Moving into the Apartment

Mark pointed out that we have come full circle--we moved into the dorms when we arrived in Weatherford 35 years ago as students, and now we are back in the dorm apartment as we prepare to leave Weatherford as retirees.  When the house sold so quickly, we scrambled for a place to live until we retired.  We found the perfect place--a one-bedroom apartment that is just a three minute walk from work!  The "commute" to our offices on campus is great!

After all the down-sizing, it should have been a fast and easy move to the apartment.  But we were amazed at how much stuff we still owned that would fit in that little apartment!  Thanks to our son Blake for coming to help us!  He decided that he owed us a move since we have moved him ten times in the last five years.  He even brought his new girl friend, Claire (who we had never met before) to help.  What a trooper!  She came and carried load after load and got to know us very quickly.

After giving away most of our furniture, we saved the very oldest couch for the move.  Our apartment is decorated in a vogue retro style we call "using what no one else wanted."  We have the first sectional we bought over 30 years ago, that had been relegated to the basement years ago.  But it is the most comfortable "guest bed" now.  

The recliner was a gift from my parents 30 years ago and matches Frazier's father's cherished chair on the famous sitcom.  Both the recliner and sectional will be disposed of easily when we retire.  The placement of wall hangings was determined by the myriad of holes that were already in the walls.  Home decorating at its best!

The kitchen has about a quarter of the storage I had at the house, so it was a true lesson in down-sizing (that will prepare us for the next move into the motorhome where the kitchen is even smaller).

That moving day was one of the longest days of our lives.  We were up early carrying boxes and furniture as fast as we could until there was only a narrow path to walk through the apartment.  After Blake and Claire left, we returned to the house for a final cleaning before we turned over the keys the next day.  That also included purging the last of the treasures in the garage shop well after midnight.  By the time we got to bed that night (or should I say the next morning), we had been up and working for almost 22 hours!