Goodbye Aquila, hello Brushy Creek.

Well my four-day trip back north in mid-February (to close on the house) was jammed packed with lots of memorable (and some I'd much prefer to forget) stories. There was a lot white stuff everywhere.
There was so much to do—while closing out our bank accounts, our junior lackey bank boy couldn't get it threw his thick skull that my name was NOT Karen Williams. He insisted that I transfered funds from my Equiline of credit and that my closing balance was $14,100. I told him five times that I didn't have that much money; that he was off by at least 12 grand. I couldn't possibly accept the cashier's check. Finally his manager intervened; he found the mistake and corrected it. We were betting by the time we got to the car, this poor dude was toast. That evening I managed to squeeze in a small birthday party for Bob and Rochelle. After this picture was taken Rochelle took it upon herself to flip the numbers, which really worked to her advantage. And not so much for Bob. Ha.

The next day (Thursday) was a mad scramble. We had to finish packing the U-Haul trailer and clean up the house as the walk-through was first thing Friday morning, followed by the closing. We already had a I-Pod filled to the brim so we were hoping we could get away with a smaller trailer. NOT. I was still frantically packing up at 9 pm that night (the cleaning had not begun yet) when Bob announced that he needed the next bigger sized trailer. At this point, U-Haul was closed so I made a frantic call to our realtor to let him know that we'd be using the garage as a staging area for all boxes and that he needed to let the buyer know the situation. I was just sick at this point. At the same time, we were dumping crap we didn't want into a bagster out on the driveway. Stuff like old mattresses, wood with nails sticking out—all sorts of junk. The bagster guys were supposed to stop by in the am. We also had a queen size mattress that was too big for the bagster, so Bob stuck it near the curb praying he could bribe the garagemen in the morning to haul it away (it worked—$20 is all it took). Needless to say, the place wasn't looking too pretty and we were supposed to be out of there by 8 am Friday morning. I was more stressed than I was going to Kaz and that's saying a lot. By 11 pm, Garrett and I were exhausted and he still had school tomorrow. So Bob kindly drove us to a nearby hotel to get some shut-eye while he finished packing and deep cleaning the place. Yikes. We were on the highway going at 60 mph when all of a sudden a car pulls up beside us and starts pointing to the back of our trailer. Turns out the bagster (with all the crap in it) somehow hooked onto the trailer and we were dragging this thing behind us. All that remained in the bag was a couple of wood planks. EVERYTHING else was strewn about the highway—Garrett's mattress, the wood with nails and other hazardous stuff. It was pitch black and who knows if we caused an accident or something. Bob immediately called 911 and luckily another driver called it in and there was already police on the scene. On the way home, Bob saw the clean-up crew. Next morning, we found a stream of trash, starting from our house to the length of the freeway (approximately 6 blocks worth). It sounds like a funny story now but at the time I did not see the humor at all. Fortunately, at the closing, the buyer was the nicest, most laid back guy you'd ever want to meet. I couldn't thank him enough. After unloading and loading all our stuff into the new trailer, we weren't out of there until 3:30 pm. In-between all of this, we hosted a "going away" party for Garrett's class. This triggered a lot of emotions for me because it was the orphanage goodbye party all over again. While taking these pictures I became a babbling fool.
The kids asked Garrett a lot of questions.
Then it was time for yummy cupcakes and milk.



Of course, there has to be the class picture.

And goodbye to one of the sweetest teachers on this planet, Mrs. Julie Scroggins. Goodbye Aquila Primary, we'll miss you—and hello Brushy Creek Elementary (taken just four days later).Time for a new chapter—the saga continues, so please stay tuned.