Daron, Melanie, Stephen, Kassie, and Kenny

Friday, October 29, 2010

Good-bye Bumper

Our family is about to begin a wonderful adventure... we're moving to Switzerland!  Daron officially accepted a job offer with HP to transfer to Geneva.  He asked his current bosses and fellow co-workers to look for him to return to Houston in TWO YEARS, which is when he will begin looking for a job back HOME again. While missing all our family and friends will be the hardest part, we are all VERY EXCITED about going!  This possibility has been discussed for most of this year, but nothing has officially happened. But 2 weeks ago, Daron was offered a great package and we are now deep in the process of selling EVERYTHING we own except for our few treasured items (photo albums, the bosch we got for our wedding, etc.) which we’ll store in mom’s attic for 2 years, and we’ll take our clothes, bedding, tent, and a few toys – and that’s about it. We’ll be living in a small (about 1000 sq.ft) apt and have only 1 car, since public transportation is great there. After Daron learns the ropes of his new job (which is the same role as his current job, but just doing it in Europe) he'll be able to work from home 3-4 days per week.  HP is flying both of us to Geneva next week to house-hunt, look at schools, etc. So crazy, so fun, and so exciting. Our kids are at a great age for this kind of adventure: Stephen (10), Kassie (8) and Kenny (5). We’ll be gone every weekend seeing something wonderful – we don’t know if we’ll live in Geneva or across the border in France. But our kids will be speaking French in school, so we've already bought the Rosetta Stone software and we're already learning French!  We’ll be back here to visit at least once a year – probably come back from Thanksgiving til Christmas.

This morning was our first big garage sale - everything in the house goes! We weren't expecting for Bumper to go right now -- we figured we'd hang onto him til right before we moved. But a sweet man came and asked for him. I hadn't really spent the time thinking about how I would feel when it was time to part with him. But really, it felt like I was giving my child away. We've had him for a decade -- we have pictures of little newborn Kassie, napping laying across his back, holding his tail, and sucking her thumb. He's the sweetest dog we could ever hope to have. I just looked in this man's eyes this morning and asked if he would love Bumper. He said he would, and that he had a big yard and family that would take good care of him. Bumper just looked at Daron and me with his big eyes and then happily lumbered over to this man's car and hopped in. Oh my word - I just cried! I didn't expect that. But remembering how he just follows me from room to room and really just lives to have our company - to love and be loved - it's no wonder 'DOG' and 'GOD' are the same words spelled backwards. 

7 comments:

  1. At least you have pictures of Bumper. Most of us don't think about pictures of the dog until it's too late. Great memories.

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  2. I'm looking forward to all of those fotos of Bumper ( that of course you will be posting ), that wonderful dog that protected your little kiddies when he thought they were being attacked ( and they were only playing hard ).

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  3. Je suis tres desole! C'est tres triste. Mais, je suis excite pour tu aussi. C'est un bonne adventure, no?

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  4. WOW! This move seems a lot like our move from Utah to Texas. Just moving right along fast and furious. The Bumper story made me sad, but I'm glad he has a great new home. And I'm glad you're blogging!

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  5. Welcome to the bloggy blog world. So glad we'll have a way to keep up with your adventures. So sad about Bumper, but glad to know he's got a new home!

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  6. Holy cow...this is so exciting. My sister and brother in law just moved back. They had the time of their lives there.

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  7. Hi Matt! Why were they there? How long? Were they in Geneva? I'd love to hear more about their stay. Did you go visit them?

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