It is Well With My Soul

Started reading "The Good and Beautiful GOD" on vacation.  First three soul training exercises are rest, silence, and awareness of creation.  Feel like I am attending soul training university.

So easy to relax and rest away from everyday life.

So easy to be silent walking alone on the beach.

So easy to be aware of details when I am moving slowly.

I think the purpose of 'soul training' must be to learn to live like this in my everyday life.  Yeah, I could live like this.

My Best Advice

Graduation seems to be a time when people solicit and offer advice. The best advice I ever got was from a therapist counselor who told me that you don't have to tell everyone everything.  The second best advice I got from the same man. He told me sex is a good stress reliever. Not sure if that is the kind of advice the pastor's wife should offer to someone just headed out to college.


Nonetheless I decorated the table runners with chalkboard paper and added a few words of wisdom.

And we left the chalk out so guests could add their own advice.  Or not.

Loaded.  All guns are loaded.

Some very useful advice indeed.

I did take my camera to graduation.  And I handed it to someone else and asked them to snap a few pictures of my son, the graduate.  So there are a few good shots of the Goob at graduation.  But after graduation I got my camera back.  And with the exception of that one selfie, I did not get another picture of my own son, the graduate. I did, however, capture a few smiles.

I loved how this little project turned out.

Because it only took a few seconds and people were very genuine

.Although 'boy' smiles are a little different from 'girl' smiles.

Because boys are different.

But we hold out hope that they will grow up... to be men who make their wives smile.

And have boys of their own who make me smile.

Love this smile.

And this one.  (These guys might be the same age.  In that case, one of them may have repeated first grade.  Just saying.)

Love this lady and her smile.

This happy lady was one of the Goob's class advisers.  Entrusted with giving guidance to the Goob beginning his freshman year.  She retired from teaching last year, but she returned to the school once a month this past school year to continue to meet with her 'assigned' senior students.  She loved the Goob and I love her for that.  Thinking these two must have been high school sweethearts.  Either that, or he used to date a friend of hers before she stole his heart.
Like another happy couple I know.

More good advice?  When entrusted with a secret, keep it.

Graduation Day If I Lived on Facebook

Here are a few of the status updates passing through my head this morning:

Moms who are hosting graduation parties should not attend other graduation parties before their own. Suddenly my idea to use 'buckets, chalk, and twine' as a decorating scheme seems suspect.

I called the school one final time this week.  To request that they correctly pronounce our last name.  The secretary said she would leave a note that it was a long A.  So if my son receives his high school diploma as Ay-lex Have-ner that will be on me.

When class advisers recommend that graduates put their gowns in the bathroom while they shower, they should take into account how many times a boy will shower between the last day of school and graduation.  And if they will remember to take the gown out of the bag.

Yesterday the graduate in my house asked me what time graduation was.  I think there may be some important information about graduation I have not received.

This morning I colored the hair on my head, removed some hair from my face, shaped my nails, dressed myself and the pasta salad.  Why am I not this productive every morning?

Toying with idea of not even taking my camera to graduation.  My level of distraction is heightened and I always miss the shot anyway.

Congratulations! You're a Cowboy.

Took the Goob to the State University so his Mom could see the campus and he could make a final decision.  Paid the initial deposit to secure his spot in the freshman class of The University of Wyoming (or as the Goob calls it YouDub) for Fall 2014.
Spent some nostalgic moments this afternoon locating a few pictures to display at his graduation party. Came across this blast from the past (because 'organize the pictures' never got crossed off the 2013 non-resolution list):

This is the STP and I (I'm on the left) just before we had children. (At least I hope that is a maternity top.) In 4 short months, we will be back there.  (Back to no children, although loose fitting tops and elastic front pants hold a certain appeal as well.) Not sure how I feel about it, but I am sure there is no one else I'd rather share an empty nest with.

March On

What I did the rest of March:

I worked.  With some diptheroids.

I baked 2 apple pies for pi day.  Because in less than 8 weeks the Goob will graduate from high school and my days of being volunteered to bake something to take to school will end.

I kept the world's cutest seven year old in the guest room 10 days while his mom went on a mission trip to Mexico.  I stepped over playmobil pirates and lego bionicals.  I walked to the elementary school.  I checked the backpack and math homework and practiced spelling words. 

I put paint on a pinewood derby car.  

I took paint off the woodwork in the hallway of the HND.

I also made two big decisions this month.

1.  I am not having any more children.

2.  I am not stripping any more woodwork.

Landscaping

These tulips are against the foundation of the house next door.  Along with three sad very old lilac bushes and a host of kochia weed they are the sum total of the landscaping.   Every spring since Shirley died, I have admired (and maybe stolen) these tulips.  I admit I have entertained the idea of taking my bucket and shovel over and moving them to my yard.  This year they are mine.  Seems a slight overkill to buy the whole house.  

Gave the House Next Door its own facebook page this weekend.  And picked some outside paint colors.  And rued the decision to strip the woodwork in the hallway.  

Remind Me Again

Why was I so anxious for Spring?  Today the weather is warmer.  The sun is shining.  The snow is melting.
The ground is muddy.  The flowerbeds need cleaned out.  I have my evacuation bag packed in case the river floods.  The back yard is knee deep in dog poop.  The thought of giving up my sweaters for shorts and tank tops makes my belly roll and the place where I should have triceps wriggle with discomfort.
Oh, Punxytawney Phil, how could six have gone by so quickly?

The Demo Begins--in the Bathroom

The Bathroom.  Before.  Not quite ready for it's close-up.  (Scroll fast if you are eating, or pregnant, or otherwise have a weak stomach.)

I wanted to save the coral wallboard, until the STP told me it was pink.  Then it lost its luster.  So we brought in the demolition crew.  And armed them with hammers and crowbars.

Something quite satisfying about smashing things with a hammer. Just sayin'.

Demo?  We got that.  Praying for someone who can put this back together. 

Did I Mention the Plumbing?

Humbug.

Ghost of Carpets Past

Electricity on.  Check.
Electricity updated?  Still on the to-do list.
Heat on.  Check.





Carpet removed.  Almost checked.

 Going along pretty smoothly until we discovered carpet over carpet.

Over tiles.

Over stubborn older tiles.

Still don't know what's ultimately under the bathroom flooring.  And we'll probably not know whats under the kitchen flooring.  Because I think it is new tiles over vinyl flooring over who know's what.

At the end of the day mere shadows of the things that have been.

That they are what they are, do not blame me.

And, yes, the sunporch is green.  I'm guessing the color of the house before the current color.  I went to the Sherwin Williams site to try new colors on the outside of the house.  (I still love to try things on.)  The outside does not need repainted except from an aesthetic point of view. And by that I mean the view from the street.  I think I could buy the paint and put it out with a sign at the curb that reads, "If you are tired of seeing this color when you drive by this house, bring a brush on Saturday and help us paint it."  Kind of a Tom Sawyer fence thing.  But, alas, I'm getting ahead of myself (and mixing works of literature.)

Cold and Dark

Darkness is cheap. (And Scrooge liked it.)
The house next door passed its first test.  The pressure test on the gas line.
Next up:  electricity and heat.

A New Chapter

Shirley was dead: to begin with.  (Ah, Charles Dickens.  Such a promising opening line.)


The Goob has been mowing the front yard of the house next door for three summers.


Why?  he asked.
Because Shirley is dead.  She can not mow her own grass.


 Have your own questions about the house next door?  Join the club.

Yard Sale Finds Put to Use

I got a gun. (for $2) A jerky gun.  

And I learned how to use it.

Along with my dehydrator ($3).  To make jerky.  Elk jerky.  Very good elk jerky.

Which I sealed up with my vacuum sealer ($5).  

I think we can cross that off the 'Things I Never Thought I would Do' list.

Ten dollars worth of fun.  Not to mention enough jerky to share.  I think so.

Holiday Round-up #1

Was a little discouraged to see my shadow on my way home from work early on Groundhog Day.

Because I was tired of Winter.  I was tired of cold.  I was tired of snow.  And I miss green things.
But then I refocused and looked in the other direction.

And was struck yet again by the beauty of the sunrise.  

My choice--focus on the shadow or focus on the sunrise.

I pulled over to shoot a video of the sunrise for you in case you were a little discouraged as well.

 But in the name of full disclosure, if I had seen a groundhog along the road, I would still have swerved to hit him.  Just sayin'.

Holiday Round-up #2

The STP made me a valentine.  Out of conversation hearts.  (He is still claiming he does not have a Pinterest account.  I'm not convinced.)
I thought it was very clever until I found out he glued the hearts to the paper.   What?  I couldn't eat them?  
Not to worry, he says.  He used Elmer's glue.  Non-toxic.
And he gave me the rest of the bag of hearts.  Truly, he is my soul mate.

I may or may not have eaten them off the paper after I took this picture.  Not sayin'.

Real Confused

If $59.88- $95.76 = $12.00 ...

...then what is the two year rate?  

Catching Up

Did I mention I had a birthday?  I know....last month.  Let's catch up, shall we?
Got a wonderful gift from the girls for my birthday.  Prompted me to clean the china cabinet so it had an appropriate display place.  Was 'clean the china cabinet' on my list?

Actually, I have a cleaning list.  I keep it in my head, so you will never see it.  And I don't have to see it either.   So I never am guilted into cleaning something when there is something anything else I could be doing.  But since we are crossing things off the cleaning list, let's add 'clean the washing machine' to the list.  And then cross it off.  Oh, and when we painted the kitchen we had to 'clean under the refrigerator' and 'clean under the stove'.   I think I'm good with the cleaning thing for awhile.

Baked a double chocolate mousse cake to use the new cake stand.  And then I took it for a ride.  Because a double chocolate mousse cake needs to be shared.  Ah, fellowship dinner, I am so fond of you.