Wildlife

One of the things that I thought I might miss when we moved into a neighborhood inside city limits was the wildlife.

Birds.  Shocking, I know.

I figured we'd have birds - and we have, with hummingbirds this summer and winter birds so far this fall - but I wasn't as sure we'd have some of the other critters that we got at the old house.  It was fun to look out the back window and see coyotes or ducks or, once and very memorably, a groundhog who was considering making his home in our crawlspace.

I shouldn't have worried.  I put up our winter bird feeders about two weeks ago.  It didn't take long for the birds (and the neighbor's two tabby cats, whom we affectionately call Fat Bob and Skinny Bob though they're probably female) to discover the feeder.  The birds enjoy the food and taunting the cats.  In fact, I think they deliberately throw food on the cats' heads.

The squirrels don't object at all.  They come and perform clean-up duty during the day.

Last night, though, I wandered into the formal dining room to admire the lights that Oz, the kids and I put up and saw something poking around the strewn seeds.  I called Oz in and grabbed the camera.  Oz wanted to go out and see what it would do if he came outside, so he opened the front door.

The opossum did what 'possums do...

... and promptly shimmied up the tree.  Oz hadn't expected that and got a kick out of the critter that he had treed.  He hadn't realized that opossums in America climbed trees, let alone that they had prehensile tails.  He knew that Australian possums (which are really possums, not opossums) had those features and did those things but hadn't realized that opossums in the USA did the same thing.

Of course, the little guy (or gal) was gone by this morning, but as Oz was getting ready to tuck M2 into bed tonight, he happened to glance out her window - our little friend was back.

It seems that we haven't left Mother Nature behind after all!  And that makes me very happy.

It's Over, and Other House Updates

Today was an interesting day.

First, we closed on our old house.  The house-selling ordeal is over.  It wasn't pretty, and there's a very frustrating and slightly ugly saga attached to it, but it's over and done and we have the check (OK, we had the check but I got a lil' bit nervous about having the check in the house all weekend so I made Oz take it to the bank already) and we don't have the keys and I will hopefully never talk to the buyers again.

After Oz and I finally made it back home (my mother-in-law had come over to watch the kids), things got better.  First I put a pot of stew on - beef stew made with Guinness - and got M1 started making some mini strawberry cheesecakes.  While he was cooking, the doorbell rang and two neighbor girls wanted to play with M2.  I sent her off, and a few minutes later I saw one of the neighbor boys circling around the cul-de-sac on his bike, so I sent M1 out while I finished up the dessert.  I popped the stew in the oven, and then peeked out the back door to check on the kids.

They were doing fine, so I came back in to start some soda bread to go with the stew, but I left the back door open so I could hear what was going on.  A couple minutes later, the shrieking began.  I walked to the back door.  The first thing I noticed was the number of kids - 7 at first count, which was NOT the number that was there when I had checked a few minutes prior.  The second thing I noticed was the two moms standing around watching.  I recognized one of the moms but not the other, so I left the butter to soften for a few minutes (I know, it's soda bread and the butter should be hard, but I didn't let it get too soft and it was amazing bread when it finally got made... soft and light and wonderful) while I went down to say hi.

Have I mentioned our back yard is the neighborhood gathering place?  I can't remember, but at the risk of repeating myself, our back yard (as well as the yards of the neighbors on either side of us) is the neighborhood gathering place.  We're on the creek.  Creeks = children.  It's a fundamental math rule.  And we have the youngest kids.

Turned out that the shrieking was due to the fact that the boys were trying to catch a giant spider in a net and the girls were pretending to freak out while circling like voyeuristic vultures.  The mom I didn't know is the mom that lives next door.  She has a 12-year-old son (and two older ones; the 12-year-old is the youngest).  My son was already playing with the two boys from around the corner - their mom was the second mom outside - and M2 was playing with the two girls who originally rang the doorbell.  A few minutes later two more girls who live nearby came over and joined them.  I had to do a quick head count.  My two munchkins, the two boys from around the corner, the next-door neighbor boy, the two girls from the house behind ours, and the 'new' two girls.  Nine.  There were NINE kids in my back yard.

I've never had nine kids simultaneously and spontaneously appear in my back yard before.  And yet there they were, all playing happily together.

It was fascinating.  I think we're going to like it here.

Settling In

We got the moving done today.  I'm eternally grateful to my husband, dad, and brothers-in-law who spent the day lifting, hauling, and working in the 100-plus-degree heat to help us move.  Thanks to them, my previously empty house now looks like this (minus photos of M1's room... when I entered, I was told, "MOM, no pictures until my room is totally done and looks good!  Get out!"  I couldn't help but chuckle and accede to his request):

M2's room

The other half of M2's room

Casual dining

Formal dining

Half bath - my sister made that drawing years ago... we finally have a place to hang it!

The kitchen

Living room - the TV is on the entertainment unit now,
and Oz is going to hook up the surround sound sometime soon

Master bedroom

Also master bedroom

Oz's office

School room

Other side of the school room

It's been a long, long week, but it's finally over.  The kids are asleep in their new rooms.  Oz is thrilled to have his ottoman back.  I took a lovely soak in the whirlpool tub, and the cats are still prowling around, figuring the place out.  The dog?  Well, he's sacked out on the floor near the end of the couch.  We're definitely settling in.

The New Digs

My day has been rather surreal.  Life-changing days always are, aren't they?  Getting married was surreal.  Giving birth (both times) was surreal.  Buying our first house was surreal.  Today just adds to the list of days that I'll look back at and think, "How could it be such a momentous day?  Nothing particularly special happened!"

My mother-in-law agreed to watch my munchkins this morning while Oz and I visited our soon-to-be home and did the final walkthrough.  From there we went to the closing company and signed all the paperwork.  ALL the paperwork.  We were out in less than 45 minutes.  We came back to home (heretofore known as The Old House, or TOH) to let everyone know, then hauled the kids, a bunch of boxes, and my mother-in-law to see our purchase (heretofore known as The New House, or TNH).

I've avoided putting up pictures before now largely because I'm uber-paranoid and have a more-than-is-probably-healthy fear of jinxing myself but also because those photos would have been someone else's and I try to avoid copyright issues.  It's a respect thing.

So here are MY photos of TNH... sans furniture, of course.  Those will come later:

The front

The kitchen (the door on the right is the pantry)

Look!  Oz will have an office instead of working from the laundry room!

The living room... WITH a fireplace :)

The game room upstairs

This is going to be the school room... more pictures after it's all set up!

M1's room

M2's room, complete with...

Her own vanity that connects to the upstairs bath

So that's the house in a photographic nutshell.  We filled our van twice today and brought over a fair amount of stuff... boxes of books, extra clothes, bathroom essentials and some kitchenware that I won't need between now and this weekend.  Tomorrow we're going to get a small U-Haul and empty out our storage unit and bring over as much small furniture as the van will hold, provided none of us collapse from the heat.

The kids are absolutely fascinated with the place, even more so now that it's actually ours, and I've already seen neighbor kids stalking the house to see whether our kids might fit their particular gender/age demographic.  It's a big change from living in the country where there are literally no other kids their age anywhere on the street... and you couldn't walk to their houses safely if you wanted!

Thanks to everyone who has put up with all the posts about the house over the past six months.  The journey is almost over, and I, for one, am very glad.

Sign of the Times

Even the cat is tired of waiting.

The move, obviously, is still on.  We haven't run into any major snags yet.  We've done the inspections on the house we're buying, and we've had inspections (and repairs) done here.  Today I got an e-mail from our realtor that said we're ready to schedule closing, which is both scary and really, really exciting.

We're two weeks out now.  The end is in sight... and now that it's actually happening, it can't happen fast enough!

Countdown to Chaos

Boxes are starting to fill my home.  From where I sit, I can see three different stacks because I'm trying to keep them out of the walkways for as long as possible.  There is a stack in the hall and another in the kitchen.  So far I've packed up things like knick-knacks, the china, extra coffee mugs, extra linens and pillows, and appliances I won't be using in the next three weeks.  The kids have picked out some books to read, and I've packed the rest.

We had inspections done here on Friday afternoon.  We have a few things to fix but thankfully nothing major.  Inspections for our new house are scheduled late this week.  We're not expecting to find anything big, but you never know.  Once those things are taken care of, we get to wait on the appraiser.  Then we get to wait on the title information.  And in the meantime, I'm supposed to be educating the children because our first school day is tomorrow.  We may or may not take a week off while we're moving; I haven't entirely decided yet.

Once we get into our new place (knock on wood, etc., etc.), my mom, sister and I are headed up to visit my grandmother.  She's decided that she wants to move to an assisted living facility... before winter.  In her mind, this means September or October.  It's a facility with studio apartments, and she gets to bring her own furniture, but it's still a studio apartment, not a house.  My mom, sister and I have to make sure the facility is going to be a good fit, get her moved, and then go through everything in the house and sell, give away, or otherwise dispose of all the furniture, goods and detritus that accumulates throughout 88 years of living... and that includes the car and the house.  I'm not really looking forward to this, for many reasons.  It's odd and uncomfortable to be talking about getting rid of so many things when their owner is still around to hear about it.

I'm also waiting on word from my sister.  Her husband had a phone interview for a job out of state (WAY out of state), and if he gets it, they'll have to be moved by mid-August.  For their sake, I hope he gets it, because it sounds like it would be a perfect fit, but at the same time, I don't want my sister to be so far away!

I'm taking things one day at a time right now, because if I try to look too far ahead, I'll have a full-on nervous meltdown and simply won't function.  I'm one minor catastrophe away from the Land of Straitjackets and Valium.  I don't handle stress well, and moving myself is bad enough - I wasn't planning on EVERYONE moving this year, know what I mean?


I will make it through this, I will make it through this...