We're coming to Utah - Finally!!!!!

Hey, guys!

It looks like it's finally going to happen! For those who haven't yet heard, we have a buyer for our house, and we're in the final negotiation phase with them. They are a family with 7 children from Mills River, ranging in age from 19 years old and in college, to 16 months old. They are currently living in a small house and need to sell in order to have room for everyone. They can't sell their home while they're still living in it because there's just no room to put anything "away". They are also home schooling, and there's just no room to meet for school. So you can imagine how much they love our big house! They were just here to see it, and when they saw the study with the fireplace and book shelves, they all were excited about their new school room!

We are having to do some fancy financing with them to help them make it happen, but it looks like they'll be able to meet our terms. We'll hear definitely by next week. We also learned last night that they are close friends of Dr. Walicki and Nicole (they go to Church with them). The Dad is a family counselor and runs his own practice in Asheville.

We finally got a renter for our Smithfield house, and they moved in on Dec. 28th. We found out that they are active members of the Church, and will be a real asset to the people in the Smithfield Ward. They have 6 children, most of them teenagers. They will live there until they sell their home in Louisiana (they are realtors, but the market has died in LA, just as it has here.) They want to eventually buy a home in Logan or Smithfield to be near their family, but until then, I hope they will be long-term in our home.

Now the rest of the story. When we leave Hendersonville we will be renting Andra's home. We will move in and keep it attractive and sellable. With just the two of us there we can keep it ready to show on short notice.

In the meantime, our renters will have a place to live in Smithfield, and when they get ready to move, we'll either move up there, or we'll rent it to someone else until Andra sells her house. We'll be close enough to see you and have you come visit, but we'll be helping out Andra as well. We also have the option of moving to Smithfield anytime we want to. We have a month-to-month contract with our renters, and we just need to give them 30 days notice to vacate. So we're set.

Now we just need to finalize the sale of this house to put in all into motion. Pray it will happen!

We love you guys and are really excited about seeing you again. We'll probably be moving the weekend of February 9th or February 23rd. February 16th is our Stake Conference Leadership Training and all our Ward members will be in meetings, so they won't be available to help us move. We're targeting Feb. 9th, if we can close on the house and if Andra will be moved by then. We'll see how it works out. If anybody wants to make the trip to the old homestead one more time, you'd better do it before the end of January. We'd love to see anyone and everyone between now and then.

At any rate we'll see you in Utah soon!

Love you,

Ramona (and Dad)