Time to Move on-Tom Petty
The top of the things I won’t miss list, firewood, chopping, hauling, stacking, hauling. cajoling boys to bring it in.
Things I really will miss. The neighbors. The road. The colors. The smells. The creek, babbling in the background of all of it.
The garden. The blueberries. The firewood.
*Home- Michael Buble
What Monday evening? How did that happen? Oh right, I’m crazy now. Today passed in a haze of chicken noodle soup and hacking coughs, following a weekend of packing, craigslisting, entertaining family and friends and general putting off the thought of what is headed down the road.
But Friday was fun and started off with donuts, because when the ongoing summer construction (ongoing construction not summer) on your road means the power is out. Again. Well breakfast is more challenging and we’re not really in a challenging place. And also we realized we wouldn’t be at the donut shop for birthdays this year. What! Hysteria!
Hello Sugar high that lasted most of the day!!
The Weekend was an ongoing extravaganza in uncles, and uncles and some more uncles helping us move heavy things over there, no over there, wait, here. And friends and grandparents, and old friends who stopped by and some friends who came for dinner. Frankly Sunday rolled around and it was no wonder we were all a little tired.
Today was spent easing into school, drinking lots of tea with lemon, and some chicken noodle soup too. There was also some dinosaur bone excavating, because nothing can top the excitement of MOVING TO UTAH WHERE THERE ARE REAL DINOSAUR BONES!!!!! (exclamations points not exaggerated) And knitting. I did some knitting because it helped with the hacking coughs which are perfectly times and really, really excellent thank you. I should have been doing some quilting, but it was colder in that room, and I actually haven’t plugged my sewing machine into the wall yet since I returned home from the East Coast. I don’t know what I’ve been doing really.
Trying not to think about it really. Look something shiny…with no teeth.
photo by the super awesome Jenica Lemmons
*All I want is you-Tristan Prettyman
This boy took a job in Utah.
He leaves next week. He took the job the day before we flew out of Seattle to my sister’s East Coast Nuptials. It was a bit of a hectic frenzy. As you can imagine. And it wasn’t until after the bride an groome had boarded a plane for Ireland that I had the mental breakdown that I deserved. I had tried to stave it off by making lists. You know how I like the lists?
List of things to go, to stay, to get rid of, to return. List of things to do, people to see, places to visit before we leave.
Then we arrived home and promptly (two days later) boarded a plane for Utah to find a place to move The Burrow inhabitants to. Well not all of them. The Chickens are off to another home, and Sweet Lily will be staying with my in laws until we have a yard for her. This rural crowd is packing up and headed to an apartment, which will be nothing like the Burrow.
The Burrow. How can I leave it? It’s ninety year old self, complete with weird wiring, drafty rooms and lack of doors. One big package of homeowner’s nightmare wrapped up in my heartstrings.
It’s a good thing that man is cute.
*When I’m 64- The Beatles
Really well suddenly. Suddenly the sun is out and while the corn is not as high as an elephant’s eye, at least its not all rotted yet. Which sometimes happen. My boy is very proud of his carrots and pumpkins tucked in among the neighbors (fully sunned) garden. My garden is never quite as expansive or as impressive as my 85 year old neighbors garden, but then she has lived there for fifty years I’m hoping to get my gardening groove on by then.
My creek dwelling I’ve got under control.
The fourth exploded into our lives with temperatures in the seventies. Seventies! And those temperatures lasted all week and throughout the weekend. It was crazy, unheard of. I think I remember this feeling of warmth? The boys frolicked in the creek, took your-not-coming-in-the-house-till-you-are-no-longer-caked-in-creek-mud/clay-baths on the porch.
They camped in the yard. As predicted, I got no sleep at all. My babies! in the dark alone!
Dad worked all week long on his wall project and we adjourned to the porch. Outside! for dinner each evening.
I spent the week leading up to the fourth volunteering at the Elephant Ears stand and came home both nights with over ten pound of left over dough. (You can just throw ten pounds of dough in the trash can …explosion). I made cinnamon rolls for the neighborhood and then I made some for the freezer, and still we have had cinnamon rolls for breakfast everyday this week.
I tell ya this Christmas in July thing is working, its like vacation! When I tired of cinnamon rolls (14 pan of cinnamon rolls) I made pizza crust and froze it for future pizza nights. Ten frozen pizza crusts. In the midst of the baking I made breadsticks for lunch one day and then I froze breadsticks for another day. Four loaves of cinnamon raisin bread are stored in the fridge and several went to the neighbors, I honestly lost count.
This morning dawned cool and grey and our usual 55 degrees I”m not sure what to do with myself. I guess could clear off the forgotten dining room table. We have been living the life of the sun people, taking every meal on the back porch. It has been simply lovely.
*Good Day Sunshine.
The Weekend was a dreary downright wet affair. I was able to hang some laundry out on Saturday afternoon, that was almost dry when I brought it in, but that was mostly the wind I think. Sunday’s load was almost drippy when I brought it after dinner. But there you have it, Spring in the Pacific Northwest. Some friends near and far did experience this thing we call the “Sun”. But the Burrow is situated in a valley, a shaded valley so it is not what you would call, warm.
With The Man away on a fishing adventure this weekend, and the quarter grades needing, finishing and the sun hiding behind a cloud there was more indoor play to be had. Luckily time travel is not weather reliant and my youngest had some trucks to re battery. He spent a happy amount of time, with a screwdriver fixing his non blinking trucks and talking to them. ” Here’s the problem! no batteries at all!” Said the Mechanic clucking his tongue.
Truck repair, time travel and grading papers, kept us busy for most of the dreary weekend. The forecast for this week? Sun.
The cuckoo song-The sound of Music
Despite the cloudy mcloudersen of the weekend, there was a fair amount of outdoorness. Working on the rock wall, playing in the sandbox, walking the road. There was a lot of Spring Cleaning, as the the weather was ‘threatening’ as they say for most of the weekend.
There was of course time travelling, which requires a lot of plotting and planning. Which kept the minions busy, since they are not adept at cleaning the toilets yet. But there day will come! oh Yes. It will.
There was some relaxing, but mostly by the superfriends, time travelling is exhausting. Don’t you know.
My girl-temptations
We skipped our traditional camping on memorial day weekend this year for a little family one on one. The man has been traveling a lot lately, the yard has many projects waiting for us what with the sun putting in random appearances here and there. Up until last week we were planning on making the five hour drive to the rendezvous point but somewhere in the last week it just all became too much.
Too much driving, too much away from home time, too much, too much. And we realized we were not anticipating the trip but making a list of all the things we wouldn’t be getting done instead.
And so we stayed home. We worked in the yard, we played with friends, there were even s’mores over a fire. Fire! My Marshmallow is on fire! Mom! We took the kids to the beach, not the one five hours away where old friends gathered around a guitar player but the one much closer. The one where He and I began our journey. We took our children to a house they never knew near a beach they spend a lot of time on but have never lived at.
We reflected, on our early days, on the road that led us to here. The beach trails and bike rides and campfires that took The Man and I from boy and girl to Dad and Mom. On the happiness of beginning together now in the middle of this little boy whirlwind, and what a whirlwind it is. A constant onslaught of information and noise. Of song lyrics and Greek myth facts. “I’m not sure this book is entirely accurate, this is not what Percy Jackson said about the god of the Olympics” There are conversations bordering on grown up. “Well Rick Riordian, is just one man, and there is a lot of information about the Greeks, he may not have it all down”.
Our weekend was not what we thought it was going to be, yet it held the same essential qualities that we look for in the five hour journey. Old friends, beaches, campfires and stars. Good conversations, a fair amount of silliness and just a little rain.
*A Hard Rain is Gonna Fall-Bob Dylan
Saturday was bright and sunny, and we worked hard in the yard, gardening, moving dirt from one area to the next, weeding. We new the rain was on it’s way. And even so we optimistically planted a few starts in the ground (although as a rule I don’t like to do that until after Memorial Day-it rains, a lot, here).
Old pot, new herb garden
Beverly’s blueberries, they cometh.
strawberries.
We didn’t get too crazy with the outside planting, we know how it goes here in the wet, wet, northwest. Our indoor garden is still going strong.
Give a little bit=Supertramp