settling in Archives | Heavenly Homemakers

I wanted to give you an update now that we’ve been in our Castle for two weeks. WOW, has this been a busy 14 days!

Settling into the Coppinger Castle: Phase 1

How many phases will there be? Who knows? At this point I feel like we will never completely be finished unpacking, simply because we have so many little ones with needs more important that me finding my jeans. Thus, while our bedroom looks a bit better than this, we still have bags of clothes we’re ignoring and will ignore for a while. Priorities, man.

Settling In, Day 1

The day we closed on our house and got the keys, we left our seven littles in York with sitters so that we could get as much done as possible without children underfoot. Elias and Malachi were with us and Justus, Kelsey, and Eva joined us as they could.

We knew the previous owner of our home would be leaving behind some beds, dressers, end tables, and linens. The house had been a Bed and Breakfast, after all. However, we ended up getting much more than we had agreed to. Our first-day-to-do-list quickly got overruled when we realized that almost every room in our huge house was full of stuff that we’d need to pack and find a home for.

DEEP BREATH.

We had seven hours before we needed to head back to be with our littles, so we all worked feverishly to clean out our new place. Kelsey and I started in the kitchen (of course), clearing out cabinets so we could get it set up the way we needed. Then Elias, Malachi, and I headed to the laundry room (which is going to be awesome, by the way). The linens we’d inherited filled no less than 18 enormous black bags. I stopped counting after that. :) I filled bags; the boys lugged them upstairs and out to Goodwill.

Then we continued through every room, gathering items we didn’t need for our family. We put them all in our entry way and slowly but surely, Elias and Malachi got those donated as well. (Two weeks later, this is still a work in progress.)

We left the house in a mess and headed back to York for our final night in our home there.

Settling In: Day 2

We got up that morning and loaded cribs and mattresses for the kids plus as many boxes as we could stuff into our van. I got no pictures of this as I was a bit emotional leaving our York house for the last time.

Once we got to the Castle, the kids ran around exploring and I felt incredibly nervous trying to keep track of everyone. ;) This home is 7712 square feet, which is amazing and wonderful! But it’s easy to get lost if you’re unfamiliar with the layout – or if you’re a two-year-old. Oy.

I had no idea Kelsey got this picture of me walking through the house with Acacia and Josie. :)

Then Eva sent me these. :)

Matt got the babies’ cribs set up while Elias and Malachi went to Wendy’s with a gift card and picked up lunch for all of us.

The kitchen looked something like this, and we somehow managed to get the final crib up the stairs.

We got the four littlest down for naps then Matt, Elias, Malachi, and Brayden drove back to York to pick up a UHaul and load it with lots of people from our community there helping.

Meanwhile, Kiya, Keith, and I unpacked and started to figure out an organizational system for our pantry.

Eva, Asa, Justus, and Kelsey came that evening to help while the other guys were in York loading our truck. We got the littles to bed but the other guys didn’t get back with the truck until after 10pm. What a day!

Settling In, Day 3

We kept everyone alive that morning and afternoon. That’s about all I remember. ;) Eva snapped this sweet photo of Josie in what was to become our Play Room.

We ordered pizza that night for our moving crew and they worked like crazy to unload our UHaul for us.

While the guys unloaded and I gave instructions to everyone as to where to put boxes, Eva, Kelsey, and their friend Chelsea took all seven littles on a long walk and then to explore the Sunken Gardens which is amazing and just a few blocks from our house! It was great to have the kids out from underfoot while we unloaded the truck.

That night we were all exhausted and sore. The living room, library, play room, and beyond were all filled with stuff and I went to bed grateful but overwhelmed.

Settling In, Day 4 and Beyond

Every day we keep getting more packed and taken out of the house (from the stuff that got left behind). And we get more and more of our items unpacked and put away.

One day we realized that BabyBoy#11 was wearing his shirt inside-out, evidence that his parents are very, very tired.

Our bedrooms are all on the second floor and the landing looked like this up until four days ago when I finally decided to work on finding its items a home.

Upon opening up the linen cabinet and drawers in that hallway, I discovered, guess what? MORE LINENS. Say it isn’t so.

Settling In, Day 14

So here we are. There are no pictures on the walls yet because that’s a lower priority right now. Plus I can’t find a hammer.

But look at this beautiful side of our living room! It’s coming together just they way I had envisioned with a “Coffee Hospitality Area” for people to gather and visit or play games.

The other side looks like this, with lots of cozy seating (and pillows for kids to throw on the floor 40 times a day).

The Play Room looked like this for 5 minutes after Eva got it organized. Then the kids played in it and made a sweet mess. But all is well – it’s a play room after all!

During the next few weeks, I’ll share more photos of our settling-in process. I’ll probably devote an entire post to our kitchen and pantry, sound good?

We are extremely thankful for God’s gift of this home, our “Castle.” It is everything we need and then some. He is faithful.

We are slowly but surely getting settled in at our Castle. We are amazed at and grateful for the care people are showing us here!

Our moving truck got unloaded last Friday, leaving every room of our house looking something like this:

Picture toddlers climbing over that and rearranging boxes as I try to sort and organize. That’s been interesting – but as I share our Food and Fun photos of this week, take note at all God is providing for us so that we can survive these crazy days!

Food and Fun – July 2-8

My friend Cindy, whom I’ve known for a few years but rarely get to spend time with, came by on Saturday with two of her girls. They brought us this huge box of cherries!!!! She and her girls helped me unpack and clean and play with kids for several hours. How lovely that we will all live in the same town and are able to do life together now. :)

Sunday morning I cooked two pounds of meat from my freezer so we could have a quick meal of tacos when we got home from church. This felt so normal!! Which felt so good in the middle of everything that is not normal right now.

Someone at church gave us these beauties from their garden as we were leaving. What a gift!

Sam’s is a mile from church, so Matt gave all the kids a snack while Elias and I ran into the store to grab a few essentials for our 4th of July celebration plus fresh produce we needed. We grabbed hotdogs and buns, guacamole, queso, grapes, greens, apples, bananas, nectarines, sweet peppers, and strawberries. Oh, and Spindrift drinks were on sale – Elias’ and my fav sparkling water! ;) We got home and ate our tacos then got littles down for naps.

That evening I made a plate full of small turkey sandwiches and took them outside for a picnic with pickles, watermelon, and cheese.

I had a package of English muffins in the freezer, so I made scrambled egg sandwiches for breakfast the next day. I was itching to make something (my kitchen is amazing, who cares if it wasn’t fully unpacked yet?!). So I blended up our favorite Cheesecake Parfait recipe to enjoy with our strawberries.

Mid-morning was already very hot so we enjoyed popsicles to help us cool off.

Lunchtime got super exciting because we got word that our custom-built dining room table was on its way!! I had thawed chicken legs to smoke for our meal because Asa and Eva were planning to join us for the day. Plus I’d sliced up all the squash we’d been given to stir fry and enjoy with our chicken.

Our table was built by Sola Woodshed Designs, friends of ours whom I’d messaged several weeks ago to see if they’d want to tackle my huge table project. :) They did a marvelous job and joined us for lunch too. Check out this beauty of a table!! Even better is the people all around the table…

I asked for a 12-feet long farmhouse table, not fancy, just big. :) I requested long benches for seeing instead of chairs so we could fit more people around our table. It’s perfect! We went with four 6-feet benches instead of two 12-feet long benches. It’s amazing.

After such a full morning and a big lunch, we made frozen pizza for dinner.

That evening, more neighbors stopped by to welcome us to the neighborhood and they came with four pounds of strawberries for us. Perfect!

Tuesday’s breakfast was peanut butter honey toast with bananas and yogurt.

Our fridge looked so delicious, full of cherries, nectarines, and strawberries!

Tuesday afternoon, friends stopped by for a visit and they brought several boxes of food – a gift from the Helping Hands ministry at church. This was all so perfect so that we had easy foods to throw out as snacks and side dishes.

Our 4th of July celebration day was as busy as the other days have been with more unpacking and sorting. But that night we put hotdogs on our smoker and had a feast with Asa and Eva joining us. (Justus and Kelsey have been in Montana visiting her family.)

I snapped this photo of our oldest with our youngest. THIS is why we moved to Lincoln.

While were were outside celebrating, our friend Rebecca stopped by with food that her mom, Barbara, had made for us. They have been so intentional about helping us settle in, and it is remarkable. They had taken the turkey we had in our freezer so they could roast it for us. AMAZING and so very helpful. The delicious cooked bird was delivered along with a big bag of banana pancakes, prepared salad, a bag of kid-sized apples, baby carrots with homemade ranch dip, and a bag of ready-to-eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. This was so thoughtful and has been so helpful!

Our girls dug right into the pancakes the next morning!

Matt and I decided that the kids needed an outing so we packed everyone into strollers and headed out to explore our new surroundings. We made our way to our closest library to check it out!

Everyone had good naps (or rest times) that afternoon, then we warmed up the turkey Barbara had made us along with green beans, strawberries and cream, and salad.

The next morning, Matt and Brayden headed to York to do some work on our house there. I packed them a feast to get them through their day.

While they were gone, Eva and I took the other six on a long walk to play at a park. We enjoyed capri suns with raisins and veggie straws mid-morning.

I’d warmed up leftover 4th of July hotdogs before we left and they were still hot at lunchtime. We ate them before heading home!

That night I made Turkey Cheese Melts with more of Barbara’s turkey. We ate them with fries and watermelon.

Friday morning we took the kids to visit another library all morning. We came home and made pancakes and eggs.

A dear friend sent us a gift of flamingo paper goods and a Dominos gift card from Arkansas, so we enjoyed a fun pizza meal that night!

Saturday morning, Anna and I made Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Muffins before everyone else slept. It was my first time baking anything and it was so nice!

We went to “Discovery Days” that morning on the UNL campus where the kids enjoyed fun science activities at each booth. We took a snacky lunch to enjoy late morning before coming home in time for naps.

While the kids were napping and resting, I went to the grocery store for the first time since moving. Our three littlest girls plus Baby Boy#11 are all on WIC, so I focused on getting all of those qualifying items.

While I was there, I took advantage of a buy-one-get-one-free pork loin sale. Plus I picked up a few other things we needed. Out of pocket I paid $78.

Before leaving for the store, I had put this Taco Pasta in the crock pot for dinner. Justus and Kelsey were on their way home from Montana so I told them to stop by for dinner if they wanted. Then I texted Asa to come (Eva was out of town). Asa invited our friends Seth and Corrie. Malachi’s friend Max came over. Elias’ friend Emma came to see the house and accepted our invite to stay and eat.

There ended up being 18 of us, all at the last minute. I LOVE THIS. The Taco Pasta turned out great, and we pulled out lots of sides to round out the meal: watermelon, black beans, corn, cherries, veggie tray, chips and guac, brownies, and rice krispie treat. Our table was full and it was fantastic.

Stay tuned for lots of pictures of what the past week and a half have looked like for us as we settle in!