Saying goodbye

I finally am able to get online so I am going to try to go back a few days and "catch up"



Thurday June 11th
Thursday comes and we realize we have wwaaayy to much crap! We filled a 24 foot trailer and a 14 foot trailer and thats not enough! We either need to leave a LOT behind..or we need to find a way to get it down to Texas. SO..my amazing Uncle Jeff volunteered to drive a Uhaul down for us! =) VERY nice of him, way above and beyond "Uncle" responsibility..but thats just how he rolls =) So my sissy Sherry put in a call to her peeps and got us a 24 foot truck..yes I just said a 24 FOOT TRUCK! and worse yet WE FILLED IT! Crazy! It really is amazing how much stuff you can accumulate over 11 1/2 years..and yeah I had way more stamping/scrapbooking stuff than I thought, or than one person could probably ever use in a lifetime..i'll only admit that once, please do not refer back to this page! =)

So with the help of MANY we got everything packed and almost ready to head down, but one more trip around the house by myself before we go.. I walk down to the mail box and start my walk back ..goodbye to my Annie banannie buried under the big Oak out in front of the pond, I hope the Hosta blooms beautifully again this year.. walk around the pond to the the spot where my kids love to throw rocks in and think about how much work it was to get the pond looking as nice as it did, alot of love and sweat into each and everyone of those rocks..right behind me is the tree's that have grown so much since Darren planted them so many years ago in the late fall as it was snowing on him, freezing his little butt off..looking toward the house..the house that my husband and his father worked for so many months together building, the house that we made our home..then to the flower garden, the garden that my Mom and I made together, we tore out the sod, struggled with the edging! and layed the black dirt and bought flowers, we searched high and low for the perfect water fountain for the garden and DID finally find it.. two cherubs pouring water out of a bucket, then when Madi was about 2 she became part of the gardening crew. The year Mom passed I didn't really have a desire to plant my garden, we always went to the green barn together and did the entire thing together, I put it off and put it off and then one day I walked out the front door and my garden was FULL of flowers! FULL! They grew to be thicker and prettier than I could ever have planted them! It was AMAZING! SoI looked up and said..Ok Mom, point taken, you planted them so I guess I will weed them..so we gardened yet another year together =) and then I look to the porch, the hammock swing that I LOVE to sit in and look out at the garden and the pond, it's amazingly relaxing, that too I bought with my Mom at the Home and Garden show. I walk around the back of the house, down the hill the kids slide down, it's little but it was their hill, the hill that Jase learned to ride his bike on, then 20 minutes later was doing wheelies! . ..to the fire pit and the playhouse and to the garden I planted for my first time last year with the help of my wonderful neighbors that I could have never done it with out them..not sure I ever will again, my thumb is NOT green that's for sure =( walk back behind the garden onto Darren's little "back yard track" not very big bit it did the job. Then to the back of the pole barn where Sharlene and Nicks wedding pictures were taken, Sharlene said to me that she never knew how beautiful it was back there until we did her pictures. I hope the new owners take the time to check out the beauty. OK, time to head back up front..as I walk i glance to my right, across the grape vineyard that will be beautiful one day to the house where that little boy Cody lives, not so little anymore..16 as a matter of fact! my heart aches as I think about my 'other" son who's Dad is leaving for Afghanistan soon and now we are leaving him too..I'm sorry Cody. I try to swallow the lump in my throat as I continue on past the ginormous deck that Danny Darren and Wayne built that has held many family BBQ's. Always a great time. As I say my goodbye's to this amazing place I called home, I remember all the wonderful memories that this house holds, and try to remember that I can take them with me. The house I will never forget and yet my youngest two may never remember. I think back to the day Darren and I decided that Texas was our dream, the day we bought our land, the day I went for the first time to"check it out" and how amazing it was..but now it's a reality..am I ready for this?? I am excited to be a Texan! ..yet so very sad to say goodbye Minnesota and all the people and memories it holds.