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| tulips next-door to The Brown Bungalow |
Oh my goodness, have I got news to report to you today! It's been so exciting around here, which is why my blogging has been infrequent and relatively brief.
But this week the time came to share the latest with my public, beginning with our immediate family, then my co-workers, and also you, my readers.
Yesterday I called a Staff Meeting in the basement of The Brown Bungalow, emphasizing that attendance was mandatory. Mrs Berniece Mertz offered to make brownies and fill a punch bowl for the occasion, although she had no idea why the meeting had been called. But I asked her to not go to the effort. We would have serious work to do immediately after The Announcement and refreshments would just slow us down.
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| my Staff and friends |
Once everyone had collected on top of the sewing tables in the lower level of The Brown Bungalow and I could get their undivided attention (no easy feat with some of these characters!), I cleared my throat and told them that our days at The Brown Bungalow were nearing an end.
Poor Mandy Sue, terribly sensitive as she is, nearly passed out, fearing they were all being laid off and would shortly find themselves jobless and homeless. Mrs. Berniece Mertz, who has been around the block a few times in her life patted the hand of the younger one in a reassuring manner, urging her to not fear the worst until they had heard me out.
Unruffled, I paused until that little scene had settled down and continued with what I had to say.
The time has come for Grandad and me to relocate away from our mountain home in Whistlestop to a near-beach resort that will put us in closer proximity to our multitude of grandchildren, none of whom live any closer than 1,457.5 miles (give or take a quarter of a mile), and some of them live another 431.9 miles beyond that!
We are moving to a location that can more easily and inexpensively accommodate the visits of all those grandchildren (and their parents, of course), as well as all of our staff.....
And with that clarification I was suddenly deafened with (to quote Surfer Girl) the giggles and squeals of my staff. My control of the meeting was lost thereafter.
Jumping up and down, high-fiving each other with delighted laughter -- not a one was disappointed to realize we are all going to take leave of the land of freezing snow blizzards and short summers to a place of palm trees, ocean waves, and sandals! Yes, we are moving to the Land of Flip Flops!!
Eventually I was able to make myself heard and could explain the course of action we needed to take next. I rather dreaded this part because I knew they all wanted to pick the choicest seats in my Ford to make the trip. But due to the large number of our staff and the myriad of other items that will need to go in the car, none of them can travel in that manner.
Practicality usually wins out with me and in this circumstance especially. All of the staff will need to be packed away so they can travel via moving boxes. So although that pronouncement damped their spirits a bit, Mandy Sue did herself proud by presenting herself at the front of the line to get packed away.
She asked me to draw the shape of her little rag doll body on the packing paper, and then she carefully placed herself on top of it and submitted to the gentle folding of paper all around her and got tucked into the moving box.
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| Mandy Sue submits to the packing paper |
With her winning spirit of cooperation, the remaining members did the same. Not everybody could fit in the same box, but true to my spirit of compulsive organization, their names have been listed on a spread sheet so I know the box number of each doll and can retrieve them easily at the other end of this move.
(you understand, of course, that at times I take liberties with the truth for the sake of literary fun .. I know which boxes contain dolls and I'll just leave it at that -smile)
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| some of the packed boxes |
Amid the Internet research of available properties, email correspondence with our realtors on both ends of this venture, a house-hunting trip, and communications with family and friends, the boxes will gradually get assembled in an orderly fashion.
There is also a hefty amount of purging and preserving. We dispose of the unnecessary and keep the precious -- which is no easy task.
In my teen years, before one of my family's cross country moves, I wanted to take my stack of teen magazines. The Cook on Fifth Street taught me the diligence of taking only what is needed and not waste our money to move items of no value. She suggested directed me to clip out the articles I wanted to preserve and throw away the rest of the magazines. It was a good lesson that has served me well.
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| entry hall of The Brown Bungalow |
Our current home is not on the market as we have some details to work out first. We are hopeful this can be a house-to-house move.
Because I have many demands on my time during this season of change, I want my readers to know my blog posts will probably be infrequent. I will read your blogs as time allows and make comments when I can.
At the other end of things I plan to reappear and share pictures of the changes that have taken place.
Fare thee well for now.
P.S. Yes, this is all true, even though I have shared it with whimsey.
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