In The Circle: Change of Address

Memory Road.

We moved into our house on Covewood Place in the fall of 2000. Scott and I bought the house before we were married, or even engaged. Living in sin! We looked and looked and looked with Scott's dad as our incredibly tolerant and underpaid real estate agent, and then we found this house. THE house. Five bedrooms, three bathrooms, on the end of a circle, the yard with the 8 million roses and the vegetable garden, the 3-car garage with RV parking plus a huge attic. It was perfection.

After a few days of pulling down floral window coverings and replacing sculpted grey carpet with tile in the bathrooms, Scott proposed in the living room. Jeff and Lynne had set up a cute little table in the living room, the fire was lit, wine glasses were full and the Chinese takeout was still warm. Scott said he loved our life, our house, our future but there was one thing he would change..."I want you to be my wife, not my girlfriend." And we were engaged. Engaged homeowners. Who slept on the floor of the house that night with no furniture, no nothing really...except love and hope and belief in the future. It was perfection.

Tami, me, Little Michele and Tiff at the first sushi party at the old house.

If I could find all of our old photos (sorry, moving hazard), I know I have many of those early years. The first family dinner with no furniture. The first epic Xmas Eve Eve Party, with no furniture. The years where we ignored the yard letting the mint take over and the roses go crazy, and turned the garden into a dog kennel because we were boating and playing and being married and in love.

Of course, there were also the sick days. Lots of time on the couch cracked out on painkillers, middle-of-the-night dashes to the hospital, moments of great fear, great strength, great hope and undying love. The roomies - Jere and Tiff - who made it all possible and kept our sanity.

And then, this house became the house where we - Scott and Lisa, the couple who does stuff - became a family. The most lucky, enchanted and blessed family. I was standing in what is now Sloane's room one afternoon in my robe with a towel turban on my head when we got the call that Tagg would be our son.

I found a bedding set that

felt "right" in a way that so many things in my life have felt right and my mom and Tiff and I painstakingly painted a busy bee room to match. It was a room crafted with love. Over the years, he's been obsessed with Nemo, Cars and now Star Wars but no matter what he would never, ever let us paint this room. He loves his bees. And I love that he loves them.

Tagg saying good-bye to the bees.

This room, one of my favorites because of the bookshelves and vaulted ceilings. Over the years it was a guest room, a closet, an office, and then less than 2 years after Tagg was born, we were blessed with a daughter and it became Sloane's magical purple butterfly room. Purple is still her favorite color, and maybe those bookshelves are the reason she became a climber at such an early age.

Our first family photo after Sloane came home. May 2010.

Both of our kids learned to walk in this living room (did not always look like this, for the record). First steps recorded right on this little patch of carpet. Over the years, it's been littered with beer bottles and baby bottles, dog bones and legos.

The family room we left. That TV is epic!

That room was FREEZING (to me), all the time. Especially in the corner where we had the couch positioned. But we loved it.

Aunt Kris doing some Wii action!

When it was red and gold with the gargantuan Mitsubishi projection TV and the dart board on the wall. When we would play Wii Dance Party. When Auntee Leese cared for Tagg, and then Ashley and then Sloane and this was their basecamp. The true embodiment of a "Family" room.

Tagg's First Christmas.

The kitchen. How do we even talk about the kitchen? Scott's last ditch effort to keep me in the house started early December of 2012 and was done 3 weeks later. It took awhile to dream up but this island/bar but once we had the vision, and a construction crew? Amazing. It was perfect. I already miss it. The whole kitchen. It is amazing, and it is ours. For the way we lived our life in this house. In the kitchen. Cards. Parties. Games. Kids crafts. Work. Connecting. This room was the heart of our home. And our family.


Tagg's Star Wars-Swimming Party 4th Birthday. They all look the same but this one had foam light sabers.

We probably spent as much time outside the house as in. Once the backyard was under control (thanks, Clemente!) we hung out a lot. Curbing for the gardens, the playhouse for Tagg's 1st birthday, the inflatable waterslide for Sloane's first birthday, soccer, flower hunts, barbecues, birthday parties....the backyard was "our" special place.

First playset. In Scott's old truck. Made it under every stoplights.

Halloween on the porch, 2011.

We had great neighbors (and a few not-so-great neighbors, aka the ones who were shooting for no apparent reason and the ones who never mowed their lawns). On the up side? The Trans next door who hardly spoke English, watered their lawn by hand every night and always say hi, bring garbage bags for leaves in the fall, and gave our kids Chinese New Year gifts each year. Every couple next door on the other side seemed to have a couple of kids, and were all sweet as pie, especially the ones who helped us get the playhouse over the fence on a Sunday (nice excuse to get out of church but you've never seen so many sweaty guys in shirt sleeves and ties). Corinne who lives down the street. Her daughter babysat for us for a long time and now she has a baby of her own.

Bike ride to see the 'cows!'

And then there's the "hood." Our neighborhood. There are milkcows on one corner, fuzzy cows on another. A corn field at the end of the street. A whole little farm with horses and chickens (which Alice almost killed) and a great little farmer in overalls who loves the kids. The school playground, the "loop" where a lot of neighborhoods started years ago and then stopped, like a little ghostly memorium to the housing bust, and now are filled with excavators and for sale signs and new residents. The horse field that used to reside over our back fence. I remember feeding them apples, and a rare morning in the late fall when the six horses that lived back there galloped exuberantly up and down the frost-covered field, their breath creating white clouds of mystical smoke as they ran. It was a magical moment. Of course that same field also resulted in our basement flooding as they would run irrigation water through the viaduct in our backyard. But the flooding? Totally not as cool as those horses galloping, in our back yard, like a scene from a fairy tale.

The whole house was, and has been, like a movie. It's just been perfect, changing with us as we grow. Wonderful memories. Amazing times. A perfect house, even with all its imperfections, which were also perfect.

Good-Bye.

Scott and Tagg walking out of the Covewood house for the very last time.

We sold the Covewood house in less than 48 hours. For more than the asking price. I like to think it was my super-awesome 'staging' efforts. Or that the house is just THAT incredible. It could be that the market is picking up, maybe we underpriced a bit, but we sold it. Fast. And to a super cute couple who, much like we were, are engaged but not yet married, whose dad is their real estate agent. It was like passing the baton to our previous selves. Which made it easier.

And, when we did the walk through? Turns out the guy who bought our house was my neighbor when I was in high school, a hundred years ago. A little kid who is now a man and recognized me before I did him. And they are walking in our footsteps. I can only hope that they are as blessed in their path in that house as we were.

New Beginnings.

Our new house has that same magical quality as the Covewood house. The second I walked in the door, I knew this was our house. It took a bit to convince Scott since (A) we weren't actually looking, (B) it was way more than he wanted to pay and (C), it had the one garage/RV situation he said "HELL NO" to.

But after a few visits and an online slideshow, the house captured his heart too. And in just a matter of weeks, it was ours. We're still settling in, unpacking boxes, figuring out how to fill all this space, remembering where things are at. But someday, soon, we'll send out a change of address card and pictures of the new house, Harmer style.

Big thanks to all of those (especially the Motorsportsland crew) who helped us move. In under 2 hours. Seriously 12 trucks 20 dudes and I didn't even get pizzas delivered in time to thank them. So, incredibly cool guys! XOXO