Getting ready to move

So, we have shifted from an effort to rearrange rooms (see index tab "Room Upset 2014"), to preparing to move.  Here are some highlights, starting with those relating to the Room Upset:

• Just before Joe got the call for Clara City, as in, the day before, we finally had finished Sophie and Stella's orange room.  Sophie had requested an orange room shortly after she got a quilt from her Grandma A. that was bright colors with black: orange, green, purple.  We had gradually gotten some items for her in those colors, a lamp, clock, storage containers, etc.  Kyle N. painted the bunk bed in a bright green.  We had bought and installed wire shelving for the closet. 
• Our poor youngest girls were finally moved into their own room.  Or at least their own beds.  Clara and Sophie still had several piles and bins of things to remove from when they shared that room.  But at least the girls had their own beds for the first time in months.  
• We got Clara and Sophie's stuff moved out.  Since we knew by that time that we'd be moving, they simply sorted and packaged most of this for the move.  
• And seemingly strange, yes, ...  we moved Clara and Sophie's empty dressers into the garage and moved Inge and Donna's into their room.  Why, might you ask, would we bother moving dressers into a room?  Because we'd been squeezing past them in the hallways for the last four or five months.  With all the hauling and carrying we knew was coming, we wanted to clear the hallways.  

Sophie's custom shelves

The Orange Room and the Orange Lamp

The Purple Trip and the Purple Clock and the Purple Cork Board

That's the summary of the tail ends of the Room Upset.   The highlights of the move operations follow.

• We started by sorting books.  Books and books and books.  Besides an extensive home library we had boxes and boxes of homeschool books to organize and figure out what to do with.  Most of these had been boxed up since we quit homeschooling and changed our school room into our Louisa room.  But in that time the boxes and been shifted and spilled and restacked and respilled and it was simply chaos.  We worked on books for about a week.  And even then each new thing we started we'd find more.  But most are either packed, gone to Goodwill, or waiting to be sold or given to other homeschoolers.  
• We have all the stored-for-later-use shoes, boots, jackets, coats, snowpants, etc, sorted and packed.  Except those, of course, that are currently in use or that I find while digging through other things.
• Joe's parents came for a quick weekend and helped with many little sorting and packing jobs.  Primarily they did some of the lesser used and more breakable kitchen and dining room items.  
• Kim and Todd C. brought us pallets and more pallets.  We know that with the spring thaw comes a very wet garage floor.  And we knew we wanted to use the garage to store the packed boxes.  Joe and Matt gradually cleaned out areas of the garage enough to start to organize the stuff.
• The kids and I have sorted and packed many/most of the toys.
• Clara has been such a trooper to haul and haul and haul many stored boxes up from the basement for me to sort.  
• Sophie and Clara (who are homeschooled) have been busy helping to keep up with regular household tasks such as dishes and meal prep and laundry, along with their studies.
• Joe has all his guns and ammo sorted and ready.  

Some of our book sorting

Some more of our book sorting

Donna and I working in the living room

John and Stella helping Grandma

Grandpa cutting packing bubbles for Grandma

Grandma and Grandpa packing some of the dishes

Garage Chaos

More Garage Chaos

Garage Order

And besides all this, we've gotten many details of the move worked out:

• Primarily the dates.  Joe will preach his last sermon here on April 12.  The churches here have planned a joint service that day with a meal following, so we will be able to say our goodbyes to the members of all four churches at one time.  Our new congregation is sending a semi up here on Monday, April 13, to move us down there.  It is their hope/tentative plan to rent a semi trailer for some extra time, so that we can gradually move in rather than having trip over boxes while trying to figure it all out.   And Joe's installation at Faith Lutheran Church in Clara City will take place on April 19.  Our new church family is planning a hog roast to welcome us and to thank Pastor Muehlenhardt who has served them during the vacancy.
• We have all the details worked out for the kids' schools.  Sophie, Clara, and Inge are homeschooled now.  All will be homeschooled after the move.  Next fall, all will enter the MACCRAY schools.  We're excited for this since the Jr. High and High school are right in the same town, and the elementary schools are each only seven or eight miles away.  This is only half as far as our nearest school is now!  Elsie is currently doing PSEO work at Bethany, which allows her to get two years of college under her belt while she finishes her last two years of highschool.  And we've just found out that she will be able to continue to be enrolled in Oklee while doing this, so that she can still graduate with her Oklee classmates.
• Big Kids' summer plans: these are still in the works.  Somewhat.  Elsie will be living with us and hopes to work at the Clara City Care Center as a CNA.  She would have preferred to stay in Mankato and keep her same job, but Joe and I feel that as a 17 year old, she still needs the time with her family.  She, understandably, does not agree.  But I hope it will not be too miserable for her.  Clara may or may not stay up here with Tiffany's family.  Clara has been working for Tiffany doing babysitting, housework, and outdoor chores, and learning from Tiffany livestock husbandry skills.  And she's bought from Tiffany a filly in exchange for some of her hours.  They have plans to continue training on the filly this summer, which is the reason Clara wants to stay.  Louisa is (this week) planning to stay in Moorhead for the summer, but I'm not sure she's decided for sure.   I keep hoping she'll decide to come stay with us in Clara City, but she has a very good paying CNA job in Moorhead.  I've encouraged her to be sure to calculate food and rent when deciding which options would really be a better deal.  But I suspect she is calculating based more upon my boring meals and all the dishes she might potentially have to wash in Clara City.  We shall see.  And Matt has found a place to live up here until he can move to Moorhead in the fall when he plans to start classes in Law Enforcement and/or Criminal Justice.  Along with his USMC drill weekends and annual training, he will be able to continue working for Quinten (Nelson and Nelsons Construction) throughout the summer.

Of course there are many, many things left to do.  But we go one day at a time.  We trust God to provide what we need, whether it's patience, time, energy, brain power, help, health, strong bodies, well behaved kids, etc.

And although it didn't exactly fit into any of the above paragraphs, I want to thank Barb C. who has brought us several Suburban loads full of boxes and Chris V. who dragged a absolutely huge bag of  packing bubbles home from Digi-Key.  We've had gifts of food.  We've had the support of many prayers.  God is good. 

Oh, and we made a quick trip down to Clara City to visit a little and to see the lay of the land.  Marsha P. and the other ladies helped me to pick out paint colors; and they have been busy painting some of the rooms down there.  Marsha has been my main contact at our soon-to-be home and I appreciate all the questions she's answered and measurements she's taken, etc.  Jeffrey L. has been so helpful to Joe in getting everything ready for the move.  He and the men have had many decisions to make to help us settle in easily.  They are putting a new bathroom in the basement of the parsonage and are working on finding some sort of space for the pastor's office.  Joe's vast pastoral book collection, which he indeed uses regularly, needs a home with much wall space for shelves.

And speaking of books, I ran into Sheryl W. yesterday while getting my hair cut at Gelene L.'s.  Sheryl mentioned several boxes of Old Norwegian books, some pastoral, that her dear departed mother Ragna had wanted Joe to have.  So, Joe, I think I forgot to tell you last night, but you will be getting some more books before we leave.