Catching Up , What I've been doing

Since I last blogged lots of things have happened , changed.
  I made my last trip to Cape Cod as an artist. I had my yearly show in the gallery , but it was also the last because the gallery was closing in the Fall.
   I also started to make a real effort in reclaiming my house. The hoarding clutter was out of control and I was drowning. I donated and culled things I wasn't using. If you visited during this time , there was a " two bag minimum " to take away ,( & the bags were totes , so extras of those went away too!). And I'm happy to say several friends stepped up to the challenge . One friend in particular , made many many trips, thanks Anna ! I hadn't even  tackled the garage yet (SO MANY THINGS)  when I got big news. Mom wanted she and I to both move into one new house ! She put her house on the market Tuesday night and sold it Wednesday afternoon !!  I know , right ? Me ? I was still frozen with the horror that was having to pack it up enough in two weeks for the realtor to come through, (spoiler alert , I didn't make the deadline ....). September 26 came , the deadline , and we were still packing. I was stressed with having to cull so many of my things , Mom was super stressed she hadn't found a house with her closing date fast approaching , and EVERYBODY  was stressed at how much I had, kept and needed to pack.  I sat down in the bead room to start packing up beads on a Thursday evening about six pm. and was still packing at nine the next morning when my help came to pack. The job was finally finished( for the most part ) that Sunday. It really was a nightmare. I'm ashamed of the fact I displayed many of the behaviors the hoarders on tv do when their "stuff" is gone through.  Finally in October I had a massive , four day estate sale .  It was one the third day of the sale we got the news, we got he house we had found and made an offer for. It went really well and I was almost done ! A few more friends came by to load up , one even drove to Tulsa and filled her car to maximum capacity , ( an art teacher , she took lots of things I hated to see 'go to waste' , which is how I got into trouble in the first place) . I called a few organizations to come and get all the leftovers and that was the end of all the stuff. All that was left was to couch surf until closing on the new house, November 20th.
   Mom and I managed to get downstairs ready in time to have Christmas in the new house , but minimum work has been done upstairs in my bead room. Some basic furniture placement is done, and I think I have all the bead room boxes upstairs. Now comes the 'fun' part, unpacking and making a new(and hopefully improved) bead room.  I'm happy to say the with  upcoming Bead Soup Blog Hop I have a deadline and a goal to work towards.
   Here are some before shots , I'll be updating as progress is made, wish me luck !