Ok, so if you are wondering why a fifty year old woman would change her blog background to Tonka trucks, well that's what is going on in our lives just now. We are paying lots of $$$$ to play with Tonka trucks on our property.
Actually, about three years ago, children began to leave our home at warp-speed. Rachel and Wesley began college four years ago. The next year, Mason was added to the mix. And then last year Jordie began her freshman year. My strategy at the time was to quickly move some of my own junk in their rooms as soon as they moved out and therefore claim the territory as my own, hoping to block their return at a future point in time.
About a year and a half ago, we had to move Tom's parents here from their home in NC due to aging issues...specifically bumping into other people when they drove their car. And that was just Grandma. Grampa had his license confiscated by the MD a couple of years earlier, but we were suspect that he might have actually been "sneaking" and driving just a "little bit"!
This transition made us rethink some decisions we had previously made regarding staying in our present home versus building a new home. We have a modest older home in which we had utilized every square inch, converting the basement into much needed bedrooms, children's den, LARGE bathroom and laundry room. So about the time we got everything completed, creating six bedrooms and three baths, everyone (except Clara Beth) moved out!
I wanted my basement back....for covered parking. I wanted a larger living area upstairs as all the children are MUCH larger now and usually are accompanied by friends and/or spouses! I wanted my laundry room upstairs. I didn't need six bedrooms. In fact, having six bedrooms encourages one to collect or hang on to more "junk".
So, we are doing our part to boost the economy by building a new place. Space-wise, other than losing Tom's "warehouse/workshop/junk-catcher" in the back yard, we will have about the same amount of living space. Just larger living/family areas and less, but larger bedrooms. And a laundry room and garage on the main level.
Now all I have to do is get rid of approximately 2500 square feet of junk in the warehouse and playhouse. And a couple of bedroom's worth of furniture. And about 54,134 homeschool books. (Anybody need 4 years of Latin curriculum?" And about 67,324 yards of material for "all those quilts I was going to make". And about 548 boxes of baby/kids clothes. And about $3,854 worth of "Creative Memories" scrapbooking stuff that I used to complete maybe 4 scrapbooks. And about 784 Beanie Babies that were going to be worth millions of dollars. And about enough Christmas decorations to decorate the entire city of Birmingham. And about.......you name it, we probably have it....and alot of it times eight(one for each member of the family!) And about 789,678 other various items that I might "need" some day.
Sigh.......
On a positive note, I have sold about 15 homeschool books on E-bay. At this rate, I'll be done in about 40 years.
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