And just like that

...my heart drove away. 

Chad, Anney and Finley left this morning for their new adventure in Tucson. I'm a mess and I now understand that look on my mom's face many years ago when Doug, Matthew and I drove away to our adventure in California. Sorry mom!

Saving some pictures from a trip to the ice cream store last week to put a smile back on my face. We asked Finley what flavor he wanted and he said "blue!" so forever more blue is a flavor in my mind!

Time marches on

  Wednesday, the 8th, Chad and Anney sold their house and bought a house. What a whirlwind the past few weeks have been for them. Luckily the housing market in Utah is a seller’s dream right now so their house was only on the market for three days. When Chad came to pick Finley up and told him about their new house in Tucson, Finley was jumping up and down and being all excited and then turned to me and very seriously said, “Now, you’re moving too, right?”  Just about broke my heart all over again. I explained to him again that no, we weren’t moving but that we’d come and visit him in his new house. Luckily kids adjust quickly and he’ll be fine...but who knows about these old grandparents.  We had a fun two days with him and are just enjoying the time we have.

I took him to Costco with me on Thursday while Doug was at physical therapy for his back. We had to drive to Ogden first to take some stuff to DI (purging and cleaning out the toy closet in the basement) and Finley fell asleep in the car. He never does that. This child just doesn't nap and never has. Even as a baby I'd had to hold him to get him to sleep. At any rate, when he fell asleep I wasn't about to wake him up so found a shady spot in Costco's parking lot and just sat there for an hour while my boy slept. He was still a bit groggy when he woke up but I still had to take a picture of him holding Geoffrey's hand so he "wouldn't be scared or fall out of the cart."

Derek, Shelby and Zoe have been at Lake Powell all week with Shelby’s family so we haven’t heard from them or seen new pictures of the baby. I’ll be glad when they’re back in communication with us. In the meantime I’ll have to rely on a “stock picture” of Zoe and her mommy to make me smile. I’m not sure where the picture was taken; somewhere in Colorado last week.

I spent this afternoon online looking at new, and older, single level homes for sale. We really would like to downsize as this house is simply too big for us anymore. We don’t need 3000 square feet, five bedrooms and two kitchens. With my aches, pains and sometimes overwhelming depression I just can’t keep the whole place clean and the yard is getting too much for Doug too.  However, after checking prices I realized that we simply can’t afford to move so we’ll have to make do. The housing market is a bit crazy. Chad and Anney sold their small 1500 square foot house for the same amount as we’d be able to sell this one. The small homes I was looking at today (around 1500 square feet) would cost us an additional $100,000 over what we could sell the house for. That’s just crazy. We’re in an old house in an old neighborhood though and can’t change that. We’re too old to start making house payments again especially when I’m scrimping and saving for trip money to visit our kids. It’s a conundrum. Oh well, I’m grateful we have a nice home and that it’s paid for even though there’s always something that needs to be fixed. Cody, our handyman, was here again today working on some things for us. I guess that goes with the territory of being a home owner.

Early August ponderings

I'm not sure where the year has gone and how it can be August already but it has and it is. It's another late Sunday night and I'm wide awake so it's catch up time in the journal. I also needed an excuse to post the cute pictures of Ninja Finley.  He was cracking us up using his baseball bat as a Ninja weapon.

We had planned on having Dave for dinner tonight but he ended up with a case of stomach flu and so he'll come next Sunday instead. Naturally I had cooked enough for an army so I'll be freezing pork chili verde and refried beans and we'll have leftovers another day.  Chad, Anney and Finley came over and had some dessert with us. I appreciate them coming over since we know our time together is limited. They said tonight that they're planning on leaving around the 22nd since Chad starts his new job on August 27th. They're still looking at homes online and still trying to sell their home here but are confident that all will work out. I'd sure hate to buy a home long distance without seeing it first but I guess it's done often now. I was thinking about that the other night, about how the world is a smaller place than it used to be and how technology has improved our lives in so many ways.  When Doug and I moved to California with our little 20 month old Matthew in tow it was hard, really hard. Long distance phone calls were expensive and so mom and I would take turns calling but no more than a couple times a month, and then only after 5PM and then have only a short conversation because it was so expensive. We wrote letters a lot. In fact, I have a box full of letters that I wrote to Mom and Dad while we lived in California that mom saved all those years. It's been fun looking through them as they are a diary of sort of our lives there for two years. If I wanted them to see how Matthew was growing I'd take a picture, but then I had to finish taking the rest of the roll ( usually 24 pictures) before taking it to be developed, waiting a week or so for the developing, and then mailing the picture to them. By then, he had changed! Now I can almost instantaneously get pictures from my kids wherever they are and whenever they send them. Face Time with the kids while we were on tour helped us when we were missing those grandchildren and it will keep us sane when Finley is gone (and Zoe next year). I still would rather keep my family physically close but I know that's not possible so I'm glad that we have technology to help keep us emotionally close.

Derek,  Shelby and Zoe have been in Colorado all week. Shelby did a 70.3 Ironman on Saturday in Boulder. I'm so proud of her. It's nothing I could conceive of ever doing (even when I was younger and somewhat healthier) but she's a natural athlete who also works hard at it. Her dad did the race with her. Derek has been so busy with school, work, etc that I'm glad they had time to get away and have some family time. They're going to Lake Powell with her family this coming week too so it will be a while before we see them again. At least Shelby is good about sending pictures of that adorable baby girl to us. It's not the same as holding and squeezing her, but it helps!

My mind has been racing with how I'll change things around the house after Finley is no longer here. I know that I won't be able to walk by that toy room several times a day without losing it emotionally so have planned on turning it back into a spare room/office. I'll take the majority of toys downstairs (hopefully will get the closet cleaned out for a toy closet) and just leave the baby toys in there for now for Zoe. I'll leave the crib up for another year but then it will come down too after they leave for Derek's schooling. Sheesh, if I think I'm an emotional mess now I don't know what's going to happen in a year when Derek and Shelby leave too and we're left alone without family. It's disconcerting in many ways. We love to travel and will love visiting them all but that takes money and my work is hit or miss at best and my awful dental bills keep piling up. I've been racking my brain trying to think of some way to earn money at home since I don't think my health will really allow me to get a job outside the home. I'm blessed to have so much so I can't complain but I still hope to be able to visit my family often and if I want to do that I'm going to have to figure out a way to make that happen! In the meantime, praise be for technology!