Scott and Evan's visit

Evan and I walked down to the neighborhood park. 

There was this other little boy there the same age as Evan 

and his name was Evan too.

They played together just great. Evan had to come to terms with sharing his name with someone else. It was kind of hard for him to wrap his head around that. 

Evan wanted to go to the Dinosaur Park and ride the train. That we did!

This is about the last toy we saved for little grandkids. 

We may need to readdress that decision once we move.

 

Farewell little piano

Scott and Evan made the journey to pick up my piano and take it back to Phoenix.

Mikel Poulsen a good friend from Bremerton Days came to help.

These three hefted that piano into the back of the pickup.

Ready to hit the road.

Fred did check it over before we let it go.

Look how beautiful she looks at Scott and Jess's home. 

 

More stuff August Colorado

As we have been preparing to make this move, we have been downsizing our furniture. I offered up my piano. I've been wanting a new shiny paino for years. 

Well this is the year. Shannon and I went shopping to two piano stores. 

This is the new piano I choose. 
It has already been delivered to our new home and is waiting to be played.

On one of our days out and about we went to Costco and took this picture to send to Scott. He is not happy with us that we got a Sam's Club membership card. He is totally loyal to Costco. We wanted him to know we aren't total losers. 

Shannon and I also took a trip to IKEA and found this new dining room

 table for her new house.It matches her flooring. It looks perfect. 

 

64th Birthday Day

Shannon got tickets for us to go to the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum.

I was expecting antique quilts, but these quilts were made by 

The National Association of Certified Quilt Judges.

I've seen lots of quilts and never anything as intricate as these. 

The docent took at least a 1/2 walking us through and talking about each quilt.

I didn't take many pictures because she said I couldn't post them on social media.

I don't feel like my blog gets much traffic so I'm posting them here for memory's sake.

These are the birthday cards that the kids made for me.

I think you can tell which one each child made. 

 For my birthday dinner we went to a Mexican Restaurant with Shannon and Brian. We stopped at Village Inn and bought two pies. It was pretty much about food.

Kitchen progress

This is a view of what was the kitchen before Fred started ripping it out.

Carpet has been pulled up.

The process of ripping out the old cabinets.

Getting tools staged.

Painters paint marking studs and cabinet placement and countertop height.

We asked the missionaries to come and help bring in the cabinets from the garage. 

Old cabinets in the livingroom now.

Here are most of the upper cabinets and our new motorized kitchen window blind.

I have to admit I quit taking pictures. The progress was just so stilted and slow. Very discouraging for me to watch. It felt that each step was fraught with complications. We didn't accomplish as much as we had hoped during the month we spent there. I admit I probably added to it by wanting to get new bedroom furniture. But in my defense, that means less big pieces of furniture to move here. Not that the new furniture arrived, but it did require a trip to IKEA and Fred putting together a couple pieces so we could see if they would work out. 

Fred was busy the entire time. I was pretty engaged during the 10 days that Shannon and Brian were on their cruise and I was a full time mom again, but after I didn't feel like I had much to do. Shannon and I did get out to stores and she took me to a quilt museum and lunch on my birthday. I did get a haircut with a new gal and I think she will work out great. I watched a lot of tv and read books which is pretty normal for me, but when not in your own home it just feels different. I walked almost every morning through the neighborhood. It's a great place for walking. I think because I knew the progress downstairs was going slow it made me want to go home and wait until Fred was done. With the sale of the house in the back of our minds and knowing that the market is slowing down, it creates another facet of stress.

Knowing that there is still so much to do when we move there puts a damper on my mood about everything. I just want to be done with all this work and begin the next phase of our lives. You know, retirement where we can enjoy doing stuff together that is, I don't know, recreational and enjoyable instead of work work work worry worry and work some more.

I've been up since 4 am - so I'm not in the best of moods. I'm discouraged and anxious about selling our house. What if no one wants it? I have to admit it doesn't look great. We still have two bedrooms that are a mess. Filled with stuff. Our master closet is a mess of stuff. It seems like our prep work in Bremerton was so much more efficient. We were ready to show the house. Here we are not ready. Well we will know this weekend because we are putting out the For Sale sign no matter what. Good Luck to us.

 

Our road to remodel

I suggested to Fred that we drive both cars to Colorado so we can leave one there and trailer the other one when we move. I said I could do the drive in two days, not one. I'm good for about 5 hours driving long distance. We decided that was a good idea. It also gave us more room for hauling tools, materials and stuff we need for a month at Shannon's. 

We made it to our hotel in pretty good time, but we parked under a tree. The next morning Fred wanted to get both cars washed to get the tree sap off.

There was a mudslide along I-70 so we had to divert our course. It added on hours. I didn't sign up for a 7 or 8 hour day which it turned into. It was pretty miserable. We drove up through beautiful scenery, but at one point the road was two lane, no barriers on the roadway and the drop off. I was kind of freaking out. I couldn't look to the right of the lane. I kept my vision stuck on the center lane lines. 

It was just pouring rain. We got to one length of road that just came to a halt for what seemed miles to me, but later found out it was only a couple. I was so tired by then and it felt like we were never going to get there. Fred had us pull off for gas not knowing how long we were going to be stuck. Well just up ahead the road jam opened up and off we went.

This Welcome Sign was posted on their garage door It was very sweet

Lots of cars parked here for now.

This is the cause of the detour off on I70. Mudslide near Glenwood Canyon. Rotten timing for our trip. I think we will find an alternate route when we go back home.

What is the best detour route? 

CDOT recommends taking a combination of state highways north through Meeker, Craig, Steamboat Springs and Kremmling. That adds about two-and-a-half hours to a trip from Grand Junction to Denver. A southern route through Montrose and Gunnison is now viable after a construction project there was suspended until I-70 is open again. 

Final Garage Sale

We held what I hope and believe to be our LAST garage sale.

As expected, there was a lot of time in preparation for the big day.

We got up at 5am so we could get everything set up.

I think we set it up really nice. 

Grouped things by category and tried to put everything out in good visibility.

The only Princess House pieces that didn't sell were the hurricane candle holders.

I haven't used any of it in years!!!

Games and toys. Most of that sold too.

We placed things in aisles so people could walk through.

No more room for silk plants. The majority of our wall decor was sold also. I'm only hanging pictures that are sentimental to me. Like our family!

Extra pot and pans, luggage, camping gear - so much stuff.

My Dad had notebooks with 100 plastic sheets filled with letters. 

I thought those were a good deal for someone to pick up.

Fred sold his bicycle that he got when he was about 15 years old. We will look for a cruiser style bicycle to buy him when we get moved.

We had quite a bit of electronics. Most of that sold. 

I won't be displaying my collection of water pitchers anymore.  I want our new place to be clutter free.

A lady bought that quiet book I made when Corinne was a baby. Our duplos that our kids played with. 

Fred had so many packages of unused tools. I think all his tools sold.

Multiples of so many things. 

Gas grill sold. All that fencing and chicken wire sold. 

We sold the majority of stuff within the first hour and a half. It was slow after that. 

 These are pictures after we rearranged the remaining items.

A large portion of the items went to about three different people. One couple came back to pick up the grill and then bought the security camera system of Fred's. It was amazing to watch the people as they shopped. 

Our day was successful. We had to take two loads to DI and one load to Habitat of Humanity. Done. 

Now our house looks kind of sad inside, but that was the goal.