Goodbye Prince Albert!

Today was a very busy day. I am sitting in the camper typing this. I have no internet connection, which is weird, because I had one yesterday in this same spot. As a result, I don’t know if I will get this posted tonight or not. I suppose that I could run into the house and connect, but I am totally pooped and don’t know if I will be able to summon the energy.

Everything is now out of the house. In one hour and sixteen minutes, we will no longer own a home that cannot be connected to a truck and driven away. We have a list of things a mile long to do in the morning, but thankfully, packing is not one of them! After going to the dollar store, city hall, the lawyers, SaskTel and Tim Horton’s, we will be on the road to Tisdale. The van has still not sold, so I will be driving it and Michael will be driving the truck. We will both be towing and it has been a long, long time since I have towed anything so I am a little nervous. Dad will come into Tisdale with us and get us set up for the first time with water and a working toilet. Maybe tomorrow will be the day that something other than coffee gets cooked in here!

So, this afternoon we went over to Andrea’s house. We promised her AGES ago that before we left town, Michael would put baseboards in her salon. While Michael and Lanny cut and pasted…I mean nailed, Andrea and I played in the yard with the kids. There were two pools and a big sprinkler going and we all had a lot of fun. Then, as we were sitting around on the deck in walk the Stenske’s…and then the Banman’s and Charity, and Jeri, Bethany, Kate and Sam, and Rosie, and Dave! They totally put one over on us and had a wonderful going away barbeque for us! It was so nice! Perfect weather, great friends, wonderful food…all in all a wonderful surprise and a very touching end to our time in Prince Albert! Almost makes us want to stay! Almost…but we are so very excited to start on this new chapter in our life!

Last night Laura and Paul Bunyan came up to visit and say goodbye to the house. OK…so it was hello for Ryan since he had never been before, but goodbye for Laura. She and I transferred our growth chart that we had on the wall onto a 1X2 that I had sanded and stained earlier. I think that is going to be my new baby shower gift. I love to have a nice growth chart on the wall, but paper gets ripped, so I always mark right on the wall. The unfortunate thing is that we end up moving and it gets left behind. So now, I am going to have one that I can take everywhere. I made it the same height as a door frame, so it will blend in. It was truly the one thing that was bothering me to leave behind. (Paul Bunyan is Laura’s new squeeze. His real name is Ryan, but he is a powerhouse, so I have dubbed him Paul Bunyan. For some reason, although I HATE shortening people’s names, I occasionally really like a person directly on meeting them and they get a nickname that sticks in my mind. We really like Ryan!)

I think the kids are finally starting to understand that we are leaving here and not coming back. The boys were getting it before, but it really sunk in for Abby in the last two days. She cried a lot of the way home tonight because she wasn’t going to get to see Hanna for a long time. My poor babies. I wanted so badly to move from my hometown when I was a kid, and now I am scared that my kids will resent being moved around so much. Maybe the next town will be the last for a good long while. We’ll see.

Sorry to disappoint on the entertainment end of things tonight. I am feeling rather melancholy and just wanted to chat, not entertain. The next blog will be fun…I promise!