Packing and Moving Part I

Totally upside-down.

That is what life feels like right now.

Our rental house is three fourths of the way packed, but we're moving slowly, one evening at a time, so I kept a few things unpacked to make dinner. You know, the can opener, one pot, a stirring spoon. Measuring cups.

Silly me, I volunteered to bake the gluten free cake for my brother's birthday on Wednesday.

It will also include duck eggs so I can have some of it.

Each room in the house is 70% packed. Except depending on how you look at it, the bedroom is 80% packed or 20% packed. All my clothes are out of the dressers, and packed in suitcases. Suitcases thare are open and I'm digging through them to find what I need to wear each day. The laundry hamper may still fill up before we move. There are no more throw pillows on the bed.

Having 70% of my things in storage leaves me feeling disconnected. You might remember that we're moving in with friends until we purchase a house. It's like I'm going on a vacation that has no definite end or destination? How do you pack for that? It might be cold (it's Seattle). It could get hot (It will be July...maybe August). I might need a winter coat (no defined end date to living with friends-could be November). We may go camping (gotta enjoy the summer!) I will want my VitaMix (can't live longer than a week without it.) Should I bring my pizza stone (or is that ridiculous?)

But in good news, despite all the frustrations of moving and feeling totally disconnected from my comfort-seeking self, we put an offer on a house on Saturday and are in the middle of negotiations today. There's a lot of exciting stuff to say about this place, but since it isn't ours (yet) and to keep myself from falling in love with it even more than I should (because I already have!) I'll just leave you with a few pictures of dreams that this place will fulfill.

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A spontaneous solstice.

 The longest day of the year came and went.

In Seattle the sun was up before 5 a.m. and didn't disappear until after 9:45 p.m.

with light still visible after 10.

We decided to spontaneously change our plans and spend the evening with our friend on his boat.

We boarded around 6:30 and then zoomed past our neighborhood (we live behind those red roofed houses--

say hello to the Mt. Rainer!).

 And settled somewhere behind Blake Island in calmer water for a little BBQ.

 A boat BBQ!

 There was my favorite beer.

And later some company from our friend, the seal.

And we toured the downtown waterfront before heading back home.

We live in a truly beautiful city and despite complaining about the rain from time to time, when the sun comes out all that rain seems worth the wait.

Happy Solstice!

Summer is officially here, even if it doesn't feel like summer until July 5th.

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The Next Steps and Summer Bucket List

I'm doing much better today with my feelings towards losing the house we wanted. I'm still dealing with uneasiness towards the uncertainty of the future, but I'm also aware that this will be a major lesson in trusting God. Easy to say. Hard to do.

We're out of our little beach rental in two weeks and we've decided to move in with some friends who have grown-up kids and empty bedrooms. A few days ago in my head I was positive we would live with them for only a few weeks while all the details of buying a house were worked through. But life took a quick turn, as you all know now, and now those few weeks will stretch out indefinitely. It could still be a few weeks. It could be 4 months. It could be next year. There's no way to know.

Naturally my controlling, protective, fearful self started to worry about my comfort. Oh, comfort, you sly thing you. How will it work sharing a bathroom, a kitchen, a fridge, a washing machine, not sleeping in my own bed? Do you see my concern? My comfort will be ruffled. And you may or may not know this about me, I do not like my comfort ruffled. I worship my comfort and here is God, removing the idol of comfort from my grasp, and asking me to trust Him. Trust that He has a perfect plan, that He knows the end result, that He works all things for His Glory, and that He will not put me through something I cannot handle. He did not promise it would easy, nor did he promise to be gentle. But I will endure.

And I'm working on being excited for this new transition in our lives. Our friends that are opening up their home are some of the sweetest and most generous people we know. We've been living life with them through church for upwards of 5 years and we couldn't ask for better people to be sharing a home with. They are well practiced at inviting others to live with them too, as they have had over twenty people/families join them in their home over the past 20+ years, some staying as long as eighteen months! I'm blown away. I think you should be to. But then again, look at my comfort resume (see whining above). I could learn a thing or two from them. And I'm betting I will.

So after a bit of prayer, and a decided effort to turn my summer around, I followed Janetha's promting and made my own summer bucket list!!

I'm super excited to get started on my list. And I wrote it cautiously because although I like to make lists, I actually like to cross things off my list more, and I feel somewhat unsuccessful if I don't scratch all items off my list. So my list is manageable with nothing too wild and extravagant but also built with tasks that will take intention to complete. OH! And my self imposed deadline and self imposed end to summer is my 30th birthday on September 13th. But if the sun wants to keep shining, I'll happily take it, summer or not.

1. Make sushi at home.

2. Hike minimum 4 times, two of which are Backpacking overnight.

3. Make a new header for my blog.

4. Learn to love my waist.

5. Achieve "healthy" according to my doctors.

6. Plant a garden, perhaps herb.

7. Have a picnic.

8. Donate old stuff to thrift store.

9. Try 5 new West Seattle restaurants.

10. Go to a festival.

11. Make Popsicles.

12. Pick fresh blueberries.

13. Make a complete meal over fire (perhaps during #2 above)

14. Attend an outdoor concert.

15. Volunteer.

16. Sunbathe.

18. Walk around a small town outside of Seattle.

19. Visit local brewery for fresh summer ale.

20. Buy our house :-) 

How's that for goals? What are your goals this summer?!

XOXO!

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Offer Not Accepted

WELL....

That big day came and went. We stressed ourselves out completely and waited anxiously for news, and just as we were crawling into bed, we got a phone call from our relator and his news wasn't good.

We bid ten percent over asking price (all our chips on the table, so to speak) and we were still outbid by someone with more money. It was a triple offer scenario, and what we thought was a strong offer and a sure win became the weakest offer on their table.

We had no idea the market was doing an upturn so quickly. It leaves me feeling cheated and raw. I'm fighting thoughts of disapointment, saddness, and frustration as we watch the market creep out from underneath us and what is left is homes we really don't want to invest in at this point. There is more desire out there than houses, driving the prices upward and the couple that won that house probably paid twenty percent over asking price. That asking price was probably five to ten percent over what the value of the house actually is... or was.

I'm taking a break from it all today. I'm grieving a bit, working through my emotions, and then hopefully I'll feel like searching for a house again tomorrow. God has a house in mind for us, and I'm working on learning the lessons he has to teach me and being patient in the mean time.

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Making an Offer

Today is a big day.

Maybe not as big as your wedding, or as significant as the day your first child was born.

But it feels pretty huge.
A defining moment.
Life changing.

This evening Mark and I put an offer on a house that we have a very good chance of buying. That may sound funny to you, a very good chance of buying. We're in a housing market in Seattle in this particular neighborhood where houses are desirable, and bidding wars are common, driving the price up past what the house is worth, into premium purchasing.

We watched one house we wanted get away that way.
It was a sad day.

So far with this current house, we are the only people planning to make an offer. So. far. Your prayers are appreciated and please keep them coming. We do not want a bidding war.

To sweeten our deal, we did a pre-offer home inspection and sewer inspection. A bold move.
One less contingency in the offer makes it a little more enticing, especially in a bidding war. Which we don't have yet. Fingers and toes crossed.

I'll be sure to post tomorrow to let you know any updates. Until then, please pray for favor for us and no bidding war, and a good smooth deal and whatever else you can think of to pray for.

XOXO!

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Final Recap of Table Lake Rock, Missouri

Vacation is officially one week over. And I want to wrap up my thoughts about my vacation, because if I don't, knowing my brain I'll probably forget what happened. You can read all about our recklessness here, and my check-in mid vacation here.

 This probably doesn't really matter to most of you because you didn't grow up with me, and for the few of you who did, I'm not really sure if you'll even find this cool. But I love my dad, and his quirkyness, and love for hunting, even though I don't care for dead animals, and so I took pictures to document his new house.

He retired at the lovely age of 52 (YAY! fire department pension!) and he left Illinois for the mountainous region of the Ozarks. He bought a home right on Table Rock Lake and plans to be there for quite a while. He spends his time remodeling the house, landscaping the yard, and building a deck. There are enough projects to keep him busy for quite a while.

This is his gym in the basement. I was very impressed and slightly jealous and may or may not have added barbells and weight bench to my personal wish list. But I did manage to use this space four days out of the six full days we were there.

 That resort sign has a story. My dad's family immigrated from Germany and settled in the Chicago area and in northern Wisconsin. Dad's grandma and (step)grandpa specifically settled in northern Wisconsin and started Trail's End Resort. It was lots of land set on a large deep lake and they built little rentable cabins on the property as well as their own house that they lived in, and that was their business!  I scanned some old photos so I'll share that story with you in a later post.

 And three more deer that my dad hunted. He loves those and the home I grew up in always had these proud trophies.

We did quite a bit of fishing! Mark loves to fish and I have fond memories of early morning fishing with my dad when I was little, so it was inevitable that we pulled a few 4:30 a.m. mornings to head out on the lake at sunrise to score some bass.

This was Mark's first fish, a bluegill, and I thought it was so small and cute that I had him pose for a picture. He threw that one back but he continued on to catch three more fish that day, and a few the following day.

 Then I had a nice strike on my line and pulled in this little bully. Check out the size of my lure in contrast to the size of the fish! Greedy little thing. He went back in the water too.

And then the following day was my day. I caught 4 fish that day and kept three of them for a fish fry!

There's something about catching and foraging your own food that makes me feel so proud.

 Later in the week Dad treated us to dinner and a show on the Branson Bell Lake Cruise. It was good in that cheesey talent-show kind of way. The food was...pardon me...awful though and I only ate enough to make the hungries go away. I guess I shouldn't have expected too much.

 Since the showboat was rated-G with cheese, and the food was sub par, AND it was a dry ship (no adult beverages), we stopped at the store to pick up some margarita mix for after the show. While perusing the isles I found this stuff! No I did not buy it--hello 50% alcohol! I liked that it was bottled in mason jars though. I'm a sucker for cute stuff sometimes.

 We got up early on Memorial Day to go blueberry picking. This was my chosen activity and Dad went along with it. Funny, he wasn't too thrilled to stand in the hot sun and pick berries, but once home and in the air conditioning again, he repeated throughout the day that he thinks he'll go back and stock up on blueberries for the freezer.

 They were cheap! $2 a POUND. All three of our buckets totaled only 6 bucks.

 And we wrapped up our trip with some epic water sports. This tube is the same tube we used when I was 10 years old, with maybe a new rubber tire inside. Tubing was the highlight of family vacations back in the day and my brother and I would fight about who got to go tubing first and who had a longer turn and so on and so forth. Ya, we bickered quite a bit.

It was a beautifully relaxing vacation with a few activities but nothing stressful or pressing on the schedule. I enjoyed seeing my dad immensely and I can't wait to get back to the lake house and spend some more time on the water!

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Table Rock Lake Adventures and Recklessness

We're back from our Missouri adventures! It's always good to be home, sleep in your own bed, and eat your own food, but I do miss my dad and the luxury of sleeping in and waking up to coffee already made and sunshine calling my name.

I thought I would recap some of the highlights of our trip, starting with the night before we left and wrapping up with the day we spent together with my dad and my brother.

Mark and I really looked forward to this vacation. He needed it even more than I did, and I badly needed to get away and relax. So after packing our bags and having all things prepped for the early morning departure, we headed out to one of our favorite stops in West Seattle, Prost, for a frothy brew. We enjoyed unwinding together and discussing all the things we hoped to do on our upcoming trip. And by 10 p.m. we were in bed with the alarm set to go off at 3:45.

Travel to Missouri wasn't too bad. We had a layover in Denver. There are no direct flights from Seattle to Branson, Missouri and I personally think they should get at least one. We weren't the ONLY ones in Seattle headed to Branson. I think.

Dad picked us up from the airport and we greeted my brother (lives in Seattle, but visited with Dad the week before) and then we started the hour drive back to his lake house. He toured us through the actual town of Branson, so we could see the tornado damage as well as the sites that are left that the tornado didn't take with it. It was quite shocking to see how much damage was really done. If I remember correctly, 13 people died in that tornado. The town is set on top of a rather high hill or small mountain, obviously for the views from the hotels and whatnot, and my dad told us that nearly every hotel in Branson was hit or affected in some way or another. We saw the back end of one hotel just brought down to the ground and debris still hanging off the sides of it. Others were STILL missing roofs and it didn't look like much construction was happening to repair or put the town back together. I asked Dad about this and he said its because to hire outside crews to come in and fix the town, they need hotels, and most of the hotels are out of commission. The few hotels that were getting pieced back together were big name ones like Holiday Inn and Days Inn, but the little family owned places looked like they were hit yesterday.

We also met Dad's neighbor, Bev, and like I told you, I fell in love with her instantly. She welcomed us with big hugs and lots of questions, as well as authentic Cajun dinner made with love.

The next day was the big day. It was the only full day that we'd all be together as my brother, Kyle, planned to fly out the following afternoon. We headed out on the boat around 11:30 to go pick up the rented jet ski.

It was also my first time on my dad's new boat, which he named after me. 

The S.S. Sweet Pea (my childhood nickname.)

 Mark learned to drive the boat right away. And Kyle took the first turn on the jet ski.

 I forgot to mention that we packed that boat with enough beer and liquor to open a bar.  Or rather, my brother and dad packed the boat with enough beer and liquor to open a bar. I later learned how much alcohol was readily available. (Next time, I think I'll pack the cooler.)

This is my brother. Wearing a cowboy hat. (He's a hippy, not a cowboy, but he told me hippies can wear whatever they want. Apparently they can have mohawks too. But you don't know that because of the hat.) Check out the triceps on that boy! I asked him what he does.

Answer: Yoga. 

Brat.

 He had about 30 minutes on the jet ski and then he handed it over to Mark and me. Well, first Mark had some fun on it, and then I joined him, but I don't have any good pics of just him driving. And I was scared to drive it on my own. Thank you, honey, for driving for me! After warming up to the speed, we opened it up and maxed out at 57 miles per hour. I decided I like jet skis.

 It was HOT out, and we took sporadic dips in the water to cool off.

And of course Dad had to have a turn! He drove like a pro. I guess it was all those ambulance and fire truck driving years that helped him turn sharp corners and make the biggest splashes.

Funny thing though, we lost dad. Let me back up. This lake is HUGE with lots of "fingers" of the lake to explore and they sort of all look the same. If you can imagine 760,000 acres of water, 857 miles of shoreline,  200 feet deep at its deepest spot, and on my dad's depth gauge we averaged 70 feet deep.

So anyway, Dad told us to head to Kimberling, a specific dock about 15 minutes up the lake. We took off knowing the jet ski was faster and that Dad would follow us or lead us while he zipped along.

And apparently he's losing some of his eyesight, because he lost us, got turned around, and couldn't figure out which way was the right way. He won't admit it, but I think it was the beer.

We did finally realize Dad was nowhere to be found and we turned around looking for him, pulling up to strangers and asking if they'd seen a jet ski, and finally we found him almost exactly where we left him.

After all that confusion we decided to do some cliff jumping instead. Because that's a logical thing to do while drinking, right? If you haven't figured it out yet, I was the DD.

 Mark munched on a sandwich, and then he and Kyle headed up to the cliffs to jump. I hopped on the jet ski to capture photos.

 Kyle went first and jumped like a monkey!

 And Mark went second. He jumped well, but my camera took a second too long to capture it. And he refused to jump again.

And if you thought that wasn't reckless enough, read on. Those idots blood related relatives managed to drink ALL THE BEER. And we all wanted one more. So we sent Kyle out on the jet ski to do a beer run back to the house. Home wasn't far.

Mark, Dad, and me hung out on the rocky shore with some fishing poles until Kyle returned. This beach was very rocky. In fact, the whole lake is. Because it is a former mountain range that was flooded at the mouth of the White River. So nice sandy beaches don't really exist.

Why is that relevant?

Well, Kyle was...not sober. And he is a rather adventurous soul. And he thought it would be fun to make a huge splash wave and get the three of us wet with lake water as he pulled up. 

In order to make a big splash, the jet ski has to be going pretty fast. And he...miscalculated,  and instead of splashing me, he lost control and nearly ran me over, running the jet ski 10 feet onto shore, nearly hitting a tree!

He was so shocked he didn't know what to do other than jump off the thing, so I yelled him to turn the motor off, so it didn't grind up rocks, and then we all looked at Dad. Terrified.

He was silent for what seemed like an eternity, and then he busted out laughing!

The sigh of relief coming from the three of us was audible across the lake. 

Kyle was still obviously mortified, but thankfully he wasn't injured at all--not a scratch-- and we couldn't help but pose for a family Christmas photo or something. Oddly enough, this is the only photo taken of all three of us on this trip. What does that say about us? Wait--don't answer that.

 Dad was still loving how funny it was that Kyle drove that thing into the forest, especially since it was a rental and not his own machine. The damage fee on the jet ski was very minimal and was easily taken care of back at the dock. He laughed all the way home.

 Kyle managed to scrape and then shake all the rocks out of the engine so we didn't grind anything up, thank GOD. That thing was sure heavy though. We tried carrying it back into the water to try not to scrape it up further, but it must have weighed 800 pounds. Dragging it was all we could manage.

 That accident helped all of realize we needed to call it a day, you know, for safety's sake, so we headed back in to the house.

 Mark (not drunk!) drove the boat, and I drove the jet ski back to the rental dock. 

Not pictured was while Dad turned over the keys to the jet ski, my brother picked me up in a bearhug and tumbled into the fuel-filled water right next to the gas pump. After climbing out, he went for Mark too, but Mark (again, not drunk!) easily sidestepped Kyle and thwarted Kyle's efforts to dunk him too.

We headed home and enjoyed Bev's cajun meal that night, and the biological relatives all passed out around 7 p.m. after that hard day of play.

It was a fun day, but Mark couldn't stop thinking how dangerous we were, and what we can do next time to be more active in ensuring everyone's safety while enjoying adult beverages. We were very fortunate.

I'll be back soon with the rest of the week's updates. Those will be shorter, I promise. Day one was the big highlight of the trip and it deserved a true play-by-play. If you're still reading, thank you, and I promise you that we all learned from our reckless mistakes and will definitely do things differently next time.

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