More folks come to perform services

When we purchased the appliances from Spencer's TV and Appliances, they let us know that they have recently started a pest control service, Spencer's Best Pest Control. Since we had purchased from them, they offered us a free initial pest control service. We decided to take advantage of it...

Spencer's Best Pest Control guy spraying in the back yard

Treating back yard spaces

Spencer's truck out front

Still treating perimeter of the property in back yard -- he had already treated the perimeter of the house and inside the garage.

We had also arranged to have gFiber installed for our internet service. They had to run a line from the "flower pot" (at the corner of our neighbor's lot) to our house...

A man and a woman came to do the task... they first cleared the gravel off the area where they would be burying the fiber...

The man ran a jack hammer about every 6 inches to break up the hard soil, while the woman used a sharp-shooter spade to make the trench -- hard labor in this hard soil and under the hot sun (100F+ temperatures).

We're getting things in place so our new house will feel more like a home!

Furniture

I wrote that we attended The Springs Chapel on our first Sunday in our new community. I noticed at "meet and greet" time that the folks at the end of the row where we were sitting looked familiar, and I was pretty sure we had met them at the resort in Show Low where we stayed this past summer. I spoke with them and found out that, yes, they summer at Venture In in Show Low and we had met there. They have also just recently moved to Sunland Springs as they sold their primary home out east of Mesa in Gold Canyon -- but they are renting at Sunland Springs as they wait for availability before entering another 55+ community.

After the service, we talked with them a little more, and someone came up and asked them how their estate sale was going. They indicated that they had not been out to their (now sold) house, but that the estate sale agent said that not many folks were coming through, and that the furniture pieces weren't selling well as the people who came already had all the furniture they needed. 

Estate sale? Furniture? We need furniture... how long is the estate sale going on? (until noon, and it was about 10:30am) Where? We got the address and went out to their former home in Gold Canyon.

When we got to the estate sale, the sign on the door indicated everything was at 75% off, wow!

We found that they had a bedroom set (our friends' guest room's furniture). While our new home has a Murphy bed, we had made it up and wondered how comfortable it was going to be. But, how could we get a bedroom set transported to our new home?

Carl asked the estate sale agent when we would have to get the items -- she indicated that an auction company would be coming to get everything not sold on the next day. Carl asked if the auction company truck might be willing to deliver some pieces to our house instead of the auction company. The estate sale lady made a call and the auction truck guy would be willing to make a delivery to our house for a reasonable fee.

We were able to find quite a number of pieces for our new home:

Dining room hutch

Dining room table and chairs

Kitchen table and chairs (to replace the card table and folding chairs we'd been using!)

55" TV

Bed...

... nightstand...

... mirror...

... and dresser.

The pictures are from our friends' former home. The truck delivered the furniture on Monday afternoon...

Inside our home, the dining room chairs have been brought in.

Besides the furniture pieces, we also got some art pieces. We're still figuring out where everything should go!

Chapel in our community

Our community, Sunland Springs Village, has a Sunday morning worship service called "The Springs Chapel. It is held in the auditorium. We visited it the first Sunday after we purchased...

They didn't have printed bulletins that Sunday (I guess they normally have printed bulletins) so before the service started, they displayed the program on the screens, so I took a picture so I'd have the information for later in the service and to read during the week.

The service located in the Auditorium

The worship leader

Unlike many of the communities here in Mesa, there are enough people here in our community year round that the service continues on through the summer. However, the service we went to (the first Sunday in October) was the first Sunday that the worship leader was back and the pastor commented that all the members of the chapel were very glad that he was back.

We were warmly welcomed and appreciated the clear presentation of the gospel provided by the pastor.

An evening view down our street

We were out for a walk and enjoyed the sunset view from our new street:

Our car is in the driveway with our tree beside it -- you may note that no other cars are in driveways nor on the street. The community requires that you park your vehicles in your garage unless you have a variance for why you aren't required to... I'm not sure what constitutes a good reason for not parking in your garage (I think I read that having your garage full of other "stuff" is not a good reason). One of our neighbors has his pickup truck parked in the driveway all the time; when his garage door is open, he has a car and a golf cart parked in the garage, and he only has a two car garage -- I guess that must be a valid exception.

It was still quite warm while we were actively moving but the weather has finally moderated some.

Appliances

Our new house came without a refrigerator, microwave, and washing machine. We had been told previously by friends that Spencer's TV & Appliance in Mesa was a reputable company for appliances, and that they had a "scratch and dent" area in their main store that we should check out. We visited the store a couple of weeks ago and were able to source all three appliances (and a pedestal for the washing machine too) at really good prices. They were to come to deliver a couple of days after we closed (Carl needed to install an outlet above the stove for the microwave and we didn't want to have to rush through getting that completed).

Delivery truck from Spencer's and washing machine with pedestal base

Microwave and refrigerator on the driveway

Microwave installation 

Washer and pedestal being installed

Two guys carrying in the refrigerator - it is amazing how they can move such a large appliance, carrying the weight safely.

Preparing to put the refrigerator into place

Microwave installed

Refrigerator installed

Washing machine and pedestal installed

We found that Spencer's was really easy to work with and we were able to get a very good deal on appliances that have very minor dents (they had a diagram on each item identifying where the scratch or dent would be found -- we may not have seen them without the diagram!). We would definitely use Spencer's in the future if we have other appliance needs.

Something new for Carl and Patti

This month, Carl and I would each be starting our 12th year of full time RVing, minus our brief stay in our park model last winter. We plan to continue RVing in our motorhome part-time, but we have officially closed on a house in east Mesa and have started the move-in process.

The house is built for the desert and hot weather, with 12-inch thick walls and a garage for our car, golf cart, and e-bikes. The home is located in a 55+ community about 10 miles east of Venture Out, near the Superstition Mountains. We still have our three properties in Venture Out at this time, though we are anticipating that they will be going up for sale soon.

So, you may be hearing more on our blog about home projects than RVing, but, if fuel prices come down, we hope to continue with our traveling across the US (and Canada) next summer -- so the RVing posts will start up again. 

Some more pictures around Mesa

Random pictures around Mesa...

I saw this bird's nest on top of a cactus in a yard... I honestly think that someone (human) placed the nest there, the birds didn't build it there, as I think it would have been more tied into the top of the cactus by bird-builders than it appears to be. But... it could be a very safe place to raise your bird family if you're concerned about predators from the ground, I guess!

Our church has Wednesday lunchtime gatherings for a meal ($5/person) and a Bible study lesson from one of our pastors (Pastor Kim Bristow). It is primarily for senior adults. This picture was from a few weeks ago -- we were at this gathering at the time that a monsoon rain storm went through. We could hear the rain on the roof of the building, but didn't realize what a gusher of rain was delivered until we left and attempted to drive back home on the flooded streets!

I can't remember where I saw this, but boy, this certainly shares the challenge of getting to merge into traffic at times! If you aren't aware of the ways that the roads change, and the fact that your lane is going to suddenly disappear in the next mile or so, and so you don't start trying to merge over until the signs actually warn you that your lane is going away, sometimes it seems that the other drivers want to punish you for waiting to merge until you became aware that the lane was going away!

I get the feeling that drivers everywhere are a little less considerate than maybe they have been in the past. Maybe that is related to driving a big rig, or driving in places where I really don't know what is going to happen to my lane in the next few miles, or because I'm older and not as willing to try to squeeze my vehicle between two who aren't really being accomodating, but it seems to me that consideration towards others might be on the decline.