Moving on...

Southern California is an amazing place to live.  It has been such a blessing to Zac and I.  We have made unforgettable memories and made life-long friends.  If the cost of living wasn't to darn expensive, I would stay here forever! The downside of living here was being so far away from family.  However, when your family is far away, the church becomes your family.  And how true is that living anywhere? However, we had not ever experienced it until we moved here because since we were married we always lived by family.

 We knew this was not going to be a permanent move.  We didn't know when or where we would move.  But we knew that we would eventually.  And now the big news... Zac and I will be moving out of Southern California at the beginning of September.  Zac was offered a new job in... *drum roll please*....Logan, UT.  He will be working for a company called UK2 and will be able to focus solely on Affiliate Marketing.  I will be able to work as a hair stylist (because the process isn't so darn long and frustrating).  This is a good move for us and we look forward to starting in a new place... again! This will be our 2nd move to a new state as a married couple and our 6th move total in our short 3.5 years of marriage (we are pros by now... at moving, not the marriage thing).  

California has been so good to us.  It has given us many opportunities that I don't think we could have had anywhere else.  Especially opportunities for growth.  Zac was able to start his career right out of college.  He was able to learn and grow so much in the online marketing world.  I worked as a nanny and was able to watch 2 beautiful boys (5 years and 2 years) I worked for a wonderful family who treated me as another member of their family and a friend instead of an employee, which I so badly needed living here without family.  I'm so sad to be leaving them. 

Even though we only lived here for a year and a half, we experienced many changes (mostly in the church).  6 months into us living here, the ward we were in was disbanded... they split our ward and then merged us with 2 other wards.  We had to change buildings and get to know new people again?! Zac was put in the Elders Quorum and I was made a Primary teacher.  We were able to jump right in and get to work in this new ward.  About 6 months later, there was another... BIG change.  They were merging the youth and the primary children with our primary and youth and the spanish wards primary and youth, but everyone else was separate... what! i had never seen this done or even heard of this being done before.  I was teaching at that time and it was such a struggle.  I taught the young kids and many of them didn't speak english.  Fortunately, most did, so they were able to serve as interpreters.  I was only a teacher for a short time and then another BIG change, Primary Presidency- hardest calling of my life! there is so much that goes into primary.  who would have thought? I was very humbled and grateful for this opportunity to learn and grow!  Right after that, they changed the bishopric and called the Elders Quorum President to the new bishopric.  Uh oh... that left an opening as the Elders Quorum President...you guessed it.  Zac.  He handled his calling with much more grace and finesse than I ever did.  These changes made me realize that we really can't plan out our lives.  Heavenly Father has a plan for each of us and we get to learn how to be flexible because things aren't going to always go how we want them to (tough lesson to learn!)

 Zac and I were given leadership callings in the church and we learned patience (a lot of patience!!) We learned all about service.  There were soooo many opportunities for service down here it absolutely amazed me!I learned to be able to love freely without having to truly know a person and without judging them first.  I was able to see people through our Heavenly Father's eyes and it is AMAZING. I learned leadership skills and how to prioritize. I learned that each of us is a child of God and he loves us so much.  I felt his love for me and I felt his love for the children, teachers, and parents of the Primary.  What a wonderful blessing that calling was for me! It is so good to be able to go back to the gospel basics.  Some of you may be thinking... duh Caitie?  We have known this since we were in Primary!  Yes, I know...  I guess I just needed to be reminded.  I learned how to speak my mind without it being confrontational! Those who know me know that I HATE anything that could potentially turn confrontational.  If I think it can be confrontational, I run, and I shut my mouth, and I let everyone else duke it out.  If you say what you need to say with love, it will be taken out of love and not turn ugly.  I learned how to say NO. Which goes back to non-confrontational Caitie- just say yes all the time and no one will ever be mad at you... ya ok... then you just run yourself ragged and burn out way too fast and hate yourself for not being able to say no... vicious cycle!! 

Our marriage has been truly strengthened as we have had to turn to each other and rely on each other to figure things out.  From cockroches, to clogged sinks that fill up with water, to buying our first car together and the stick shift chain breaking before we got it home, to buying another car that has been a much better experience, to many other challenges and problems that we were able to figure out together.  

We have been so blessed by all of these experiences and lessons we have learned.  We are so sad to be leaving our friends and California weather! But we are so excited for a new adventure in Utah where we also have many friends and also family members- still trying to get excited about the cold and the snow though... brrrr!