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.