Bittersweet

And I'm not talking about chocolate (surprise considering how much I've eaten lately....anywhooooo).

Today we closed on the sale of our house. It is surreal. And actually was quite bittersweet which TOTALLY threw me for a loop (since I am loopy anyway, I felt right at home ;-)!) I was not expecting to feel the mixture of emotions I did today while driving the 3+ hours to sign the papers. Here are just a few fond (and some not so fond yet funny now) experiences that I recall as I reminisce our time spent here:

**First real world move we made after Sage graduated

**First real world job

**A nice rental that we were SO lucky to find

**A rainy day when our car wouldn't start when we were supposed to leave town and I was BAWLING and upset when Sage came home so we went out to eat at a restaurant that came highly recommended. So we show up "as is" and I mean me in my sweats, and should've taken one look at the menu or anyone inside and walked right out. Apparently it is one of those *nice* restaurants that you dress up to go too. Oh, well. We ate there anyway with toddler in tow.

**Sheriff at our back door knocking after an awful night with sick kids and I had FINALLY gotten down for a nap

**SWAT team in our home, night spent at Branch President's home with screaming baby who we almost took to ER.

**suicidal neighbor (hence SWAT team)

**driving back and forth and back and forth AND back and forth

**Bought our first house

**SURPRISE positive pregnancy test!

**LONG work hours for Sage.....four on, four off, 12 hour shifts but Sage gone for over 15 hours

**Pilot and Houdini our kitties who disappeared after touching our lives for a short time

**Babe and Dotty the neighbors dogs (aka our lawn fertilizers)

**trips back and forth, back and forth, back AND forth

**Surprise visit from a friend after I had Aubrey with a pair of matching nice snuggly socks for Aubrey and I

**cooked meals brought to us

**Hanging out at our friends' houses

**wild turkey kabobs

**elk stew

**church in a triple wide

**brand new church

**relief society presidency

**driving back and forth, back and forth, back and forth

**baby shower thrown for me (and Aubrey) when it was -18 degrees outside and there was still a good turn out

**many nights rocking my babies

**the sound of the train at night

**fireworks from the neighbors all night long

**smell of new house I LOVED until I was sick with morning sickness

**trips back and forth, back and forth, back and forth

**taking Kyle to the Frosty Freeze for ice cream

**malts at the Prospector

**meals at The Country Skillet

**drives in the mountains

**fires that shut down the mine a few days

**watching the fires

**driving back and forth, back and forth, back and forth

**visits from family members

**bought our first car AND first truck together

**selling our house

**driving back and forth, back and forth, back and forth

**many more but I think that will do for today =)

Fill in the Blank

I was not really sure exactly how to title this post as there are too many options floating in my brain. Here's what we've come up with:

Homeless and Happy
If You're Happy and You Know It
Born Free
Going, Going, Gone
Home Sweet Homeless
Where the Streets Have No Names

Well, you get the picture and to help get the picture a bit more.....um, well, here's a picture!



Except instead of "sale pending" it should now read SOLD!!!

A Month of Many Firsts

The month of September has been a time of many "firsts" for us. Of course, of highest importance was our first decent offer on our house which ultimately will lead to our first home sale! WOOT WOOT!

Another first was Kyle starting Hand 'n Hand Preschool at the local Lutheran church. His teachers are Miss Allison and Miss Renee and he loves it! He goes Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for two hours in the afternoon.


Both girls also started their first year of dance--tiny tots tap and ballet. TOO cute!




We weren't planning on starting Olivia this year but when we went to Aubrey's first class and Olivia was doing everything the other girls were, she was invited to join. and since Olivia is so little still, I had to order her leotard on the internet which just arrived but last week she didn't have it hence the "unprofessional" attire. =)

Aubrey does so very well and her teacher says she has great skills. If she were 3, she would be moving up to the next class. I LOVE my little tap ballerinas!

Kyle also started tumbling. Now he can use all his tumbling energy in class and spare the poor couches! LOL! I know I am a proud mommy and sound a bit too braggish but I promise the teacher is very pleased with his skills as well!




And this past Saturday, Sage and I were able to go up into the mountains (just the two of us) and cut some firewood for this winter (our rental has two fireplaces). It was a lot of fun! It's been awhile since we've been alone doing something enjoyable like this and I thoroughly enjoyed it!





We have been blessed beyond imaginable measure!! My heart is continuously full and grateful for the grace and love we are being showered with.

One week and counting......

We close one week from today! I talked to the realtor today and everything seems to be one track. We are just so overly excited (well, at least I am---sure Sage is too---I just seem to be leaking excitement! LOL!) Our rental is still not ready for occupancy due to some cleaning issues that no one knew would be an issue--aka mushrooms growing in the nasty bathroom downstairs that was new just a few years ago. It's not the house's fault just the previous occupants. NASTY but once it is all cleaned up, replaced, etc. all will be good!

The Words I Never Thought I'd Hear

"Hi Sage and Kimberly. This is Mary. I showed the house today and have an offer. Give me a call!"

I couldn't dial fast enough.

There is an older gentleman who had made an offer on a smaller house in the town our house is. It was close to the nursing home where his wife was being cared for. He wanted to live close to her and planned that after she was discharged, they would get a bigger home. She ended up passing away. So he was ready for a bigger house sooner than he expected. So through total miracles....he decided to put an offer on ours. The good things in this whole situation (can't think of too much bad actually):

1)financing should not be a problem for him since he will pay mostly with cash

2)he made a very decent offer and although we will still owe money at closing (about $2-3000) we are okay with that

3)he wants to close on Oct. 8th

4)the rental we want is supposed to be ready Oct. 1

5)I am on top of the world today!

6)this is an amazing day especially after waiting (and sometimes not too patiently) for 18 months for our house to sell

7)the path to this point has been guided even though I have often been blind!

Of course nothing is final yet but this is the best news we have gotten in a LONG time!

The Little (actually Big) Garden that Could (and DID)!

If you've been keeping up with my blog (not all that hard to do you might notice), you will have gone through this journey our precious garden has traveled this growing season.

First it started out with early threat of frost when the plants were just babies:





Then a ravaging hail storm was determined to squish everything in it's path:


This picture doesn't even do justice to the pelting the garden took. The corn was literally shredded, the beans were minus leaves and blossoms and the onions were flat to the ground. I should've taken a picture a few days ago because this garden has done AMAZINGLY well! It has been very well prayed over and our prayers have been answered. We have canned and canned beans (the most important part to us this year). And are now enjoying the corn and potatoes and carrots. We ate many sweet garden peas. It truly has been a miraculous recovery and yield!

Last night the garden faced yet another challenge when the temperature dipped to 28 degrees!







We are SO not ready for the garden to be done yet. And really it fared quite well considering. The leaves on the beans look a bit toasted but the water from the sprinklers did the best job it could and it appears we will have more garden goodies yet! Incredibly, there are still blossoms blooming and beans growing! Thank you Heavenly Father for this wonderful blessing!

Crazy Cousins!

We were lucky to have Debbie and Tyler spend a week with us. Kyle, Aubrey and Olivia love Baby Tyler (Tywer) and Aunt Debbie (Dibbie) (Aubrey's pronunciations).

Kyle and Tyler



Aubrey, Olivia, and Kyle EXTRA happy to be with Tyler



All eight cousins together



I feel so blessed that my children are able to be part of their cousins' lives. They are all such good examples to them and they love their cousins dearly!