It's official, we're moving to the Kingdom!

After nearly 6 months of waiting, wondering, and anticipation, we are officially moving to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia! Travis received his visa today and will (probably) be leaving tomorrow for a 3 week stint to get his Iqama (residency permit or something like that), which will allow us to start the visa process for Lucy and me when he returns. And maybe this is totally inaccurate but that's how I understand the process to be :)

We did not expect the process to take nearly this long, but one advantage is that it has given us a lot of time to think about and plan our upcoming move. I've also been blessed with the opportunity to ask a LOT of questions to some nice people that already live there and this has greatly eased our minds regarding the move. I'm sure there will still be some culture shock once we actually arrive for good!

We have been thinking about an international opportunity for awhile, and especially now that I'm a SAHM to a toddler this seemed like a good time. Saudi was definitely NOT on our radar as a place to go, but Travis had an opportunity to visit during a business trip in August 2012. His supervisor (who lived there for several years) was clearly trying to plant some seeds when he said "Be sure to visit Murjan Village, where the expat families live!" Once Travis saw that the compound the families live in actually looked like a nice place to live we began to consider Saudi as a place to look for an international opportunity. As these things go, a job opened within two months. We had been praying for guidance but were not quite ready for what God had planned!

Travis applied for a job in October, interviewed in December and was told they would make a decision by the end of the year or end of January at the latest. Finally in MARCH he received an offer letter. It was a nerve-wracking 6 months not knowing what was in our future! Travis' plant in Houston has a turnaround in June, so we will not officially be moving until July.

In the meantime, I'm constantly making lists in my head about what to take, what to send in our air shipment, what to send in our sea shipment, what to store, and what to sell! Not to mention all I need to do to get our house in 'show ready' condition to sell. Needless to say it's keeping me very busy. Lucy is in a great Mother's Day Out program two days a week and I'm very thankful for the free time I have while she's there to get things done.

Keep your fingers crossed Travis makes it on a plane tomorrow so he can get there and home again to help me with my lists :) Don't worry too much about him while he's there, he gets to fly business class and the good cooks at BRC put extra bacon on his meal tonight!

I hope to use this blog to chronicle our adventures in moving to Saudi. I'm not normally good at finishing things I start so hopefully I can keep up with this! Keep me honest, folks!