The new chapter in our lives - revealed.......

It's close enough to being official that I can announce the fact that Mark has accepted a position at Spring Arbor University in Michigan!!

It's been a whirlwind of events that started the day after Easter! We had both accepted the fact that we would be here another year. The "hiring season" has somewhat passed in academia - so, you can imagine our surprise when Mark got an e-mail from the SAU asking if he was still interested.

With the timing of everything, we decided to see if it was possible to purchase a house and get a contract settled by the end of this month to take advantage of the tax credit. So far, so good. Mark and I drove up to Michigan so he could have his on campus visit and I could "shop" for houses. The housing market is pretty reasonable up there so it made sense to buy a house now even though we weren't planning on buying one until next year. It would be worth it in the end to get the credit - even though our savings is taking a bigger hit than I would have liked. The house that we are in the midst of trying to purchase is in Jackson, MI. It's 15 minutes from the university.

It's been a little crazy for us - we're going about things a little backwards - because of the April 30th deadline.

Needless to say, Mark's parents are thrilled with the move and are already making plans to come out!

Get a load of these stats....

Now---> Michigan
my parents - 9 hours away ---> 6.5 hours away
civilization(Target) - 45 minutes away ---> we're there
IKEA - 4 hours away ---> 1 hour!!!
Mark's parents - 21 hours away ----> 8 hours away!!!!!!!!

TO GOD BE THE GLORY