This is Just a Tribute.

Please ignore the fact that I'm very much tearing up right now.

I just called my dad to chat about my foot (it's pretty much the only thing we chat about these days...) and am officially the first to know that

MY CHILDHOOD HOME HAS OFFICIALLY BEEN SOLD.

This is devastating. We moved into that house when I was almost 1 year old. It's been on and off the market for several years (pretty sure since before my mission...), and, frankly, we weren't always sure it'd sell. Two days ago Dad said there was an offer on the house and I didn't really think much of it. And NOW look.

This is the home of all my memories.

Listen to all the great things we did! (And don't let this next paragraph scare you. It's sweet and nostalgic.)

We'd swim in the pool and play Shark and Marco Polo (with Fish-Out-Of-Water), and every winter the frogs in the pool would croak outside my window and put me to sleep. Kristina and I would play trolls and office in the front yard, and I kind of forget how weird it is that there is a racquetball court inside the house that is magically unnoticeable from outside (or inside, for that matter...)....and my BROTHERS. We used to shut each other up in the Murphy bed (you know, the kind the goes up into the wall) and then come slamming back down to the ground...or put a blanket over the racquetball court door and run around in the ABSOLUTE DARK (seriously, the darkest dark you've ever seen), or ride inside sleeping bags down the mudroom stairs, and ride our bikes around the cul-de-sac or play family baseball with ghost runners on Sunday afternoons, and one time we played hide-and-seek and I climbed into the dryer and Cam turned it on (only for a second...), when the electricity would go out we'd all gather round the kitchen table and the living room and the whole rest of the house was just shadows...and whenever my girlfriends came over in high school we'd just sit around the kitchen table and talk and talk and talk...and BUFFY the greatest dog ever would sleep on Burke's bed, and I'd be in my room or something, and Burke would come over real quiet-like and say, "Kinzie, come here..." and we'd tiptoe over and watch Buffy sleep and whisper about how cute she was (this happened, maybe, a few times a week)....and sometimes, when Dad wasn't home, we'd pull Buffy up on the couch with us when we watched TV, and when we heard Dad coming home through the garage, we'd throw the huge, holey, burnt-red, crushed velvet blanket over her when he walked in and he never saw her wriggling...she was the greatest dog ever. We used to dress her up in Burke's #7 T-ball shirt and shorts with the hole in the butt for her tail. Burke and I used to go bushwacking through the woods and the field down the street, and the four of us built a tree house on the cliff in the backyard (read: Cam and Scott built the treehouse. Burke and I "helped." And I had a little hand-broom that I'd sweep things with.), and we'd swing on the rope swing off the side of it...And Mom would listen to classical music whenever she cooked dinner, and whenever she listened to the Midsummer Night's Dream soundtrack we'd dance around the table with wooden spoons to the music...Scott made the best chocolate chip cookie dough, and every Christmas morning Dad would make pancakes and waffles. Whenever we put up the Christmas decorations (Mom is STELLAR when it comes to Christmas), I would get so happy I couldn't stop dancing and bouncing around, I'd just jump up and down clapping my hands...and there were Christmas lights that went all the way down the staircase and wrapped around the arch at the bottom and it was just magical.

This house is stability for me. I moved out of that house when I was 18, and it's been my only permanent home ever since. When I go home, all the stress of my out-of-state-solely-independent life falls off the cliff in the backyard when I catch a glimpse of Mt. Rainier, and everything just seems so EASY. I can go lie in the dark recroom on the most amazing burnt red couch ever (it's 30 years old) and just relax and not worry about anything, and let Mom and Dad take care of me for a bit.

I kind of feel like things are never going to be the same.

Here's some pics in tribute -

A little blurry, but that neighborhood-entrance sign right there says "Highland Meadows." (This is when I finally got home for Christmas last year after spending the night in the freezing, food-deprived Spokane airport.)

This is actually the only picture I could find of the house. Definitely doesn't do it justice, but at least it's got that really good-lookin' guy to make up for it.

Disclaimer: Please do not get the wrong impression about Seattle. It doesn't snow this much every year. It's just that, when it did, I took a lot of pictures.

This is the view from our house - that's Mt. Rainier behind the clouds.

I grew up in the most beautiful house, on the most beautiful street, with the most beautiful view, with a really, really amazing family, and spectacular memories. Here's to the house.