Leaving Leadville: Packing and Packing and more Packing

The month of June 2016 is a complete blur to me. Once we decided to move it was time to get to work. Not only did we  have a huge moving sale to prepare for, but we were also looking at homes on zillow and working on getting the Leadville house ready for sale.

Looking for a home when you are 2,000 miles away is really hard. Thankfully we have wonderful family that would drive by a house we were interested in and let us know how the outside looked and how the neighborhood looked. We were in love with this one house, but it was really close to the train and the neighborhood was not the best. I knew nothing about Long Island or the town we wanted to move to, so I was asking a lot of questions and looking at maps and learning what streets to avoid because they are really busy with traffic. At one point we found a house that was about 20 minutes from the family and it was right on the water. It was an older home and for one night we were excited. We talked about what it would be like to just walk out and have a perfect view of the sound. Then we really thought about it and looked at the pictures more, and this home was going to need some major work and since neither of us have "rehabbing a home" skills we quickly let this house go.

And then we found the cutest little house. It was adorable outside, recently updated inside and we feel in love. We had family go over there during an open house and we even put an offer in for it. This was mid July and were excited for this house, but not getting our hopes up. Once we visited the home we quickly learned that zillow can be very inaccurate. One of the things we loved about this home was the downstairs room that had all windows leading outside. When we got there, there was no room and no beautiful sun room. Plus, there were about 20 steps to get upstairs and the whole inside was just not a good fit for us. I remember leaving the house kind of sad because we had such high hopes for this house. But it just wasn't going to be good for us. When we left we decided to go back and look at the very first house we  had looked at that morning.

We had flown in the day before and the next day we were set up to see 7 homes. The first house we went to is the house wen ended up buying. When we came in the morning it was dark outside, rainy and kind of chilly. I loved the house, but I was still thinking about the house that we really loved, which we weren't planning on seeing until later in the day. After we decided the other house wasn't a good fit my mind instantly went back to the house we are in now. When we came back it was around 4pm and the sun was shinning and the house looked completely different. I knew right away that this was the house we needed to buy. We had really hoped to get a ranch style house, but we also knew we had limited time to find a house and this house really is perfect in every way despite having stairs. The house was taken down to the studs and rebuilt just a few months before we bought it, so everything is brand new in the house. It was perfect for two women that have limited repair skills. lol

Our current house is so similar to the house I owned in Kansas City. The layout of the houses is flipped so the only time I feel like the house looks like my previous home is when I am pulling up and I see the outside. I hope to stay in this home for a very long time because it has such a cozy, homey feeling. Others have mentioned that when they come here it feels very warm and cozy and that is exactly how I want my home to feel. I want others to feel welcome and loved when they walk inside.

My home in Kansas City long after I owned it

New Home sweet home

Sold! We'll take it! 

So we have our new house picked out and it's time to get serious about selling the house in Leadville. We decided to put the house on the market in August and we had set a date of closing on the new house and moving in Mid September. The first weekend in August I decided to drive to KC to celebrate my niece's first birthday. We had decided on a realtor and they were coming by to take pictures and sign the contracts while I was gone. As soon as I get in KC, D calls me and tells me the house is immediately going on the market (we wanted to wait a few weeks to work on decluttering more) and they were having an open house within days. I felt so bad because I was in KC having fun with my family and D was at home picking up the house and making it ready for showings and pictures. Lucky for me, I have an understanding wife who insisted I enjoy my visit with my family.

Having your house for sale is a pain in the ass. We had to be ready at any moment to leave the house and pick the house up as best as we could. By this point we were done with the majority of the decluttering and were packing. It's hard to keep the house "show ready" while packing. But we managed and we were having a lot of people coming through our house interested in buying.

So here we are...September. We are down to just a few weeks and what we are about to embark on is slowing hitting home and I think we were both so nervous, anxious, excited and tired.

We have a final moving date and time from the moving company and now we just wait for that day to come.

Here are a few more pictures from our last month in Leadville.

We sold so many things. Happy these went to our neighbor  that we love. 

We sold the cat tree so poor Little Love had nothing to play on. 

Hanging out in the car while the house is being shown

Going to the dog park one last time

One last lunch at our favorite place in Buena Vista. 

Picnic lunch at the hot springs

Trying Dim Sum in Denver

Frisco, Colorado also known as Heaven on Eearth

Oh S***. 

The lovely, horrible Leadville Safeway. The one thing in Leadville that we don't miss. 

Our one drive thru burger/mexican place

I miss my buddies here. They got to know me really well. 

Filled to the brim with boxes

Hard to walk anywhere

We had the best sunsets in our backyard

Saying goodbye to the crew at Avon Pet Center

Don't forget me. 

Look at the view we had. 

Phil at Kum & Go. He's a tough shell but every once in a while I saw how kind his heart is. 

Leaving Leadville: Preparing to move

Once we decided to move I knew we had at least 7 weeks before things were going to be getting real. We had previously planned a trip for late July to visit the family, but now that we had decided to move there, this upcoming trip was going to be the trip where we find our next home.  Most people laughed at us when we would tell them that we planned on finding a home during those 6 days, but we both knew we had to find something because summer ends quickly in Leadville and we really wanted to be out before the snow started falling.

Then there was our home in Leadville. We knew we had to sell it quickly and with it already being June, we had to declutter the house quickly, make any needed repairs and get it on the market. Once again, the summer ends quickly in Leadville around mid-September and once the snow comes, the town looses a lot of the visitors. Summer time is so beautiful in Leadville. The wildflowers are all blooming and everything has turned green in what seems like overnight. Many of the homes in Leadville are second homes, so summer time is usually when people are looking for a second home, so it was important for us to get the house on the market with enough time before the selling season was over.

Thinking back on all that we did just to get the house in order to be on the market, makes me tired. A year ago, I knew that we had a huge mountain in front of us and it was going to take a lot of time and patience and hard work. The thing we decided to do first was to have a huge garage sale. It was time to get rid of some of our stuff and we hoped and prayed that our junk would be a treasure to someone else. I don't know how many hours I spent going through things, bringing books out to the garage and organizing the items we were selling, but it was a lot. I found that I worked great late at night and there were some nights I was in the garage well past midnight getting things ready for the big sale.

All during this, I think both D and I were in shock. D had never wanted to leave Leadville and wanted to stay there forever. When I moved there, I learned why this town was so special and decided that I, too, wanted to live here forever...at the top of the world. As much as we knew that we needed to move to lower altitude, it was breaking our hearts to leave this wonderful little mountain town.

Leadville is so meaningful to us as a couple. The first time I came to visit D, we drove from Colorado Springs to her home in Leadville. The first year of our relationship we spent many of those weekends there in her cozy and warm home. It's where we fell in love, where we got to know each other and what makes the other person tick. We learned to live together as a couple, we experienced me finding my birth family and the most important thing...it is where we were married. Exchanging our vows in that home makes it even more special.

There were so many times when I would drive away from home on my way to work and I just hated leaving. Then when I would pull in at the end of the day, or after being away on a work trip, driving up our street and seeing the greatest little house there on the left, always made me feel better.

When we first decided to move I told D that we had to take the rock in front that had the address on it. At first she was not sure, but I insisted that it was something we needed to take because she had it specially made. I'm glad I persisted because everything we walk out our back door and look to the left, there is our 9 Comstock Sign. I wanted to make sure we always had a part of Leadville with us.

Leaving Leadville: Deciding to Move

Hard to believe that we have been here in New York for 8 months now. I am kicking myself for not writing about leaving our home in Colorado before now because I know I have forgotten some of the details, but I'm going to try to write about our cross country adventure because when we think back to what we did, we are both shocked that we managed to move 2,000 miles away. And with pets, there are always adventures...especially considering we were in 8 different hotel rooms in 10 days.

It was a year ago this week that I gave my notice at work. I was so upset about leaving that job because I really enjoyed what I was doing, before they changed my job description.  I was working with at risk adults and also doing a little bit with foster care. I was told 7 months prior that I had no choice that my position was changing and I was going to have to be trained in child welfare. I've been a social worker since 1997 and there is reason I have never worked with children. It's just not my thing. Because I really liked my job, as well as my co-workers, I pushed through the training and got my certification to be a child welfare worker. Within weeks I knew I just didn't have it in me to do child welfare. I told with D and as the loving and supportive wife that she is, she said...Do what you need to do. So, I turned in my notice.

The last few weeks of work after you put in your resignation can be either really good, or can be really awkward.  I wasn't treated poorly my last few weeks, but there was definitely some tension. My employer was pissed that after all that training I was now putting in my notice and I totally understand their frustration but I had told them I had childhood trauma that might interfere with my capacity as a child welfare worker and I was told numerous times....you have no choice. I was trying hard to keep my job, but there was no flexibility with my employer. They were pretty set on what they wanted and after I put in my notice, I realized I was not what they wanted.

The beginning of June was my last day and suddenly I was unemployed. I knew it could take months to find another job and we were both prepared to spend the summer hanging out enjoying the wonderful summer months at the top of the world.

It's no secret that I loved Long Island. My first trip to L.I. was in September 2011 and that is when I feel in love with this island hanging on the bottom of New York. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but everything was green and lush and I just loved it. In the beginning of our relationship D and I always talked about where we wanted to end up at because we both knew that at some point the altitude would be too much for one or both of us. Long Island was always at the top of that list because of D's family here but we always said it could never happen because it was way too expensive to live here. When you are looking for a house here, the first thing you look at is the taxes...not the price. The price may be right, but you may be paying 12,000+ a year for property taxes. Yeah, it's that expensive here. I always gave a huge shout out for Kansas City because the altitude was lower, my family was there and it is very reasonable to live there financially. I imagined us getting a house on Lake Lotawana (we had a cabin out there when I was a kid...before it exploded in popularity) and maybe both of us not having to work...I dreamed and I shared that dream with D and she always said no. One of her best sayings is....God told the Gays and the Jews to get to the sides!!!   We even thought about Arizona for a while. It's really hot, but the humidity is low, the altitude was good and the cost of living is reasonable. But then we are in a city and state where we know only a handful of people and we are even further away from our families. Sorry Arizona...it's not going to happen.

So we always came back to Long Island. After I left my job we spent so many hours talking. Talking about the pros of Colorado and the pros of L.I and we did the same with the cons of both places. I kept that list and when we moved into our house here, I taped that list to the inside door of one of our kitchen cabinets. It's fun to look back on that now.

So, it was time for us to move down the mountain and rejoin society. The other crazy thing about Leadville is how small of a town it is. With a population of only 2,500 you get to know the people in town. I had become friends with the manager at the local convieanence store and a few years ago there was a wreck on the highway I normally drove home on and when the manager saw me the next time she expressed how concerned she was because she hadn't seen me that night and was hoping I wasn't in the accident. It had a great feel of the community taking care of each other. Whenever someone was sick or needed some extra help, the town always seemed to come together to help that person or family. So, we knew it was going to be a shock moving from a little tiny mountain town to right outside the center of the world. (NYC) The upside to moving to such a highly populated area is all the food options and that was on our list of pros for moving to NY...all the wonderful food options. In Leadville we were pretty limited to a handful of Mexican restaurants, a few coffee shops, a steak place that only sold steak and a Subway. And living in such a tourist area in the summer, many times the locals would go to these few restaurants and they are sold out of things because 2,000 more people are in town for the weekend.

It's so scary thinking about moving across the country. Our house in Leadville was (almost) perfect. The roof was not slanted enough for the snow to melt off, so several times a winter we would have to have our roof shoveled. Not shoveling the roof enough can cause water damage in your house...as we learned a few years back. It was one level, it had a jacuzzi tub and we had just put in a tankless water heater...which is awesome when you live int he tundra and need to take a really hot shower to warm up. If we could have picked up the house in Leadville and brought it here, we would have done that. So, deciding to leave Leadville was especially hard since we loved our home so much. And we loved the weather. We loved the snow we got and the nice cool temperatures and, well, I can't say it anymore than we fucking loved living in Leadville. I think both of us wished we could have stayed there longer but it just wasn't in the books for us.

We made the decision on a Saturday and by the next day we called the family to tell them that we were officially moving to Long Island. No one ever thought D would ever come back to L.I. so the news that we were moving was quite a shock to the family.

So we are moving. When you live at 10,200 feet you have about 12 weeks of "probably" no snow. We knew that if we wanted to move before the summer of 2017, we would have to do this move pretty quickly. Once the snow moves in, many companies will not come to Leadville and even moving before the snow came in, there were many major moving companies that said they would not drive to Leadville.

I was able to have about 10 days of not working and not having to do anything else when we decided to move. Suddenly my little break from work was over and I had to get ready to get the house ready to sell...and I knew there was so much to do. So much.

I'll end this post with some of my favorite pictures of our home in Leadville. The house is awesome because D put so much work into the inside and the landscaping around the house. Lucky me was able to move in and not have to do much.