6/28/11: S O L D ! ! !

Well, we closed on the house yesterday!!!

We're both VERY relieved and happy and excited and tired.

Both of us have been working very hard to get the house sold.  And now, we're free to move on to the next stage of our lives together.

I must say that it'll take a little getting used to the fact that we're now houseless.  Even though we both knew this was coming, it's hard to prepare for this until it happens.  We have no regrets.  Selling was the right thing to do.  We now have eliminated that anchor, and we're free to hit the road soon.

Terri has been very diligent in preparing the house for market:  keeping it clean and presentable, and making sure we were following through with the suggestions from our realtor.  Also, making sure I was doing the necessary things needed to reach our goal like cutting grass, clearing yard debris, and cleaning windows.

It has been a long and strenuous ordeal. However, we have been blessed with a rather quick sale.  Thanks to all of you for your prayers and support.

We have a few things to take care of, and then we'll take off on our new lifestyle journey.  Hopefully we'll hit the road in a couple of weeks or so.  And now it's time to celebrate!!!

Sunday, 6/26/11: Campfires, Peeps, Wonderful weekend with friends

We've had a few campfires recently in the evenings.  We often like to roast marshmallows.  Unfortunately we had run out of them, so I suggested to Terri that maybe we could roast a marshmallow Peep.  I decided I'd pass on it, but Terri tried it.  She said it was okay, but regular marshmallows are better.  And, I'm sorry to report that we did have one "casualty" as one of the Peeps fell into the fire and burned up.

Roasting a Peep

A closer look at that Peep

UMMMM, good Peep

Cherry Pie

Last weekend was spent with our friends Paul and Marti.  They drove down in their Journey motor home, arriving late Friday afternoon.  We went out for dinner to a local Mexican restaurant.  Afterward, we came back to our place and spent the evening together talking about our fulltime future and the trials and tribulations of getting there.  Later, we all enjoyed a piece of cherry pie, Paul's favorite, that Terri had baked earlier in the day. 

Saturday, Paul and Marti spent much of the day organizing and putting stuff away in their motorhome.  I went over to our storage unit and worked over there for a while sorting and 

Marti, Tag, and Paul

organizing.  Later, they came over to our place for an excellent spaghetti dinner that Terri had prepared.  Terri and I also set up a small salad bar, and I think we all could have just had that for dinner.  For desert, Paul and Marti brought a delicious fruit tart from Wegmans.  It was a shortbread shell covered with smooth vanilla cream topped with a lot of fruit including blueberries, pineapple, kiwi, strawberries, raspberries, and black berries  Boy was that ever gooooood!!

Sunday morning we had Paul and Marti over for a pancake brunch.  I fixed sausage, bacon, and pancakes.  Everyone must have enjoyed it because there wasn't anything left.  Later Terri and I went over to their place for a mid-afternoon meal.  We had delicious chicken kabobs, macaroni salad, potato salad, and chips.  For desert, Paul had some more cherry pie and Terri, Marti, and I had icecream.  Unfortunately, the weekend went very quickly and they had to head back home.  We all really enjoy spending time time together, and we look forward to seeing them again real soon.

Bye, Bye Paul and Marti, see ya soon...

6/12/11: Weekly update, anniversary dinner and a friendly visitor

Since Monday was our wedding anniversary, we decided to take the day off and not go over to the house.  Instead, we just relaxed and enjoyed the day.  We had a pleasant surprise in the afternoon when we heard a knock on the door.  It was our good friend Paul Dahl.  He stopped in on his way home from work to personally wish us a Happy Anniversary.  We sat outside and chatted for a while, listening and encouraging each other toward our common goal of full timing.  He and Marti are in the final stages of preparation before listing their home for sale.  This is such a stressful time for them, and we know what they're going through.

Later, Terri and I went out for our anniversary dinner.  One of Terri's favorite places to eat is The Cheesecake Factory.  She had been the fortunate beneficiary of a gift card, so it was cheap eats that day. 

I had the Cuban Sandwich which is slow roasted pork, ham, Swiss cheese, pickles, mustard and mayonnaise on a grilled and pressed Cuban-style roll.  For my side, I chose a small green salad with thousand island dressing.

Terri had The Navajo which is warm fry-bread stuffed with grilled chicken, avocado, lettuce, tomato and mayonnaise with a side order of fries.

Of course we HAD to have some cheesecake for desert.

  I had the Vanilla Bean Cheesecake.

Terri had the Chocolate Mousse Cheesecake.

Terri could only eat half of her sandwich, a few fries, and about half of her cheesecake, so she brought the rest home for another tasty meal later on.  I, on the other hand, am a member of the clean plate club!  After dinner, we headed home for a night of TV and internet and a bit of napping too.  This was our first anniversary in our new lifestyle, and it seemed really strange not exchanging cards this year.  Also, I believe this is the first year I didn't give Terri flowers, but we decided that we don't need to do all that now.

The rest of the week was back to the normal routine.  I spent some time at the house and storage unit.  No grass cutting this week, but it will have to be done soon.  Hopefully we'll have more to offer for all of you to read about soon, so stay tuned.

I'll end with a few pictures of our hydrangea in the backyard at our house. 

Enjoy! 

Monday, 6/6/2011: Pearl Anniversary

Thirty years ago today Terri and I were married.  I married the love of my life.  I'm truly blessed to have found her and to have her as my wife.  She is a positive, patient, caring, loving, beautiful, truly wonderful woman.  She gracefully tolerates me and puts up with all of my crap, well most of it anyway.  She keeps me on track and focused.  And, she is the best pie and cookie baker I know.  Thank you, to the one that I love, for thirty wonderful years!!!

Here are some really "old" pictures.  The quality may not be too good as I took digital photos of our wedding pictures to share with all of you.  Click to enlarge and enjoy and have a few laughs...

And now, lets get on with the next 30 !!!

Saturday, 6/4/11: A "see you later", another month, still mowing

Monday morning we walked over to see off our good friends, Jim and Dee.  They're headed north, working their way to Canada for a visit.  The last two weeks with them was absolutely wonderful.  We have a lot of common interests, and our time together was really great.  Terri and I really hated to see them leave, but we know our paths will cross again and we look forward to our next visit with them.  I had good intentions of photographing them as they left the park, but the camera battery was depleted, so no pictures.  The rest of the day was taken up with TV, internet, watching many others leave the park, and relaxing.

Tuesday and Wednesday we were back at the house.  Terri did the laundry and cleaned the house, and I cut the grass. . . again.  It was extremely hot both days and quite miserable, but I got almost all of it done.

Also on Wednesday, we made the decision to stay another month here at the KOA near Ashland, VA.  I had hopes of taking a ten-day trip to northwest Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania.  But we decided to stay put with the hopes of leaving here next month.

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were pretty much the same with more TV, internet, and some more work around the house and at the storage unit.  Both Friday night and Saturday night we had a nice campfire.  I just can't wait to get going from here.  The park is back to almost empty with the steady stream of overnighters.  Our friends, Jim and Dee, have already moved twice since leaving here.  We just keep waiting here for our time to get going.