Goodbye Briarthorne Drive

Closing was today; or our part of closing was today.  The buyers' loan hasn't come through yet so they should sign the documents sometime next week.  We moved Tues after some intense packing during the previous two weekends.  Wed night and Thurs were cleaning.  As I was at the kitchen sink rinsing the cleaning rags on Thurs afternoon, the hawk swooped in and landed on a tree branch in the backyard.  He only appears every 6 months or so and I was only at the sink for a few minutes, so the timing was quite a coincidence.  You know that birds don't come to say goodbye (except in Disney movies when they can literally say "goodbye"), but it sure seemed that way...If he shows up at the new house to welcome us, that will really be spooky.

Most of our stuff is in storage, so finding the key stuff to unbox at John and Wendy's townhome hasn't been hard.  Unpacking a little each day.  C and M are adjusting to sleeping in the same room--on the same futon.  "She has her legs on me."  "He won't move his pillow."  "I want Mommy to stay."  "I want Daddy to stay."  At least they agree that jumping on Mommy and Daddy's matress is a temptation that is too difficult to resist (over and over) and appearently well worth losing privileges to do.

Ellie has started communicating yes and no by shaking her head--usually emphatically.  She understands quite a bit as you can tell her to do something--she particularly likes to deliver objects to C or M--and she does it with a big smile.  She has talking jags a couple of times a day where she'll jabber enthusiastically and if you talk back, will do a call and response with you for a while.  She won't eat much of anything at pre-school.  She won't eat baby food for them at all but usually doesn't eat Gerber toddler food or much adult food either.  She likes milk and that's about it.  She'll usually eat some baby food for me once we get home.  Sleeping is still a problem as she often wakes up several times a night and will have trouble falling back asleep at least one of those times.

My favorite Briarthorne memories: 
*proposing to Tracy on the couch in the living room (no, it's not really about tax-free school supplies !)
*C's first days at his new home:  marching around the downstairs circle with Opa tapping boxes on the floor; hammering nails on the back porch; playing in the leaves and helping me rake
*C greeting us at the laundry room door when we returned home with M
*M on the swing set
*M riding tricycle, big wheels and bikes like a natural
*All the neighborhood kids (Jordon, Jayna, Kayla, & Jamal, Will, CJ) playing outside in the street in the evenings and weekend afternoons
*winter snow storms, complete with snowmen
*the huge oak tree in the backyard; its magnificent demise onto the swing set on Good Friday evening 2011 (Brittany saying, "Wanted to let you know that everything's okay" when we called to check on the kids.)
*T waving a little stick at me in the bathroom, "Two lines means positive...You know what this means, don't you?"  Well, actually, no... But I was quite surprised and pleased to find out!

I bought the place about 6 months after T and I started dating, so it's been home during our adventures in creating a family.  Now our adventures take us elsewhere.  Onward and upward...