Across the country and into the 'Hood!

Well, we made it here! I will post more later and put some pictures up, but I just wanted to write a quick note while I had a chance. Justin and I made our trip across the country and had a great time of it! Don't get me wrong, it was long, but we had a little bed set up in the back of our u-haul and would pull into a rest stop and cozy up for the night and I thought it was a lot of fun! We saw some great sights along the way.
Summary: Washington - home sweet home. Oregon - love it! Idaho - long...really not very exciting. Utah - home sweet home again. Wyoming - depressing land of desolation! Wow. Sorry Tiff and Scott, but Wyoming was terrible! Nebraska - Quaint and pretty! Corn fields that go on and on forever! Iowa - short and sweet! (we just went through the corner) Missouri - really pretty - trees and green fields everywhere. Illinois - the same! Indiana - more of the same beauty! Kentucky- amazingly beautiful! We were tempted to live in Kentucky. We loved all the rolling hills and trees and beautiful big estates with pastures and horses! West Virginia - Also beautiful. The Appalachians where gorgeous! I couldn't believe how green and beautiful it was! VIRGINIA - HOME SWEET HOME!
We are loving it here. We are renting a little house in a place called Portsmouth. As it turns out, we are the only white people in the neighborhood, or any of the surrounding neighborhoods for that matter! It is a definite switch for us and a will be a lot of fun. At the moment, I only understand about half of what some of the people say, but most everyone is just filled with southern hospitality here and I love it. I love standing in a line and the person passing by us all says "All ya'll have a good day". Or as I'm walking through the store or parking lot people say "Morning ma'am" and nod their heads. It's contagious. I wave at everyone in my neighborhood and say hi and talk to all sorts of people I normally would just walk by. I love that part of living here. I also love the history! Just a mile away is Oldtowne Portsmouth and it has houses and buildings and churches from the 1700's and 1800's. These huge beautiful churches with stained glass windows and the victorian style houses. Anyway, I am going to have a great time checking it all out.
Also, since I have been here we have been to the beach 3 times and I have seen dolphins twice! It was a fantastic new experience! Anyway, there are some down sides (the water tastes like I stuck my face in a slow moving, silt-filled river with a little chlorine on the side - I seriously turned on the water to wash a dish and was trying to figure out what the smell was, and then I realized it was just my water. Gross. - and we don't have a washer and dryer yet (doing laundry by hand is not one of my specailties, although Justin did it for two years in Russia), and although I feel pretty safe in our neighborhood, but it's definitely not the safest place in the world. We stepped into the hood, for sure, which is both good and bad.
Anyway, this quick little post is turning into a novel, so I'm going to go to bed now, but I will post more pictures and fun things later.
Love ya'll!