What makes unpacking a house similar to Christmas?

You never know what you are going to unwrap when unpacking boxes labeled 'breakables' and 'knick knacks.'  

Yesterday I found sea shell after sea shell and other treasured collectibles that had so many memories attached to them. This has truly been the highlight of unpacking. Remembering much of my past in these object. I am nearly done with the un-boxing and I almost don't want to see an end to it. Every little item boxed up has an event and memory I treasure. It is the memory behind it that makes it more special than the object itself, ho

wever ugly or knarled it may be. 

Yesterday, I came accross this small, tan, and ugly donkey statue  that my Mother once had in her bathroom and that previously used to belong to our Lake Burton house. No one else had wanted this donkey when Mom's siblings divided the possessions among themselves after the lake house sold. Mom reluctantly took it home with her remembering that it used to be hers. She came to find out that Dad really liked it, so we kept it in o

ur living room for the longest time until Mom decided to put it in her bathroom.

Since then, there have been so many memories attached to this donkey, but the most memorable one happened when Hannah was just learning to use the potty...

Hannah was 2 or 2 1/2 years old. Because Mom showed her how to use the potty in her bathroom and because that was where

 her step stool was, she only used Mom's bathroom. One day Hannah was needing to use the bathroom and had run to the the toilet, but came running back sobbing and shouting out, "Mommy, he is looking at me." Hannah took Mom's hand and led her to the bathroom pointing emphatically to the donkey statue that was posing by the sink and facing the direction of the toilet with that whimsical smile on his face. Thinking that Hannah was merely scared of the donkey,  Mom removed him from the bathroom momentarily while Hannah was in the bathroom and placed it back where it was when Ha

nnah had finished washing her hands.

This went on for a couple of weeks. One day, Mom happened to be in her bathroom cleaning or taking out the laundry from the hamper, when she noticed the donkey was turned with its face to the wall. Hannah must have had to use the bathroom so bad that she couldn't wait for Mom to take Donkey away from the room so she turned it around instead. What we had all mistakenly thought of as a fear of the donkey itself, was really just the need for privacy. For several weeks Mom had grown accustomed to seeing the donkey faced away from the toilet and often would forget to shift it back to its original position. Then Hannah grew out of her ways and the donkey was forgotten and later put among a pile of give-aways in the hallway. In memory of Hannah and the donkey, I couldn't resist and adopted him as my own. 

Truly a Miracle

Now that I have a little bit more time to relax, let me tell you what has happened in my life recently.  

Wednesday, October 15, 2008 started out like most days for me. 

We had our friend Jake over for dinner the night before and he had asked about the apartment for rent of which the sign at the top of our drive was announcing. I knew it wasn't one of our apartments in our complex. So I told him I hadn't a clue. 

On Wednesday, I told him I would call and ask for him. His friend needed an apartment that was affordable and that was a little more private than the one she is living in now. I called and found out it was $450 a month and a $200 deposit. I was shocked at this information. Surely she would be able to afford that! I began to get excited for her, hoping I would be her neighbor. I relayed the information to Jake and left it at that. The next day, I found out that she wasn't interested, but I thought maybe I could take a peak at the apartments just for curiosity sake. I called the owner and asked more detailed questions. "How many bedrooms?" was my only curiosity about the apartment for rent. She told me there are really two apartments with two bedrooms, one is a cottage and one in the complex and they are both the same price and deposit. I set up an appointment for the next day to see both of them. I thought about our friend Keith and how he has been wanting to move into a more private apartment. I knew that the cottage would be of interest to him. 

Friday, October 17, I met with Helen Henson and saw the complex apartment and was in shock that for two bedrooms, a bigger kitchen than ours, a sun room, dining room, living room, screen porch, and washer and dryer it was still only $450 a month. And still just a $200 deposit. Even though I was in awe, I knew it wasn't for us. And that is how I was going to view it, no more, no less. The cottage came next. It was just two bedrooms, a screen porch, kitchen, and living room area attached to kitchen. Nothing big, nothing fancy, but cozy. Just a tad bigger than our apartment. I went home and relayed the information to Nathan. Keith had already set up an appointment with Helen and was going to see both as well around 5:00. Nathan told me, "let take the big one." He didn't have to see it to know he wanted it. I had already asked the lady about cats and found out she didn't want animals in her apartments. I decided not to tell this to Nathan and called the lady up. I asked her if I could please pay a pet deposit on top of the $200, because my husband really wanted the apartment but would be broken without the cats. After thinking it over, she told me we could keep the cats and only pay the $200 deposit. Nathan saw the apartment, didn't say anything about wanting it, and went on to the cottage and spoke with Keith. Keith was taking the cottage. I was so happy I could cry. I was getting a dear friend for a neighbor as well. When we got to Helen's house, Nathan spoke up, "We'll take it." I quickly replied to him, "really?!?" My excitement overflowed. Tears were unstoppable at this point. On our walk to the car, I do believe a tear escaped. We talked it all over on our way to Cashiers for the weekend.

Saturday October 18, we paid the deposit and started packing some of my knick knacks. Monday and Tuesday all our possessions except our bed and cleaning solutions were moved. Wednesday we were officially living in our new apartment. This was a miracle that it even happened. Truly a miracle. Nathan and I had always planned that he would have to get a better job in order to be able to live in a bigger apartment. Never did we think we could get a bigger apartment with a second room on what we make now. And with a second room, we can have guests, a baby one day and still have room for another baby another time. There are two rooms right now, but our sun room will convert into a bedroom as soon as we can get rid of one of the sofas in our apartment one day. It belong with the apartment. I am going to ask if I may buy it from her. If that happens, then I will trade it at a thrift store for a chair. God has provided us a miracle that I never dreamed would happen. And it only took three days to get moved into our new home. Though it is new to us, the apartment complex is an old old building built in 1929. It was built with cement walls and floors. No need to worry about termites. We went from having one window and a sliding glass door, to having 27 windows. Literally, I am counting my blessings one by one. I was happy with where I was and saw no need for another place for a long time, and here I am sitting in a miracle that happened in our lives. I call it a miracle and that is what it is. Truly a miracle!

Busy!

Well, we are moving! Up the driveway to a bigger complex where we live on the third floor. Well depending on which side you look at. On the one side, we are the third floor, but on the other side, our entrance is up one flight of stairs and on the second floor. Because of a bank on one side, we are the second floor up through the entrance. I will be very busy for the next couple of weeks.

Sorry...

I know I haven't been updating as often as I should. Lately I haven't had much happen in my life. I applied for three jobs at the Macon County Library, haven't heard from them yet. I will be applying for a job at a  bank as soon as they post the job on their website. I know it is available through a friend who works there, but I just haven't seen it on the website yet and online is the only way to apply. Besides that, I don't really have much to talk about here. So I am sorry you don't have an interesting update. I have been cooking, cleaning, eating, making sure Nathan eats only the good stuff, finding ways to preoccupy myself now that I am not working at the chocolate store. They aren't doing a lot of business. I do struggle to find things to do all the time. I can't read all day, and I can't clean all day either. And there is no driving if I don't have a licence. If I get one of the four available jobs, I will go ahead and take the test and put my name on Nathan's insurance and start driving Nathan's car myself since he doesn't use it. He carpools with a friend and saves gas. Well that is really all that I have to say right now. I wish there was more for me to write about. 

well I am hungry. When I am inspired to write something I will do so, until then, this is it!