This morning is dominated by the need to prepare for the two men that are coming  to help us load the trailer. I have already vacuumed the spiders from the bottom of two pieces of furniture. A few days ago I saw what looked like a black widow on one of my paintings that I was wrapping. Then I put in a load of laundry, as the washer and dryer will be loaded today. Almost everything will be out of the house today, except for the computer and a table and the bed. We may be leaving on Thursday or Friday.

The official wedding pictures were sent via email from E and S in Korea. Here are two that I especially liked with them wearing the traditional Korean costume.

I wrote a farewell poem to my house last night. There is nothing quite like it to get at feelings and I got rather emotional and shed a tear or two while writing it. Ok I sobbed and then had to have two margueritas. I am now thinking about how my Dad must have felt after leaving the house that he designed and built with his own hands, and my Mom helped him, but that is a whole other story.
In the meantime I see E has put a few photos of his wedding on Face Book.
D is on his way home this morning from Berkeley, his friend who lives here is giving him a ride home.
Yesterday I got Sierra out, bathed her and trimmed her feet, and then Karrot, but I was too tired to do his back feet. I will need help with the Pesk.

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Eddy and Stephanie with Steph's Mom sitting at right

  






Amtrac train at Burbank

 D is on his way home he called me from the train and he is heading to Burbank airport. He will stay in Berkeley over night and then be home tommorow. After that there will be some organizing and more packing of boxes. I did not know that he had arranged for some help to come on Sunday to get the heavy furniture into the trailer. So that changes the time frame that I had in mind to get the horses to Bald Hill and us moving,  it is sooner than I had thought.  I think that we may have to take Rocky one of the roosters who has trouble walking and flying up to his perch, and Nelly the duck with the broken leg. They will have to live in the laundry room of the new house until other arrangements can be made. In the meantime I an going to sytematically go through each room in the house and pack boxes. I am also waiting eagerly for photos from E and S wedding.

The place that we are going to breeds thoroughbreds for the race track !! There are two stallions. This is is good and bad as I have mixed feelings about "backyard breeders" But I will be very interested to see what bloodlines are being used.
D had an exciting day yesterday visiting with his old friend guitarist Don Peake and meeting violinist Scarlet Rivera who played with Bob Dylan.
Also I had a surprise phone call from E heading to his wedding and I also spoke with S and briefly with her Mom.
D took pictures of the inside of our new place to live.

In the meantime I am idly packing boxes and wrapping paintings.

the kitchen



front door and living room



Today D gets to see the place that we are renting inside and out. Yesterday he drove by and took some pictures. It looks hilly and interesting. On the aerial it looked dry and flat. I talked with the horse hauler yesterday and they are going to stop in Santa Rosa and let the horses spend the night at their place. I spoke with H at Bald Hill and we will take the horses over there a few days before May 14th when the hauler with collect them.
Yesterday both the social worker and the care giver were over at Gingers. It will be interesting to see if anyone suggests that she should get her grass mowed.  D had told both a while ago that he did not want to hear from them, because both did not communicate many major issues with us to see if it was OK.

The new house at Lapeyre Court

The new house from the road

It is supposed to rain here soon. It was very warm last night 55 F and it is humid. I just sprayed some diluted skin so soft on Karrot to help him, as the mosquitos and no see ums love this kind of weather. I am hoping with the dryer climate down south that there will be none.

A slight hitch in proceedings with the news that the horse haulers are booked until May 12th.  I suppose the main issue is getting to NYC for E wedding on June 2nd.  We have to try to not book tickets etc at the last minute, so that means deciding if I am going alone.
In the meantime yesterday I pressure washed our horse trailer and painted over the rust spots. I noticed that Gingers blinds in the kitchen, living room and bedroom were open. By open I mean about a 1/4 of an inch. This is very unusual. They were closed when I looked this morning. Her care giver is due to come today. No one checks on her day to day as she cancelled meals on wheels.

Kole and the boxes in the trailer

 D left Jody's this morning and will arrive in Moorpark this evening to stay at Jon's. Then on Wednesday he meets with the realtor and owner of the rental where will live for hopefully a short time. 

Gingers house blinds shut



Things are really getting going now. We both packed a lot of boxes yesterday. D got the trailer pulled around to the side of the house. D was nervous about this because Ginger might notice that we were moving and get her lawyer to put pressure on him to give her back all the money that she thinks is hers alone. He has a lawyer now to deal with it.
Yesterday I talked with Marion on Skype as I do every Sunday.  Our neice Janette was visiting and it was nice to see her and chat.
D is going down later today to see the new place. I packed a box with essentials in it to leave in the new house, things like towels and toilet paper.

While he is gone I will be packing more boxes. We had two big rolls of bubble wrap. The horses happily oblivious, the trailer belonging to the new owners the McCues, and our car seen here for the last time.

I just spent most of this morning trying to figure out how to properly access this blog and post on it. It said that I needed Google Chrome. But then it would not download properly, plus I did not like the Google home page, no back buttons and no favorites on the left side. I downloaded Windows 8 a new Internet Explorer and it worked !!!
So D is going down tommorow to take the car and leave it there. Then he is coming back after he has looked at the place where we are going to live. Then we will be seriously packing and moving. I just spoke with H from Bald Hill to let her know what is happening. We will probably either take the horses to stay at BH or have her here to help load them.
In the meantime we are planning and packing boxes.

I just lost everything that I had written because of this new google chrome. There was no warning or option to save when I went to look for a picture to add. But here is a picture of E in his wedding out fit taken by Stephanie in the store in Korea, where E is now. The wedding is on April 26th.

Yesterday the new owners came and dropped off a travel trailer. It is for Lorraine to stay in here while the house has a new roof and the floors refinished. We talked for over 3 hours and it was great, such nice people, and they both like to garden !!

In the night I suddenly realized that neither of the two cats was sleeping at the foot of the bed as they usually do. I thought that they had been upset by the new surge of activity in the house to do with moving. So I got up twice to look for them. Ciel was around outside the house, but no sign of Smokey. D woke and said may be he had accidentally shut him in the trailer. So out I went again, but no Smokey.  Of course he came in at about 5am through the open window in the bedroom. They are asleep already !!

Yesterday D called about a rental with room for horses, and it looks as if that will be our home until we have a chance to look around for somewhere to buy. It is in Moorpark close to family and where we want to live.
Also there is the possibility that whoever is in escrow with the Hitch house may drop out when they find our about the fines. They have 10 days.
We will be packing now and loading up the cargo trailer. I am not sure yet of the sequence of when the horses go to Bald Hill ready to be transported and when I will leave etc.

This is an aerial view of where we are moving. It is 10 acres and is a horse  boarding place with a modular seen upper right.

Rob emailed yesterday to say someone else had a better bid than us on the Hitch house. I thought then we would have a place to go with the rental house( belonging to the realtor that D contacted) with room for the animals. But as it turns out D did not tell me that we would have to take a year lease on it.  he also said that he was not so keen on living in the Ojai area where the house was, So now it looks as if we will have to board the horses and find a cheap place to live such as an apartment with a month to month lease, with no out door space for the dogs or cats. We will have to leave behind all the poultry. I put a lot of my favorite plants in pots and they will have to stay in pots for a while. D is talking about using a reverse mortgage to bump up the ammount that we can spend on a house with land. Also Eddy's wedding is fast approaching on June 2nd. I may have to go by myself.
I can hardly bear to look at my beautiful garden that has taken me 15 years to create. It looks so glorious at the moment. With many beautiful blossoms and flowers blooming for the first time since last year.
Ginger has decided not to get her grass mowed, flower beds, driveway  maintained and the garden over there that I created will need a lot of work when the house is finally sold. I did go over first thing in the morning before she was up and put chicken wire and sticks over the two apple trees, buddleias and roses and other flowers and shrubse that I planted so that the deer would not destroy them.
I really hope that the realtor calls today with news of somewhere for us to live and also we need to find place for the horses.

Things are better today. D came home yesterday evening. He brought boxes. He also had spoken with a realtor who has a house that we can rent mont to month with room for the horses etc. So at least we do have somewhere to go. Now it is a matter of when. I passed the time yesterday by remaking a Man O' War pedigree. I had sold out of the series of ten that I made before. He is one of the best sellers for me. Another one being Secretariat.

I will carry on  working on some pedigrees that are half done and packing boxes, until we hear what is happening with the house that we want to buy.

I almost don't feel like blogging today because nothing has happened with the Hitch house that gives any kind of indication that we may have our offer accepted. I did email our realtor Rob and he emailed realtor Tim, and Tim said that it was not unusual to wait this long for a response. So I emailed Rob back and asked if it was possible to know how many days was the usual amount of time to wait. I don't know if he ignored my email or if he asked and got no response or what.  However D is on his way home and may be home tonight. Or he may be home tomorrow night, it depends on if he decides to stay at Jody's.
Several times in the past  few days  I have had people ignore me. It is kind of strange. Two women, one J  fiancee who lives on our street ignored me twice as she jogged past on the road and I was right next to the fence and the dogs barked at her. Yesterday a woman was between the two fences separating us from the pit bulls at Stella's. She was picking things up from the ground and putting them in a plastic bag. I was going to get the mail. She walked away as I approached and I was ready to say hi what were you gathering. She just kept walking and turned into the Wassons. Then early yesterday I called and left a message for someone to come and get some things here that I want to donate to a rummage sale, no return call.
One thing that I will be able to do is pack things when D gets home, he will bring some packing boxes.
I saw care giver Lynette go the Gingers in the  late afternoon yesterday, and she was there the evening before. It is puzzling, could G now need more care, is she going to need daily care. Usually L is there twice a week for 3 hours.  I suppose time will tell.

I can not believe that Karrot and for that matter Pesky are not hopping lame this morning.  Yesterday evening P insisted on chasing K around at  a full gallop for quite some time. I intervened but nothing could disuade P. Later I checked K and his beathing had returned to normal and he was busy rubbing his tummy on a branch, as he does every evening. I should mention that K is 25 years old and P is 9 and an ex race horse who bowed a tendon. Sierra stayed up in the barn out of the way.
D went over to have dinner with his family and spoke with ex N for a short while. I am pleased to hear this, as there has been a lot of hostility and bitterness in the past.
However D mentioned Gingers garden this morning when he called. She seems to have stopped paying the gardener to come over, and the grass is getting very long.  I said just let it grow long.  In the beginning I mowed and took care of the garden, as I created it when we bought the house for her. But she insisted I not take care of it. I was tempted this morning  to go over and plant Calla lilies. G had made a point of saying she did not want me to plant any as they reminded her of funerals.
I am really hoping that we will hear something today from the Bank via Realtors about  the Hitch house.

Additur also known as Pesky as a racehorse # 1

A glorious Spring day. D wants to look at rentals. Probably that would be our best option to start with.
J M called to ask if it was ok to bring up a 22ft travel trailer and park it behind the greenhouse. This is for later when we are gone and the house is being painted and having the floors and roof done. I felt a bit sad as this made me realize that it was not my home anymore, reality is starting to sink in.
D is going to have dinner with Jessie and fam, will ex N be there ??
I suggested we buy a travel trailer and park it in J & N driveway.
It is still possible that the Hitch house is ours... but when will we know what is going on.
I was saddened to hear about the 2 horses that died in the Grand National. M and I talked about it and one conclusion that we came to was could it be that the horses legs are weaker now. In our day in the 70's steeplechasers were big strong boned animals. With big thick cannon bones and stong pasterns.
Looking over at Gingers I see that her bedroom blinds facing the road are open enough so that she can see out, but the other blinds are tight shut.
I did a short ammount of weeding in the veg garden to pass the time.
D called and wanted me to look up a house in TO for sale. That is another possibility to just buy a house with out land.

Red Rum the winner of the Grand National 3 times.

Today has started cold so I have got a fire going in the wood stove in the kitchen.
D called at 9:30am to say he had handed Mo the race car over to the new owner and feels that he is a good owner, much as I feel that the new owners of the house are good.
I did some research starting on the parcel number on the land on Rosita. I ended up finding some useful information on living in a travel trailer on your property while you are building. Yes you can, but you have to get a permit, have to be hooked up to sewer, water and electric, and can only be there for a certain amount of time. I am now trying to find what the certain amount of time is. It is interesting to see that the street # on the Rosita is very similar to here. Here is 21401 and there is 10240.
D calls to say he has gone by to look at Rosita and that it looks nice and in a good neighborhood. Later he says he does not know if a trailer would fit along the roads leading to it. This means mainly his big race car trailer.
He seems to have misplaced all the sheets with info on them about each property that I printed out. Which I later found in the top drawer of his bedside table.
I look up the realtors # but D says that he is tired and will call after he takes a nap.
In the meantime the weather is warm and sunny with a slight breeze. I decided to go and weed the strawberry bed and put some aged manure on it.
D calls he says it is to late now to call realtors, and is going to set out to look at some more property. Very reluctant he would rather buy something move in ready, but because we need land that kind of place is rare in our price range.

Another day with no news

D left early for his journey to Buttonwillow.
In the night it rained and blew hard.I was woken by Smokey the cat announcing his arrival and coming in with a soaking wet dripping back. He does this time and time again and seems to enjoy getting wet.
I put Nellie the duck in the fish pond for a swim to try and heal the head wounds that we think the goose inflicted on her. She is now shut back in the duck house with food and water.
Yesterday we took great delight in watching Ginger come home from an appointment at the hair dresser. It was pouring with rain and she had to get from the care givers car to her house. Just a few steps, but she was wearing some kind of plastic rain cap and then put newspaper over her head. When D took care of her she would cancel appointments if it was just hinting at rain.
I keep checking the Hitch house on Redfin to see if it is pending yet.  Every day it accumulates a fine of $400 for code violations which is to be paid by buyer.
I washed the bed sheet and pillow cases and dried them and made the bed and vacuumed. I have taken up some of the rugs and packed them in the trailer.

The sun is shining today and the no see ums are out. Karrot got down several times to rub his tummy. I got some febreeze and sprayed him. I have not tried it before. It will either help or cause another allergic reaction.

April 12th 2012 before moving house but after selling

Today I am so bored I decided to start a Blog.
It is a time of limbo here. Our house has been sold and we do not have another house to move in to.
I am not motivated to do anything today very much. Also it is cold and rainy outside. We have already packed some boxes and sold some furniture. We do have a large cargo trailer that we bought to put everything in if it will fit. . Earlier today I started to take pictures off the walls and wrapped them in bubble wrap. What a great invention bubble wrap is!!
I am seriously training the horses manes to stay on the right side, two of the horses that is. The third already has a mane that is trained. I tell them that they need to look well kept and handsome for their appearance in Southern California, that is where we are moving to.
The garden here is in full Spring glory. Fruit trees blossoming, forget me knots, day lilies and calla lilies. the lilac, all look wonderful. The new owners are missing it. Hopefully they will see the tail end. We have two months from a week ago to move out.
Normally at this time I would be busy in the garden and greenhouse. Mostly weeding and cutting grass. Tomatoes should have been planted by now and some lettuce seeds. There are some potatoes growing that the next owners can harvest.
Tommorow D is going down to look at land.