August 6th, 2013 - We are all sitting in my dad's family room reminiscing about our lost Papa, making arrangements, generally figuring things out when we get a call from our realtor. We needed to sign a couple more forms, and we needed to now. Luckily, he lives less than a mile from my dad's house, so we ran them over. We all took this as a great sign for us to get this house... woo? So much to think about at a time like this, it was hard to be happy.
August 9th, 2013 - Happy Birthday to me. Today was Papa's funeral. Months prior to his death, he had decided that he wanted to go out with a bang. Literally. A fireworks enthusiast, retired military airman, and someone who loved his home (which he built himself) going quietly would have been unnatural. He wrote very specific details of what he wanted in his own funeral. He would like all of his grandchildren to get up and say a little something, after the service he wanted several (illegal) fireworks to be shot off, he wanted to take a drive passed his house to a cemetery where there would be full military honors with a 21 gun salute. He got it all. Now, I don't know if you've ever been to a military funeral like this, but man. That was intense. Folding and presenting of the flag, taps, seeing men in uniform crying over a fallen soldier, of which whom they had never met. I don't think there was a dry eye in that memorial park. It certainly didn't feel like my 28th birthday, but really... it didn't matter that it was.
The next couple of weeks were a blur. There was a lot of talk about different scenarios that would happen with Papa's house. The common theme was 'someone needs to live there while the estate gets straightened out.' The last thing we needed was for his house to be sitting vacant during this time. My dad extended the care givers' schedules to get us through the end of the month while we figured it out.
All in all, it was decided, that while we wait for our short sale to be finalized, we should break our lease and move into that house. Being that it was only about 2 miles from where we were living, and we were the most reasonable choice, we accepted.
For the next week or so, we started to pack and bring out belongings to Papa's house. We immediately decided that we would leave the majority of our belongings in boxes and use what the house had. Essentially, we unpacked our clothes, some bathroom items, very few kitchen items... and that's about it.
That Labor Day weekend, we headed north as a family to scatter Papa's ashes in the same state park that he had vacationed several times per year since the 1940s. This was becoming a family tradition for us, and it seemed normal. We enjoyed the unseasonably cold weekend before going back to reality.
So there we were, less than a year into our marriage and we just moved into my grandparent's house with everything we own, and everything they owned too. Was this a mistake?
August 9th, 2013 - Happy Birthday to me. Today was Papa's funeral. Months prior to his death, he had decided that he wanted to go out with a bang. Literally. A fireworks enthusiast, retired military airman, and someone who loved his home (which he built himself) going quietly would have been unnatural. He wrote very specific details of what he wanted in his own funeral. He would like all of his grandchildren to get up and say a little something, after the service he wanted several (illegal) fireworks to be shot off, he wanted to take a drive passed his house to a cemetery where there would be full military honors with a 21 gun salute. He got it all. Now, I don't know if you've ever been to a military funeral like this, but man. That was intense. Folding and presenting of the flag, taps, seeing men in uniform crying over a fallen soldier, of which whom they had never met. I don't think there was a dry eye in that memorial park. It certainly didn't feel like my 28th birthday, but really... it didn't matter that it was.
The next couple of weeks were a blur. There was a lot of talk about different scenarios that would happen with Papa's house. The common theme was 'someone needs to live there while the estate gets straightened out.' The last thing we needed was for his house to be sitting vacant during this time. My dad extended the care givers' schedules to get us through the end of the month while we figured it out.
All in all, it was decided, that while we wait for our short sale to be finalized, we should break our lease and move into that house. Being that it was only about 2 miles from where we were living, and we were the most reasonable choice, we accepted.
For the next week or so, we started to pack and bring out belongings to Papa's house. We immediately decided that we would leave the majority of our belongings in boxes and use what the house had. Essentially, we unpacked our clothes, some bathroom items, very few kitchen items... and that's about it.
That Labor Day weekend, we headed north as a family to scatter Papa's ashes in the same state park that he had vacationed several times per year since the 1940s. This was becoming a family tradition for us, and it seemed normal. We enjoyed the unseasonably cold weekend before going back to reality.
So there we were, less than a year into our marriage and we just moved into my grandparent's house with everything we own, and everything they owned too. Was this a mistake?
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