We are finally in Canada.

Well we turned in everything they asked for, but we still don't have our work permits. The immigration office emailed us and said too many inquiries will just slow down the process, so we gave up on getting them before going to Canada. We decided to go ahead and cross the border as visitors. We just packed the truck with some stuff and left the trailer in MT. We got to the border and they checked us out really well. They pulled our names on their computer and found out that we were waiting for our permits. We weren't trying to lie to them, we really were just going to visit. We aren't officially hired until we get the permits. But after 2 hours of waiting, they finally let us go across the border on the condition that we leave in 3 weeks. So if our permits don't come by Oct 8th, we will have to leave Canada. We can get an extention too. But hopefully we will get the permits soon. We are just shadowing the staff and learning right now. We will have some training meetings all next week. We really can't wait to become the parents in the house and not have to say, go talk to someone else about that, we can't do anything right now. We need to establish ourselves as the athority figures in the house. The kids are excited that we are here and they love the babies and Gidget. These kids are very different from the kids in NC. This place has a great system in place for working with them though and helping them to learn how to work on their issues instead of just talking about it and never doing anything about it like the last place. We are really enjoying it.

I will add some pictures soon. I just wanted you all to know we made it to Canada.

We are resting in Montana

Hello everyone!  We have made it all the way up here to MT.  The truck drove great and the trailer pulled fine.  No more blown tires thankfully.  We have a friend from Jacksonville that is a Border Patrol agent  stationed here in Plentywood , MT so he let us crash at his place.  (Thank you Ben!)  We got here Friday afternoon and have just been relaxing a little.  We were so tired after driving(Jim) and riding(the girls) that it feels good to be still for a while.  We will get back on the road hopefully tomorrow to finish the last 570 miles of our journey.  We got an email from the Visa dept. that said they needed some more paper work like our degrees and a letter of reference from our previous employer.  I think we have it all together now and will send it off.  They seem to be right on top of things so hopefully it won't be long until we get our work permits.  I can't wait to get up there and see what it is like there.  I am also anxious to meet the kids and get back to a normal routine.  Anyway, just wanted to let you know we are fine.  I'll add more pictures soon.  I'm on Ben's computer and I'll have to add pics from our laptop once we are back in the truck.  Technology is amazing.  I love the internet card that lets us get internet as we are driving down the road.  bbvvggbnubrxx5cctbunkni nuvycyh   bb  (That is from Hannah, she is sitting on my lap trying to reach the keys as I type with one hand and hold her with the other.  She wanted to say hello too.)  :)

The road turned to dirt!

We're up in North Dakota driving along and all of a sudden the road turned into dirt. As we drove down a little way, a worker with a stop sign tells us they are working on the road and to be careful. Then a few more miles down we have to stop again. This time the worker leans in the window and starts chatting with us and petting Gidget and feeding her a pig ear he happens to have in his pocket. He is really nice, like all the people we have talked to so far. He told us he was a triplet. Then it was time for us to follow the guide car. As we passed by we saw these big machines that are tearing up the road. Really cool.

South and North Dakota

Day 4 - Scherck trip log

The babies woke us up about 6:30am this morning wanting to eat. Jim felt rested so he went ahead and started driving. I stayed in the camper with the babies to feed them and hopefully get some more sleep. It was kind of fun riding in the back. It was a little bumpy, but the babies slept some more. We are enjoying looking at the beautiful farms up here. Jim likes the farm equipment. True Americana. We are only 400 miles from our friends house in MT now. We will go there tonight and then drive the rest of the way to Calgary tomorrow.

Jim was able to stop for me to take the picture of the ND sign. There's not much traffic up here. :) The GPS shows our little blue truck and the destination flag. This is just our friends house. We still have about 570 miles to go tomorrow.

Iowa, a little Nebraska and South Dakota

Day 3 - Continued

After seeing the sights in St. Louis we decided to be tourists. We stopped in Independance at our church's visitors center to see some of the history of the church in that part of Missouri. It was really neat. Then we went on a walking tour around the town. It was such a nice day. We all enjoyed being out of the truck for a while to take in some fresh air.

Once we got back on the road, we headed out of Missouri and into Iowa. 

This is what Iowa looks like. Miles and miles and miles of nothing. We didn't get anything to eat after we left Independance and there is no where to stop along I-29 in Iowa so we were starving. Finally we got into a town in Nebraska close to Omaha and got some Long John Silvers about 9:00pm.

We weren't sure we could get into Nebraska when we saw this sign.

But everything was fine. Jim drove a little more into the morning hours and then we pulled over to sleep some in the camper.

Sights of St. Louis

Jim took this pic

Jimbo says - "Everybody Poops!"

Jim caught Gidget doing her morning constitution and wanted to post it.

Missouri today

Day 3 - Scherck trip log

We ended the yesterday's driving in St.Louis, Missouri. That makes 4 states in one day. Today we are driving west through Missouri. We got a good sleep in a motel and feel refreshed this morning. (Doesn't Jim look ready to drive all day!)We started out at 8:40am. The girls are in a good mood this morning and playing and "talking" to us. Aren't they so cute in their little hoodies? It is getting colder as we get more north. I thought they needed a little jacket. Even Gidget is ready to go. She travels well and is easy to sneak into hotels. :) She gets the front seat because I sit in the back between the babies to take care of them and keep them entertained.

We saw the arch in St. Louis. It is really fascinating how it changes as you drive by. We also crossed the Missouri River. Not a good river as recorded in our church history. Jim is really into being a tourist. He wants to take a picture of everything.

Illinois now - 3 states in one day!

Yes we are moving along quite well. Jim wanted to get a nice full day of driving today. We started out around 8am this morning and he will probably go until 8pm. We won't drive so long everyday he says and we are stopping at a motel tonight so we can get a real good night's sleep. We are down to only about 1300 miles to go till we reach our friends place in Montana. Then we have about another 400 miles or so to Calgary.

We missed the state sign this time. Maybe we will catch the next one. :)

I took a picture of the interstate sign so you know where we are.

Now we are in KY

Day 2 - Continued

I told you we wouldn't be in TN for long. We were able to catch a picture of the sign this time. Jim was able to pull over so I could snap it. The girls are taking long naps with the movement of the truck. They probably won't sleep tonight when we want to sleep.

We are in TN today

Day 2 - Scherck Trip Log

Well, Jim drove as long as he could to get us through Atlanta in the middle of the night. Atlanta traffic is much less at 1 in the morning. :) Around 3am we pulled into a rest stop so we could get some sleep. We all piled onto the King sized bed in the trailer and settled down for a few hours sleep. Around 8am we pulled away to get started on the second day of our travels. We stopped at Cracker Barrel for a hearty breakfast to get us going. The babies are doing great. They love looking around and seeing new things.

We entered into Tenn. around 10:30am. We are just going through the skinny part so we won't be in it for long.

We took a couple pictures for you. We are happy to be seeing mountains again, and cooler weather.

We are in GA

Day 1 - Scherck's move to Canada

We started down the road at 7:00pm on Monday Sept. 8th after a grueling hot day in Jax re-packing the trailer. Jim had taken some stuff out because one, we were very heavy and two, he had to get his tools out to modify the trailer. It started to rain in the middle of this and some of our stuff got wet. Not a great start, but it will get better. After a tearful goodbye with Jim's family, we headed out. The GPS shows that we have 2100 + miles to go to Montana. We are going to drop the trailer with a friend of ours who is a Boarder Patrol agent in Montana about 4 hours from Calgary. We will leave the trailer at his place until we have our work permits, then go back and get it.

We tried to click a picture of the welcome to Georgia sign as we drove by. It is not very clear, but you can tell it says Georgia. :) Only 9 states to go and 2064 miles.

Check back!

We are on our way!!

The Schercks are on their way to Canada. We spent the past week with Pop and Tutu, Tami, Brandi and Cayla (Jim's family) in Jacksonville, FL. We blew a tire in the middle of the night on the way to Jax. We had to wait in a WalMart parking lot from 4am till 8am when the tire department opened. Then once he got new tires and had to put them on himself in the blistering heat in the parking lot. It's a WalMart rule that employees can't help people put tires on trailers. Once we got to Jax, Jim and his Dad made some other modifications to the trailer to make it pull better. It took a little longer than we had expected, but we hope now to have a safe trip with no more blown tires. SO, now we are finally on the road. We are going to document the trip on the blog so everyone can kind of ride along with us.

This is such a bitter sweet move. We are excited about many things and looking forward to our new adventure in Canada. We are mostly looking forward to being able to go to our church weekly. It is so important to us to serve in the church and to raise the babies in the church. In this profession, we are working on Sundays and at other places they require us to take the kids in our home to a specific church they want all the kids to attend. So we have to take them and don't get to attend our church unless we pay someone to take the kids to church. At our new job, we will have 2 full time assistants. We are their direct supervisors and can schedule them to work on Sundays while we go to church. This is a huge part of the reason we chose to go to Canada. We know the Lord blesses us with all we have and we have to give back by serving in the church. We are also excited about working for a company that actually has a proven program in place and will give us some training. We found that we have a nack for this work, but will surely benefit from training. We know this is the Lord's work that He would have us do, so we will go, we will do.

The bitter part is the distance. We will be so far away from our families and friends that we love so much. It is especially hard since we have the twins now. We want them to know their family. We will blog, send pictures, videos, call, write, email... whatever we need to do to stay in touch and make sure you can watch the girls grow. Hopefully some of you can come visit us in Canada. It is a very nice place for a vacation I have heard. Come in the Spring or Summer though, it is really cold in the winter. :) You may get stuck in the snow. :)

Keep checking back for more trip log.