Good-bye, Washington!
We have said all of our good-byes to beloved family and friends (although there are still some we haven't managed to see while here 😭) and are heading out in the morning for Oregon.
It has been a very busy week. We feel like foreigners here in W. Washington any more; the weather is cool and overcast, the profuse landscape is lush and green (I feel a little claustrophobic!), the traffic is beyond horrible. But our precious family here makes it all worthwhile. They are difficult to leave. And so, Lord willing, we will be back.
I have a ton of pictures that I haven't downloaded. Will do that soon. Too many memories captured in them that I want to share.
I will get back to my saga soon. The story is too unbelievable not to record. A 'who-woulda-thought' kind of story. God certainly works in mysterious ways. What a gift when He lets us have some understanding about His ways, which are higher than man's. Until then......
Monday, June 12, 2017
Wednesday, May 31, 2017
May 31, 2017
Ahhhh..... we're finally on the other end. We're moved out, have found a house in Missouri, said our good-byes to the E. Washington contingent of friends and family, and are now spending three days simply recovering at beautiful Steamboat Rock State Park.
I DID start to cry yesterday as I said my silent good-byes to everything and everyone familiar on my way out. "Goodbye" to 'our mountain' (as Gunnar called it) with the green roof of our former home visible only to those with an eye to see it from the highway. But crowding out the sadness was a recollection of the journey and how God's hand has been leading us out for some time. Let me take you back to September, 2016...
We received a full-price, cash offer with a close in two weeks!!! Yikes! All stops were pulled as we got the word out and people came in droves to 'shop' at our home! Our intention was to save only our antique furniture and sell the rest, along with all the equipment. Labor Day saw us rescued by grandson Alex, wife Rachel and their three children. What dynamoes!! They packed and hauled and consolidated and hussled to our complete exhaustion and relief! Home inspection, well draw-down and radon testing were all completed the same weekend. Alex and company left Monday and the house was in a shambles reflecting the half-move we had all accomplished. Carol and Skip came to pick up mom's old sewing machine, and a buyer handed Fritz cash to purchase the bulldozer. I was typing up a Bill of Sale when the realtor called. The buyer had decided to cancel. We reeled from shock! He gave no real reason, but cited the home inspection (which our realtor had called the day before to say there was nothing major in the inspection, just a lot of little things having to do with unfinished projects). I walked the dozer-buyer's money back out to him, tearfully explaining the situation. Then I broke down in my sister's arms while Fritz was talking with the prospective buyer, trying to understand his change of heart (to no avail).
It was only our trust in God and HIS plans for us that gave us the strength to put the pieces back together again. Thankfully, while we had sold a lot of 'stuff', we had parted with nothing necessary, and some of the things we would like to have kept, kind buyers offered to leave them and get their cash back. We were exhausted, emotionally and physically, but continued to reassemble our fractured lives. It would be months before God graciously revealed to us HIS reason for not allowing that sale to go through. From a human perspective, we found out the buyer was a widowed 70-year-old who absolutely loved the house. But Labor Day weekend, we left so the realtor could show him the boundaries, and he brought his 75-year-old sister, his daughter and granddaughter to show them the place. Our realtor said the sister was negative, the daughter concerned about the size of the house. We concluded he may have been a recent widow who made an emotional decision which his older sister eventually talked him out of. But none of that matters because God had a job for us to do that we had no clue about at the time.
Since this is going to be a chronological detailing of the unfolding past nine months, you'll have to wait to find out too! 😁
Ahhhh..... we're finally on the other end. We're moved out, have found a house in Missouri, said our good-byes to the E. Washington contingent of friends and family, and are now spending three days simply recovering at beautiful Steamboat Rock State Park.
I DID start to cry yesterday as I said my silent good-byes to everything and everyone familiar on my way out. "Goodbye" to 'our mountain' (as Gunnar called it) with the green roof of our former home visible only to those with an eye to see it from the highway. But crowding out the sadness was a recollection of the journey and how God's hand has been leading us out for some time. Let me take you back to September, 2016...
We received a full-price, cash offer with a close in two weeks!!! Yikes! All stops were pulled as we got the word out and people came in droves to 'shop' at our home! Our intention was to save only our antique furniture and sell the rest, along with all the equipment. Labor Day saw us rescued by grandson Alex, wife Rachel and their three children. What dynamoes!! They packed and hauled and consolidated and hussled to our complete exhaustion and relief! Home inspection, well draw-down and radon testing were all completed the same weekend. Alex and company left Monday and the house was in a shambles reflecting the half-move we had all accomplished. Carol and Skip came to pick up mom's old sewing machine, and a buyer handed Fritz cash to purchase the bulldozer. I was typing up a Bill of Sale when the realtor called. The buyer had decided to cancel. We reeled from shock! He gave no real reason, but cited the home inspection (which our realtor had called the day before to say there was nothing major in the inspection, just a lot of little things having to do with unfinished projects). I walked the dozer-buyer's money back out to him, tearfully explaining the situation. Then I broke down in my sister's arms while Fritz was talking with the prospective buyer, trying to understand his change of heart (to no avail).
It was only our trust in God and HIS plans for us that gave us the strength to put the pieces back together again. Thankfully, while we had sold a lot of 'stuff', we had parted with nothing necessary, and some of the things we would like to have kept, kind buyers offered to leave them and get their cash back. We were exhausted, emotionally and physically, but continued to reassemble our fractured lives. It would be months before God graciously revealed to us HIS reason for not allowing that sale to go through. From a human perspective, we found out the buyer was a widowed 70-year-old who absolutely loved the house. But Labor Day weekend, we left so the realtor could show him the boundaries, and he brought his 75-year-old sister, his daughter and granddaughter to show them the place. Our realtor said the sister was negative, the daughter concerned about the size of the house. We concluded he may have been a recent widow who made an emotional decision which his older sister eventually talked him out of. But none of that matters because God had a job for us to do that we had no clue about at the time.
Since this is going to be a chronological detailing of the unfolding past nine months, you'll have to wait to find out too! 😁
Tuesday, May 23, 2017
Feelings.....
I want to get this down on paper before I forget. I still need to begin at the beginning, but will wait until I am no longer in the midst of the transition....
I haven't really had time to think about how I feel about leaving our beautiful home on the hill. I worried that, having left and had to return this past Sunday to review systems with the new owner, all my sense of loss, my grief at the closing of a very vibrant life chapter would come flooding over me. But.....all that is strangely absent! Every time I think about the house; every time I see it, all I feel is an immense sense of RELIEF! I hadn't realized what a taskmaster the place had become, demanding so much in terms of our financial resources (not just for the house, but all the equipment necessary for access!) as well as our physical resources. And the truth of the matter is; we were running quite out of both. There may even have been an underlying sense of resentment towards our lovely home. All I know is there is (at least not yet) no sense of loss, but of freedom gained.
Truly, I understand better how much MORE less is! While the motorhome is quite cramped with too many clothes, shoes and other seeming essentials and I often trip over Fritz's boots splayed out in the narrow walkway, I always know where he is! Oftentimes at home, I would have to call his cell phone to locate him. We even had the amusing experiences of looking for one another, going from room to room, while the other of us was doing the same thing until one of us stopped so the other could catch up! I like his closeness. I'm more content here.
Our (hopefully) new home is on a paved street, with a level, paved driveway. It's all on one level. It's smaller. It has an awesome yard! And Fritz is like a kid in a candy store shopping for a pole building to house the motorhome and truck. This all appeals to me tremendously. With all there is to look forward to, I don't want to take any time to look back. But when I do, it simply affirms that we are on the right path. Like Fritz said,'when you let God lead, there's no reason to look back'. Amen!
I want to get this down on paper before I forget. I still need to begin at the beginning, but will wait until I am no longer in the midst of the transition....
I haven't really had time to think about how I feel about leaving our beautiful home on the hill. I worried that, having left and had to return this past Sunday to review systems with the new owner, all my sense of loss, my grief at the closing of a very vibrant life chapter would come flooding over me. But.....all that is strangely absent! Every time I think about the house; every time I see it, all I feel is an immense sense of RELIEF! I hadn't realized what a taskmaster the place had become, demanding so much in terms of our financial resources (not just for the house, but all the equipment necessary for access!) as well as our physical resources. And the truth of the matter is; we were running quite out of both. There may even have been an underlying sense of resentment towards our lovely home. All I know is there is (at least not yet) no sense of loss, but of freedom gained.
Truly, I understand better how much MORE less is! While the motorhome is quite cramped with too many clothes, shoes and other seeming essentials and I often trip over Fritz's boots splayed out in the narrow walkway, I always know where he is! Oftentimes at home, I would have to call his cell phone to locate him. We even had the amusing experiences of looking for one another, going from room to room, while the other of us was doing the same thing until one of us stopped so the other could catch up! I like his closeness. I'm more content here.
Our (hopefully) new home is on a paved street, with a level, paved driveway. It's all on one level. It's smaller. It has an awesome yard! And Fritz is like a kid in a candy store shopping for a pole building to house the motorhome and truck. This all appeals to me tremendously. With all there is to look forward to, I don't want to take any time to look back. But when I do, it simply affirms that we are on the right path. Like Fritz said,'when you let God lead, there's no reason to look back'. Amen!
Friday, April 28, 2017
"You may never again have the intersection of health, resources and time to start life anew, so let the adventure begin!!"
Wise words from my oldest sister on learning that we have sold our home and will be moving across the country. Because we are in the midst of the move, this blog will simply be a place-holder for me to make notes on events that have occurred over the past six months. I hope to comment more fully on them in the future.1 - The false start, Sept. 2016.....and the reason revealed
2 - The very worst winter, 2016/2017-illness, snow, driveway, fall, rain, rain and more rain
3 - What do we do with our stuff?
4 - Surprised by people's reactions; who is sad, who is indifferent
5 - My fellow-Washingtonian's sister's good-by
6 - Moving the rock and the never-ending story of tractor problems
Adventure, indeed. Looking forward to looking forward! For now, it's just get-through-each-day-and-try-not-to-think-about-it!
Til we're on the other side of the transition.....
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