August 2013

The Labor Day parade is one of the highlights of the Last Fling in Naperville. This was probably our last parade in Naperville. Stephanie, Sean and the boys walked in the parade supporting NCEC. NCEC stands for Naperville for Clean Energy and Conservation. Stephanie is the President of NCEC.

After the parade we all had lunch at Quigley’s Irish Pub. The weather was beautiful.

We spent the week emptying all the furniture and closets in preparation for moving some furniture to Stephanie’s house and the estate sale we scheduled for the 18^th. I dismantled my basement work shop as Sean wanted the shelves and tables. We moved as much as we could into the garage. The rest we moved over the weekend. Sean rented a truck and we carted stuff back and forth from Stephanie’s to our house and vice versa. Big job and we greatly appreciate all of their help. On moving day I was able to recruit John and Marshall DuPuy from next door. They were a huge help. Thanks guys! Sean recruited a neighbor on his end also.

It was a big day and we moved a lot of stuff. Anything left over went into the estate sale. We gave all of our clothes to charity. Anything we didn’t sell in the estate sale went to charity. The estate sale was a weird experience. People bought soap, canned food and paper products before the crystal, china and furniture. We had really good furniture, but nobody wanted it. We gave tons to charity. I spent the entire week after the sale hauling stuff to Habitat for Humanity and Serendipity. They were thrilled to get it. After we emptied the house we shampooed the carpets and left it spotless. We only took what would fit in the trunk of the car.

We were able to see the boy’s football games during the month. Jack was an Eagle and Clark was a Jaguar. Sean coached. We enjoyed the muffled sounds of football practice most days from our backyard while enjoying one last fire in the fire pit. Youth football is good for the kids.

We left town on the 27^th and headed to Vermilion, Ohio to help celebrate John and Joann Pinter’s 50^th wedding anniversary. We stayed with good friends Tom and Sharon Zeck. They have a beautiful home in the Lagoons. We walked the beach on Lake Erie and took their boat to lunch. The Pinter’s party was at the local French retstaurant, Chez Francois and everything was delicious. We always enjoy visiting Chez Francois. John and Joann had a wonderful party that was attended by long time friends and family. We enjoyed meeting them all. Nice people.

The day we left Ohio, our home closed and we could finally close that chapter. My first thoughts? It was a lot of work non-stop all summer long. Oh my gosh! I am so glad that my kids won’t have to do that for me. What did I take away from it all? Never, never have an estate sale. Give your stuff to charity and take the full write off. Selling a solid oak kitchen table and four chairs for $80 is more painful than giving it to charity and deducting the reasonable value of $500. Estate sales cheat you out of your own stuff! Especially if you have nice stuff. To see Henredon furniture walk out the door for pennies on the dollar is truly disheartening. Give all of your stuff to charity. Take the write off.

We will miss Naperville. It was our home for over 30 years. We raised our two beautiful children there. We did business there. We learned first hand it is better to give than to receive. We did, Boy Scouts, we were room mothers, we did the Naperville Jaycees and back then Jaycettes, we did Chamber of Commerce, we taught catechism, we coached soccer and football, kept score at little league baseball and through it all we were the lucky ones. I also take pride in having provided a good income and environment for our employees. They are good people all. I miss them.

As we left Ohio we headed through Maryland towards Virginia Beach, Va. and the outer banks.