Since Zac proposed, Erika, Mom and I have been discussing ideas on a wedding. You could tell by Erika's body language she wanted one, but she also didn't want one (Zac was a huge influence in this). It posed an issue, where were we going to have it and when? As the weeks wore on, Erika had an idea to have it at Zac's mom's house in Vancouver, so we started coming up with a plan to have it there. We even had a tentative date of July 22nd.
Then as we got into June the plan changed because Zac's dad Bruce probably wanted to go to the wedding so they couldn't have it at his mom's house. Then they were getting tired of their landlord and all the problems they were having with the neighbor's dogs getting into their yard and ruining the fence line and the gate. Their landlord was lazy and fixed everything half assed. That sparked them into looking into getting their own place.
Erika started search and the paperwork process. They even got themselves a relator, the same one Celeste and Issac used when they moved into their Tumwater house in early May. They got themselves all set up with the bank, Erika's GI Bill and even went to go see some of the houses that were available within their budget. They finally found an old house, in pretty good shape, in a questionable part of Olympia. They closed on the house on June 27th. I met Erika over there the next day after work so she could give me the tour of it. It reeked of pee because of the previous homeowners kept the dogs in the basement and trapped inside of some of the bedrooms. At first look, the house was filthy and needed a good scrub down before we moved their stuff in.
I went over there after work on Friday to help her clean. She had spent most of the day before and Friday power washing the basement to get the pee smell out. She did a lot of work. We wiped down walls, cupboards, baseboards, the kitchen stove, range and other areas of the house. I vacuumed underneath the fridge (it was disgusting underneath it), and sadly, the fridge's wheels wrecked the linoleum on the floor. Erika said she really didn't care because they planned on getting rid of it someday. Before we called it a day, she briefly told me how she would like the weekend to go. We were going to start moving stuff over the next day with everyone's help.
The following day, we all met up at her current place and started stuffing boxes and random things into our vehicles. As I arrived, Erika said Zac had already taken a few carloads over and I asked where we should start. She said just start grabbing boxes and putting things inside of them. I worked on their computer room and the kitchen mostly. Doug, Ben, Zac and Dad disassembled and moved some of the bigger items into the trailer. Mom and Grandma packed up boxes and started cleaning as we got rooms emptied.
We loaded up all of our vehicles with what we had in the first trip and drove the back way to their house off of Martin Way. Erika wanted to do a little more cleaning to the upstairs, so we unloaded most of the boxes into the basement until it was gone through. Some of the stuff went into the kitchen since that area was clean. As it was nearing lunch, we had Mom go out and get us some sandwiches from Walmart. We wanted to keep it as cheap as possible. Erika had chips and drinks. We took a break in the front yard once Mom got back so we could eat.
Over the past few days, Zac has been coming home from work and cutting down a lot of the overground brush in the back yard. Erika sometime joined in. They found all sorts of garbage from pieces of scorched wood to a broken wheelbarrow, aluminum cans, pieces of clothing, old, rusted tools to a lot of unknown items. They had quite the collection piled up.
We finished off the afternoon with one more visit to the old rental in Hawks Prairie and grabbed as much stuff as we could. We put most of it into Mom's Expedition, the Escape and Erika's car. We knew we would have to do a few things the next day. Our goal was to get as much stuff done as possible while we had Dad's trailer and guys around to move the heavy stuff like the washer and dryer. Once we completed the back rooms, we wiped down everything and vacuumed the carpet. There was so much dog hair!
We wrapped everything up and we all headed back to the new house to unload everything into the basement. Once all the vehicles were unloaded, we took a short rest and then helped Erika move some of the stuff into the appropriate rooms, bathroom stuff in the bathroom, clothes into the bedroom, etc. We wiped down the walls in the bedroom and Erika's office so she could start putting stuff up against the walls and into the closets.
As it reached the end of the day towards dinner time, it was time to go and let Erika and Zac relax and go through their belongings at their leisure. We asked her when and where we should meet to finish up moving the next day. She said they would be up early trying to figure out where to put everything. She said to meet over at the other house to get the rest of the stuff around 10 or 11.
The next day, we drove over to the house, grabbed the rest of the stuff, put it into the random assortment of vehicles and cleaned up the rest of the rooms. Erika said that they would take care of the rest since they had to mow the front and back lawn before they were out of the house for good. That included cleaning the bathroom and the kitchen. She thanked us for helping and was not expecting the move to be so quick. They thought they would have to do it over a couple weekends. Many hands make light work.
Erika was so happy to finally have a place they didn't have to pay rent or deal with inept landlords. I could not wait to have that as well. Ben and I have been talking about possibly moving my parent's Woodbrook Lane property in Rainier. We would have to live in the trailer for a while and pay Dad rent (a rent to own situation) as we come up with plans for building a house. I am not sure how long it will take or when we will start the process.
Next Adventure: Bob and Bev's 60th Anniversary
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