School ends. Break begins. Heart rends.

Our son's first year of official homeschooling went phenomenally well.  He's such a joy to teach and seems to enjoy doing anything with his mama, even school work.  I wanted to celebrate his hard work and spend some good quality time with just him while his sister was away at horse camp.  So, on the Monday that kicked off summer break, we arrived at Monkey Joe's as soon as they opened for a play date with friends.

My plans for great bonding time with him for the rest of the week ended up changing when my husband decided out of the blue to relist our house for sale.  I scheduled contractors to work at our house for the remainder of the week doing basic repairs, painting, and pressure washing. I forgot to mention to my son that these workers would be coming, so you can imagine his surprise when he woke up early the next morning to find two handymen pulling strips of hardiplank siding from the back of our house (an occassional repair necessity when one lives along a fairway). My poor boy thought the house was going to fall down.  As soon as I assured him all was okay and going according to plan, he became much more interested in what the handymen were doing than in anything I suggested that we do together.  Having sons and grandsons themselves and having learned their trade by watching their uncles or mentors, the handymen insisted that he come outside and watch.  They explained every little task they performed and let him help whenever possible.

Gotta love a handyman in Buzz Lightyear PJ's & Fleece

I hardly had to inspect their work before they left because my little boy had already told me all they did and how they had let him help with testing to make sure their fixes worked.

I must have mentioned after the pressure washer left that I would need to repaint the white bench on the front porch since the water pressure chipped off some of the paint.  Apparently, my son overheard me.  While I was on the back deck having my quiet time the next morning, he sneaked into the garage, found a rusty can of paint, a paintbrush, and a screwdriver.  He used the screwdriver to open the lid and began painting my bench.  He even remembered to spread newspaper underneath the bench to catch paint drips.   When I came around looking for him a few minutes later, I was quite surprised to find him hard at work preparing a surprise for me.  Check out my freshly painted bench, compliments of my little handyman.

Our realtor told us that he would post our home listing on MLS on Wednesday.  It takes a few days for photos and showing instructions to post, so we did not expect any showings until that weekend, at the earliest, when we would also be hosting a family of four.   While my son was with the handymen on Wednesday, I got busy purging the master closet.   As soon as I had pulled everything out of the closet, I was very surprised to receive a phone call requesting a showing within the following hour.  My husband had not even completed all the realty paper work by that point.  What in the world?  After four years of trying to sell the house with little interest, I knew this showing would be a bust with contractors everywhere and parts of the house in the process of being replaced.  So I stuffed all my belongings back into the closet and walked with my son to a neighbor's house where my boy enjoyed a fabulous impromptu play date with his best buddy.  We had several more showings over the course of that week, so my son spent many hours with his neighborhood friend.  That week may have been stressful for me, but it was total blast for him.

The biggest surprise for us was that the feedback for every showing that week said the buyers liked the house and were considering an offer.  In all these years, we've only had one or two people interested in it, but to be 3 for 3 the first week was just crazy!  This news should have made me very happy and excited after wanting so desperately to move for many years, but I had finally decided after years of hearing God say "no" to our plans to move that I would be content where we are.  I did not really think we would get an offer this time, but I prepared the house for listing as I have done every year for the past few years because the house needed purging anyway, and I wanted to respect my husband's wishes.  When the showing feedback suggested that we may actually have get to move this summer, I said, "Okay, God.  Wherever you lead, I will follow."  While I feel like I am spiritually ready to move, I was not emotionally prepared and almost flooded the house with tears that week.