New Chapters

 When I last updated, we had just signed a contract on our house and were headed into packing up mode.  It was a good feeling to have that part of the process go so seamlessly.  We have sold 3 houses in the past and they have all taken quite awhile and had ups and downs, so to get a buyer that loves the house and offers right away and gives more than we asked??  That was unreal.  We had about 5 weeks to enjoy the last days in our house and get stuff to storage.  We had an inspection the week after we signed, which produced 100+ pages of a report, citing things like the possible inconvenience of our tankless hot water heater being plugged into a garage outlet where the power could go out and the pretty pavers we put at the bottom of the deck steps being a tripping hazard.  Insert eye rolls galore.  We got to work repairing the few things that made sense- changing an outlet, caulking a few things, trimming trees (and about falling out of the ladder because I was stubborn and attempted it alone)- and in the end, the buyers were so easy to work with that they humbly asked for us to do barely anything, including the message that they hoped it wouldn't be a burden while we were busy packing up.  I want to meet them one day because they were so great to work with!

Once we heard they were good with the inspection, we got a storage unit and had 3 weeks to fill it.  It is located at a building very close to our house and even closer to our lot, so the convenience was great.  It's on the second floor, which had me worried, but with the many dollies available and elevator, it was fairly easy to navigate and kind of fun to try to fit everything in like a puzzle.  Of course there were moments of difficulty with Matt and I trying to do the heavy lifting of some of our big furniture.  It's always way too tense for my liking.  We bought a dolly and these straps that let you carry heavy things down stairs, and that proved so helpful in the process.  By choice, we spent the morning of my birthday continuing to move things to storage and taking our big freezer to the Moores' house.  I do like to get things done!  Those few weeks of packing and moving and cleaning held a lot of busyness in any free time I had and a lot of grief too.  I felt a major chapter closing on our lives.  The 9 1/2 years we spent at that house were the bulk of the kids' childhood years.  They held an era of wonderful times with friends, social gatherings hosted, Bible study with my closest friends, yearly summer ice cream parties, countless walks with family and friends and pets, pool days, covid year memories, fun-filled Halloweens in the neighborhood, kids walking or riding bikes to meet friends to play, walking down to Nanny and Pa's, community group dinners, getting to live in the same neighborhood with Jeannie, bringing a baby home to be our little girl...and so on.  So many blessings.  It was a big prayer and dream of mine to live in a place where our family would have friends that we shared lots of life with and God gave me that in abundance.  It was really emotional for me to process giving that up.  

I really hate endings and goodbyes, but it's always okay on the other side, and that's what I've found this time too.  We are adjusting to living at Barnette and Cindy's house.  We have organized and fit our stuff in as best we can, which means a Christmas tree in the living room already, a ton of plants in the dining room, boxes and bags stuffed in all sorts of places, the girls sleeping on double mattresses.  But it works and we have lots to enjoy here.  The lake is beautiful and we are getting lots of literal walks down memory lane, as Matt grew up a stone's throw from this house.  We hope to break ground on the new house this month, but for now, it's been a welcome bit of downtime and it's good to be past the big goodbye.

Some pictures from the last month:

We celebrated Kim's birthday in September with a lunch out for the whole family.

During a tennis match, I snuck over to watch Sawyer get his first high school start on his soccer team.  Being just an intermittent onlooker, this was my view.

As a paid ticket holder weeks later, the view was much better!  Mimi and GG came into town and we enjoyed lunch out with them, then all watched Sawyer play and had dinner at Jeannie's.

Fun at our home away from home-- the storage unit.  The kids have really not been very helpful with the moving process but Allie did accompany me many times to storage and liked to open the lock and push the elevator buttons.  Our low moment was loading a bunch of bunk bed pieces precariously on a dolly and having them fall off the dolly as we went through the doors to the building and again as we went into the elevator. 

Pa took Gray to a prospect day down in Georgia for Young Harris.  Gray liked it a lot and they were impressed with the coach, but the coach never contacted Gray.  He also visited Lincoln Memorial with Matt one day, which is all the way in TN.  He ended up not liking that one as much.  One weekend, Gray went to Guilford in Greensboro and did an overnight visit.  Matt took him there and the next day I picked him up. He liked that one a lot and even asked me to come to the parent tailgate to meet the players and families.  He could have chosen that school and said it felt very comfortable there, but I think he is looking for more of a stretch and it's not in the mountains.

Joshua came home for my birthday and to see the house one last time.  It was so good to see him after a month away.  He answered Matt's greeting of "your mom sure did miss you" with "I didn't really have time to miss you guys much."  He did later inform us that he did not miss being parented and when the girls were arguing, said, "You know what I didn't miss...?"  Julia declared that he was now more like an uncle you see every now and then ("I mean, he's just so far above us now").

Joshua was thrilled to get some fishing in and I was happy to have one family dinner together.  We went to an Italian place on my birthday after church and it was fun to be all together again.

Allie continues to enjoy playing tennis and can even hang with the 10-13 year olds for some of her lessons.

Julia continues to wish I never encouraged/made her do tennis.  She likes the teammates but is not into the sport and doesn't get to play in the matches, which I think initially was a selling point so as not to have to perform for an audience, but has become a downer, feeling like her presence on the team is pointless.  I did get to see her play a neighbor of ours for fun one afternoon.  

We went up at the end of September to see Joshua play in a "green v gold" scrimmage.  It was so great to see him playing so confidently on his new team.  He says he likes everyone on the team and clearly is having a wonderful time living the college life with his teammates.  

After the game, we ran some errands and went to a Japanese place for lunch.  It was a quick visit but a good one.

Meanwhile, the girls had barely slept the night before at a lock-in at church and stayed home to rest.  Allie slept all day till 2:30!

Enjoying the beautiful view at our "for now" home.

Allie's tiny fish she caught on her own.

Addie and Julia enjoying the lake.  It was good to have a friend over and feel like we can still do a lot of the same things here.

Matt and Gray had a busy weekend traveling to Boone to help with Samaritan's Purse in the mountains.  The destruction left by Hurricane Helene sure put my angst about moving into perspective.  We were so thankful that Cheryl and Rick were okay but there is so much work to be done and so many depressing stories we have heard.  Matt and Gray worked moving heavy bags, grills, etc. of donations at a church in Boone.  

Allie and I had a thrift store trip to search for her Mary Poppins costume while Julia worked on learning how to put contacts in at the eye dr.

The highly anticipated Homecoming Dance totally did disappoint.  We spent a long time searching for a dress for Julia and in the end, she borrowed one last minute from Audrey.  She had fun getting ready and hanging out with Addie that day, but the dance itself was poorly attended and low energy, aside from some types of dancing that she said were so bad she couldn't even describe and she and her friends couldn't possibly dance to.  She is very teen girl now and I see so much of my focus at that time in her.  But I am proud of her for being so social and confident enough to go to a dance alone, sure that she'll have plenty of people to hang out with there. She is really loving all the different groups of people she's getting to know at school.

The day after the Boone trip, Matt and Gray headed back out early to go to Gray's first lacrosse tournament of the fall travel season.  

After talking a lot with the Lees-McRae coach and Mars Hill coach and thinking a lot about money and what aspects he liked about each, Gray called up Mars Hill and verbally committed to play there.  We are very happy for him!

I'm at the end of my fall break, which could not have been better timed this year.  We moved over to Durham the Sunday of the first week of my break and I needed every bit of those first few days to clean and finish packing up the house.  Matt had to switch to work Monday night and then worked Wednesday day as well, so he was tired and not very free to work at the house, but thankfully Jeannie and Lisa came one day and Jeannie came back the last day and was such a help to me as we finished the very last of the cleaning, had a cry in the driveway, and left the house for good.  It's been great to have time since then to get settled here in Durham and get adjusted to new routines.  This weekend we will celebrate Emoni and Andre's wedding and Joshua's birthday, so it's a great finish to my break!  New chapters ahead as we make new memories in Durham, watch Gray finish up his high school career, and get this next house built.

See you in September?

Hard to believe the last time I posted was the beginning of July!  Here we are in September and everything over the last month or so is a complete blur.  Maybe these pictures will jog my memory...

We got back from the beach and the boys left the next day with Young Life friends to camp in very upstate New York.

Alden, Joshua, Gray, Sage, Peter, and Will packing into the Musser-mobile

A stop in NYC!!! They drove through the night there and back again at the end of the week and were completely exhausted!!

When asked if it really was the best week of his life (as advertised), Gray's response was, "Um...yes."

Wind surfing was a favorite of the boys. There was also a silent disco, many competitive (and some silly) games they loved, food, a great speaker, lots of outdoors, and fun with friends.  So glad they got to do this.

While the boys were away, the girls and I helped Kim throw a wedding shower for Emoni.  We played some games, decorated little cakes, ate, and enjoyed getting to know Andre's family and Emoni's friend.

And Allie had a birthday!  For the 3rd year in a row, she chose to have her party at the neighborhood pool and wanted an ocean themed cake, snacks, and party favors.  The exact same snacks and party favors, actually.  We did vary those a little;)

Her prized gift from us was a camera.  She promptly used it to record some of her favorite country songs that we are already subjected to on a daily basis, so that she could play them whenever she wants.  Yay.  

Some friends met us at the pool to celebrate.  It was a very chill party as usual and she was happy to just play in the pool and eat.

The next day we took her to Claire's (in her fancy new high heels from Nanny and Pa) to get her ears pierced.  She was very brave and though the nice lady doing the deed seemed to have some early stage of Parkinson's or similar, they turned out just fine and Allie was super excited about it.

The travelers returned totally worn out, with Joshua recovering from a cough and Gray starting one.  

After a few days of work painting, staining, etc. houses/decks, Joshua headed to Rock Hill to spend the weekend with Mimi and GrandGene.  He did a lot of fishing, but caught nothing, plus some eating and game playing.  He loved it and only wished he could stay longer.

Game night at the Moores--always a good time when we play the celebrity name game.

I thought I had better pictures from Julia's beach trip but can't find them right now.  She went with a local church and girls from school to Emerald Isle for their youth annual beach week.  She had a wonderful time and declared it her favorite camp ever.  I think she's starting to have a faith that's more real to her and this week was spiritually fulfilling to her.  Glad she got to go.

My summer, which actually felt like a real summer this year, came to an end and I headed back to work.  Between friends, family, and rec camp, Allie had one more month of fun and being cared for before she had to go back to school.  The boys continued working and Julia's hours at the sportsplex summer camp really picked up, as some of the counselors went back to school and they needed her more.  She ended up loving this job, definitely because she liked working with the kids, but also because she got to know her coworkers and really enjoyed them. 

Annual themed teacher picture-- this year we are a construction crew. This week was such an overwhelming one for me.  Going back to work was fine, but we were all over the place at home...we had been waiting for a loan to come through for building the new house and in the meantime, Matt did some figuring and decided we would be better off selling our house and funding the build that way.  We tossed around a few ideas and even nearly signed a lease on an apartment before settling on waiting till we sold this house to move.  I was completely stressed by getting the house ready to sell and started right to work. And pretty much didn't stop till we put it on the market, hence the month being a blur.  There was endless cleaning and painting and caulking and staging.  So thankful for Jeannie, who came over many days to advise and assist and even did some work several days on her own while I was at work.  My friends helped paint a time or two and my kids and their cousins helped pack and clean too.  Matt did a lot of repairing things- laying new floor, building steps, etc.  Barnette helped out with step building and Cindy made our deck and patio beautiful with new plants.  We had a lot of help and it was so much work...I had 102 items on my house projects list and it was every bit as overwhelming as I had imagined it every time Matt had brought up moving in the past. 

This guy FINALLY got his braces off after more than 3 years!!  They look so good!

The night before we took Joshua to college, we did a family trip to the Bulls game.  Our church went the same night and we got to see them a little, but an acquaintance of Barnette's who plays for the Bulls let us have free tickets in the shady section, which was so nice.  We even got to bring along some friends...

It's always fun to catch up with the Rider family.  Their youngest, Mark, was headed to NC State that weekend, so we had a lot of similar feelings to talk about.

On the 16th, Matt and I had intended to take Joshua to Methodist and head to the beach to celebrate our anniversary.  Due to the aforementioned to do list, we ended up just going back home after the move in and skipping the celebration.  We arrived late morning and immediately ran into Joshua's former Orange teammate (who he'd also played with on the summer men's league this year) at check in, which was reassuring.  It was quiet with little wait time in this building as we went from table to table to check off various steps.  I was struck by how one lady heard Joshua's name and knew he'd already filled out the needed form and his advisor knew his schedule.  Welcome to small school life!  We then went to get his parking pass and ran into a mom with her son who had a lacrosse shirt on and turned out to be Joshua's roommate!

These guys seem to get along great and I'm so grateful for that.  The day of move in, they were also getting texts from the whole group of freshman on their team, with plans to meet up and hang out.  I think it helped Joshua feel at home so much easier to have this group of built in friends right off the bat...or should I say right off the stick;) 

We moved in most of Joshua's stuff quickly and took him to lunch and to get some shorts, then came back to campus for a "Welcome to Methodist" assembly with all the freshman and their families, meeting up with his coach right before.  There were some brief talks from some of the staff and then the student body president did an activity where the lights were out and the kids were supposed to hold up the flashlight on their phone if they fit into various categories...who is from NC, who is an athlete, etc.  She asked who was feeling a little nervous (Joshua yes), who was feeling a little sad to leave home (yes), who was missing their pet (yes), who would miss their pet more than their siblings (yes).  It was so neat to have this day together, rather than a sweaty, tiring, move in and goodbye like my college days.  They took the kids in groups after that to do some kind of forced socialization and then we all met back for a picnic.  We sat with Joshua's roommate's parents and chatted with them for a long while.  After the picnic, we went back to Joshua's dorm to see his loft set up and help get his tv going, then said our goodbyes and headed out.

I had been so happy all day because college is so fun and I could see how Joshua was going to love it, but when we pulled away it all hit me and aside from a brief stop at a bar to meet up with some other lacrosse families, I was sad and teary the rest of the day...and a few days after that.

Meanwhile, we have another getting ready to go off on his own.  Gray got his yearbook photos taken and really ramped up the college search, especially once he decided he does want to play lacrosse for a college team.  We tried to help him get going with more emails to coaches and scheduling visits.  First stop was Lees-McRae.  He had already visited there with Matt but the lacrosse team got a new coach in July and scheduled a last minute prospect day, so we headed back, taking advantage of having Rick right there in Banner Elk to stay with.  Our a/c had gone out in the van so Gray drove his car the whole way.  We had a pretty good time, listening to his play list, which he warned me was "the variety that makes Gray feel good"- a twist on a radio station slogan here.  He also attempted to find a current rapper that I would like. We were surprised to find that the prospect camp for this very famous coach in the lacrosse world was not at all full.  It was a beautiful day and I did some walking and listening to my audiobook and then got to know another kid's mom that I had a lot in common with.  After drills, we met Rick for a picnic lunch and short scenic walk, then met the crew back on campus for a meeting with the coach and student led tour of campus for the prospects.  We headed home after that, with Gray feeling like he still really wants to go there.  We have 4 or 5 more visits in the next month and Gray has been talking to a few more coaches, so hopefully it all lends more clarity to where Gray belongs for the next few years.

We got back and I got back to work on cleaning and painting, again feeling like I'd never finish all the work and like I was so tired of stressing over the house and like I was so tired in general and like I really missed Joshua and didn't want everything to change.  

Soon the first day of school came.

Allie started 4th and was so excited to get to know her teacher and be with her friends.  We went to open house Thursday night and she had made two cards for her teacher by Friday morning.  

Gray started his senior year.  He's driving himself and Julia to school and was on time every day the first week!  He's got a few AP classes this year and looks forward to Lord of the Rings in AP Lit and having his FCA advisor for AP Calculus.  He's taking Accounting I and II to try to help him decide on a college major.

Julia has jumped right in to high school and loves the more social aspects of it.  So many more people to know and interact with throughout the day.  She was unconcerned about finding her classes, knowing she'd not remember where they were and would just ask.  She liked seeing her sportsplex coworkers and having friends in all her classes.  She's made some new friends in PE already and can't wait for the Homecoming dance.  We had her join a team and since she felt cheer was too overwhelming after the summer workouts, she decided to do tennis.  She likes her teammates but isn't so much into tennis. Hopefully she'll like it more as she improves.

Speaking of improving, she just finished her last driving lesson.  After the first one, the instructor came over and declared that we really have our work cut out for us, as she didn't leave the training course or go over 30 mph.  Then I took her for a parking lot practice and so did Jeannie and by her second lesson, the instructor said she was so much better and even got on the interstate.  She's a lot more comfortable now and enjoyed chatting with her last two instructors as they drove.

We scheduled the house to go on the market during that first week of school, which was a little crazy, but it helped that Nanny and Pa offered their house for us to stay in while they were in Guatemala.  We made our house as beautiful as we could, packed up, and settled in at their house, not knowing how long we'd need to stay away.  The house was listed Wednesday night and we got a couple of showings for Thursday scheduled right away.  The first showing gave feedback that they'd be sending an offer and it ended up being a really good one.  We had some other showings but cut them off to accept that first offer and before we knew it, we were cleaning and packing again to go back home.  Now we await the inspection and hope it's smooth sailing from here.  We have a month to enjoy our last little bit of living here and get our stuff moved into a storage unit.  Nanny and Pa graciously had the idea to move into their beach house and let us live in their Durham house, so that's the plan.  Lots more work and more changes ahead.  But so many things to be thankful for.