SOUTH DAKOTA to MONTANA to WYOMING to COLORADO
Guys! I am on the road again!!
My Two Months in Virginia
But first, you may be wondering what I was up to while Shana Takes A Break. Here's a quick recap:
I just spent two months in Virginia. My parents have a second home there near Charlottesville and they are letting me stay there until I find something permanent. Knowing I have this option is what made the whole Shana Takes A Hike scenario possible to begin with, so a HUGE thank you to Mom and Dad!
Here's a snap of their house I took one night, after returning home from a walk, when the sky was particularly pretty:
The house is about two hours from the DC area, so it's easy for me to drive up for the day for client meetings or to fly out of DCA or IAD if I need to visit clients in St. Louis.
More importantly, Mom and Dad's house is just a few doors down from my sister's home (looks like Mom and Dad officially cast their vote for Favorite Child when they bought this house, haha) and it has been so awesome to see my three adorable little nephews ride their bikes by from my office window, play Legos as often as I like, and have my sister pop in to just chat whenever she has a few minutes.
I spent the first week in Virginia working with my brother and his wife over the phone to purchase three rental properties (six units!) in Brookings, SD - purchase agreements, leases, background checks, expense tracking, setting up bank accounts, and more. We are super excited to have our new tenants all settled in for the next year!
Here's a pic of me signing a bazillion closing documents with a notary public at the UPS store in Charlottesville. She gave me the award for most notarizations in one fell swoop.
After that, I had meetings in DC and St. Louis, and then a quick trip to Minnesota for a tragic funeral.
The following two weeks, Dad came and stayed with me in Virginia. (Well, he stayed in HIS Virginia house and I just happened to be there, haha.) It was so nice to spend that time with him. Also, it was the first time I spent time with Dad as a roommate. I'm proud to say he was a real champ and managed to take care of himself despite the fact mom wasn't there to feed him, do his laundry, or set clothes out for him to wear each day. (She really does this. I can't make it up.)
We celebrated my sister's birthday:
We had apple cider donuts at Carter Mountain Orchard at sunset. Here's a pic of Dad and me:
The point of Dad's trip was to take care of some business he had in VA and then drive his Can-Am Spyder (a three-wheel motorcycle) back to South Dakota - something he had talked about doing for years, so I'm thrilled he is finally making time to do it! Here he is, moments before zooming off:
For the next month, I did a few hikes in Shenandoah National Park and near Charlottesville, walked countless miles through the sprawling golf course community where I now live, and hosted a couple friends who came to visit me - Amy from Northern Virginia and Cristy from Minneapolis!
We celebrated my littlest nephew's fourth birthday (although he still insists he is three):
Days later we stressed over my littlest nephew's two-night hospital stay after a bad cold turned into a serious case of dehydration and low oxygen.
The rest of the time, I pored over real estate in northern Virginia, trying to find somewhere to live. The great news is that I sold my house at the top of the market. The bad news is that it's still the top of the market. It's so disheartening to see these gorgeous, brand new houses going up in the Charlottesville area for the same price it costs to buy a tear-down house in Northern Virginia. Ugh. I spent four weekends in Northern Virginia looking at houses, but none were quite right, so I never pulled the trigger.
In the meantime, just as things were getting back to normal with client visits and seeing friends ... the Delta variant of COVID started spiking. My company canceled our in-person events for the fall. My clients were told to work remotely again. And I decided to take advantage of the situation.
I left my SUV with my parents in South Dakota back in June thinking I could maybe sneak back out for a final road trip this fall. I never would have guessed it would work out quite this well!
Shana Takes Another Hike
I decided to fly back to South Dakota to see my parents and spend a couple days on the farm. Then head out to visit Glacier National Park, Yellowstone, and the Grand Tetons. And finally, drive to Denver, sell my car on Carvana, and fly back to Virginia to buy a house and start living like a normal person again.
I know Mom and Dad have a TON of stuff going on this month, so I called them to ask which day / time would be most convenient for me to fly in and could they pick me up at the airport, which is two hours one-way from their farm. Before I could finish the sentence, they just said, "YES! Whatever you book works for us." How can I love these two any more than I already do??
Mom picked me up from the airport. We stopped in Brookings on our way home so I could see the rental houses my brother and I purchased this summer. Here we are, getting groceries after our rental house drive-bys:
I spent a couple days on the farm, working from Mom's office, going for walks, and playing cards. My brother's family was supposed to visit, but unfortunately my brother got a bad cold, so they opted to stay home. So bummed to be that close and not see them ...
And then, despite their insane schedule, Mom and Dad moved some things around and decided to join me for a few days in Montana. They had talked about wanting to do this, but didn't know how to squeeze it in, and then figured out a way. I am over the moon that it is working out!
Time to get the ol' Highlander out of storage and take to the roads again. This wagon train heads out Friday after work!