The last two weeks (guessing on time frame) have been a whirlwind for me, and my family. The kids are pretty resilient and other than having colds have seen "unscathed" by the process (I have to count my blessings somewhere, so we'll start there :)) Anyway, I believe in my last post I stated something like, "Bartlesville can't get rid of us so fast..." but when it all came down to it, they did. Our buyers wanted to close even earlier than the contract, we said no, and in fact tried to push it the opposite direction. We had found out we were going to be "homeless" (another blessing to count here is we have my parents home to call ours so we aren't really homeless in all sense of the word), and so we were trying to keep our home for as long as they'd let us. So we thought they were going to agree to the 15th, then no, then we thought they'd do the 8th (pushing back from a Monday to that next Friday), but then at the last minute he changed his mind on that too. Leaving us with no option other than to begin packing up and moving out April 1st. Oh how I wish it were a big ol' April Fools joke, but alas, it wasn't.
So the games begin.
The PODS unit showed up Thursday. We started getting things somewhat organized Thursday and began packing up the kids' rooms first on Friday. We began loading Friday mid morning. (this is our second pods unit by the way!) HOW DO WE HAVE SO MUCH STUFF?!???
We had dear friend and former associate of Jeff's, Brittany, to help us all day on Friday and she was great! She did the things I couldn't do. I held it together appearance wise, but on the inside I was falling apart. Boxing up the last of my things, specifically the kitchen just wasn't going to happen if I had to do it, so I am SO thankful she was there. Because of the the help we were able to get SO much more done on Friday than I had ever anticipated.
Saturday was the fort day. We have Jeff's old fort that he received as a kid (built by his dad and grandpa) that weighs about 2500-3000 pounds and then we have Creighton and Charleigh's house (that was built by Pop and Grammy) that weighs about 4000 pounds. No joke. They fit snugly down the side of our Bartlesville house and the neighbors fence. Watching them get them (in last time) and out this time is completely crazy. It takes about 8-10 grown men to do this. Then they have to pick them up and put them on a trailer. (just for remembrance sake (although the guys will surely never forget even if they try) they have to move them the old "Egyptian way" of moving things with PVC pipes underneath and roll a few feet and then pull one out of the back and lay it out front continuously until you reach point B)
We had Pop's trailer lined up with his car. But we wanted to have 2 trailers and 2 cars so we would only have to find help once in Bartlesville and once in Bixby. So we both made multiple calls and found a few that would work, but one of our friends that was coming to help anyway said he had one and a hitch and could also pull it . So we said "sold" :). Because the houses are so big we decided to verify the size and weight. He assured us we didn't need to come measure that it would be fine. So, I let all the other leads go. Saturday morning I pull up and there is a trailer sitting outside of my house that doesn't have a chance in heck to hold the girls' house. So I tried desperately to make all the phone calls again to the other leads to no avail. The guys all tried desperately to get the girls' house on his trailer, but it just was NOT going to work. So back to plan C, they went with the first one, then came back and got the girls' fort and went a second time. A very long and tiring day for the guys. (blessing: we have a sweet family in Bixby that is housing our forts in their backyard in our time of "transition").
The rest of Saturday we continued packing up and loading the PODS. It was very strange with a mostly empty house. We were fixing to load up the washer at one point and I stuck my hand in to make sure all the water was gone and felt soap. We had cleaned it out and dried it out and had even turned off the water supply. I know there wasn't soap in there the night before. But apparently Taylor had tried to do a load unknowing that he wouldn't be able to. He didn't find this out till he had already put soap in it, but he didn't tell anyone. So that was an incredibly frustrating event because then we had to load the washer back in the house, hook it all back up, run a cycle (empty because we had already loaded the dryer), and then begin the process again of drying it out. UGH! We found this all out about midnight. That late with all day of packing, being emotional and tired, didn't produce a great outcome. But it all worked out.
Sunday we went to church and looked at houses and got home late. We didn't think we had too much to do. But that day Jeff got a MAJOR migraine that took.him.out. He wasn't able to do anything. It was terrible. When we got home, we realized just how much there WAS left to do and thankfully a sweet family from Grace came and helped! They were amazing and helped us out in SO many ways! Thank you Karns family! I am so thankful for them because without Jeff I wouldn't have been able to do any of it by myself. They even hooked us up with an air mattress to sleep on so we wouldn't have anything to put in the PODS the next morning. We were offered by 2 different families to sleep at their houses in comfort for the night but Jeff wanted to be sentimental and sleep there on the last night. I would have taken up the offer, and next time FOR SURE will. But I obliged to his request. We ended up sleeping like shoes fit in a shoe box because I can't sleep with a bump behind my head and he wanted it. So we cuddled with each others feet by our faces all night :) Oh the memories!
Stay tuned for Part 2.
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