Moving to ??

Yes, its been a long time since I've posted anything but the reason is...finally I'm moving. I was sort of thinking I'd go ahead and move this Fall anyway. I wanted to find a place, settle in and get busy living again. Suddenly--along came a couple looking for a house with trees, water (pond) and all the other things my house has. YAAAY! It went fast. I remember the last time I walked down the road with Biscuit, I stopped and talked to a neighbor and told her "no, no one has bought my house yet" and now, here it is a couple weeks later and I'm moving!

So how can I move when I don't know where I'm going? Easy! Things are going in storage in Greenville (SC) until I find the perfect place. I'm looking at duplexes, so that I'll have a yard for me and the dog, close to town...I'm really tired of driving 30 minutes to get a gallon of milk. Close to parks and events and all the stuff one has close to them when they live in a city! I would like a kitchen with lots of cabinets, fairly new if not new...new stainless appliances, wood or laminate floors (hate carpeting, its just too much work to keep clean). 2-car garage so I have room to store stuff. 2 bedrooms so I'll have a working room as well as a bedroom. Most 2 bedrooms these days have 1 1/2 bath which would be nice. Decent size living room. A dining room isn't important if the kitchen has room but small DR would be ok. Ability to put my own touches in it would be good too, sometimes a new light feature or paint or something like that would make all the difference in your house vs their house.

So I'm not asking for a lot I think. I've lived in a lot of places in my married life, some good, some pretty crappy. This one hopefully will be the last place I live in so I want it to be right. Luckily I don't have a husband who always looks for "cheap" if you know what I mean. He was happy in a "cheap" motel, "make-do" house, etc. Not that this house is a "make-do" but this is his dream house, I didn't have a lot to do with the details and had to fight for what I got, the rest wasn't worth a divorce so I kept my mouth shut. Building a house together, I've heard can definitely lead to a divorce I know why. This time I get to do what I want. Yaaay!

Best-Best of it all, I'll have cable computer internet...WOW! You don't know what a treat that will be.

Pictures above show the work I did last week. I can't say I did it all alone though. Saturday a friend called me early in the morning and asked me how I was doing and did I need help. I BEGGED her to hurry over and over she came. She even brought lunch. We worked all day, finishing up the kitchen, dining room, and starting upstairs but by around 3:00 I was totally pooped, although she would have continued. We stopped and agreed to continue Sunday. So Sunday she came back and another friend came over with her husband, daughter and daughter's significant other. The guys went upstairs and hauled down all the heavy boxes for me. I gave the daughter my dining room table and a glider rocker I had that I was going to take to the dump simply because I didn't think it would survive a move and the table is a bit too big for what I have in mind. I had 2 of the gliders at one time and when one fell apart, beyond repair I took the cushions and put them on the porch chair outside. I loved that chair with the cushions and wanted the other chair's cushions for my new front porch (add front porch/and/or deck to my "want" list above). Their hard work made the rest of the day an easy one. We sort of finished up the loft and quit for the day. I had bought us a veggie Kashi pizza for dinner, we ate dinner among the boxes and yesterday was finished.

This week I'm going to clean up the house, vacuum and all the stuff one has to do when the furniture leaves. If it dries up outside I'll mow the lawn, if not I won't but it really needs to be done. Am going to go around and label the light switches for the new folks if I get time and leave them some notes about the yard. Other than that, I'm finished.

Friday the movers come, Saturday my son and grandaughter are flying in to help me finish up, Sunday we should be able to relax a bit and Monday we close on the house. After the closing, we hit the road. If we can get on the road fairly early we can make it to at least Kentucky before we have to crash. We'll go to Traverse City and then later I'll go over to Wisconsin. So that's it for now. I'll post again when I get time. Final picture shows a tired dog this morning, among the boxes. Lucky for him I left him some room on the bay window ledge which is his favorite spot anyway.