Wednesday, May 13, 2020

Sad Post--Selling our Home


June 2019: I started this post a year ago & never posted it.

After 24 years of living in Montesano Washington we sold our home!!! We've 
known this day is coming, but didn't think it would happen SO fast. We decided to list it on Zillow and do it ourselves. We listed it on Wednesday, May 1, 2019 and had 11 showings that weekend. We had an offer on Friday, one on Saturday & another one the following week! Russ and I laid in bed two days after we listed it until 2:00 am and kept asking ourselves, "what just happened." We expected it to take a couple of months to sell, not a couple of days. Its been a very tiring and stressful few weeks. We're still in the "fun" stage of inspections, septic systems tested, appraisal, etc.
If all goes as planned we will close the end of June. In many ways I'm ready to move, but know we still have a lot of work ahead of us.

I wanted to post these pictures so years down the road I can look back at our beautiful home and remember how much I loved it and ALL the memories we made there. The BEST memories were raising our kids here and all the fun they had growing up in the woods. We had 6 acres around our house and another 2 acres down our lane. It was an AWESOME place to raise a family and a good place to teach kids to work!!
We literally remodeled every room in the house.We had our yard landscaped, paved our whole lane, and added on to our house in 2008.

Living Room 


Kitchen...my happy place.





Family Room off the kitchen


Laundry Room


Kids Bathroom


Master Bedroom


Master Bathroom



Walk In Closet

Russ' side of closet

My side of the closet

Office & Work out room off our bedroom


Front Entry

Boys "old" room, now guest room.

 Lindsey's former room, guest room 2

I didn't get a picture of Kristy's (and Jared's after she left) old room as it has changed a lot and was pretty empty when I took these pictures. I was turning it into a sewing room!!

 Great room or family room downstairs.
We had already moved the furniture to our new home when I took this.


Our beautiful lane I used as a jogging track.



Front yard of our home.

We had lots of Blue Jays all the time. They were noisy, but pretty.


I'll miss my Star Gazers, they made our whole yard smell amazing!!


Hydrangeas

Rhododendrons

James & Meagan Erickson are the cute family who purchased our home. 
Their boys are about the same age Jared and Jacob were when we purchased this home back in 1995.
I'm SO happy we got such a cute family to buy our home!!

I WILL miss this little piece of heaven when we leave!!


Wednesday, April 3, 2019

February & March



The first week in February I flew to Kansas City to watch Kristy's kids while her and Wes went to Phoenix to find a house to buy. It was snowing when I arrived at the airport, but my flight still said it was on time. As I was waiting at the gate I kept seeing flights cancelled, but mine still said it was on time. Right when it was suppose to leave the sign came up, "Cancelled." I was worried as Kristy and Wes were flying out the next morning. I immediately called Alaska Airline and they got me on a 6:00 pm flight. I don't think I've ever seen Seattle Airport SO crazy!! There were people everywhere from flights cancelled and long lines to try and get new ones. After close to 12 hours at the airport, I was on the only flight out that day to Kansas City. I felt VERY blessed. I got in at midnight and when I brought my luggage out to the car, Kristy informed me her car wouldn't start. We said a prayer & after it still wouldn't start we asked the guy in the car behind us to give us a jump. Fortunately, he was kind enough to help us. As in many cases, our prayers were answered by another individual.

While I was in Kansas they had an ice storm so we were stuck in the house a few days. We made the best of it though and had fun together. The morning Kristy got home we headed to the Children's Museum and they loved that.




We made our last trip to Kansas City Joes for some great barbecue.
 I'm going to miss going there!!

 Cuties

I was worried I wasn't going to make it home because a big snow storm was suppose to hit that day. Fortunately, it hit as Russ was driving me home from the airport.
Its the first big one we've had in several years & everything looked beautiful.

 At the end of February the piano movers came to move the piano to Kristy's new home in Phoenix. I don't know why, but I was very emotional about this. Maybe its because all my kids practiced and played so much on it, we used it for our hymns for FHE, sang Christmas Carols around it or maybe because its making it real that we're REALLY moving from a place I've grown to love?!?!
Needless to say, I think I cried 3 times that week.


I know our piano is going to get MUCH better use at Kristy's new home.
 In Kansas she had around 17 piano students. 
This was one of her sweet students who made Kristy this blanket and gave it to her on her last lesson. She will be sorely missed there!

Here's the gang at the Phoenix airport. Talk about totally different weather than in Kansas!! They could literally say, "we aren't in Kansas anymore!" 
They've had such a cold winter that I'm sure 70's 
feels pretty darn good.

 Russ and I make two trips to Ivins in March. It had been close to 3 months since we'd been down and checked on our home. It was SO weird to actually see snow in the mountains, but SO beautiful. It was still quite chilly, but we went on a couple of hikes anyway.


This is where the rock was quarried for the foundation of the St. George temple.

                            

 One day we drove to Pine Valley. What a beautiful place and so quaint. They still hold church meetings in this building that was built around 1868.


 We saw wild turkeys running around.

At the last minute we decided to drive down to Las Vegas and see the Donny & Marie show. 
It was really good & amazing they can still sing & dance as good as they can, considering they're Russ and my age! The worst part is walking through the smoky casinos.

 Tyrel, Lindsey and the kids came down for Spring break. We were only home for about a week, but couldn't pass up the opportunity to hang out with them so we went back down.
Halter just got this new 2 wheeler.
 He's been riding one for quite sometime & does a great job at only 4 years old.

 We went on a couple of hikes and the boys did great!!
They loved getting out and riding their bikes, hiking, and putting their feet in the water after all the cold weather in Rigby, Id.

Tyli loved the hikes too!!


 The pool was around 50-60 degrees. Tytyn actually jumped in a few times.
We bought some fake swans, hoping it would keep the ducks away...NOT! Ohhh, and next
to the swans is AL our alligator!  I'm SO tired of 
spending money on things to try and keep the ducks out!!


 Tytyn, Tyrel and Russ took a really long bike ride and loved it.


Tyrel's brother, Collin & his wife happen to be down for the weekend also so they came over for dinner a few times. We had a lot of fun playing games and having some ping pong tournaments.
I love my family!! So glad we could spend this time together!!

Lately whenever we've been flying I've seen some beautiful scenery out the window of the plane.
This is in Northern California somewhere. Below is Mt. Adams and Mt. Saint Helens