The weekend is over already? It happens every Sunday evening: we get the kids coerced into bed, then plop down on the couch, look at each other, and recount the events of the last two days.
This
weekend, like last weekend, and as will be for several weekends into the
unforeseeable future, involved a great deal of unpacking. Don’t get me wrong, Mindi has done a
tremendous amount of work getting us to where we are today: eating off Nana’s
china and with kids’ plastic zoo animal utensils – that’s no joke, we haven’t found
the everyday dishes and silverware yet.
We’ve got about 50 boxes still in the house and a 2-car garage full of
more. If we have any plans to park at
least one car in the garage before the Chicago winter starts... ugh, don’t even
want to think about it.
So I
won’t. What else did we do this
weekend?
Saturday’s
highlight, for the bookworms in our family, was getting our library cards. Thank you Cook Memorial Public Library. The kids got complimentary tote bags, and saw
to it that they were filled up with books, music, and movies before we
left. Mindi and I chuckled as both kids
checked out at the librarian’s counter, each in their own unique way. Juli first, took each article out of her bag,
one by one. Then, with purpose, slapped
her library card onto the counter as if to say, “ok lady, here you go, let’s
keep this moving”. It was much funnier
to see in person than I can explain here.
Then Abby
steps up, places each piece onto the counter one by one, much like Juli, but at
1/2 the speed. And during the entire
time, Abby’s carrying on a full blown conversation with the librarian, telling
her how we just moved here from Indiana, how we went to the Pumpkin Festival in
Libertyville earlier that day, what she had for lunch, her favorite color, her
sister’s name, etc., etc. I’m just glad that
both the girls love books as much as they do.
Thank you, Mindi, for encouraging and promoting such behavior.
Today, after
we came back from one of Abby’s classmate’s birthday party at the Blast Zone,
the girls helped me hang a tire swing on the perfect limb in our back
yard. It really is a perfect limb for a
tire swing, probably six inches in diameter, and almost completely parallel
with the ground – unfortunately, it is twelve feet high. Rain and cooler temperatures turned what
should be a simple task into a somewhat unpleasant event. This isn’t your normal tire swing. This is a horse swing, a tire that’s cut into
the shape of a horse. And it came with
directions that aren’t very clear and the fact that the rain soaked the paper
didn’t help. After making a quick trip
to visit our new friends at the local Ace Hardware to pick up a slightly longer
rope, we got to business: drilling boards, threading rope, tying knots, you
name it. This is a serious project and
engineer dad is going to make sure said swing doesn’t fall down. A refresher on knots was needed, and I
resorted to the Internet (where else?) to see what knot I needed to tie, and
how to tie it. The knot of choice: a
stopper knot. Found a really cool web
site that illustrates and animates the tying of any knot.
When all was
said and done, and the final stopper knot was tied, Abby and I (Juli had left about
20 minutes earlier after getting tired of the rain), let the horse go, to see
how it hung. We looked at each other
with somewhat disappointment as the bottom of the tire swing brushed the
ground. Without saying anything, Abby
and I looked at each other and knew that we were going to have to finish this
task another day.
Our family
has a list of “to-do’s” on a giant scrap piece of packing paper duct-taped to
the refrigerator. Anyone can add a “to
do” to the list, and they do. From
fixing the doorbell, to hanging a tire swing, to unclogging a slow drain. For the moment, the list is growing faster
than items are being checked off. In
time, the list will shrink, and we’ll settle into this place that is beginning
to feel like home. If you’re interested
in helping on the “to do” list, whether you are a family member, a friend, or
the lurker, please let us know, we’ll take your help. We’ll even probably feed you and might, just
might, be able to offer you up a bed (that is if we can find the sheets). Heck, we’ll even let you take a turn on the
tire swing!
In closing,
the last time I wrote, you read about Abby’s new teeth, two on top and two on
bottom. All of those have come out now
and have been or are being replaced by adult teeth. Today, Abby lost a lateral incisor while eating
a piece of honeydew. The tooth was
hanging on by a thread, literally, so it wasn’t going to take much. We’re proud of Abby, she’s lost five teeth
and has pulled out all of them by herself, sans the first tooth.
Have a great
week, and I’ll see you again in 2,229 days (November 21, 2018). Or maybe sooner, if I need the brownie points
again.
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