tow man. They took us straight to the hotel and then the tow man decided to drive the car straight to the dealership.  The cop said he'd follow the tow man there to make sure everything goes well.  That night we were so glad everything went so smoothly and as we looked back at all the little instances on the way there, we realized we were SOOO lucky it didn't fall off going 80 mph on the freeway.  We felt like we were inspired to make the smallest little decisions that helped us to have a very safe, and smooth car 'issue'.

The next day, our car got fixed, and we were on the road again by 4pm and after a few miles on the road, again we realized we were SOOOOOOOOOOOOO incredibly blessed that the tire fell off where and when it did rather than on the road we were heading on.  The road was the swurviest road we had been on thus far with water and cliffs on both sides of us.  Chase was driving both days, so he instantly realized by the way the car was driving the previous day it could have easily swurved off of the road.  We quickly said a prayer of gratitude.  We were so grateful for our safety!

After eventually getting to Oklahoma (it was like 10pm- Friday night), we had another great TENDER MERCY or blessing.  As we pulled up on the road that our apartment was going to be on we noticed a tattoo parlor, an adult shop, & a bar right down the road from our new "home."  We felt a little uneasy about that and then pull up to a not so nice apartment complex that looked livable but a bit sketchy.  As we park we notice a man struggling to walk towards the apartment...most likely drunk...and barely clothed.  Yikes!

We call the landlord, who was a very nice lady, to meet us and sign papers and what not.  She took us to our new apartment, gave us the keys, and said to come into the next day or so to sign the contract. At that time it was late so she wanted us to rest. What a blessing that was that we were able to wait to sign any contract because the apartment was disgusting:

It was a furnished apartment (so we didn't have to bring a uhaul of stuff like our beds, furniture, etc.)  There were wet, used towels, used bars of soaps, non working toliet, tv remote had a band-aid on it holding the battery casing on it, smelly, doorstep covered in cigarette butts and garbage, & more. But most disgusting was the girls bed...we look in the sheets and there were hairs ALL OVER IT...BARF .  I instantly felt sick to my stomach feeling really uneasy about the whole situation; partly because I felt so far away from family and anyone we knew, but also because I was trying to talk myself into staying there for the next few months.  We decide to spent the night there and wake up in the morning to check out the area in the day time, hoping it would look better or make us feel better about the apartment.  Through out the night there was music playing, people coming and going right outside our window, small groups of people smoking and hanging out in the early morning hours, etc.  

We woke up that next morning and started driving around the area.  Chase was definitely inspired because the first place he decided to drive to was the closest LDS church- just because....no reason at all, he just felt like we should.  We get there and another car pulled up behind us so Chase felt like we should ask them about the area.  We introduced ourselves, told them we just moved there the previous night, and asked if they knew the area well.  The guy responds with, "Well, I'd be the person to ask because I am a detective for the police department for this town."  WOW.  He told us the apartment  we were at is where he gets drug-bust calls for quite frequently, stolen cars, and even some shootings over our way.  He told us where to go & pretty much where to avoid.

 And as we drove away......we felt so overwhelmed with gratitude....... AGAIN we felt so blessed!

We continued to drive around, scope out the area, & look into apartment complexes that the detective recommended.  Unfortunately, no openings were available so we looked into the hotel extended rates around town for the time while we waited for one to open up.  

Well, it's been 7 weeks since we got here and we are still calling our humble little hotel room home for now.  :)

It has turned out that this situation is better for us right now... 

plus, the girls get to swim again in the indoor pool!!

We are enjoying our little adventure thus far and appreciate the kind people we have encountered these past several weeks.  If we have learned anything this past month,  it would be that the world is full of kind, generous people...

...AND that it pays to listen carefully to those sweet promptings that the Holy Ghost so graciously sends.