We are coming up on the one-year anniversary of selling our last house and moving to the small town of Rexburg, Idaho. In so many ways, we can’t believe it has already been a year. Having been born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, there are aspects of small-town living that I am still trying to fall in love with. I am not used to wide open spaces and farm smells and limited recreational activities and only a handful of restaurants. Utah’s restaurant scene is actually quite diverse and we so enjoyed trying new places every week.
Something I have learned throughout all of the relocations in my life is you fall in love with where you’re living by being involved with where you’re living. Volunteer! Host a gathering! Attend Events! Sometimes it just takes making a new friend–which is kind of the most difficult thing to do. I could sense some negative feelings creeping back in earlier this year–there’s nowhere to eat here. There’s nothing to do! It’s freezing! And at that moment, I knew we needed to get involved in our community somehow and that’s when the idea for our new side project, RexburgEats.com came up. Over the last several months we have been working on this website that is a complete listing of restaurants in our area–turns out we have close to 100 and several we haven’t even been to–or heard of! It allows guests to write reviews, search for foods or restaurants they are craving, and we’ll be blogging about our own dining experiences there, too.
There’s only a small percentage of you that live around here, I know–but we wanted to share this on this site because it has been something we have been working so hard on behind the scenes. Even through our research and planning and building the site, to the launch yesterday, I am feeling so much more connected to where we live–which is not only important, in my opinion, Â but so rewarding. No, we don’t have very many restaurants or a lot of shopping or events, but I can feel my heart growing fonder of this place with every passing day and I know this local project, this new website, has played a major role in that.
Have you had the same feelings when moving to a new place? How do you connect/fall in love with where you are living?
Ps. For our local readers and friends, feel free to use RexburgEats.com as a tool to search for restaurants, or even a specific food item to display restaurants in our area that serve it. (The site is mobile friendly as well.) Also! You can win 1 of 5 $10 gift cards to Karie Anne’s Delectable Desserts (for those of you not in the area here, it’s an Italian ice place and it truly is, well, delectable) we’re giving away to celebrate the launch. Visit the RexburgEats.com Facebook page to enter.Â
Have you ever used Yelp? It’s a great tool for finding places to eat or shop or whatever you need in a new town/city or even another country.
I have lived in Rexburg my whole life besides a few small stints in other places. We are moving soon and I have been really excited for a lot of reasons, but am starting to get really sad. I love the people here, living in the country, all the outdoor recreation. Mostly I’m sad to leave family and all the good memories (we met and married here!) Really hoping I can learn to love our new town where I know no one and have only been to once. I’m nervous!
Also, the original Thai resteraunt on Main Street is amazing!! It’s kind of a hole in the wall but the food is incredible.
I moved to St. Louis for college (and then stayed here) and I found it really helpful to talk with locals. Whenever I’d go out to eat or for a drink, I made it a point to ask the waitress/bartender for a couple of their favorite places in the are and I created a list that way to start exploring. Events, eateries, parks, museums, etc were things that people had mentioned. It took me until I graduated college to really fall in love with St. Louis. Getting to share and experience that list with other friends really made me feel connected to the city. And finally being able to give directions to someone made me feel like a native.
PS…If ever you get a chance, spend a weekend in Ketchum and drive up through the Sawtooth Mountains. We only made it to the Smiley Creek Airport before turning around because of snow and available daylight, but the Galena Pass/overlook is beautiful! My husband’s company is headquartered in Hailey, so we spent a long weekend up there back in March and I loved it.
I love what you said about loving a place by being involved in that place. My husband is in the Navy and right after we got married he was stationed in Portsmouth, NH. I worked in a store at the mall in our previous home port and was making small talk with a customer who had just moved from there. She looked me straight in the face and in all seriousness said “You’re going to hate it.” then left the store. I was flabbergasted! How could it possibly be that bad? When we did get to New Hampshire we had a blast, granted it was before we had kids. We went camping, and to the local theatre, and to shows in the park, and awesome restaurants. I found a new job and we attended church. We were an hour from Boston. I’ll always remember that lady and her sad attitude, and I’ve made it my goal that wherever the Navy sends us we will enjoy what there is to enjoy. As we’ve added kids to our family that means fewer shows and restaurants, but definitely more friends. We will be transferred again in the next 6 months and its truly bittersweet. We are ready for a new adventure, but sad to leave the people and places we’ve gotten to know here.
I moved from Minneapolis to Twin Falls so I totally hear ya! Although it looks like you have better restaurants than Twin!