On the home front

As we anticipated our period of missionary service, one of the conversations with our family was what to do with our home while we were gone. We have friends in the neighborhood who could check on it and help maintain the yard if needed; and it was nice to know our children were not far away.

At some point, the idea of having our son Matt and his wife Jenna move into the home came up. They have been fixing up an older home in Spanish Fork, and have done many wonderful things to increase its value. But they were also feeling it might be time the right for a transition. If they were able to sell that home and move into ours, they would have a year and a half to save more money (not paying a mortgage) for their next home; and we would have the benefit of our house being watched over and cared for. As we talked more about the idea, both they and we felt very positive about the arrangement. So they put their house on the market, and we began to anticipate having them move in with us.

Phase 1 was for us to make room in our house for a new family to join us! They decided to get rid of much of their furniture (sofas, kitchen table, etc.); but they still had a house-full of other things. So we took over one of the spare bedrooms in the basement and started filling it with furniture, boxed-up clothing, etc. It's been good for us to go through all our "stuff" again and do more sorting; we've given away a lot of things to family and friends, made lots of trips to Deseret Industries, and tossed a bunch into the trash. Bonnie was stunned to go through the kitchen pantry and see how much out-of-date food we had that just had to be disposed of. But in general this was good for us, to go through everything and keep out only the things we needed for the mission, along with the minimal amount of things to live on for the next six weeks at home.

We also donated half of the garage, and another of the spare downstairs bedrooms, for Matt & Jenna's storage. They had the luxury of gradually moving a good portion of their stuff instead of doing it all at once, which made their ultimate moving day easier. They were able to empty out much of their home in order to "stage" it more appropriately for sale. The work they had done over the past few years to fix up the home up paid off, and they soon had an offer that returned them a very good profit on their time there. Closing was set for the end of August, so we were overjoyed to look forward to an "overlap" of more than a month.

Final moving day was Saturday August 24. With all the preparation work Matt & Jenna had done, we didn't even need to invoke the Elders Quorum Moving Service; Matt and I took care of the bulky stuff using just my pickup and a rented trailer. It went very well; no injuries, no significant damage to property.

So now Bonnie and I will live in the spare bedroom in the basement for the last month before our mission. It's good practice for us, anticipating the changes to come for the next year and a half! And meanwhile, we have the joy of sharing our home with two darling grandchildren, two additional dogs, and two wonderful parents of the children and dogs!