Category Archives: Weather, Seasons, & Celebrations

Weekend Roundup: Housewarming Edition

“Is it tomorrow today?” the boy asked me when he burrowed into our bed Sunday morning. When told that yes, it was tomorrow, he cheered. He’d been looking forward to the housewarming party for a week.

Our house has been thoroughly blessed by friends, laughter, children playing, good food, and not one but three rainbows created by the on-again off-again sun and rain. There were about forty people here, and I don’t know if I got to talk to all of them. We gave everyone free rein to wander through the house, and the general feedback was that it looked like we’d been living here for ages. That’s just what we do: we move and we set up immediately, otherwise we’d go insane. There were still some small boxes here and there on lower shelves and in the corner of my office, and we didn’t get the photo collage frames up in the hallway, but in general things were done, and we were happy. The boy’s best friend from preschool was here and he was in absolute heaven playing with her, as well as all the other assorted children. The play structure was a huge hit. His preschool educator and her family attended as well, and we enjoyed seeing them talk with our parents. We got to see people we hadn’t seen in person in a while, and it was splendid. I was deeply grateful for the food everyone brought, because everyone ate and ate and ate! Sign of a good party, I suppose: everyone mingles and chats and eats and enjoys. It felt wonderful to be able to show the house off to everyone who has supported us through the househunting, the sale, and the move.

[Notes to self: We can have forty people over for a party so long as the weather allows half of them outside. The kitchen is fine for one or two people, but with the entrance to the backyard being one of the kitchen walls, it gets clogged up very easily. (Not setting the kitchen table up as one of the food stations may help with this.) The house provides good flow for movement and various places to gather and chat. Thumbs up for the space as a good one for entertaining.]

The only real drawback to the day was the upstairs bathroom sink clogging up. It started getting slow as the party progressed, and it wasn’t draining at all by the end. HRH went at it with a coat hanger, some Draino, and the plunger after everyone was gone, and all’s well again. We suspect the angle of the faucet, which sends the stream of water right into the drain and creates bubbles, and the lack of cross-piece to trap detritus are the culprits: the bubbles get forced into the drainpipe and the air creates a blockage for dirt being washed down.

My parents arrived in town on Saturday afternoon and they came over for dinner. Things got a bit tangled up schedule-wise because HRH went out Saturday morning to bring plants back from the old duplex and plant them here, and he ended up digging an entire new garden in front for them. While he was digging them up in LaSalle I wiped myself out scrubbing the bathroom and the kitchen, two things that needed doing but I misjudged my energy reserves badly, and so once he was back I couldn’t take the car and the boy out to do the groceries on my own. The garden ended up taking much longer than anticipated, and then HRH had to brace the play structure, and by then my parents were in the area, so the groceries got rescheduled for Sunday morning. The boy requested pancakes for dinner, so I ended up feeding everyone pancakes, sausages and bacon, fried potatoes, and scrambled eggs, which was fun although not overly formal and nothing like the original plan.

On Monday we left HRH at home to do absolutely nothing. My parents took the boy and I on a lovely drive through the Eastern Townships to Farnham, where my mother grew up. The weather was gorgeous, sunny and clear with a good breeze. We stopped at the old station and let the boy climb all over the decommissioned diesel and caboose there, then stopped by the railyards to see a couple of different engines, and had lunch at Chez Roger, the patate frite place that is a traditional stop for everyone in my mother’s family. I remember Chez Roger as a tiny building with a window through which things were served. It’s now a huge place with seating, and it was mobbed. The boy threw himself all over the great play structure in the playground beside it, and taught himself how to slide down the fireman’s pole in the centre of one of the climbing bits while we waited for my parents to bring lunch out. He chased a seagull, explored the rock and iron goose sculpture nearby, and then my mum took him to walk on the old train tracks across the end of the park that led to the train bridge across the rapids of the Yamaska river, the other end of which connects to the street my mum grew up on. The tracks went right along her backyard. The boy reputed got a bit nervous when they went into the trees, because he said, “Mama can’t see me any more” (thumbs up, kid, for remembering you’re not supposed to wander away out of our line of sight, but if you’re with Nana it’s okay) and again when Mum started leading him onto the bridge to see the water ( “But a train might come,” he worried, at which Mum reassured him that she would never take him onto a train bridge if there were trains that might be using it). I remember I was too scared to cross it as a kid, even though I knew my mother had done it when she was a child herself (and this when it was in regular use, too).

Then we drove out to the graveyard to check on my own Nana and Granddad’s grave. This was the boy’s first time in a cemetery, and as I expected it was just a big playground for him. He ran through the grass, read headstones, looked at the horses on the other side of the fence, and only asked once (and cheerfully) about the bodies in the ground that were no longer needed because the spirits were in the Summerland. Kirkwood is such a lovely little graveyard, so very peaceful and bright, full of the Scottish immigrants who came over in the twentieth century and settled in Farnham. It always feels slightly odd that I enjoy my visits there so much.

We drove home along the old highway, through Sainte-Brigide and Saint-Jean, as the sky grew darker and we passed through the odd light sprinkle of rain. We’d hoped to pass a roadside stand selling apples, but alas, none were to be found. The boy fell asleep on the way home. It was a wonderful, wonderful day out with my parents, with no timetable, just the general idea to wander about as we liked and to explore the old places we knew. When we got home we discovered that HRH had mostly rested, but had decided to trim the wild cedar hedge out front while we were gone, one of the tasks that got dropped off the must-do list before the housewarming.

We had a light supper of shrimp en brochette, with a warm potato salad en vinaigrette and raw veggies with dip. The boy had built a wooden plane with my father earlier in the day, and had coaxed HRH into honouring the promise that they could build his Lego Millennium Falcon “after the housewarming”. He almost made it to the end, too, but was yawning and becoming clumsier as bedtime arrived, so we told him he had to finish it the next day. There were a few tears, but he was tired enough that it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. We said goodbye to my parents until our trip down at Thanksgiving, and waved to them as they pulled away.

It was a wonderful weekend. We’re blessed indeed by such wonderful friends and family. It was a lovely way to formally launch our life here.

Kindergarten: Day Three

The boy got on the right bus on the way home, and got off at the right stop. We have a successfully completed Mission: Kindergarten Integration. (Achievements unlocked: School Bus Passenger, Elementary School Kid. Rating: Awesome.)

Reports from the boy have included:

    “The bus ride was REALLY AWESOME! It was bumpy, because there were lot of bumps.”

    “I sat with another boy.” ( “Can you tell us his name?” “No, because I didn’t ask.” “Tomorrow, tell him your name, then ask his.” “Okay!”)

    “I sat with the boy again! He let me sit next to the window!” ( “What is his name?” “Well, I can’t tell you, because I asked, but I forgot it.”)

    “We saw all the offices! And met all the people! And Mr. Chris is our gym teacher!”

    “There’s a girl in my class!” (Yes indeed, and there ought to be more when both halves of the class are together for the first time on Monday.)

    “Mama, Mama, when we sit for circle time we do a hop and kick and cross your legs!” (When he tried to demonstrate, he almost fell over when his legs tangled.)

Goodbyes have been conducted with vigorous waving, and so have hellos, complete with smiles. Indeed, this child has had zero problems with new school, new teacher, and new friends. And yes, he refers to everyone as his new friends, and I wish that as an adult we still had that outlook. Tuesday is his first full day, which should be interesting for everyone.

As for the house, the first round of painting is complete; the downstairs hallway will get done when we build the new stairway and repaint the current one. There is art on the walls of all rooms but our bedroom and my office (my collage wall takes a while; I’ll have key pieces up by the end of the weekend). HRH is off picking up a secondhand bentwood and wicker settee for the living room, which will do for now until (if) I find something small and light enough to replace it. The heavy vertical blinds have been removed from the kitchen, living room, and my office, replaced by our light bamboo blinds and in my office a light green linen curtain. The pot rack is up (the ceiling is plaster and lathes!), and HRH has moved the hinge from one side of the fridge to the other. Hilarity has ensued as all of us continue to reach for the old side and come up short.

It’s Friday night, so it’s homemade pizza night. Off I go to mix up the dough.

Kindergarten: Day Two

First time on the school bus!

Just like he’d done when going to preschool for the first time, he bounded away and I had to call him back for a hug. HRH and I watched the bus pull out, the boy’s face sporting a big grin as he took his seat; we waved madly as the bus went down the street, and yes, I felt that wrench.

I didn’t cry till forty minutes later on the highway on the way to do groceries, though. And I sat there at a red light with tears on my face, wondering why. I think it has to do with the huge step he’s taking, going somewhere on his own and making his own way through new situations. I can empathise with the enormity of that, and how overwhelming it can be at times when you least expect it. Getting on that bus for the first time symbolizes quite a lot. He is strong and cheerful and brave and social, and I don’t anticipate problems with him adjusting at all, although I fully expect his sensitivity will raise a few interesting questions about the other children’s behaviour. He’s already having a fabulous time with the whole idea of the bus and school, and eager to meet new friends.

I’ll pick him up from his half-day at lunch, and I expect to hear a lot of enthusiastic but slightly garbled reports.

Kindergarten: Day One

Five loads of laundry Tuesday night, three yesterday, two today. I know, my life is so scintillating. The washer seems to use warm water when set on cold, though, and vice versa. One suspects the inlet hoses were reversed between the source pipes and the machine intakes during installation. One must tactfully suggest this to the resident installer and request a fix. [ETA: Ah. Turns out the cold water intake on the machine was marked with red. I’d have absolutely been with HRH, then, in assuming that was the hot intake. Problem solved.]

I am suffering from the worst allergies I’ve had in ages, which is saying something because I used to get weekly allergy shots to combat them. I know I’m in a new geographic location and every region has its own pollen profile to which one must accustom oneself, but this is awful. I’m not alone, though; it seems to be hitting across the board in southern Quebec. I’ve lost track of how many allergy pills I’ve taken and when, which is not the most ideal of situations. My sinuses and throat are grumpy, grumpy customers, and my temper’s not the best, either.

Speaking of which, I was feeling rather guilty that I had the boy home for all of four days and was already looking forward to school beginning. The prep, the packing, the move, and the unpacking drained me of energy and cope, and the poor kid, who has actually been in a fabulous mood, has been bearing the brunt of it. We’ve had a few I’ll-finish-this-then-play-with-you, Mama-Mama-Mama-Mama, I-TOLD-you-I’d-be-there-when-I-was-finished-you’re-just-making-it-take-longer moments, but both of us have emerged relatively unscathed. We’re in the middle of an honest to goodness heatwave, and the boy inevitably selects the high-heat part of the day for playing outdoors. But the basement is cool, the DVDs are my friend while I finish the last of the unpacking, and we’ve run errands each day as well that get us out of the house.

We asked the delivery guys to leave us one of the appliance boxes. The boy played with one in the backyard all yesterday afternoon. I cut a door and a window for him, and he dragged it under the lilacs behind the play structure and used it as a command module. Eventually it got dragged forward to the end of the slide and he slid into it for a while, crowing with his unique giggle. Hours of amusement in a cardboard box.

Today was Day One of the three-day progressive entry for kindergarten. We packed up all our school supplies in the boy’s new backpack and met his new teacher and a third of his classmates for an hour. Tomorrow he takes the school bus in and I meet him at lunch to take him home, and on Friday I take him in after lunch and he buses back. There are seventeen kids in his class, twelve of them boys. Mrs Lisa, his teacher, said brightly that it was going to be an… active class, and all the parents snickered. He’s already seeing the other boys as his friends, and at least two of them are on his bus, so that will help. (One of these co-bus passengers has his full name, and the other his nickname, so we three mums are already foreseeing a little trio of proper noun terror happening.) It was interesting to watch the small group of boys explore the classroom while the teacher explained some of the routine to us. They were given their choice of four activities, and they all headed for the Lego and cars without hesitation. After fifteen minutes of that, the boy got up and moved to the book corner where he sat down in one of the comfy chairs and opened a book. One by one the other boys followed. After fifteen minutes in the book corner he moved back to the Lego, then to explore the play kitchen area, and he was followed again. He ended up back at the book corner while two boys rummaged through the play kitchen, one boy went to read as well, and one went back to the Lego. It was nice to see that he felt comfortable and confident enough to move on when he felt like it, and not wait for someone else to demonstrate that it was okay. It was also reassuring to see that he was taking his time, too, settling down to involve himself in each activity for a decent block of time instead of running from one to the other. He got to play in the playground afterwards, too, and one of the boys stopped by with his dad on their way down the street, and the boys did a few circuits of the play structure together, and waved and shouted goodbyes when they left in their respective cars. All in all, it was a terrific experience.

I took him to Tim Hortons for lunch as a treat, and we shared a ham and cheese sandwich. He downed his carton of milk in one go. I think I’m going to have to buy a cow. Or perhaps shares in a dairy farm.

The obligatory photos:

That’s a double thumbs up from the kindergartener as we head off.

Tomorrow is Day Two: The Bus Trip To School.

In Which She Attempts To Chronicle Some Days; Or, How Far Can We Push Exhausted?

On Friday around two o’clock we signed the final papers and became official owners of a real live house. It was mildly surreal: after running around for four weeks having meetings, calling various institutions and services to send things to different people and so forth, actually sitting down in the conference room with the notary and having her read through the contract and point out various disbursements before we signed, then sitting with the sellers and signing a much shorter contract was so quiet and less stressful than we’d expected. In fact, we had fun with the sellers while waiting for the notary to call them in, and again after we’d rejoined them and signed everything. The notary almost had to kick us out. The only bad news was the amount of the welcome tax, which is going to be more than a year’s worth of property tax. I sincerely hope they let us break it into multiple payments.

We had intended to go scoop the boy up from school early and let him take down the sold sign that was still in front of the house, but the selling agent said that it was actually her responsibility (and property) and she just hadn’t had the time. She was already there unscrewing it when we arrived, sans boy. This was our first look at it completely empty.

It is kind of like a dollhouse. It’s quite small, but well proportioned. There’s a lot of work ahead in the patching of large holes left by the screws they used to hang pictures, evening out the paint lines on the walls in order to have a smooth surface to paint, and the painting itself, especially because there needs to be one of those huge buckets of primer purchased in order to cover the dark brown, purple, gray, raspberry, and neon green with cobalt blue rooms. (Yeah. So not us.) HRH is over there today doing the spackling and plastering, then mowing and trimming the jungle the previous owners left for us. Then this week is solid painting. I am having minor existential crisis about the colours for the kitchen and living room, as the space is pretty much flows from one to the other. It’s either a green-tinged tan for the kitchen and a mid-green for the living room, or the mid-green for the kitchen and a darker sage green for the living room. The latter was my first choice and still the forerunner in my mind, because I am concerned that with a tan in the kitchen it will all be sort of a big neutral block, since the cupboards are all beige as well and they make up the majority of the kitchen. Also, the darker green is called Mermaid’s Eyes, and really, how can I pass that up?

We had time to kill between dropping the boy off at school on Friday morning and our notary appointment, so we did some recon regarding our laundry set and the loveseat for the living room. We think we’ve settled on the laundry system, and now we’re just waiting on a reply from the commercial salesguy at The Brick, with whom our real estate agent’s company has a deal regarding preferred pricing. Time’s getting tight, though, so I’ll send him another e-mail today, and if I haven’t heard from him by Tuesday I’ll switch to the guy located at the branch near our new house instead. I’m getting frustrated regarding a loveseat, too. The living room is tiny, and all the loveseats we’re seeing are surprisingly large. We wanted something light-looking, too, and apparently that sort of style is Not In at the moment; everything is overstuffed. Also, what is with all the leather and microsuede in the furniture options? Why can’t I have simple upholstery? We thought perhaps a futon might work, as the frames for those tend to be light-looking, but even they are too long for the space. We went to four different furniture stores that morning alone, and I’m at my wits’ end. In the final one I saw a chaise lounge I liked, and we realised that one of those would be less visually weighty, as well as comfortable and would allow for two people to sit if necessary. So suddenly that’s an option. (It has just occurred to me that the one I saw and liked is the colour of wheat, and would go beautifully with the Mermaid’s Eyes paint. And I’d already noted that it has the additional bonus of being the precisely right height if I wanted to sit on the end to play the cello or spin.)

We checked out the Dix-30 shopping complex before the notary appointment as well, because I needed to pick up a gift for the sellers at the SAQ and a book at Indigo. The Indigo is pretty, relaxing, and polished, although smaller than I am used to. Their children’s sections are very nice, though.

I am out of commission this weekend. I’d been having increasing difficulty with my left hip and lower back, and near the middle of the week I thought it was getting better. Then on Thursday I moved the wrong way and the right hip did something weird, so I couldn’t move at all without a lot of pain and problems. I dug out the muscle relaxants for an initial strike, used Tylenol after that, and the heating pad a lot. I’ve been really, really careful over the past two days, but that specific pain on top of the general fibro achiness and exhaustion aren’t doing my temper or stamina any favours. I’m glad we’re about 75% packed.

This week I pack the last of the household while HRH works over at the new house. We have to figure out an alternate route to the new place for moving day, because the bridge is going to be down to one lane from its usual three and traffic is going to be a nightmare as a result. Our usual alternate route across the Mercier bridge and around the seaway isn’t an option because the mileage will kill us when added to the truck rental, so it looks like it may have to the the Jacques-Cartier bridge, as the Victoria bridge has a height and weight restriction and is cars-only.

HRH fit twenty-one book boxes in the car this morning. He’s very pleased. If he can take twenty boxes of that size over each trip, that puts a significant dent in the amount that have to be moved on the actual moving day. (Significant being one hundred boxes. You can’t knock that.)

In non-house news, we managed a brief visit with Ceri, Ada, and Scott in the hospital and were completely enchanted by tiny Ada Emily. They stopped by on their way home from a hospital appointment yesterday to pick up the baby equipment we had put aside for them, and the boy got to meet Ada, who slept through the whole visit. He sat a bit behind me on the chesterfield while I held her and just looked at her with a little smile on his face. He wouldn’t touch her, though; I think we may have gotten him to barely touch a finger, but I can’t remember if he actually made contact with it or not. He did whisper to me at one point, “She just said hi.” “Did she say anything else?” I asked, aware that the baby had been fully silent in her boneless state of babysleep. “No, just hi,” he said.

We had the local grandparents booked for babysitting last night, as the original plan had been to go out with Ceri and Scott to celebrate the beginning of Ceri’s maternity leave and our signing for the house, and they urged us to go out anyway. So we went to see Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, which had been part of that original plan, and we loved it. The only thing missing was having Ceri and Scott along with us to make it the best possible experience, but I am plotting to see if we can make that happen somehow.

So here we are in the home stretch. I’m really hoping my body holds together long enough to accomplish the last of what I need to do this week. Tylenol is my friend, as is the heating pad and the occasional Robaxacet. We can do it.

Weekend Roundup: Yet More Packing And A New Baby Edition

We have managed to exhaust ourselves, and it’s not even the move yet.

On Friday we went to the bank and got the bank draft for the notary, covering the down payment, the taxes, and the notary fee, another huge step that made it all a bit more real. We stopped by the license bureau to renew my driver’s license, had lunch together, bought a new toaster (you didn’t seriously think we could live without one for two weeks, did you?), researched washer/dryer sets, scoped Home Depot for new closet doors for the master bedroom (or at least something which which to cover the twelve feet of mirror that both of us find creepy), packed the knick-knacks, statues, and photographs, and stopped by the yarn store for some weaving supplies. (And good thing too, but that’s later in the story.) I drove hard to finish a freelance assignment I’d begun the day before, but I ran out of time. t! dropped off a slew of boxes for us, bless him, and stayed for supper.

Saturday I packed the wall of books in my office, my altar, and my knick-knacks. Once I’ve cleared the last few lingering things like cables and gloves off the bookcases we should be able to dismantle them, giving us a new place to stack packed boxes. Then pretty much all that’s left in here that I can do is my writing desk and the reference stuff and plastic bins of fibre-related stuff underneath it. Saturday afternoon Ceri called, saying that she was in her local hospital under observation for her blood pressure, and we talked for a good long time about stuff in general and possible premature delivery. We had steak and corn on the cob for supper, our first corn of the year, and it was tasteless and cardboardy. We’ll try again.

Sunday morning we had the upstairs neighbours down for brunch, the last one we’ll have like this. We’d packed our waffle iron (oops) but Blade brought his down to learn how to make HRH’s awesome waffles. There was equipment failure, though: the iron plates had too-small grooves and so the waffles self-destructed every time, so we gave up and I used the batter to make pancakes instead. But the company was good! While brunch was happening I got another call from Ceri, telling me that they were transferring her for possible induction to the same hospital I’d been transferred to, the one with the neonatal intensive care unit. We both got a bit weepy, me because I knew exactly what she was going through, and Ceri because she knew that I knew: I’m not ready yet, I was supposed to have more time.

We packed two-thirds of the kitchen that afternoon, until I had to stop because my back and hips were aching too much and my energy was wiped. Scott called and told us that the hospital was going ahead and inducing. At about four o’clock I brought out the loom and started measuring out a warp with the yarn I’d bought on Friday. I’d been planning a very different kind of blanket experiment to test a new technique I was considering using for my gift to them for the baby, and suddenly the experiment had a focus and a reason. I had the warp measured, threaded, sleyed, and wound, with half a blanket woven by the time we went to bed.

Monday morning we were pretty wiped. HRH took the boy to preschool, and I returned to the freelance project that I hadn’t managed to finish on Friday like I’d wanted to. Scott called around ten to let us know how things were progressing and to ask us to bring the stack of books and the camera I’d set aside on Saturday, expecting to go keep Ceri company before they decided to transfer her. I finished my project, handed it in, invoiced, handled my address change with the company, and officially booked off for the duration of the move. Then HRH and I drove up to the hospital we knew very, very well to drop off Ceri’s things and speak with Scott while Ceri rested.

Once home again, I realised that shoehorning a full workday into the morning had left me too burnt out to move on to packing the books in the living room, and HRH wasn’t much better, so I wove the rest of the baby blanket while we watched the middle part of The Return of the King (we’ve been re-watching the Lord of the Rings extended films at night because we’re too tired after a day of packing to do anything else). With every weft pass I was thinking health and safety, health and safety. I was going to finish it no matter what, because I was determined that this child was going to have something handmade especially for her ready even if she was a month ahead of schedule. When HRH went to pick the boy up I hemstitched the ends and took it off the loom. Since this was a new technique that I’d never tried before, I was worried that it might fall apart. But it didn’t, and it was exquisite; I foresee much potential with this technique indeed. I laid it out on the bed and took some photos (which will be shared in a project-devoted photo post once it has been gifted, I promise!), then prepared for the final step, which included felting it slightly in the washing machine. I used the gentle cycle just to be sure, and good thing. The so-called gentle cycle tore open all my protective layers and ties, leaving the blanket to agitate loose in the hot water, which is exactly what was not supposed to happen. I checked on it in time and rescued it, though, and while it’s felted a wee bit past what I wanted, it is certainly a success and I am thrilled with it.

After I put Liam to bed I drew myself a hot bath, because I have somehow screwed up my lower back and hips as badly as I did around the time I was pregnant (which, I have just realised, is the last time I moved, duh). I have to keep reminding myself to take it easy, but the repetitive motion of packing boxes and reaching up and down for things is doing a number on me. I downed some Tylenol and at the last moment paused, then took the phone into the bathroom with me, just in case.

Well, twenty minutes into the bath the phone did indeed ring, and I was out like a shot, grabbing a towel and the handset. Sure enough it was Scott, with the wonderful news that Ada Emily had been born just before six o’clock, right around the time I was pressing the water out of her completed baby blanket and hanging it on the clothesline to dry. I had finished it just in time for it to be ready for her. He told me to go ahead and tell people, and off he went to post quick notes on Facebook and Twitter from home.

When we got off the phone I sat down and had a very therapeutic cry. When someone else is going through something traumatic that you’ve been through, you worry about them. You know everything will be fine, but you still worry, and you feel for them, and I walked around most of the weekend becoming increasingly stressed and agitated, knowing what they were going through and being unable to help them any more than we were already doing, being a sounding board and support. Also moving a hell of a lot of energy around, through the blanket and otherwise, which is probably another reason why we were exhausted; the last time we did energy work that intense was when our own premature son was in that hospital and we were working for his health. There’s something about babies and births that makes you fight with everything you’ve got.

We all slept in an hour and a half later than usual this morning (apparently we’re all tired, what a surprise), which led to everyone scrambling out of bed in a panic and the boys leaving around the time they usually get to preschool. Today is the living room: we pack the books, an easy task (though long and tiring, because I did two English degrees and I’m a professional writer, and I’m not apologising for it) but one that disturbs me, because once the books are packed the house has officially been torn apart, and I still have another week and a half to live here. And that’s the halfway point packing-wise. There’s more kitchen, the rest of my office, and we’ll do some more of the boy’s room in the next day or so.

I have a double batch of bread rising to bake for Ceri and Scott so they’ll have two loaves in the freezer when they get home, I’m doing laundry, and the dishwasher is about to go on. I’m caught up on news and correspondence. HRH brought me a breakfast sandwich so I’m fed. Let’s do these books.

A Rather Important Announcement

We bought a house today.

It is small but sweet, in remarkable shape for its age, and very charming. It was built in 1947, and sold for the princely sum of $560 to the first owners. (We will be the fourth owners. We paid significantly more than that.)

Yes, househunting hell is OVER. Now, of course, we shift into packing hell, but as this has a concrete goal at the end of it and a structured timeline, it’s bearable. I’ve packed a home in two weeks before; a month will be fine.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who listened to us vent and offered moral support through this entire affair. The past six weeks haven’t been easy, but you have all made it less hellish by being positive and encouraging.

I must say, this has been a rather excellent birthday week, what with a house bought and a job offer received. Also, as a wonderful cap to the excellence, the boy paddled all over Ceri and Scott’s in-ground pool today with a floaty thing, and we were over the moon about his decision to leave anxiety about swimming behind. (When I say he was paddling all over the pool, I really mean all over, deep end and everything. For someone who wouldn’t leave the steps this is huge, and it seemed to happen within about ten minutes. There was even jumping in involved. And he paddled for ages, and then it was nigh-impossible to get him out; he kept wheedling to swim across the pool one more time.)

And in unrelated news, tomorrow we head out to the Glengarry Pioneer Museum for their Sheep to Shawl day-long celebration of fibre arts, where I will be spinning from ten till about four, unless I am slain by the heat first. It should be wonderful fun.