Our Most Valuables

As soon as Doug and I bought the house in Florida we started moving some of our possessions South.  At first, most of what we sent were items that we needed to furnish a second home.  Chairs, tables, beds, television, and kitchen utensils were just a few things deemed necessary to run a household.  Each trip brought more and more until we had enough for Doug to enjoy Florida and for the rest of us to visit.  

Doug's trip this weekend, however, was different.  With the moving truck coming in just over a month, we changed our approach.  We moved from practical items to those that we would never send on a truck.  That included photographs, the Heinisch children's memory tubs, our favorite drinking glasses, the family collection of vinyls and so much more.  We decided that we would prioritize those items for Doug's last two driving trips, since no amount of moving insurance would replace that which meant so much to us.  

Tonight, Doug and I packed the first round of "priceless" items for his trip to Ocala this weekend.  We decided to split everything up so that if something was lost, there would still be something back at home that would help ease the pain of the loss.  Thus, we only sent one of each of Cameron, Meg and Cal's memory tubs.  We also only sent the tub of photos that were pre-2000 as my mom had duplicates of most of those pictures.  My vinyl collection will be going on this trip, but not Cameron's.  He would still be home to enjoy his for a few more weeks.  

I was very impressed with all that we fit into the Pilot tonight.  I will be happy when Doug arrives in Florida and I hear that all is safe.  Before we finished packing, I took a picture of one of my favorite family portraits of all time.  I figured that if anything happened to it, that someone would be able to reprint one for us.  Overall, I am nervous, but happy that we are getting closer to making Ocala our home.  

AJ Croce

Tonight, Meg, Cameron and I met her friend Mallory in Wabash for what we thought would be an evening of Jim Croce music sung by his son.  Meg had found out that he was singing at the Honeywell Center several months ago and couldn't wait to see him.  The three of us have several Jim Croce albums and love listening to his songs.  We have debated all summer about which songs were the saddest and which ones were our favorites.  Meg had even introduced us to one this summer that I didn't know that well - Box #10.  Just like so many of his others songs, we liked it right away.

Tonight's performance was incredibly different than I imagined that it would be.  I really thought that we would listen to AJ Croce sing his Dad's songs and talk about his limited memories of him.  It wasn't like that at all.  AJ Croce did sing many of Jim's songs, but he also sang those of Same Cooke and Ray Charles He told stories of his long history of playing in blues bands along with memories of his famous father.  AJ Croce also had written several of his own songs as well.  He had a different musical style than his dad, but we still enjoyed him very much.  Halfway through the performance, I regretted not inviting Doug to join us.  He would have loved listening to the Blues.

Although Meg said that I would probably cry through the entire performance tonight, I only teared up at the end.  The last song that he sang came with a video of AJ and Jim together.  As soon as the words to "Time in a Bottle" began, tears started rolling down my face.  I decided not to fight it and cried through the whole song.  I tried to explain to Meg and Cameron later that it wasn't the song that made me sad or that the fact that Jim Croce had died when his son was just a toddler, but it was because that time period had passed by so quickly.  For a brief moment tonight I was back in my brother's bedroom listening to "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" on 45 amazed that someone could say "damn" on a record.  Life really is juts a blink of an eye and I was reminded of that tonight.  As sad as that made me feel during Time in a Bottle, the rest of the concert made me incredibly proud.  Tonight sharing my brother and my love of Jim Croce with my own children was a true moment of life coming full circle.  What a wonderful feeling.  

Look Alikes

Meg sent me this picture from Grandma Jane's with the text "I know where you got your looks."  It wasn't the first time that I had heard from members of my family about how much I look like Granny.  It was, however, the first time that I had been told that I looked like Grandma Guard.  I definitely could see the resemblance between Ruby and Lucille.  If fact, I didn't even believe Meg at first that it was Grandma Guard as I was sure that it was my Grandma.  I texted Aunt Jan just to verify and she agreed with my mom that it was Ruby.  After further inspection, I could not only see my Grandma in that pictures, but I could see my face there as well.  

My mom and dad always told me that they didn't think that I looked like my Grandma, but I always thought I did, especially in pictures of her younger years.  I wondered if my parents said that because they thought that I would be offended by saying that I looked like my grandma, but I never minded hearing that at all.  In fact, I was proud of it.  I loved my grandma.  She was an important part of my life.  I didn't mind carrying on her legacy by reminding others of her.  If they saw her when they saw me, then her memory would always live on in their eyes.  

The other reason that I never minded being told that was because I felt that I had never really resembled either of my parents.  I was such a good mix of the both that neither of their features stood out, so it was nice to know that I did look like someone in my family.  No matter what the reason, it was fun to get this old photo from Meg today and to realize that one day, my own grandchildren would be looking at pictures of me in my youth deciding which of the Heinisch children looked like me.

Bonfires in the Backyard

One of the things that I will miss most when we move to Florida is the bonfires that we have had in our backyard.  At first they were always in the bonfire pit by the lot.  Sometimes they revolved around things that we had to burn - leaves, old furniture, clothing that the Heinisch children hated and were glad to get rid of were just a few of the items that were burned in that bonfire pit over the years.  We also used it when we had family gatherings or when we hosted our children's friends or school groups.

In 2020, we decided to move the bonfires a little closer to our house.  It made it easier to separate our home from the neighbors and gave us a little more privacy.  From that summer on, Doug would set up a bonfire almost every weekend night from May through October.  We even had bonfires going in December and January on unseasonably warm nights.  

Today as we burned some pieces of wood that we found while cleaning out the houses, I thought about how much those bonfires had meant to us over the years.  I know that Doug will miss them even more than I will as he enjoyed getting them ready for a relaxing night at home or for family gathering.  Thankfully, my dad was able to give us a propane powered fire pit for Ocala.  Although it won't be quite the same, it will definitely be enjoyed for many years to come.  

Brett's Weekend Home

Brett wasn't able to join the rest of us for Doug's birthday on the 4th of July because of his commitments to the Republican Party at the Monroe County Fair.  We missed him, but were excited to hear about his week at the fair.  It definitely brought back a lot of good memories for him of the times that he visited the Elkhart County Fair growing up in Syracuse.  

Since Brett couldn't be here last week, he decided to make a trip up to see us this weekend.  With his busy schedule, we really appreciated his effort to make it home one last time before we sold the house in August.  We enjoyed playing Ticket to Ride, going to GBCo for dinner and just hanging out.  We caught up on all that had been going on in his life and even had time to take some nice photos of him at our home that he planned to use on Catholic Match and on his campaign literature.  It was a great visit and we look forward to seeing him in August in Bloomington.  

House Appraisal News

When we accepted the buyers offer in May, it was contingent upon their ability to secure financing.  Even though they had been approved for the loan, they still had to have an inspection and the house had to appraise at the purchase price.  The inspection occurred in May and our home passed with flying colors.  We were very happy to hear that, but were frustrated with the length of time that it took to schedule the appraisal.  According to our seller's agreement, they had to have financing secured by June 26th which meant that the appraisal had to be done several days before that date.  

As June 26th grew closer, the realtor asked for a three week contingency.  That got Doug and my attention immediately.  If the deal fell through, it would mean that we wouldn't be able to relist our house until almost August.  Thus, we would have completely given up the entire prime selling season.  Once we heard from the realtor, Doug decided to get involved.  He said that he would be willing to give them an extra week, but that was all.  If it was longer than a week, he wanted the realtor to take percentages off of their commission for the delay.

Doug must have gotten everyone's attention as the next day we heard from the inspector that they would be doing the appraisal on June 29th.  The good news was that we would have the house ready as we would be in Florida that week.  The bad news was that Cameron wouldn't be able to stay there on the day that he flew back from Ocala.  Thankfully, Grandma had a bedroom ready for him and by noon on the 29th he was able to get back into our home.  

This week we got a text from our realtor saying that the house appraised at full value.  What a relief!  We could now start packing for real and not have to worry about another walk though, inspection or appraisal.  I couldn't have been happier and made sure to thank my Dad right away for all of the help he gave me this past winter getting the house "show ready."  

All Caught on Tape

While I was cleaning out my closet for the move, I came across all of our old video tapes.  It had been quite some time since I had watched them and decided that before I took them all to Ocala that I would go through each one.  Some were movies that we had taped long ago and others were of the Heinisch family ones from years past.  Most of them, however, were ones that Doug and I had taped of our own family.  Needless to say, those were the best.

Meg spent quite a bit of time watching the tapes with me.  She loved the ones of her dance recitals.  We were both amazed at how good we thought that the girls danced versus the reality.  It reminded us of the last scene in The Music Man where all of the parents thought that their children were fantastic musicians where in reality they were not quite that good.  Meg also loved the videos of her interacting with Cal.  Her favorite was when she got mad at Cal for "cording" her at soccer.  

Cameron thought watching the old videos of us was actually sad,  I had to agree as I thought about us moving away form their childhood home and Cameron going off to college.  He did enjoy the fact that everyone's personality shown through from an early age.  Cal agreed that Brett was Brett from day one.  We also all realized that I had video taped way too many music programs over the years.  

During this process, I was also very glad to share Doug's old movies with his children.  I know that Doug and his friends had a lot of fun making westerns, James Bond films and videotaping the DeKalb area.  The scenes with Phil and Dan definitely caught the attention of the Heinisch children.  Overall, it was a nice walk down memory lane this past week.  I'm looking forward to getting all of the videos on flash drives so that they can be enjoyed for many years to come.