One step closer to chickens . . .

Here is a picture of the house--can you believe those trees? There is no air conditioning, so the trees are the cooling system. Lucky for us, it's about 10 degrees cooler in the summertime here than what we would get in Salt Lake or Utah County. (Please do not ask me about the winter comparison, because my mind is more agreeably engaged and I don't want my buzz harshed.) 

The light-colored tree on the left is a Russian Olive and it smells amazing. I'm not the only one who thinks so--there are so many bees in there that it's humming. This is the view from the garden, where I was raking in my 6 bags of compost and hauling out an almost equivalent amount of rocks. Have planted my seeds but still need to get the seedlings in there.

It's difficult, though, trying to do things with the Dark Lord in tow. The easiest time to go is in the evening once he's in bed. We are staying with my in-laws for most of the time until we can "take possession" and the poor man can tell that his life is in a bit of an upheaval. He has responded by attaching himself around my neck like a lamprey or similar. (Also my sister Jenny's neck, which is how she got to spend 3 enjoyable hours while I was off getting my hair done.) So that's how I watered my seeds and my lemon cucumbers this morning--hauling my watering can and my toddler between the outdoor faucet and the garden and back three times like some beast of burden. On one trip across the lawn, though, I did notice a nice fire pit that I guess some cousins put in a couple of years ago when they were renting, so that's one more thing to get excited about.

Also, see how much room there is for the chickens? My landlord cousin responded to my email and thinks chickens sound awesome, so I've signed up for a class they're doing in a few weeks at the Stokes Nature Center about backyard chickens to get a better feel for what's the what.

Only two more weeks!

Veggies + s'mores = healthy

I don't have pictures of the house or yard to show you now, please give me a bit and I'll get you some.

But I DO have pictures of all the seedlings I bought today to plant in my part of the vegetable garden. There is a huge plot where "my" yard converges with two of the neighbors' land (all GH's relatives). So they've already rototilled, marked off people's spots, started planting, and have the irrigation system set up. All I had to do was show up and BOOM. I am in temporary posession of 450 square feet of ready-to-go vegetable garden. (Except I probably will want to go get compost. Wonder how much it will cost to cover that much area. Hmm.)

I had a sleepy, cranky Dark Lord with me when I went visit with GH's lovely great-aunt (my soon-to-be next door nighbor), who took us outside to show me the spot reserved for me. TDL spied a cat and was immediately in hot pursuit. Because of the rain we'd had all weekend, I did not know that the garden dirt was actually a muddy sinkhole capable of swallowing cars until my baby stepped forward into it and immediately sank down to his shins before I could reach in and fish him out. Then he wanted to get back down and chase after the cat some more, but I held him tight while he flopped around in my arms, shrieking and flinging mud all over both of us. I backed away and said goodby while trying to assure GH's great-aunt (unsuccessfully I'm sure) that we are usually quite normal and non-crazy people who do not take mud baths.

But anyway. This is today's booty. Jen scoped out a stall at last week's farmers market with amazing seedlings, and asked the owner if she would let us come buy more from her greenhouse this week. So this wonderful woman agreed to meet us and I came away with:

parsley
thyme
sweet basil
lemon basil
purple basil
lemon cucumber
zuchinni
crookneck squash
spinach
yellow bell peppers
red bell peppers
jalapeno peppers
red cherry tomato
yellow cherry tomato (Sun Sugar)
big pink tomatoes

Now I need to go buy seeds so that I can also have:

corn
beets
radishes
sugar pumpkins
beets
lettuce
carrots

Also maybe something to wear on my feet. Do they make, like, gardening shoes?

And since I promised s'mores, here is how we capped off Memorial day. S'mores with Jenny & Company is kind of a big deal. This one had Nutella and a Ghirardelli chocolate caramel square inside.

Sir approves.

Practically a homesteader

It is time to tell you about The House. Am so excited about it that I kind of don't want to say anything. And I also want to tell absolutely everyone. I am super complicated like that.

The year GH and I were married, his grandmother and her siblings finished compiling and publishing a long, detailed history of their parents (GH's great-grandparents). We received a copy of the book as a gift, and on Sunday nights we read portions of it together until we finished the whole thing.

I loved reading that book, and I was especially impressed by the life of GH's great-grandmother. She gave birth to 11 children, 8 of whom lived to adulthood. Their first newborn died during the Spanish Influenza outbreak of 1918. (My PSA: We are so, so lucky to have vaccines. Reading about how common it was to lose babies and young children to disease was heartbreaking. Vaccinate! PSA over.)

We read all about their farmhouse, and how they raised their bazillion kids in it and ran a dairy farm & store, and about her huge vegetable garden, her flowers, and their fruit orchards. She was almost 105 when she died. They had so many descendants that pretty much everyone I meet around here turns out to be GH's cousin somehow.

So now every time we visit GH's family and pass by the old farmhouse I crane my neck to get a better look. One of GH's cousins bought it and put a lot of work into restoring it, but she lives out of state now and has been renting it. When we found out we would be moving back to Logan & started looking for apartments, I don't know which one of us first said, "Hey, wouldn't it be crazy if we lived that house?" We called his cousin, not thinking anything would come of it but figuring we should at least ask if there was any chance it might be available.

Well. We are moving in next month. It's a good thing I did all that physical therapy before because I lose a bit of bladder control every time I think about it.

We are leaving our 800 square feet of 1970s shag carpet basement apartment and moving into a charming, beautiful farmhouse with 4 bedrooms and mature trees with swings hanging from the branches and lilac bushes and wild roses and fruit trees in the backyard and a massive vegetable garden just waiting for me to plant it. At night I lie awake and elbow GH to say things like, "And in the winter I will put those battery operated candles in all the windows and it will be so beautiful!" and, "What do you think about chickens?" (His answers, just in case you are interested: "Oh good, can I please sleep now?" and "NO chickens!")

We are Logan for the Memorial Day holiday, and I took Jenny & her family over to see the place from the outside. Savvy and Ethan raced to the swings, and Hudson kept asking where the chickens were. See? He gets that there should be chickens.

Blah to packing. Blah.

Have packed 13 boxes. Only have about 60 more to go, whee!!

One thing I am quite pleased about with this move is that we are sticking with the decision we made in the middle of the last move, which was that the next time we do this we are going to hire professionals. Not that it isn't really kind of us to give all our friends and family members such frequent opportunities for service and blessings, but really. We can't be everything to everyone, you know?

So, sorry. I will not be luring any of you to my home with the promise of Little Caesars's pizza and lukewarm root beer. If you want those things, you will have to go pay $8 and get them yourself. I know it's more fun to get them for free after hours of back-twisting labor on a hot Saturday, but this is just the way it has to be.

Have scheduled the movers for June 16th, as that's the day we can get into the house we are renting. There will be an entire post about the house coming, but for now I will say that I am so excited I kind of can't stand it. I currently live in an 800 square foot apartment. The house is 1900. The math here = awesome. It is possible that I might be able to become a clean, clutter-free sort of person once I have room to put my stuff.

And no, I can't just declutter. I have a kid. Kids come with entire circus trains of necessary junk. I only have the basics and it's still quite the shload. I can't get rid of any of it because I know I'll need it all again--unless, of course, I decide to stop procreating now while I already have one practically perfect angel baby from heaven. (That frantic banging sound you hear is GH knocking on every piece of wood within reach because I bet he thinks I jinxed us just now. Neener.)

Okay. Packing. Am going to pack some more. Except first I will need to eat some of the banana walnut bread I just made in order to use up all the black bananas from the freezer. Then I will pack. I do need to pack, because going through and touching each of our possessions might be the only way I will find my tinted moisturizer. And the phone charger. And my American Express card. You know, little things.

Anybody out there have any good tips for staying in the packing zone? Music? Podcasts? Shutting off the computer? (Hah! That last one was a joke. Like I'd ever do that.)

Toe Cleavage!!!

I used to work for a department of BYU that printed annual academic calendars and took them around to other campus offices. One year, as I recapped here, (seriously, go read it, I had a super fun workplace) there was this big kerfuffle about the group of smiling multicultural people featured on the calendar. After we'd already delivered them, someone (I do not know who, but they must have had power) complained about the immodestly dressed models. Next thing we knew, the calendars had been Photoshopped, reprinted, and then we had to go redeliver them, throw away the originals, and not actually tell people why they were getting a new calendar. I think we were told to say that one of the dates was wrong or something.

The changes? A little girl had sleeves added to her sundress and the skirt lengthened. The white tank top peeking out beneath a woman's v-necked necked shirt was colored to match her shirt lest people think this woman was running around flashing garments. The same woman was wearing open-toed sandals and her toes were colored in because her toe cleavage was offensive.

Nuts, right? Except I think some of those Overzealous Immodesty Police may have ended up over at the Ensign magazine. Take a look at what Heather over at Doves & Serpents just noticed when she compared this Carl Heinrich Bloch painting as printed in the Ensign to its original. (I'll wait while you read her description of the changes.) They didn't just remove the wings, they also made the angels robes more modest (and also: ugly).

Does anybody else think that maybe we are going a little bit nuts about the modesty, here? Why insult an artist by choosing to use his work but then removing everything that does not reflect our own current religious or cultural standards? If that's the new rule for art, I'm sure there are plenty of crappy painters out there who would be willing to paint religious scenes and be sure to put Shade shirts and close-toed shoes on everyone and make sure all the guys are clean-shaven with really short hair.

Also. Sorry to be crass, here, but do we really think some teenage boy is going to take the Ensign into the bathroom with him and then blame the church for putting angel porn right in front of him like that? Really?

I suddenly feel like I'm in the middle of a Weekend Update: Really?!? segment with Seth Meyers. (Note: Does anybody else have a total crush on Seth or is it just me? It should be allowed, look at how modestly dressed he is here. Assuming, of course, that he's wearing pants.)

Well THIS was unexpected

Remember that one time when my dryer was broken and I came to the realization that it is good to have money to throw at problems? I think I may be about to bear my testimony some more on this topic.

GH has been looking for a new job for a while. What he's doing isn't bad, but it's not going to be a career and there isn't room to move up. Nothing has panned out, and I was starting to resign myself to the idea that I would be living in a 1970s shag-carpeted cave in Utah County for the rest of my days and we will never be able to afford a house ever and soon I will have like three children crawling around fishing old hobo spider carcasses out of the carpet and eating them.

So. While going about my life, I recently did the following:

Dumped $120 and many hours of work getting my garden started

Bought a $90 fitness center/pool pass for the summer

Renewed my Costco membership ($55)

And then today GH got offered a job in L**** and he starts in two weeks. It is craziness and I am still a bit dazed. Happy, and also dazed.

Some may see the previous expenditures as sunken costs, but I choose to see them as me paying my dues and alerting the universe to a situation that she is most welcome to mess with. If me buying non-refundable stuff is the way to get a better job and living situation, I say bring it. 

Another thing I'd been doing, which I had no idea would end up affecting me personally, was praying for years that my talented b-in-law would get an awesome job, which he recently did. And after moving the entire Precii family to Logan and starting said job, he found out about an opening that GH would be great for and called to tell him about it. Moral? Pray for good things to happen to other people because maybe some of that will splash back on you. That's probably how Jesus explained it at some point, I bet. 

Now I just need to find us a place to live. Anybody know of anyone in Cache Valley who is going on a mission and is just dying for me to live in their empty house for a year or so? Just wondering . . .

The Tiny Dark Lord checking out the library where his parents met.
Remember when I was pondering whether to apply for such a low-paying job?
Yeah. Good thing y'all encouraged me to go for it.

Holy dang, Sherlock

Are you guys watching Season 2 of Sherlock on Masterpiece? Did you watch Season 1? Because so help me if you are not then you are missing. out. Go repent and make restitution. You can catch Season 1 on Netflix or see if your library has it.

GH and I watched the three 90-minute episodes of Season 1 last year and both told everyone we knew about them--GH more than me, I think. Just think of everything that the Guy Ritchie/Robert Downey Jr. movies did wrong (hint: they were action movies instead of brilliant detectivey movies), fix all of it, multiply to the 10th power of better, set it in contemporary London, make Watson a blogger, and you've got it.

Things that are awesome about Sherlock:

This show has me, for the first time in life, finding Benedict Cumberbatch attractive. Like, by a lot. Must be to do with the hair. Or perhaps the general brilliance and also skills. Either way, he is perfect as Holmes.

I love Martin Freeman as Watson. He was great as Tim in The Office, is great in this, and he is going to be great in The Hobbit, along with my friend Richard Armitage who I feel certain will push previously understood limits of dwarf attractiveness (my prediction, you saw it here).

The guys all wear scarves. Oh, British men . . .

Rupert Graves plays Inspector Lestrade. I love me some Rupert Graves. Remember that one time when he was Freddie in A Room with a View? That was awesome.

Moriarty is one evil freak but so help me I was starting to dig him during the pool scene. That is how crazy good these people are.

We just watched Sunday night's episode (the season premiere) and man it was good. Loved all of the Sherlock Holmes/Irene Adler stuff. Loved, loved, loved.

Run, don't walk, friends!

Has anybody else seen Sunday night's episode? Any thoughts?