Maryland Details!

All right. Let's flash back to January 8th--Lockheed Martin contacted Chris to tell him they wanted him for a position within Informations and Global Systems in Gaithersburg, Maryland, right outside of Washington D.C. (Remember, Chris worked for Lockheed when we lived in Fort Worth.) They originally scheduled a phone interview, but then they called Chris back to say they would fly him out to D.C. to make the process go faster. So, in a whirlwind of a weekend, Chris flew out three days later and interviewed in the Gaithersburg office. Chris comes home on January 12th; the very next day they emailed him to say they were going give him an offer and they wanted him immediately! Relocation package and salary information to follow...
Well, that information didn't arrive until January 28th. Part of the relocation package (which is a pretty sweet deal, I must say) was a trip for our family to fly out to D.C. to check out housing; they would take care of our tickets, our hotel, our food, everything. So a day and a half later, we found ourselves in the Dulles airport, picked up our rental Chevy Malibu, and headed to the Holiday Inn in Gaithersburg. My family drove down and spent the weekend with us and they watched Liz so we could go on the apartment search. We had a spectacular time with them and my dad, brother Joe, and sister Julia were so happy to finally meet Lizzie!
While on the trip, we got to talking logistics. This is my last semester of college, I have my scholarship, I'm nearly halfway through the semester. Do we really want me to quit so I have to take Independent Study and pay out of pocket for classes that I'm currently taking for free? Do we really want to mess with the sweet schedule I have, seeing as I'll be done in two months for good? Chris wants to go to grad school and Lockheed will help pay the cost--but do we want to go into a lot of debt? Does Chris want to work for Lockheed again? We talked through all these questions and decided that no, it wasn't worth all the extra stress.
When we arrived back here in Utah, Chris contacted Lockheed and explained our situation. However, he offered a compromise--rather than come out immediately, Chris offered to begin on April 1st and work extra hours. Liz and I would stay here for my last two weeks of classes, my few days of finals, and my graduation. My family offered to fly my mom out for those three weeks, and the rest of my family is driving out for my graduation anyway a week later. Part of the relocation package will pay for Chris to fly out for the graduation. After that, we'd all fly out together to Maryland for good.
We waited for two days to hear Lockheed's answer...and they accepted it! Chris starts March 30th and will work those three weeks before my graduation. I will finish school and life will work out. We are so happy that this will happen.
We are BEYOND excited to be going back to the East Coast goodness. Ah, I love the East. We will be in Jersey AT LEAST once a month; we will be close to my family. We will spend our weekends in the city, and naturally we'll be seeing NYC and Philly...heck, Boston, too. Haven't been there in awhile! Bottom line, we are excited for our new phase of life on the East Coast.
Lizzie is sick this morning, so I'll put pictures up later. We blessed Lizzie yesterday, so I'll write about that too!