We found an apartment! :)

I am going crazy in this motel room, 2 animals, a pre teen, and a tired grumpy husband.
Fast food for the last 3 months, we all gained weight, at least 20 lbs, and a manager who won't get off my back!
I have been driving the streets looking for a rent sign to pop out at me, looking on line and in the newspaper, calling all the property management companies almost daily, and finally we heard about some apartments being built, 2 bedroom 2 bath with an office and a 2 car garage $1095. a month, they aren't done yet but we are on the waiting list, and we are sooo excited! :)

That's our apartment on the 3rd floor at the very end, it was nice having an apartment that was brand new, nice and clean, the view was nice too, not that there was much to see, this is Williston were talking about LOL. But the clouds and storms that roll through here are pretty wild and we got the best view.

Williston has grown on me a little, I still hate the mosquitos they are really bad here, the summer heat isn't real bad, but it can get humid. The people here are very nice, like they come from a different planet, I'm not used to the kind, very caring people I run into every day, it's like an untouched society it's kinda crazy.

I like the speed limits, the people aren't in a hurry, and I feel very safe, I feel like I can allow my kid to walk to the store, or park and not have to worry about scum bags kidnapping her or worse. I like the school system, it is a blue ribbon school, and Bryanna has made a lot of new friends, one of them is Esther she is such a sweet heart, a little quiet, and odd at times but they get along great.

I still don't care for the fact that if Bryanna needs her braces worked on we have to drive to Minot 2 hours away, but I guess it is a nice get away, they have a mall there too we like to go to, and we get to eat at a nice restaurant, which is something we don't have in Williston.

The management company has offered me a job as resident manager, it's only $300 a month to vacuum the hallways, and clean around the property a little but it will keep me busy while Dan is working.

Dan has a crazyyyyyyyyy schedule, he will get a phone call from the dispatch people at 3 am and has to be in the yard by 4 am, then sometimes he doesn't come home till 28-30 hrs later, it's wild and I don't know how he can do it, I would be a zombie. He says it don't bother him, so I pack him a fat lunch and some snacks, and wait and hope all is okay, he really does have a dangerous job. :(

Williston Herald news: File photo: A car moves along the highway in October 2008 during a blizzard in the area. Williston and area residents are urged not to drive tonight, and to be cautious if they must drive by taking cell phones and winter survival kits with them, as well as informing others where they are going. Williams County and surrounding counties are under a Blizzard Warning until tomorrow. 

It's Oct 4th, today it started to snow, and the wind is blowing like crazy, by night we were in a full blown blizzard, and it dumped about 2 feet of snow. I am somewhat used to the cold, we came from the high desert and would get a lot of the lake effect snow from Lake Tahoe, in fact a couple years before we left NV the weather had dropped to -2 degrees for a week and that was sooooo cold, BUT what we had in store for us here in Williston ND, hehe was wayyyyyyyyyyyy worse......

                                          

Settling in at the super 8 motel in Williston ND

I was tired, sad, irritable, crushed, and did I say tired?

Halliburton made us a reservation to stay at the Super 8 until we could find a place to live, so we pulled in grabbed a few things, of course the dog & cat too and went up to our room, it was located above the pool and our patio was in a terrarium it was stinky, and humid.
The next day we went down to the U-haul to grab a few more things and to drop the car off the trailer, and discovered it was almost 90 degrees out, wow the humidity was high, immediately I was under attack by hundreds of mosquitos, so I jumped in the u-haul only to discover Mango (my daughters fish) was floating in a hot fish bowl :(  JUST shoot me now!
We spent the afternoon calling every apartment, or trailer park we could seeking a place to rent with no luck, nothing was listed in the paper, everything had a waiting list.
So we decided to find a storage unit to unload the U-haul truck, again there was nothing available, so we called near by towns which by the way are not so near, and are a fragment of the size of Williston which is about 4 miles long and 2 miles wide!
Finally we found a unit in a place called Ray, ND. about half an hour from Williston.
We tried to settle as much as we could in a our tiny motel room, which by the way I had them move us so we could have a window and sunlight, I guess I rubbed the manager the wrong way because she didn't like me and throughout our stay she gave me hell!
I put my house plants in the window and made it as homey as I could.

Chrissy and Unali learned to get along quickly, I think Chrissy just missed her big sister Meika and soon latched on to the next best thing Unali lol... This is them getting a little bit of Sun light in the motel room, Chrissy also started to pee on the floor, it could have been because of other animals, but mostly it was because she was used to having a doggy door that led out to 5 acres of potty turf, and now she had to rely on me to take her out. UGH

About the 4th day in Williston, Dan was told to pack a suit case he was going to Wyoming for a couple weeks for training, and so he did, and WOW I was a very lonely girl, stuck in a motel, no where to go, didn't know anyone, my kid was still with her dad for the summer, so I sat with my little animal children, and watched the days go by out of my motel window, I cried a lot, I walked the dog a lot, and I ate fast food every day, BARF! Oh and did I tell you the manager of the Super 8 motel didn't like me for some reason, she started to harass me, looking back I now know it was because I was an out of towner, but we will get to that later....

I can honestly say I was tempted to grab my keys and drive back to Gardnerville, and just do the whole long distance relationship, but I had already given up the house, regretfully turned down a great job, and it wouldn't be fair to Dan my DH. So I sucked it up, and took one for the team, sacrifice for the betterment of my family. :\

A little History about the oil in North Dakota

Early History 1951-1955

The Williston Basin gets it name from the City of Williston.

However it was named by Dr. W.T. Thom, Jr. it seems Dr. Thom was a Sophomore studying Geology when discovering Coral in Connonball River which led him to believe that the area was once inundated by an ancient sea, this occurred in 1912.

Continuing study of the Basin in 1922 led him to conclude that the Basin was of sedimentary nature. Further studies showed that the major depth was near Williston, North Dakota, thus the name took hold in 1924.

Between 1924 and 1951 there were 23 serious attempts at the discovery for oil. Plans for drilling what was to become the "discovery" began in 1946. It was through 1949 that the leases were acquired by two men Leach & Fruh.

The well was begun on Clarence Iversons Farm south of Tioga, ND. Drilling became routine and locals skeptics scoffed, particularly since the closest supply was 500 miles away in Casper, WY.

The Discovery

The year 1951 came in with a snow storm. Jan 4th a pint of oil was recovered, drilling continued. The bits had now dug to a depth of 10,500 feet, but snowed shut down the operations and clogged the roads. Operations resumed in April 1951,  a new industry had been born in North Dakota, and the Clarence Iverson well became the discovery well of the Williston Basin.

The bust

Nearly 60 years after the discovery of the oil in western ND, Williston and communities in the region have struggled to find ways to weather the ineviteable boom and bust cycles. The city of Williston has experienced two oil busts, one in the late 1950's as well as one in the early 1980's.

Despite the current growth in the region, the 1980 bust remains fresh in the minds of those who were in Williston at the time. When the oil boom went bust, the city found itself stuck with over $26 million in debt stemming from special assessments from lots given back to the city.

New Technology

Two new methods were created in the 1990's

1. Hydrolic fracturing methods use water and sand under high force to break the rock and release the oil.

2. Horizontal drilling techniques.

This has born a new Oil Boom, the one I live in.

I'll share with you the Bitter Sweet life of living in the oilfield, as an oilfield wife. :)

July 2008 ~ Packing up and heading to Williston, ND.

Today we are heading out to ND it is a bitter sweet moment, and I don't know it yet but the term "Bitter Sweet" will be my life from here to the present day.

The day before we leave I received a letter I had been waiting for, an offer of employment as lead Secretary at the Middle School, wow I can't believe this, I had been applying for a position in the Douglas County school system for a few years, and now that we finalized everything and we're headed out they offer me a great position, UGH!

My Daughter Bryanna is leaving her Dad behind in Carson City, which I always promised wouldn't happen, no matter how much I hate that prick, I never wanted to move her away from her Daddy. 

I guess we have to make sacrifices in life in order to get ahead or to just break even. We made arrangements so Bryanna could visit him every summer, fly back for a couple holidays, and of course he is welcome to visit any time.

We gave away our chickens :( I sure do miss the fresh eggs, and them all following me around the property like I was Momma Chicken, we took our Dog Meika to Johns my Brother in law, she was just too big to put in the Truck or U-haul since they were packed solid, shoved the cat and our little dog Chrissy in the truck and we were off, makes me tear up just writing this. :(

Good bye Beautiful place :(

We took a couple days getting to Williston, the drive was breath taking, if anyone hasn't driven through Yellow Stone national park it is a MUST SEE. 

So we are getting closer to Williston, half way through Montana and things are starting to get really boring <~~to me that means no more mountains, as we are getting closer things have pretty much flat lined. :\ Don't lose it Tracy I tell myself, we mentally prepared for this, we read all about the area before we decided to come, sacrifices!

Here we are 10:30 pm driving into Williston and it was STILL day light!?? WTH?? Okay this is where I lose it I started to cry, I missed my home, my mountains, my animals, and this place is flat, the town is in the middle of no where, there are no stores, no restaurants, there are NO HOTELS, just old run down motels. I thought to myself what did we just do, there is no turning back what's done is done....

June 2008 ~ The Offer Letter

We lived in Gardnerville Nevada in a cute little house on about 5 acres, my view was of Jobs Peak, Lake Tahoe, and the Beautiful Sierra Mountains.

We had 2 dogs, 12 chickens, and a cat, most of our neighbors had horses, goats, peacocks, and lot's of other kinds of animals, I loved where we lived, we had California just 5 mins away, many places to go for outdoor activity, or a night out on the town, yet way out in the country where you could see all the stars at night, you often woke up to Deer, Rabbits, Bobcats, Coyotes, Eagles and all sorts of other creatures in your yard, you could leave your doors unlocked, and often left our keys in our cars.

I was seeking employment which was unsuccessful, my husband was working for Waste Management, but money was pretty tight, and we were very grounded in life, not being able to experience much, or do things with our kids.

My husband Dan had worked for Schlumberger in the past, and was thinking about doing the same work again, we talked about how he would have to travel and to tell the truth I wasn't real happy about that, but I new we had to do something.

June 2008 my husband was made an offer by Halliburton to come up to Williston, ND and that's where our journey in the Bakken Oilfield had begun. 

This picture was taken just a couple weeks before we left for Williston ND.

My favorite place in the world, Markleeville CA. at a childhood swimming hole.

P.S. If you didn't catch it, we all left for Williston ND together. <3