Trip to South Carolina Hampton Lake

White Egret standing on a log off our dock

Two new chairs for the house. View is from the patio

3 Turtles of many that we have in the lake.  They were hard to take a picture of
as they would go back into the lake every time you tried to take a shot. 

Another view of the new chairs.  We are getting there slowly with decorating.
We do have pictures up on the walls.  Step by step...

Eddie, Karen, and I before they left to go back to Florida.  We
had a real nice visit and it was good seeing them.

Frankie (shot was taken at our CA home)

Flight of the Egret

A Blue Heron
So many birds of different species
You can bird watch all day

We spent two weeks at Hampton Lake the beginning of October.  The fall leaves were just beginning to turn.  The days were wonderful and very relaxing.

We did have several items that we had our list to accomplish.  The first and major one, was having the Internet, TV, and phone service hooked-up.  We now have our own South Carolina home phone number.  The Internet service is wireless so we can be anywhere in the house when we need to go online.  The TV service was something we added but we didn't need too.  We had been enjoying listening to CD's and/or watching movies.  We have a great flat screen television that is 3-D ready but the picture is so clear, you don't feel like you need this option.

We did have visitors while there.  Karen and Eddie came up from Florida to visit for a few days.  It had been a very long time since we had seen one another.  Karen and I took the time to catch up and talked about everything.  It was a fun visit having Karen there.

After they left, we had our financial planner come down from Maryland for a quick one day visit.  We spent a good portion of the day just reviewing our options as Sam is getting ready to retire.  The outlook looks to be pretty good.

The retirement will be happening starting the beginning of the new year.  Sam will be working three months and off three months.  This will be going on for the next 2 1/2 years.  Sam is ready to slow down and get away from the stress he has been under for all these years.  He is ready to enjoy life without having to do that grind of traffic and work.

We do have our house on the market and we do hope we will get that buyer soon.  Once it sells, we will then organize ourselves for the big and final move to Hampton Lake, South Carolina.  Sam will still need to fly back and forth to California for work, but we will be settling in to South Carolina.  We will switch our driver's licenses, fill our new voters cards, and all the other things you need to do when you move to a new place.

This move is happening faster than I expected.  I assumed we would be in California until Sam fully retires.  Sam had other ideas.  He can't wait to make the move to our new home back east.  It is now up to me to arrange to get copies of all the heath and dental records, arrange for termination of utilities, say goodbye to friends and neighbors, but especially to go through the house and get rid of items we really don't need any longer.  Much of the furniture we have in the California house will be staying as we have already purchased furniture for the Hampton Lake house.  We basically will be taking dishes, glassware, clothes, my car, and anything else except the furniture.  I still can't believe this move is just around the corner.  I have mixed emotions as we have been here for 11 years but California is a hard state to live in as it is expensive.

Before all this happens, I will be having foot surgery again.  Same foot (left) but it is to correct the position of the big toe.  It doesn't want to stay where it should be but will cross over the second toe.  The surgery will take about an hour and a half.  It will be at the beginning of December but it won't slow me down to fly to Maryland for Christmas.  This will be the last time for surgery on my foot.  

This year, 2011, has been a bust for me.  I seemed to be either ill or the surgery with my foot that lasted much longer than anticipated.  Why should I be continuing with surgery?  It is to have a better quality of life.  I can't move that toe normally now and I have high hopes I will be able too when it is done.  My feet aren't the nicest things to look at anyway.

The future will be full of unexpected surprises.  Ready or not, the wheels are in motion.