12 days

The movers come in 12 days. We are totally and completely packed.

Not. 

We are trying to box up and move as much stuff on our own as we can. The movers charge by the hour and since there is a four hour drive involved (two hours each way), we want them to spend as little time as possible packing the truck. 

So anything that we know we won't be using at the new house isn't coming. The first item to go was the bunk beds. I detest those things (changing the bedding is exhausting and annoying) and the boys will each have their own room at the new house (you know...next year...after it's built). The beds weren't particularly high quality and I said I didn't even want to keep them to split them in to two twin beds. So I put the set on Craigslist for $100 and even threw in the mattresses. Bill said he hoped I could get rid of them before moving day.

Well, apparently there is a big demand for bunk beds. Either that or I underpriced them. I had over a dozen people try to buy them. I had my buyer within 2 hours. TJ burst into tears when I told him. I hadn't realized he was so attached to them, but he was genuinely upset to see them go. 

For the next two weeks, TJ and Sam will be sharing the queen bed. We brought it up from the guest room. For the first time in over 7 years, TJ is no longer sleeping on a top bunk (he even sleeps on the top bunk when we are up north). For years, I noticed that he slept pressed firmly against the side rail. I suspect he is going to fall out of bed a couple of times before he learns. 

If you look closely, you can see Sam's knee on the far side of the bed. I'm not sure where the rest of him is. 

The next item to go was Bill's table saw. He has had it for years and the bearings were starting to go. He said there was no way he could build another house with it. I agreed that it was time for a new one. Bill said the old one was pretty worthless so we decided to put it at the curb tonight. Tomorrow is trash day and someone comes through the neighborhood in the middle of the night to pick up interesting looking trash. We hoped they would take the table saw. Otherwise, we'd be charged extra for throwing something that large away. I helped Bill get it down to the curb. It took us a good 5 minutes to lug that thing down the driveway. We got it in place and Bill said a fond farewell to it (TJ is definitely his kid). We walked back up the driveway just as a landscaping truck pulled up. The guy got out and asked if he could have the table saw. Said his brother could use it. Bill was thrilled to hear it wouldn't be scrapped. I couldn't stop laughing.  I think the table saw sat at the curb for 45 seconds. The guy kept thanking Bill. Everybody wins. 

Did I really just say that?

If it isn't the kids giving me a run for my money, it's my pets. And they have all been full of it since we have arrived at our home in Laurium. 

Yes, both cats and the dog are with us. It's their home too, and it's easier to bring them along than find someone to take care of them. 

At any rate, here are a few things I've said (more than once!) since we arrived here. 

"Drop that cat poop! Stop playing in the litter box!" The litter box is located in the back entryway here. We don't know where else to put it. We don't want the animals in the (super scary, really unsafe) basement, so that's not an option. At our primary home, the litter boxes are in the basement storage room. For some reason, Copper is afraid of the basement and won't go down there. So she never sees the boxes (or their contents). Apparently, she's intrigued. And it's gross. The other night, I unrolled my yoga mat so I could exercise. And Copper promptly dropped a hunk of cat poop on the mat. Disgusting!!

When a child (usually TJ) asks me if I have seen the cats, my response is, "Well, did you look in the oven?"  No, we aren't preparing a dish of feline flambé. There is a drawer underneath the oven. And Willoughby, who craves peace and quiet, discovered he could crawl in there through a hole in the back. Katie promptly joined him. It's not at all unusual to pull the drawer open and see two pairs of eyes staring at you. 

"Stop peeling the wallpaper!!" This house is covered in wallpaper. It's pretty ugly, but we haven't been in a hurry to take it down. The walls are plaster, and we knew they would need some work before we could repaint them, and we had some concerns that lead-based paint was underneath. Well, Katie doesn't share our concerns. She still has her front claws (Willoughby does not), and she has decided the walls are her scratching posts. Bill has grudgingly started removing sections of wallpaper, since the cat has made such a mess. The plaster is as bad as we feared, but he tested the paint chips and it shows no lead. Bill is still painting everything primer white, just to give it some uniformity. 

In just a few weeks, we will be moving in with my parents while we build yet another house (I promise, it's the last time. We belong in Coopersville, but there are no suitable houses on the mark, so building is a better option than living under an overpass). I hope the animals behave themselves there. At least there's no wallpaper!

Good news and bad news

We are up at our Laurium house for the next two weeks. I love being up here, with a few exceptions. One is the basement. I haven't been down there since we walked through with the realtor and I hope to keep it that way. To say it's creepy is putting it mildly. Another thing is taking the dog out at night. It is pitch black in the backyard and there is no outside light on the back step. The sun doesn't set until after 10:00, so if I take the dog out at 10, I can still see. Tonight I was busy watching a movie so I didn't get her outside until after 11:00. 

Copper isn't crazy about how dark it is either. She usually does her business in the small part of the yard that is illuminated from the kitchen window. She did exactly that and started heading back toward the deck steps when she and I heard a noise. 

What happened next was pretty chaotic. As soon as I saw the skunk stepping out of the shadows, I sprinted up the steps and yelled frantically for her to come with me. But I didn't have her leash locked so easily pulled more length out as she headed off to meet the skunk (Copper is always anxious to meet new friends).  I still don't know how I got her to change directions but she did come up on the deck. But her leash had gotten tangled all around the deck posts and in my haste, I couldn't get it untangled. 

Judging by where Copper was looking, I was pretty sure the skunk was still headed in our direction. So I unclipped her leash, dragged her inside, and slammed the door.

Bill was in the living room, watching a movie ('The Sixth Sense'....seriously? I wouldn't be able to sleep if I watched that right before bedtime). I told him I had good news and bad news. The good news is that the dog was not sprayed by a skunk. The bad news is her leash is somewhere in the back yard. He told me to go ahead and leave it out there. He'll look for it in the morning. 

Up until last October, we had a small shed in the backyard. We knew there was a family of skunks living under it. We thought they would go away once the shed was gone. Apparently not. Now I have 12 more nights to avoid this (revenge-seeking?) skunk. Lovely. 

A loving hazard

Copper knows our daily routines pretty well. She loves when I get coffee, because she gets a Milk Bone. She loves lunchtime because she gets to sit outside and sniff the breeze (seriously...one of her favorite things to do). And she really loves 3:30, because that means we are walking down to the bus stop to retrieve her boys.

So at 3:30 today, when I was heading downstairs, Copper was more than a little excited. With every step I went down, she would nip my toes. I was getting annoyed. She wasn't hurting me, but I didn't particularly want to trip and fall. I stopped about 3/4 of the way down and gave her a lecture about being nice. She sheepishly slunk down the rest of the stairs. 

Wouldn't you know it...I forgot something and had to run back upstairs. So Copper's excitement was reset. She ran back up with me and then accompanied me back down. But she took my lecture seriously. With each step I took, she licked my toes. 

So I likely will still trip and fall one of these days, courtesy of the dog. But it's all done in love, right?

Tense?

TJ was working on a homework assignment after dinner. He had a paper full of verbs in the present tense and he had to write down the word in past tense. Blow? Blew. Throw? Threw. Lead? Led. 

He was zipping right along. He was coming up with all of the answers on his own; he just wanted my assistance on the spelling every once in awhile. 

When he got to 'spend', he only hesitated for a second before he blurted out 'spought!' He immediately realized his error but not before we all had a good laugh. Bill said he should get extra credit for inventing a new word.