May Summary

Another month is over, but we're making some progress. Slowly.

* Upstairs bath tub door installed.
* New stove installed.
* Living room furniture somewhat arranged.
* Belongings from old house slowly moving over and being unpacked.
* Iris bed cleared out.
* Auction items sorted and repacked. (Thanks Betty!)
* Most of house cleaned and ready to be moved into.
* Most furniture pieces from auction have been cleaned and moved into appropriate locations around house.


And here is what we hope to accomplish in June.

* Install downstairs bath tub door.
* Install door to basement stairs.
* Clean off remaining furniture from auction, which is currently being stored in garage and china room.
* Move more auction and previously owned furniture into rooms, arranging according to maps.
* Clear out and clean china room, which is still crammed full of stuff and isn’t ready to have stuff moved into it yet.
* Move remaining items from old house into new house.
* Move over swing set, sand box, and small pool.
* Fill holes where dirt on new water line settled in the rain. Holes have multiplied in the last month, darn it.
* Weed garden beds, which no longer look nice and neat. Or like gardens, really.
* Decide which appliances to keep from the old house, and where to store them.
* Clear out corn husks from metal shed.
* Fix roof on metal shed.
* Make landscaping plans for new trees and bushes to plant. Will require input from uncle who uses out buildings and winters cows in the pasture.
* Maybe move in?
* Maybe put old house up for sale?






Despite a few distractions, we made some more progress. Keep thinking of us, please, and sending us some good energy! Maybe at the end of June, the "finished" list will actually be longer than the "to do" list!

Progress on Packing

We're slowly moving more stuff over, and the girls love playing while one of us or our parents hangs out at the new house with them. We've used the new small table, and they think it's really awesome. Because it is. Especially with the rolling chairs!

So at first, I kept track of how many boxes/bags/tubs I had moved because I thought I would feel motivated by all the progress we were making.

It didn’t take long to realize that there is no motivation in finding out that I have, for example:

• 2 boxes of cds, which I rarely have time to listen to and some of it isn't appropriate for kids anyway (Sorry, Self Righteous Brothers. You know it's true.)
• 9 boxes of random papers and stuff that haven’t been sorted since college, and I have no idea of where to put them or what to do with them, but I still cling to hope that I'll get to it soon
• 6 small tubs of t-shirts, none of which fit correctly at this time since most of them came from the junior section

Arranging the Living Room

Today I attempted to arrange furniture in the living room.

Today was a total and complete failure.

We have one sofa of our own. It was Grandma's. It's actually a sofa bed, and I lost many friends in college after they helped me move it in or out of dorm rooms because it weighs about as much as a baby elephant and likes to open and unfold randomly, as is its wont.

But that item is going into the office, which is where it lived until 2001. So some of the new-to-us furniture is needing to be arranged in the living room.

At the auction, I bought Grandma's amazing mid-century green two-piece sofa. It was the most expensive item I bought that day, but it was totally worth it. It's awkwardly shaped and each section weighs as much as a baby apatosaurus. Adam says that the next time it leaves the house, it will not come back. And that it isn't allowed to go into the basement. But it's fun to jump on and has lots of cushions for building forts. The girls like it. So take that, Adam.

We're Okay! And Very, Very, VERY Lucky

Maybe you heard about the storms around Beaver Crossing?


We lost one tree (see left), a lot of branches and limbs, and my cousins' pasture has a lot of insulation from the new building at the old Abel place (see right). That is the extent of our damage. And the electricity was out for twenty four hours, along with the power for everyone else on the south side of the interstate (although not everyone has power again yet). Oh! Plus, the roof of one of my great uncle's sheds ended up in the front lawn over on the other side of the road. But that's all.

We are so very, very, VERY lucky.

Everyone around the section has much worse damage. Some lost buildings, some lost roofs, and most of the pivots are mangled. The storm actually blew the wheels off. A lot of trees are severely damaged or just plain gone. (It looks like at least one of those sheds took out part of a shelter belt.) Power lines are down everywhere. And when I say down, what I mean is chunks of poles are missing, poles are splintered into bits, and some remind me of Lincoln Logs freshly dumped out of the bucket.

Beaver Crossing will never be the same. Ever. There's just no way, because so much has been altered or destroyed.

For someone who grew up in this area, it's really, really, REALLY sad.

Auction Trophies

Let's look at some of the great things Betty and I unpacked from Grandma's auction last October. Some of them I bought on purpose, some came with other things I bought, and some things I really am not sure about. We did end up with everything that didn't sell or was left behind by people. But that doesn't explain some of this stuff.

This right here is the crowned jewel of the collection. WHAT THE HECK IS IT? It doesn't photograph so well, but what it is, clearly, is a blue hand holding a blue cornucopia. And it is maybe a vase. Or a shot glass. I'm not really sure.

I love this thing! I love it more every time I see it. I did not know it existed and did not buy it on purpose, but it is amazing. And it begs many great questions.

What made someone decide to create this piece? Was it originally part of a set? Am I missing a foot kicking a turkey, a knee squishing a squash, and an elbow balancing a pilgrim hat? Because I'm pretty sure it would be in a Thanksgiving themed set. And WHAT IS IT? Vase? Shot glass? Seriously, someone tell me which thing it is. I don't drink alcohol much, so that probably makes it a vase by default.

Auction Sorting Assistance

Before moving all the auction boxes to the basement, I wanted to sort and repack as much as possible.

On the day of Grandma's auction, Adam was the person primarily responsible for packing all of the things we bought, as quickly and securely as possible because everything purchased by us and my parents would be sent back to Grandma's house in a U-Haul. So rather than being sorted in a logical manner, things are packed partly according to when it sold and what sold with it, and partly according to what would fit into the available boxes.

Because I did not get to organize the items sold and because I did not get to take what I absolutely wanted BEFORE the sale as was stated in Grandma's will, we had to buy A LOT of stuff to get the things I really, really wanted and to get things that I just liked a lot. So I ended up with a lot of strange odds and ends, things I didn't even know existed in her house, and things I would have never chosen myself.

It was a very daunting, stressful, emotional task. After many failed attempts, I admitted that I wouldn't be able to sort it alone.

Luckily, we have some very awesome, helpful friends. Having non-relatives help forced me to sort more quickly, not get as hung up on emotional stuff, and even to admit that some of the things I ended up with are a little ridiculous. Like all the boxes of empty picture frames that didn't sell.

First Play Date!

Huge milestone today..... We did our first play date at the new house! Actually, it was the first time we've ever hosted a play date. Ever. That's a little nerve-wracking in a house we don't actually live in and therefore don't have things like cups and plates and bread lying around. Or extra rolls of toilet paper......

It went well, though, I think. No one had to be rushed to the hospital, although Emmy shut her fingers in a closet door within the first three minutes.

Emmy and Gwen were thrown off a little by having someone else's input to consider. They normally have a series of activities that we do every time we're at the house: play with off-brand Jenga blocks, play rubber ducks, play with pull string animals, play hide and seek. And these things often happen in a specific order, too, because the girls are extremely prone to patterns (my fault). So having someone wanting to play different things was a new adventure, and they came up with a great new activity: running in circles around the living room and falling down.