Container Day Part 2

Once again, the Lord has abundantly blessed us and we are THANKFUL! It took only three short weeks for our belongings to make their way across the Pacific Ocean to our new home in Taichung, Taiwan. And when they arrived, we had a mob of people out to help unload the container and get everything upstairs to our 6th floor apartment. It was overwhelming to see the willingness of the body of Christ to help a family in need. Basically, we turned around and in about 1 hour and 22 minutes, the whole process was over. And, yes we were timing it. After the 7 plus hour process to load it we were curious to compare how long it would take to unload it. Much like a child carefully constructing a tower...all that hard work is quickly thrown to the wind with one swift kick! Ours was accomplished a bit more carefully, but with much the same vigor and speed thanks to some very generous people. Thank you Morrison Academy!

This is the container being driven up to the apartment building. Our apartment is directly behind me (the photographer).




The driver was trying to get the truck as close to the building as possible so we didn't have to walk as far to get to the elevator. That is our apartment building in the background.


Garett climbing up to take a look. Right away we could tell that the men who packed our container for us really knew what they were doing. Hardly any shifting or movement had occurred!

Rockin' and rollin'

Thanks to some hard working young men, Garett didn't have to visit the chiropractor the next day!



And most importantly, the surfboards made it!:)

Except for a few minor dings and chips everything made it safely. Another one of the many reasons we have had to be thankful! We are now in the process of finishing unpacking and trying to make our apartment a home. The kids especially are enjoying having their toys to play with and their own beds to sleep in at night! I will try and get some before and after pictures of the apartment posted soon.

Container Day Part 1

Rhys helping pack the container!

Now that I have sped through our first few weeks in Taiwan in one post, I thought I would back up a little and post about a couple of specific events. The first event I thought might be interesting is the day we packed our container.

Having never moved overseas before, I had no frame of reference with which to imagine what this was going to look like. All I knew was that all of our earthly belongings would be packed in a 20 foot long by 8 feet wide by 8 feet tall shipping container. I was assured that it would all fit, but I was skeptical. Twenty feet did not seem like very much to me. Which, in retrospect was good because it motivated me to try and get rid of as much as possible. Of course, after three garage sales and several trips to the good will, I felt so confident, I went shopping!:)

After many weeks of questioning...would it fit? If not what should we leave behind??? Did we remember everything we might need????? The day finally arrived. The plan was that the container would leave port from Long Beach and in 3-6 weeks would arrive at our doorstep in Taichung, Taiwan. With the help of the sweet and extremely generous people from Fellowship Crating the container was slowly but surely filled with our belongings. In reality, Garett just stood there while these two men worked their magic. You could tell immediately that they had done this many times before and they knew exactly how to pack the container so that everything fit and was secure. It took them seven hours to pack everything inside, but in the end it all fit.....except for one arm chair. Here are a few pictures of the progress!

Early in the packing process. I'm not sure you can tell, but that's our couch perched up on top of those boxes.




Our boxes waiting to be packed into the container.



Midway through the packing process. Mattresses in...check!


Almost finished!

SUCCESS!



All Ready to go.

Catch up!

Well, I've done a terrible job all ready of keeping this blog updated. In my defense I do have a couple of excuses which I will try and elaborate on in this post.:) In summary, since we landed here three weeks ago, we have had three ER visits, one hospital stay, one other doctor visit, our container arrived, and Garett started work. And throughout it all, we haven't had any internet. Alright, enough with the excuses....I will however try and elaborate a little on our experience so far and try and bring you all up to date. That way I can hopefully be a little more faithful to this blog in the future and not feel as though I am always playing catch up!

The morning that we were going to be headed down to Taichung to move into our apartment, Eli and Rhys were "wrestling" and Rhys lost as he was thrown into a coffee table and split his eye open. A couple of hours in two separate ER's and some superglue later we were headed to Taichung. That evening, after checking out our new home, we were out to dinner with some friends and Rhys threw up. And then he did again many times throughout the night. By Saturday morning I was sick too so Garett thought he would take the girls back to Taipei to visit his family and hopefully stay well! Upon arrival Peyton got sick and after not being able to stop she was admitted to the hospital and given an IV. She was in the hospital for two days during which Eli stayed with her cousins and played to her hearts content. I think she thought she had died and gone to heaven!

By Monday, our family was finally back together and by Wednesday it seemed like we might all be on the mend. Our 20 ft container arrived on Friday and with the help of a huge group of very generous people it was completely unloaded and in our apartment (on the 6th floor) in 1 hour and 22 minutes. That night we slept in our own beds! What a blessing!!

It is now Tuesday, August 9th and this afternoon we had to take Rhys and Peyton to the doctor for ear infections. They are both on antibiotics and will hopefully be feeling better soon! Although the past few weeks have been difficult, we have felt very blessed and cared for!! The body of Christ here has wrapped their arms around us and bent over backwards to tend to our every possible need! In the almost two weeks we have been here in Taichung, I don't think I have had to cook dinner once. Someone is always there asking what they can do for us or taking us places we need to go. We are also very thankful for all of you who have been praying for us! The Lord has provided us with great encouragement through your prayers!

Well, unfortunately I feel as though this post was all business. I would have liked to have dedicated a post to each of the significant events that we have experienced so far on this journey. But, in an effort to encourage myself to stay at it I thought it wise to do a general catch up post. I will try and expand a little more on our journey to Taiwan and how the Lord brought us here in a future post. There are also some fun "only in Taiwan" experiences to share with you at a later date! The picture up above is a view from our apartment at night. Thanks for reading!