life in a hotel

We close on our new home in THREE WEEKS! By the time we close, we will have spent 90 days in a hotel. Geez. I expected these 90 days to be miserable, but overall, I think we have survived quite well. Bella and I are starting to get a little tired of hotel living, though. Here's what our typical hotel lifestyle looks like:

- Letting Bella out to potty in the morning requires putting on decent clothes, walking down the hall and stairs, across the parking lot, and into the field to let her do her business. Then I have to pick up her poop with my hand in a bag every single time. Mmmmm.

- Caleb and I eat out for lunch every single day. We have found two lunch places that we love: Stix 'N Twigs and Badlands Brew. We also eat out for dinner most evenings. Again, maybe 2 restaurants that have somewhat healthy food. Besides the weird restaurants, diners, and fast food chains, I think we've eaten at almost every restaurant in town.

-The evenings we stay in? Well, I bought a two-burner hot plate from Wally World and we brought a few cooking items from before the move. I've cooked spaghetti, breakfast tacos, fish, stroganoff, lots of salads with chicken, and a few other dishes.

- The major indicator of when it's time for laundry is when Caleb is on his last pair of underwear. I lug my huge Rubbermaid bucket with supplies down the stairs to my car and head to the Coin Laundry down the street. I can do three super large loads of wash and dry in one extra large load for $9.00. Bella usually comes with me and hangs in the car while I'm switching the loads. :) We've also had some nice friends allow us to do a few loads at their house.

- To check the mail, I have to drive to the post office on the other side of town (about a 5 minute drive) and use a key to open our very own PO Box. :)

- I don't have to wash my own sheets or towels or make our bed. :)

- Our kitchen is equipped with a mini-fridge, microwave, itty bitty sink, and single-cup coffee maker. I will appreciate my new kitchen and appliances more than ever.

- We have TWO large flat screen TVs in the hotel, one in the living room and one in the bedroom. Caleb and I don't even own a flat screen TV, so this is luxury.

- Our hotel living room is crowded with camping gear, two bike racks for our cars, two mountain bikes, sewing stuff, buckets of shoes, and no closet....just a small bar for hanging clothes.

- Our view is the roof of the conference room below us.

- We play fetch with Bella in the room and bounce the tennis ball of the walls. :) Surprisingly, we've had no complaints about too much noise from her running. :)

On another note, the tornado sirens went off Monday while I was out for a run and Caleb was playing football. I sprinted for the car and drove to the field where Caleb was playing. Fortunately, no tornado, but it was sure looking like another crazy wall cloud. The guys played through the sirens, but decided the huge lighting directly over us might be dangerous. Boys. We've heard two sirens within a month. :)

We have really been enjoying our church and have made some great friends already. I'm ready to find a job, though, so I'm praying for that right now.

-Lindsey