Movin' to Seattle

It's official! We're moving to Seattle this summer!

Here's the story: technically we could get out of the Army this summer because our four years are up: 4 years of dental school for 4 years of dental service in the Army. But we've seen dentists before us try and find jobs in the states from Germany, and it's hard. So we thought, if we can CHOOSE where we go, why not just extend one more year and make transitioning to real life as easy as possible? So we toyed around with the idea of places to live where there are Army bases. We considered New York or DC or Hawaii (cuz why not?!). I'll live almost anywhere for a year! But then we thought about where we ultimately want to end up. Which is kind of a scary thought! All my life has been planned out and "looking to the next thing": 6 years in Provo going to college at BYU and working at American Crafts while waiting for Chris to finish up; 4 years of dental school at USC in Los Angeles; 4 years in Germany; 1 year in Seattle. THEN WHAT??? Well, I think we want to end up in the Pacific Northwest. Why? To be close to family and we love rain, trees, mountains, lakes, and nature. My mom and dad are still in Redmond. My brother and his family live near by. It's a short plane ride to Utah and Nevada and Colorado where all of our other family members live. We're totally west coast people.
So rewind a few months back, we emailed a guy and asked, "If we can choose where we go can we stay in the Army one more year?" He said yes(!!!) and asked us for a list of our top choices. So far so good! We gave him our top choices which I think were Seattle, Colorado, and New York. I think we nixed Hawaii because while it would be awesome, we just really want to be close to family after being apart for so long. Shortly thereafter he said Seattle was available and we would receive official orders in January of 2017. Fast forward to today (not quite January but still, February 6th is pretty dang good for the Army!) and it's legit! We are moving to Washington where Chris will work at Joint Base Lewis McChord for one year and then... who knows! Totally scary but at least we'll be close to family for support and hopefully good opportunities!
My dream was to transfer to the Air Force and live in London for a few years :) But this is a close second! If you know of any dentists retiring or selling their practice in the Seattle area, give me a holler :)
This picture was taken at Kerry Park in Seattle just a few days before we moved to Germany:

4 years has absolutely flown by. We are going to miss living in Germany soooo much, I can't even put it into words. I already miss living here, if that makes sense. Not being able to hop in the car and drive to whatever European city we want to? Shoot. Ahhh the simple ways of life and having everything closed on Sundays. Driving 100mph! I will definitely do a recap post before we move of my reflections of living in Germany.
Anyway! Lots of changes and a big new chapter in our lives coming soon!