Packing Up

The largest garage sale  in the Pacific NW is now over.  At least that’s how the garage sale is advertised.  After attending it and also having a booth there, I think it really must be.   It was huge.

Terry and I pulled in to the fairgrounds with a completely full trailer belonging to our SIL (Robert).  It was packed ….. and, I do mean packed.  We were assigned our spaces and started unpacking.  What a chore. 

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We unloaded on Thursday and set up on Friday.  Since we’d cleaned out our shed and Tammi had cleaned out their attic and garage, we ended up renting four spaces!!   That was a 20X20 section and with all the people we were slammed.  It was fun.  It was tiring and it was profitable but will we ever do it again?  NEVER. 

Tammi has a pottery wheel, a kiln and makes all kinds of pottery stuff.  So, I put in my order and had three pottery bowls made to my specifications.  The finishing touches haven’t been done yet but I’m sure pleased with the size.  It’ll be interesting to see how they turn out.

We found a bean bag / corn hole set up on sale so just had to bring it home.  Buck wanted to play too but he wasn’t allowed.  How’d we do?  We suck but practice makes perfect they say.

We were happy to finally receive our new Sea Eagle kayak. 

The last inflatable one went flying down the highway in Florida.  This is a replacement, kind of.  We added a little electric motor to the order to get us back in when we’re all tired out.  There have been quite a few times we’ve discovered heading into shore wasn’t as easy as heading out with the wind behind us.  We’re anxious to give it a try but our bucket list is quite full right now.

Check out all the “crap” that was collected around here.  It was free dump day.  Dump trucks were to come in later, pick it up and haul it all away.   Folks did plenty cleaning up around their places and that’s always a good thing.

Jordan’s birthday was celebrated on Friday.  Now we have three more birthdays in about a week.  Then, we have a breather for one month before it's time to celebrate three more back to back.

I finally fired up the Traeger and smoked some salmon.  With cool temperatures I hadn’t really been in the mood.  Besides, we’ve had lots of irons in the fire.

When I started this blog we were getting ready to leave for Phoenix the next day.  It was one of those short nights because I had to wait until dark before going to bed.  Summer sunsets come pretty late in the Pacific NW.  Our planned flight was at 5 AM.  I hate those early flights and especially when we’re so far from the Portland airport.  The only good thing about that flight was that we were upgraded to first class seats so we had great seats and even breakfast.  We’ll take that anytime.  It just doesn’t happen as often as it used to.

Once we landed we hit the road (really we did!).  It was off to the rental car center, then to Home Depot for boxes and finally to the storage shed to pick up the motorhome.  

We sorted, we tossed, we packed and we were zonked. Who would ever have thought it possible to get that much stuff on board.  Somehow we managed.  

The outside storage bins were boxed and stacked outside.  Then, it rained!!  It’s monsoon season there.  The wind blew and not only did it rain hard on Sunday, it also rained a good deal on Monday.  You know what that does to boxes even if they're covered with tarps?  The bottoms give out and you have to start all over.

The rain cooled the temperature down on Monday but it also brought humidity.

Well, that’s behind us.  For two whole days we sorted, threw away, sorted some more, packed and made trips to the storage shed.  It was a lot of work.  It certainly would have been nice to have rented a truck and cut down the trips to and from the storage unit.  

It was especially hard when the temperature inside the motorhome was reading 104f.   Thank goodness we hadn’t planned on spending the night in it!  I have a whole new appreciation for the temperatures up north now.  I can put on a sweater to get warm.   Arizona is wonderful in the winter but it certainly isn’t in the summer!  That 49f gauge I posted on FB a few days earlier sure sounded good then.

So, we had a car rental for two days.  Ever try to extend a rental when you had picked it up on the weekend and wanted to turn it in on a week day?  I called and was quoted $250 more for an additional 9 hours.  It was much cheaper to just rent another vehicle and that’s what we did.

This trip is over for me as I’m scratching this blog while on the plane heading back.  Terry has one more day planned.   However, then two more days of peace before he’s back on the plane with another trip to Arizona!!   I’m sure Buck’s had a great “vacation” but I’ll be picking him up soon.

‘Tis life on the road