By the title of this blog post, I don’t mean the week we’re currently in (though it’s been a good week), but rather last week, January 1 through January 8. During that time we made a trip to Lake Jackson, Texas to be with our daughter’s family.

The trip came about as a suggestion by our oldest grandson, Ephraim. He said since they moved into their house the first of November, because of his parents’ work schedules, they hadn’t been able to spend much time getting things into place in all the rooms. The garage was jam-packed with boxes, bookshelves, and who knows what. Could we please make a trip to Lake Jackson and help them?

I thought about it and decided sure we could. I’m not as young as I used to be and might not be able to carry furniture upstairs, but I could sure sort through boxes and arrange them better.

I thought at first we would make the trip between Thanksgiving and Christmas, but that didn’t work out. But it turned out they didn’t go back to school after Christmas break until Jan 4. So we drove there on New Year’s Day.  The trip itself was easy. We went the fastest, not the shortest, way. That evening we mainly spent time with the grandkids.

The next day I got to work. As Ephraim had said, the garage was full of stuff. First, I found the broken down utility shelf units and assembled them. That gave me space to put some boxes and create a better pathway through the garage. I tried to interest a couple of the grandkids in the assembly and shelving of boxes, though that didn’t work out too well. I was able to clear paths to several bookshelves that needed to go inside into the kids’ rooms. Ephraim and Ezra, our no. 2 grandson, helped carry them into the house and upstairs to the bedrooms. They then spent a lot of time in the bedrooms arranging things. I continued to work in the garage alone.

The next day, I found boxes of books, carefully marked with the name of the grandchild or as adult books. I put them in a staging area and the kids carried them into the house and upstairs. I found a lot of granddaughter Elise’s art supplies, and got them inside. Once the books were on the shelves, the rooms started to look pretty good. The kids were all excited to find things not seen since late May when they moved into temporary housing in Lake Jackson.

Slowly, I labeled boxes that were unlabeled. That allowed me to put like things together. Cleaning products to the shelf unit on the west. Mary Kay stuff on shelf units on the east. I found a big box marked “boys’ stuffed animals”. I thought maybe they were too old for them now, but Ezra said, “No!”, and carried the box upstairs. I found such things as a plastic bin marked “anniversary clock”. Our daughter said they hadn’t had that displayed for over five years. I found the perfect place in the house for it and displayed it.

Adult books went on built-in shelves in the living room. They are very high, so you will only get them occasionally. Richard, our son-in-law, had to get pegs for one of the bookshelves, and I freed up a stuck shelf in another. By the end of the day Saturday, I declared the garage “organized” if not fully emptied. There was plenty of room for the four grandkids’ bikes. with walkways to spare.

I found time to interact with all four grandkids, including school drop-off and pickup runs. Reading the Bible with Ezra (12). A conversation or two with Ephraim (15). Elise (10) working on the artwork for my book covers, and Elijah (7) to play and read. I also found a little time each day to do some editing of my finished book, and some stock trading.

So I declare this to be a successful trip. On Monday we drove home through the rain but had nary a problem—other than it taking an hour longer than normal.

Oh, and Elise came up with something new. One day she came up behind me and said I had “cauliflower” hair. I suppose I resemble that remark.