In light of our family blog name, and as you will soon discover in my blog writing, we are both corny! Hah, hah! Actually, the Dye family just relocated to Iowa three weeks ago from today! Okay, everyone get out your, “Iowa????” GASP! “Why would anyone move to Iowa?” statements! We actually like it… more gasps! And unlike everybody else in Iowa City (the city we moved to) we didn’t come for the medical program or the University, which we are finding is creating even more blank stares. So, why did we move to Iowa? Who knows! We’ll let you know when we find out for what purpose we felt the Lord directed us here. That, or we’ll let you know when we decide to commit ourselves for craziness. Maybe both! But just as an FYI though, if you go to www.icgov.org, there are statements that pop up on the opening page such as, “#5 best places in the Nation to live, ” (according to Sperlings), among other highly impressive rankings (there’s my plug for you all to move to Iowa City, where apparently the best school districts and smartest people live, seriously check out the rankings on that page. How’s that for some pretty quick state pride! 
We really do like it here though. The people are insanely friendly, most of them are not insane though (except a man we met at the Public Library who told us every time we passed him to go dig up the worms so we could go fishing, Jeffrey liked him)! Honestly though, when we go to restaurants people from other booths talk to us our entire dinner through. In WalMart I got stopped by a man that told me all about his life, his watermelon sales, and living with his mom (okay, sounds like more people are insane, he was borderline, but mostly just nice). I actually love how friendly people are! On our first day at church we got invited to dinner four or five different times, and I got invited to several different people’s houses to play or so they could watch my kids. Like I said, super friendly people!
We really like the atmosphere too. Our first night we stayed downtown (yah, there’s a downtown!). Check it out:
It was crazy, people were out walking everywhere, I think most were going clubbing! Like I said, this is a University Town. Which reminds me, a little more crazy stuff, people are into the Hawks or maybe it’s the Hawkeyes (the school mascot) like you would not believe!!! One day in the mall we guessed how many people we would see wearing Hawkeye paraphernalia, we stopped counting when we got to 50 in the first thirty minutes. It’s always like that! Everyone has Hawkeye license plates, clothes, mailboxes, things in their yard, or large Hawks in their stores and stuff. Let’s pause momentarily so you can witness the craziness of it all…
I can’t wait to get my family an entire Hawkeye getup! Luckily, like I said, the people are really nice, so maybe they’ll keep being nice even if we don’t join the Hawkeye cult. In addition to the fun downtown, they have the nice suburbs, lots of trees and awesome parks, then they have rolling hills with pastures and corn fields, and what I love the most is they have water everywhere!!! Everywhere you look there are lakes, rivers, ponds, etc. We have a couple of lake/ponds down the street that our master bedroom looks out onto. I love it!!!! Anyway, Iowa City just has a lot of diversity and I like that. So far my only complaint is that IKEA is 3 hours away in Chicago and Costco is 1 ½ hours away in Dubuque! That is the other thing we are excited about with living in Iowa, we are relatively close to a lot of cool places! I love Chicago, and it is not far. In addition, we are only a couple of hours to St. Louis. Also, the Nauvoo temple is our temple and it is only 1 ½ hours away.
Anyway, we also like our new house. I LOVE having enough space to put everything! The kids have their own room, we have a play area, and the best part of our house is a screened in deck, where the kids play all day long (everyone here has one)! It works great for them because they can play outside, and great for me because they are right off the kitchen and they can’t get off the deck or get hurt! I LOVE IT! Our address is 425 Thornbury Avenue, Iowa City, and I don’t know our zip code!
I don’t know if anyone actually reads blogs this long, but there was a lot to report on, and in any case I am sure our parents will read it, well at least I think my Mom will! We love you all and miss you, and are very sorry for not telling anyone we were moving before we left. To be honest, I wasn’t sure if we were crazy or not, so I didn’t want to announce to everyone that I had received revelation we were supposed to move to Iowa, and then not actually go. We might still be crazy, that is still debatable, but we are here (and truthfully don’t have enough money to do it all again and come back, so for now, we are residents of Iowa City, Iowa, who would have thought I’d ever say that in my life?!). Thanks for all your love and support and I will try to be much more faithful at blogging, than I was at Facebook!
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Loved your blog, I’m glad to hear how you’re doing, I hope you figure out why you’re in Iowa soon, if only for my sake!
Hey Marisa- I’m happy to hear you made it and that you are alive and well!!
It sounds like you are really loving it so far. That is so great. Your house is way cute. You need to post pics of the inside. I love seeing the inside of people’s houses. So, my little sis (Mel) just moved out to St. Louis for the summer. I might come visit her later on in the summer. If I do, you should drive down and visit, since it’s not too far!! I’m glad you have a blog now, so I can keep updated on your new adventure! Love, Andrea
Look at me I’m the first to leave a comment. I guess I’m the only one that loves you, or I’m the only one with out a life…hmmm. Keep us updated on life and post more pictures.
Marisa…WOW! Iowa huh?! That is great. I hope that you guys are doing well… Your house is soo cute! I will have to come and visit you…Hey…infact…I might be going back east for an IVF study (if I get in)..we will see though. Yes, please keep your blog updated…I try to keep mine pretty updated as well so that everyone can know what the Rowberry’s are up too! Love you girl. Please keep in touch! Also, who is your phone service with?
XOXO
Leslie
Mom isn’t the only one that will read your blog. Good to hear all is well and it’s great to see photos of beautiful Iowa city and your new home. We love you and miss you!
We’re so glad you guys are here. Don’t let anybody tell you you’re crazy. We so need an amazing family like you guys in our ward. I’m so loving your blog! I love the blog title. Very clever! I’m glad you guys like Iowa so far. You have to stay here for atleast a year:) I’m so impressed with all that you’ve gone out and done so far and haven’t been scared off by the crazies (there really aren’t too many of them, but a few). Yes, there are countless die hard Hawkeye fans. We haven’t been sucked into it too much and people still like us as far as I can tell. Anyway, good luck with your cake for Friday and I can’t wait to hit some garage sales with you on Saturday!
P.S. Did you guys take that picture of the Nauvoo temple? It’s a great shot.
Marisa – Thanks for sending your email out, I am gasping after reading your blog! I just sent you an invite to Lindsay’s baby shower, but after reading your blog, I’m pretty positive you won’t be making it! Good luck in Iowa!
Yeaahh! It was so fun reading about your current adventure. I’m glad you are enjoying Iowa City…you sure did sell it well! It looks like it may be time for ME to join the blogging world. Hmmm….we’ll see. We love you all! Keep us posted.
I forgot…I just wanted to say that I happen to LOVE the name of your blog. Very creative. If you can come up with something equally creative using “hilton” I’ll be sold on being a good ol’ blogger myself!!!
Hey Marisa! I am so glad to hear that you are doing well, even though it’s all the way in IOWA!! How fun! I haven’t heard from you in so long and was wondering how/where/what you were up to? Your house looks beautiful! Your kids are probably super big by now too! We’ll miss you. Whenever you guys come back into utah we should try to get together and go to dinner or something.
MARISA!! I’m SO GLAD that you love Iowa. Reading your post makes me miss Kansas so much. It’s just so different and people are SO NICE and the ward becomes your “family.” I’m so happy for you and your little family.