Catching up

Since the day I started this blog, long ago, I have never let it sit so many months without updates...but it felt like I could never quite get enough time to come back and visit. Everyday things I love fell by the wayside over the last few months, and I am only now getting them back.  The first big news is that by the end of February, we finally had our new kitchen.  The one where we had to gut the old kitchen entirely, put in a structural beam, get a lot of plumbing and frozen pipes fixed, etc.  This bread would be unremarkable, except we went many months without homemade bread...everyone in our house is so "used" to having it that going from November until end of February without bread was a long wait.  (Of course now, Passover is almost here too, so no more homemade bread, but at least there is a kitchen to cook and eat in again!)

Literally the moment the cookbooks got taken out of the boxes, we were looking at recipes again, discussing what to make next, and getting excited about future meals again.

When the kitchen was finished, we could move the stained glass from the old house and hang it in the new one. Everyone felt relieved at the move.  We bought this stained glass when our twins were infants, and recently the artist who has helped us with the glass in this "new" old house told us that this window stained glass was likely from the late 1800s or early 1900s, and by the way, many of the types of glass in it were no longer available.  All the more reason to treat it with caution.

Getting through this time with no real kitchen, managing two mortgages (until the old house sold), a part-time job plus my freelance work, and of course, managing our household, twins and dog--has been complicated.  We spent a lot of time outside and I have found access to winter time activities  and exercise like an outdoor rink in walking distance and the (frozen) river trail--have been a great gift.

Walking the dog out on the river trail among art displays, skaters, skiers, kicksleds...it's an amazing opportunity, like having a new provincial park at the end of the block.  When the trail closed, the dog and I were both sad!

I've also been sewing, knitting and spinning when I can fit it in, although not with as much regularity as I managed before.  This winter, we managed to have twins signed up to three extracurricular activities in January and February.  (Chess club, sewing studio and piano lessons) In March, we continued with piano, tried out kick sledding--with and without the dog, and also kids had an intro to racquetball.  Later in April, we're starting again with chess and sewing, but at least there will be fewer snowstorms and -30C evenings to contend with while driving around.

Each bit of renovation that happens is a triumph.  When our contractor brothers opened up this back door area and renovated it, it was like a doorway to the past.  My professor husband has been slowly getting windows fixed one at a time, rehanging the window weights, and we have so far opened up 4 windows and two doorways.  (2 more windows to go, I think.)  Whoever decided to close off windows and doors in a long-ago renovation...maybe in the 1980s or maybe much earlier...really wasn't the brightest bulb.

Here's the re-opened back door area.  Below are two high up windows in our new kitchen...both were blocked off but one of them had actually been left open, behind cupboards and walls, to vent a half-bath for perhaps 40 or more years.  No wonder why the area was cold and the pipes froze in winter!

We also finally have a working dishwasher, which is a huge deal when feeding a family all winter.  We were not surviving on take out or eating out during this time...but we did choose to use paper plates during the kitchen renovation.  It was probably the most paper plates we adults have ever used in our lifetimes.  It was worth it though, there are limits to what one family can manage...even an eco-conscious one.  It's also the first time in 20 some years when we haven't composted at all--because our dog got skunked in September right after we started composting.  So you know, we decided to stop composting until we figured out how NOT to attract skunks to the yard.  If you have tips on that, let me know in the comments!

Knitting continued as kids keep growing and needing new woollies!  This is another version of my "Stripe Freestyle" Sweater- slightly upsized as my kids are now a little bigger than the pattern I published.  The yarn for this one was my handspun Cotswold and silk singles.  I dyed it as well, the yellow was dyed with marigolds and the red came from a nice dye packet.  I wrote about spinning and dyeing this yarn on the blog in 2006.  Some yarns just need time to marinate in the stash!  In this case, I obviously had to give birth to twins first and then wait 11 years.

Here's another fun photo of kids enjoying the art installations this year--this one was taken at the Forks. This sail turned in the wind while you stood on it...but it also served as a much needed windbreak on a very chilly day.

I'm now on to knitting yet another "Stripe Freestyle" sweater for the other kid and the fuschia yarn in the background will likely be a sweater for me, someday.  (It's on hold while I knit more for kids.)  It never fails to surprise me which knitting patterns sell lots of copies and which don't.  The Stripe Freestyle pattern is a slam dunk in my household, but doesn't sell many copies on Ravelry, Payhip or Lovecrafts.  No idea why.  In any event, it's been a mainstay in these twins' wardrobes for years.

 Finally, I'm adding a much overdue photo of the lovely birthday celebration we had back in January- I had a big birthday, in the midst of all of this. We were stressed out and it went by quietly.  However, now that we're "down" to owning only one house, things are somewhat calmer.  Still lots of renovations to go and some ends to tie up, but I'm hoping for warmer weather and more time for writing, designing and playing ahead.  

Summer on the move

It turns out that moving twins, a dog, and a household about a mile is a huge undertaking.  About 13 years ago, I documented our move to Canada on this blog, and I wrote a lot about it.  It involved a continent's drive, two bird dogs, a lot of boxes and plants, a moving van, my professor and me.  I've since learned that moves with tweens can be, umm, more complicated than that one.

The short story behind this is that our beautiful old house, featured in many blog posts, got damaged.  This issue continued to cause a lot of friction for us, along with a dead tree hanging over our power lines, increased traffic nearby and a lot of construction around where we were living.  It seemed like we needed to find somewhere else to live.  During the pandemic, this was no small thing.  It took us almost a year to accomplish this.  How we ended up with our "new" old house is a story for another day.  This story is a little about the summer...

It has involved moving things slowly, one at a time.  Here's my Quebec Production wheel, and the two customers who helped me move it from the third floor of one house to the third floor of the other. (Note, I still have two great wheels left to move!)

Meanwhile, my parents visited and my mom helped enormously by hemming curtains with twins. (Both twins went to a sewing camp for part of the summer and were very keen.)  Just beyond this photo were boxes, a refrigerator and a dishwasher, appliances for our as-yet-unrenovated kitchen.  Partly demolished, in fact.

Here's our old house, which is now for sale.  I will really miss things about this house, including the front porch.

However, our new backyard is quiet at night, and I can sit, watch the dog wander the yard, and there's little to no noise or light pollution - and yes, it is right in the middle of the city.  That bright light in the photo is the moon rising.

The inside of the house still looks like this though.  Our furniture was used to stage our old house, but it's being moved to the new house soon.  In the meanwhile...things are a bit hard to put away.  Necessary renovations are still happening as we have one lovely working bathroom (nothing else is functional yet) and a kitchen that needs a lot of work.  Note tiles at the front of this photo.

Despite all this transition, I tried to find space every day to do something fun with kids and dog, too.  This was an amazing art exhibit we 'toured' - it is painted on fences and garage doors in a backlane in Wolseley.  We were able to walk there from our new house.  It was a long walk on a hot day, but well worth it.

There's a lot more to this story, but now, kids are back at school and we adults are still trying to make order out of chaos.  (Sometimes the blog silence is because I am silently screaming in the background?!)

Lost:

One sturdy, portable folding black music stand.
This music stand was given to me by the religious school class I taught. The kids and their parents gave it to me in the early '90's. It is well traveled, much loved and has lived in upstate New York, Virginia, North Carolina and Kentucky. It's new home should be in Winnipeg. Somewhere.

Last seen during the packing of my house in Kentucky.

Note: This is one of those things you don't need to unpack right away. However, it eventually occurs to me that it might be useful to have it, say, when I'm playing music. Thus began a "*pop up from the couch, do a focused search, return to the couch, defeated, start doing something else that might have been productive, and then....*return to asterisk and repeat" sort of day.

The professor says, --and yes, this might be logical, since it was stored in my office before--
"Do you think, (long long pause) maybe... it's in a box of wool?"

Well yes. It might be, clever man... I've looked briefly through the 30 boxes up here on the third floor of the house and I can't find it. I've found numerous other skeins of yarn, stashed where I least expected them. I've found all my boxes of roving, formerly used to pack photos. (Photos still not up on the wall. Yes, I know, we're working on that.) Brief moment spent wondering if that roving could possibly be compressed into, say, 5 or 6 boxes instead of the 10 it's in now.

Rediscovery of multiple bags of wool used as padding in other bags. Oh! I wondered where this Rambouillet went to... (no, actually, I'd forgotten I'd had all that. Left my mind completely.)

I hate losing stuff. Yet, I'm feeling that the only way to find this might be to empty every single box and reorganize the whole household. Oy, I'm not up for that. I just moved! It should be here....somewhere?

(Yes, I'd planned an entirely different sort of blog post, but now I can't focus. I can't find the #$)(%#@ music stand.--add your own frustrating bad word in as it comes to you. I'm sure you know how this feels...)

Update:
Found after much searching, one music stand, carefully tucked away in the back of a desk drawer. I spun Icelandic wool and thought about this a long time. I checked every box. Then? I remembered drawers. Thank goodness for drawers. Finally! (and yes, I would have likely stayed awake until I found it...so good this happened by 7pm.)

on to vacation...

It is very clearly time for me to go on holiday. Have a rest. Get away for a bit. Why? Today I've walked two dogs, gotten fresh corn ready for the freezer, done some work stuff, unpacked 3 large packing boxes, dealt with a small meltdown with the spouse, done laundry for the trip, including dodging rain showers to hang it outside...and it's just past lunch time. I'm pretty tired...and I've been on hyperdrive for so long with this move that it's hard to remember what normal feels like. Normal is, well, so far away that I've forgotten it. I've been in Winnipeg just a month. I've been packing, unpacking, travelling and moving things for about 4 months. I'm beat.


A couple of days ago, when I wasn't canning dilly beans or pickled cabbage, I washed a lot of handspun yarn to set twist and fulled some handknit mittens. (the mittens are plain old white wool, not that interesting.) The yarn, however? You may remember, I had some yarn I felt I must spin before I left Kentucky. It was oddly irrational. Well, I found that box, and I just started plying. Several skeins later, all the CVM yarn is plied. There's still one skein of Shetland left to ply, but it's been a nice slow transition into spinning in my new house. Here's some of the yarn--it's roughly fingering to sport weight, a 2 ply. I'm excited about it.

I promised a photo of the yarn I got at the Knit Out (held once a year, at a local park) yarn swap. I hadn't expected to come home with a thing, but this hopped into my arms without me realizing it. It's interesting stuff. On left, 2 skeins of ecoknit organic sage green cotton--stuff I enjoy knitting with and would have bought myself! In the middle, there's a lot of pink. That is a yarn called Lambada, a 50% cotton, 50% Viscose mix. The knitter/crocheter who did this made 80! flowers before getting bored and giving up with the project. I'm thrilled with it, I expect I'll use all her work and incorporate those flowers into whatever I knit or crochet. The "Boogie" box in the back is nearly a full box of white Viscose tape. Ideal for curtains, in my opinon, or a slinky top. (If you know me, I'll likely go for the curtains. Slinky isn't really my style.)

Now, I don't usually buy viscose. It's not all that environmentally friendly, and I'll explain a lot more about that in Knit Green, which will be coming out in just a month! However, free, secondhand yarn of any variety needs to be used. It was calling out to me to be used...re-using and revisioning something discarded is better than, well, discarding it. So, it came home with me. By knitting this, I'm not contributing to the production of viscose, and I'm not financially supporting it. I am, however, supporting the notion of a friendly yarn swap, and this was one of the best I've been too. Just wish I'd been able to get open enough boxes of stash to contribute! Maybe next year.

You may have noticed that I've put links to a variety of bookshops on the right side of the blog. I was encouraged by the powers that be to show that I support all bookshops, everywhere, (of course. I obviously support all books...) rather than showing preference to only one retailer. It would be just fantastic if you were to wander over there to one of those links (any book store is fine, really...no judgement call just now) and order a copy of Knit Green so it can arrive at your house hot off the press. commercial pitch now over...

In the meanwhile, I'm doing my best to plan for my trip, in the midst of acquiring dog licenses, (not) acquiring driver's licenses --a story for another time, and doing all the other myriad details of handling life in a new country. I'm pretty tired. Like Sally the dog demonstrates--we're pretty focused around here, and we've got a lot to point at and do. Sally, our resident pointer mix, does most of the pointing.

I'm going to focus, with the best of intentions, on resting a little more. In that vein, you may not hear from me for a while. (internet access will likely be thin on the ground as well on my trip.) I'll be back here in September, ready to take on lots of new adventures. Until then, imagine I am lollygagging in the sunshine. Resting. Trying to kick back and...relax. I may have forgotten how.

Note: Harry and Sally demonstrate--complete with gray sheep toy--how to take a break. It apparently can be done, even with highstrung bird dogs!

See you in a bit.... Take care.

For Want of a Nail

For whatever reason, a lot of things were broken on our move to Winnipeg. If not broken, then lost or misplaced. We suspect it's because our belongings were loaded onto a truck in Kentucky, driven south to Nashville, warehoused until they found a driver going to Canada, and then loaded on a new truck. That shifting might allow for more damage. While I wish this could have been avoided, there just aren't alot of people moving their belongings from Kentucky to Winnipeg, and therefore, it took a while to find a mover that would move us and even to find a truck driving in the right direction. (three households of belongings were on that truck, and their destinations were Calgary & Lethbridge, Alberta, and Winnipeg...)

That said, we try not to dwell on the downside of things...as much as possible. I've made the damage claims with the mover. We're waiting for the assessor to arrive. Mistakes happen, and these are all just things. Not people, and not live beings, so we're lucky. However, the most frustrating things are the little ones.

For instance, the futon and hardwood frame which normally sits in my office. It usually needs to be disassembled for any move. The movers somehow managed to move it out of our house in Kentucky without taking it apart. (this was done by slight of hand and mirrors, this thing is enormous!) Then, it was taken apart at the warehouse. Then? Somewhere in the move, we lost this:

(For those who care, that's called a "futon glide" or "futon roller." The metal thing is called a clevis pin. You need four of these jobbies for our futon frame, and one is missing.)

Sadly, futon hardware is not standardized. It isn't easily purchased at a hardware store, either. We know because the professor tried to find one at Home Depot yesterday. They suggested calling a futon store instead.

The first futon store was actually very helpful. The person identified the kind of frame she thought we had. (it's 12 years old, I bought it for the professor's bachelor pad the year before we were married.) She then suggested another competing store that might have the part. I call store #2.

"Oh, no problem," they say. "Bring the part in and we'll try to help." So, after dinner, we hop in the car and go to store #2. They don't have any spare hardware parts, but they're very helpful and send us across town to their warehouse.

At this point, I insist on a stop at a mall to buy some other essentials, like Body Shop sunscreen and a book. The book, Fingerweaving Untangled by Carol James, is very well done, and I've just met the author...but I digress. (take note, this was one of the few successes of the evening...)

OK, so off we go to the next store. At this point, I've given up on using the map and we're letting the GPS talk us through a drive across town. We arrive at store #2's other branch and warehouse. The people there are extraordinarily friendly. However, the warehouse manager is new and doesn't want to cannibalize a whole futon frame/set without permission from his boss. Totally understandable, as these frames are pricey... maybe $500 average.

He asks to borrow our sample piece (that would be part #3, since we took one off the futon to find a matching one) and I just about melt down.

"No!" I say, "I can't give you this. What if you lose it!? Then we'll be missing two of these!?"

The man is used to complete hysterics and is calm in the face of impending disaster. He whips out his phone, takes a photo of the piece, and hands it back to the professor. He promises to call us tomorrow. (that would be today.)

As we leave the store, we have an entirely congenial conversation with the salesmen. They do everything they can to help. I explain that unless the futon is set up in my office, I can't unpack the rest of the office. Without the futon, the dogs have nowhere to sleep...and then they bark. They do their jobs (helping me work) best when the futon is there. I like sitting on the futon too. We are lost. Bereft. Without the darn futon. I am completely aware of how crazy this sounds. Bear with me.

We promise the guys that we'll likely buy our next futon at Best Sleep Centre. I announce my need to drown my sorrows in a gelato. Preferably a big one. We leave.

The professor, meanwhile, has been a charming and patient companion through all this. He is easygoing and pleasant. We're enjoying a cool evening on the prairies. All is well. Then, we're driving back towards home...

And the GPS points us towards Gertrude Street. Gertrude Street is a 2 way street with parking on it. It has only about 1.5 lanes open at any time, and it clearly has not been resurfaced for the last 30 winters or so. While it may be the most direct way to go, no person in his/her right mind would choose this road as a good shortcut across town. (*Bump. bump bump. Dodge car. Dodge pothole big enough to swallow us whole. Bump. Dodge pedestrian. Try to cross insanely busy road with 4 lanes of traffic, rep from *.)

This is where the professor loses it. He becomes frustrated and deranged. He is fixated on gelato. He wants to hit the GPS, and settles for shutting it off. He is agitated in a way I cannot soothe.

Meanwhile, we note that the whole city smells like poop. Like manure has just been spread everywhere. No idea why. We are new here. We have broken stuff. And--we took Gertrude Street because of GPS directions.

We share a large waffle cone with "cream of chestnut" and "chocolate cheesecake" at our amazing local gelato place. We agree that all is not lost--if the futon place can't locate us this part, we can order it online from the United States. The parts will cost around $25 US plus shipping. That would be maybe $40 US, plus all that time, mentioned above.

I have now filed another damage claim with the moving company for a stupid piece of plastic. This is only ONE of the several smaller broken things we are trying to cope with. (the piano is a big fix and is entirely out of our purview) About the little stuff, we mean--not fix perfectly, and not replace, but just--you know--set up. Make do. Put our house in order.

This cruddy plastic stuff is getting in the way of our enjoyment of Folklorama, a citywide amazing festival. We are peeved. Tonight, we're dropping everything--but not breaking it--and going out to at least a couple of pavilions.

And yes, we know this would be very funny if it weren't so danged frustrating. After the gelato, the professor insisted I tell you all about this on the blog. He suggested, nay, demanded, that I call it For Want of a Nail.

Commiseration welcome in the comments. Oh, and if you just happen to have one of these thingees laying around, please, let me know!

UPDATE: Best Sleep Centre's warehouse has the piece! Oh! Hurray! Now we'll just drive across town one more time...and we'll be able to put up the futon. Life is good.

working on it

Your comments are really wonderful...I'm so lucky to have friends like you! For instance, Alison H. understood exactly what how I felt about the permit process for having a moving truck--(oh, how good that they could help me do that quickly!!) Kerry *aka Carolyn*--we still don't have a fence up, although believe me, I want it to happen soon!

This post is photo heavy. Those who know me realize that I'm not overly hung up on interior decoration. I want things to look nice, but am not fixated on the perfect home thing. However, when I see something I like, I want to have it, dang it! That's why I took no fewer than 3 trips to Canadian Tire (a big store) to get two of these leafy vine shower curtains for our bathroom. You see, you need two shower curtains when you have a claw footed tub... and that took several trips. I'm working on the curtains, which will be knitted, of course...more than halfway done with that.

Meanwhile, the professor brought his first load of lab and office equipment to his new laboratory. Due to this fire
in one of the biology buildings, folks in the department are doubled up and sharing space. The professor caught this gorgeous view from his new lab desk. He's setting up his lab as both research laboratory and office. This allows the scientists displaced in the fire to keep using his designated office. While the fire itself (repair costs of 40-50 million dollars...) was a nightmare, the other biology professors came right out to the car to help the professor move in. What a warm welcome!

I can't wait until the rest of the lab stuff is delivered. Right now, this is what our living room looks like. The boxes on the right? Most of them are the professor's. We have a lot of lab supplies and science books in our living room!

The professor saw this canning display at the university book store and knew I'd feel right at home. He shot a photo for me.

I can't even estimate how many kind people have welcomed us to Canada. It's been sort of amazing. Each day has its own challenges, too...a lot of idioms are different here!

The home inspector told the professor:

"You appear to have a problem with eavesdropping."

The professor (and I) immediately panicked. Was there a bug planted in our house!? Could people hear all the (stupid) things we say to each other?

No. We have an actual problem with a lack of "eavestroughs." You know. Gutters. The things that keep rain draining neatly. (Eavesdropping, the phrase, came from someone listening in by standing under the eaves of a house.)

This was plain old funny, but sometimes we just don't have a clue what people are trying to tell us!

We are settling in. Due to a strange coincidence, our new dining room looks remarkably like our old one. The old dining room? Red walls. We didn't choose it, but it was recently painted, so we just lived with it, and grew to like it. So, new dining room? Here it is. For those of you who've eaten in our home before, doesn't this look familiar?!

With all this focus on unpacking, we've missed the Winnipeg Fringe Festival entirely...but soon, we'll have things set up to a point where we can actually check out the city too, I hope!

It wasn't until today that I really began to feel at home. Today we hung our ketubah as well as our mezuzahs. We have a beautiful Italian glass mezuzah that the professor's aunt gave us...we're hoping it will make it through the cold winters here without cracking...but I also love that I feel comfortable enough to put it at the front door. (It's bright blue, which would attract attention, so we avoided putting that one at the front door at our last house. For a variety of reasons, it just didn't seem safe...and now it is!)

Other wonderful signs that this will be a good home? The professor cleaned out a closet and found a set of knitting needles Waiting for me! I unpacked some books, and put the needles with the books...and a beautiful skein of samoyed/Merino yarn, made in Canada, and gifted to me by a new knitting friend. She came by with lots of info about Manitoba, yarn, jam, and cinnamon buns. How fabulous! What a special treat!

This morning, I pushed past the boxes and canned with local Manitoba fruit. One batch each of raspberry and strawberry jam...about 16 jars, all told. Beginning to feel downright homey here!

More soon, I hope. I feel guilty every time I sit down to the computer--there's still more to unpack...

Moving Day to Chicago

Here's a summary of our journey. I'll post in stages, with photos if I have them. As we're now in Winnipeg, this story begins more than a week ago, with moving day, July 10. Before I go further...to answer an important question...our final box count was 362 boxes that we packed ourselves. The movers packed our dishes and other breakables, and that was about 9 more boxes. (and then there was the furniture...) Book box count was probably roughly 60+ boxes of the total, although we don't have an official number on that at this time. (It wasn't an important number for us for customs, so we didn't count it separately!)

----

We've made it to Chicago.:) The moving truck arrived, we passed our keys to the new owners of our Kentucky home, and we drove 400+ miles today in our car. We're on the way!
Now the professor and I are holed up in a nice La Quinta hotel with two exhausted dogs. (It's been a rough couple of days to be a dog at our house.) Our journey is going well though. We've already placed an order for pizza, since we're in Chicago...!

Everything has really gone as smoothly as one could hope. We've had a couple of unsettling and stupid electronic moments today. One was when my car phone charger appeared broken and I couldn't find my regular charger either. (luckily, I discovered a backup in my briefcase, what forethought!) and the other? I loaded up several audio books on my ipod. I spent (no kidding) hours and hours on this. And?

Today I discovered that it just wouldn't work in my car plug-in itrip thingee, no matter what I did. It worked before, dang it. I got inordinately peeved about this. Luckily, the professor was able to fix the fuse that had broken in the car while we were in Minneapolis…but I get ahead of myself. This electronics thing seemed a sign that I was totally keyed up but can't find anything real to panic about. We did discover an actual CD audio book in the glove compartment that seems tolerable, if dull, so that's good. Bargain sales are good for something...

Yesterday, when the movers were in the house, the dogs had a rough day. I gave them both what I thought was a "vet-approved" sedative. Sally did well, it really helped. Harry had an adverse reaction, which included a lot of twitching, tail chasing, and barking and howling...for hours. I called the vet in the middle of the moving day and found out that there had been a mistake in the medication in the first place! Luckily, she'd also given us a few doggie valiums which didn't erase the problem but took the edge off Harry's reaction. It was still a pretty long day for Harry and he continued to act out until about 1 AM. He also appears to hate the zipper sound on the crates we are using. As best I can tell, that first medicine was like having a really really bad acid trip for dogs+moving anxiety.

All that was rough but we made it through with possibly the most efficient and professional moving crew we've ever had. Also, our friend Nic came over to sit with us/dogs and brought us lunch yesterday. That was just a godsend and added moral support to the incessant howling and barking Harry was doing...which totally rattled me. Meanwhile, Sally was a delight and slept calmly through most things. You never can tell which dog (or child) will have the meltdown, I guess!

Nic kindly made us (and our friend John, who drove the professor's car to Minnesota) dinner and it was so nice and civilized after a long day of movers/chaos. We then went home to sleep on the floor of our bedroom, in sleeping bags. I had to use a wool blanket and a dog towel and the professor's moving clothes to cope with it. The floor is harder than it used to be! Harry did not go along with the game plan though and I had to take him outside at both 11 pm and 1 am. Meanwhile, the professor snored through it all! I woke up by 5:30. I imagine I will sleep well tonight. I hope so, anyway.

This AM, we walked dogs, got breakfast take out at a local café, tidied up the last stuff, and our nice cleaning lady and her husband came over one last time to clean the house and give us a hug and say goodbye. Very kind of them! Then we handed off our keys to the new owners and went on our way. We were driving by 8:45 AM.
Sally demonstrates the portable crate with aplomb
The dogs did remarkably well today. We had a couple equipment failures...we have these neat canvas and metal collapsible crates for the journey. They weigh 10 lbs a piece and collapse into this tiny long rectangular case--it looks like tents for dogs...I thought it'd be easier for us than hard plastic crates. Unfortunately, they take up a lot of room inside our car and we had more extra human stuff than we'd planned. The luggage or the dog put pressure on the spring mechanism on one of the crates and Harry's crate imploded 2 or 3 times. He was ok about it and we fixed it each time. It was all slightly more difficult because we were in the middle of a big lightning storm and a huge downpour. We worked it out. Glad we brought our rain coats though...and that dog towel left in the car came in handy!

The cool breezy damp weather meant we could rush into a Cracker Barrel and eat lunch. We left the windows open and the car under a tree in the shade. The food wasn't anything exotic but they are fast and well, it may be our last chance for a "meat and three" (meat and three veggies) or a vegetable plate. In the South, of course, the four veggie plate I got included: mac and cheese, fried apples, turnip greens (cooked with meat) and cole slaw. That also came with a biscuit. We probably won't be getting that much in Winnipeg. :) (That may be ok since I can't for the life of me figure out why mac and cheese or that meat in the turnip greens are veggies...)

That is most of the news for now. Our Chicago pizza has been delivered! Hurray! This was the story from July 10-11. More on the saga of "The professor and Joanne move 1300 miles across the US and Canada" later...

(and yes. I finally have internet up and running at home in Winnipeg now. The latest is that our belongings will arrive at the customs depot --and then our home--tomorrow. Hurray! Finally, I can stop sleeping on the floor! I can't wait to sleep in my own bed!)

it's not the size of the box...

OK, I think this post is about other stuff, but I'm trying to be jokey here... and hence, jokes about box size. Please, add in your own joke to that subject header..I can't even think of one! Willow (I think it was Willow?) asked about our box sizes. The smallest boxes I have packed have been, roughly the size of a canning jar box from the grocery store. The kind with a dozen 8 oz jars--this is a big shoe box size. There are a very few of those, and they are usually packed in larger boxes, so don't count. The largest box size is called a "Wardrobe" box, and I packed cushions, dog beds, pillows, and a king size duvet into one of those. Most of the book boxes are liquor boxes, from our kind local liquor stores. Bowling Green is a "wet" city in a largely "dry" region...loads of liquor stores, all with extra boxes here in town, and people in the rural areas around just shop here for their alcohol, which they can't buy at home.

It's my basic rule that one should never pay for a cardboard box unless desperate. The professor has bought a few filing boxes for other moves through the years. Those uniform boxes seem to organize his moves. I reuse them as office storage until they absolutely die. Some of these are on their 2nd or 3rd move...and now, to a new country! (way more than you wanted to know about boxes, I bet. Who knew that these boxes would travel so far from their first purpose!?)

I've been worried about whether we'll be ready when the moving folks arrive. The packers come tomorrow to pack up the breakables, and the truck comes on Friday. (At least, I hope so, they haven't called to confirm yet...) The professor was packing and cleaning up his lab and saying goodbye to people at the university until yesterday. Today was his first weekday, packing at home. This has caused me great concern, as I was all on my own, but mostly, I just try not to think about it, and pack more boxes... I had 3 done by 10 AM this morning. Oh, and we're up to something in the range of 327 or something, so all estimates may be too low in our guessing game... Oops. I need to wrap this up and go pack up the Cusinart. I've got stuff to do...(but I need rest breaks, too, right?)

When I couldn't sleep last night, I finished the spinning "task" I'd set for myself. Then I closed up this box. I had a great feeling of accomplishment there. Look at all those neat little balls of singles, ready to be plied! Whew. Then I packed up the last spinning wheel...only spindles and a little wool and small knitting projects are travelling with me.

Sally the dog continues to be pretty anxious...very high strung. It's hard to blame her. The professor thinks it will all be just fine. After all, he seemed to infer, when is your desk ever this clean otherwise? (he's got a point.)

Harry's laidback personality continues to amaze me. He's a little more clingy than usual, but nothing interrupts his serious naps. The dog is a napping machine. I am jealous.

This morning I made our last meal here...tuna pasta salad with basil, parsley, garlic greens, kalamata olives, carrots, collards, and tomatoes. It tastes pretty good, which is a plus, considering we're likely to eat it for both lunch and dinner! Now the pots go into boxes, too. Oh--there's also still one last piece of pie...it's got my name on it.

Thanks (again) for all your good wishes, cheerful comments, and support. It's been an oasis of friendly comfort, the blog posting/reading of comments, during this chaotic period. I haven't gotten to write everybody back --maybe won't be able to, this time, but I really appreciate your kindness.

Now, back to packing...

the last days...

You never can tell...In the midst of packing, I read a great book. It was a 10 cent book I picked up at a used book store in Vermont. At only 10 cents, I started the book figuring it wasn't much of a risk. I didn't expect much. Instead, it lead me into a very thoughtful exploration of women's roles...how smart women cope when faced with frustrating options. The book was by Margaret Drabble, published in 1962, and it's called The Summer Birdcage. Although the scenarios have changed slightly, what struck me was this...all these intelligent, Oxbridge educated women finished school and were so disappointed by society's opportunities for women that awaited them. Although things have changed a great deal in some ways, I found myself thinking "Plus ça change, plus c’est la meme chose.." (the more things change, the more they stay the same.)

After all, why did I end up in Kentucky? (or am moving to Winnipeg, which I'm looking forward to?) The professor's job. I've gotten more used to this now but I was pretty upset the first couple of times I gave up very good jobs to move. We've also gotten better at negotiating this--now the professor knows more about how I feel with each move! (I've also reconciled the fact that I could have kept great jobs --or--the professor. In several cases, it was a tough either/or choice.) Anyhow...that book was unexpectedly packed instead of donated to the library. It was worth keeping--it's an insightful read. Willow asked how many boxes of books we're up to? We think it's a little over 60 boxes of books. After that, we stopped packing purely boxes of books, they are mixed in with other things. Yes, we've got a few books...

The box count is somewhere around 280 now. We continue to pack and things are going smoothly. I've discovered a few quirks that connect to your comments...

Willow also asked what I've been spinning. I finished spinning the chocolate brown Shetland, and I packed up the flyer/whorl and other small parts of the Canadian Production wheel. The way I move wheels is by packing all the small moving parts in boxes of wool or other soft things. Then I watch the movers like a hawk when they wrap my wheels! So far, they've come through moves just fine. (My piano, on the other hand, was dropped in the last move and needed quite a lot of repair work...insurance is a good thing!)

My very last unpacked wheel is the Majacraft Little Gem. I've been spinning CVM on that wheel, and it looks like this. (that's a skein before I've set the twist.) I've decided that I'll keep spinning that for a few days longer before packing up.

The quirk comes in here...I felt this enormous need to finish things I've been spinning. By finish, I seem to mean that I want to have all the roving/fiber spun for these specific projects. It's ok, in my weird "must be finished" world, to pack unplied singles and skeins that still must be set. (I hear they allow plying of handspun in Canada.) That said, I recognize this is entirely irrational, so whatever, I'm letting myself have this weirdness. A little spinning every day is probably good for me.

Mrs.J asked how the dogs were doing with the packing madness. Umm, that's another quirky thing going on. Although we've kept walks and feedings and crate and bed locations exactly the same, our dogs are showing some understandable stress. They've been blowing coat (losing lots of hair) at an alarming rate. We thought it was the hot weather but the vet suggested it might also be stress. We now know this to be the case...because last night, the combination of a thunderstorm, fireworks, and boxes made Sally growl and bark at our dinner guests. Both of our guests are over at the house all the time, so we know it was just her very immense anxiety. Crate training is a good thing--she calmed down immediately once crated but it was a rough night for her. I tried homeopathic medicine to relieve anxiety today when it was thundering--it did absolutely no good.

We're hoping things will be ok as the dogs travel (in their crates) with us across the country. If it's not ok and the dogs seem hysterical, the vet has prescribed some doggy valium just in case. The dogs (or we?) may need it. Harry the dog, by the way, is still totally fine. He's a type B personality--the only one in this household!

Dinner guests, you say? The "breakables" packers arrive Thursday and the moving truck is coming on Friday...and those people had dinner guests on Saturday night?! Yes, we're crazy. We had a couple of friends over for Independence Day celebrations in the midst of the boxes. I've admitted that will probably be our last set of dinner guests, so today I started packing up the kitchen in earnest. That's probably the last quirk. I want our household to stay normal as long as possible...so even with the packing up, today I baked a blackberry peach pie. More pie? (It's the new "normal." I can do it even without a recipe now--as the cookbooks are all packed!)

Got any funny packing moving quirks of your own? New box estimates? Do tell! I'll try to post at least one more time before moving day. (I hope.)

Whew!

It's finally gotten a little cooler here...our streak of very hot temperatures seems to have passed. That has been a relief!

In the box count sweepstakes, we're now up to 233 boxes, so I expect those of you with the higher numbers might be more in the ball park. Things are looking remarkably, well, boxy around here...packing's going well. I'll keep you updated on the box guessing sweepstakes, although by the time someone has "won", I'll have nothing left to send off as a reward!

Although I had a really busy weekend, I got a chance to email or comment on nearly everyone's blog. That was fun! I appreciated some of the exchanges we had. I learned a few things...Nancy and I have often exchanged blog comments, but for some reason I wasn't able to post there...I'm sorry, Nancy! I'm sure it's some sort of cyberspace blip. Another realization...Cathy, thanks so much for clarifying that there are two Cathys out there commenting! I was confused until you pointed out that my friend Cathy, who designed those marvelous crocheted socks in Fiber Gathering is that other Cathy! :)

Things are indeed gathering momentum now that the move to Winnipeg is upon us...less than 2 weeks until moving day. We had guests over for dinner both Friday and Saturday nights. I visited my friend, the farmer on Saturday afternoon. He is now home from the hospital and recuperating. Another friend came over to spin with me on Sunday. It was a busy time, but I've really enjoyed these social intermissions from the packing. I will miss these local friends.

One last, comment related realization...according to Alison, it turns out I have quite a high percentage of blog readers who comment! Thank you for all those positive things you bring to my corner of the world. I see my blog a lot like my cyber living room...it's a familiar concept in blogland--certainly not unique to mine.

For instance, for the first 6 months I lived in Kentucky, I hosted a spinning and knitting group once a month in my real living room. I loved having folks introduce themselves to each other and I welcomed them in. I liked hearing all the conversations buzzing together at once! After a bit, it became difficult to manage hosting this, as we also hosted the professor's lab parties and other events...but my temptation is always to try to welcome folks into my home and my life. As a result, for a long while, I left the "anonymous" option open on my blog comments, and it resulted in some wonderful contributions for quite a while.

In thinking about it, I've realized that I'd like my blog/cyber living room to be as kind and honestly compassionate a place as my real living room is--so I've switched off that anonymous comment possibility. I still welcome all your comments with an open heart so I can respond to you...and I hope this switch won't inhibit your comments. I like listening to what folks have to say! However, for me, reading blogs (and writing them) is about expressing oneself in a thoughtful and caring way--about making friends and sharing ideas and connections. People can be very different in their beliefs or ideas but still treat each other with respect and acceptance. Anything you might want to comment on here should be something you can say with your name attached to it, just as if you were visiting me in my real living room. Anonymity shouldn't necessary here! I want to continue to foster that openness to others and that respect, that positive tone while I move across the prairie spaces to my new home.

Oh, and Kristy, I can't wait to meet you and spin with you in Manitoba! Soyun, thanks for dropping by--you do beautiful work...I hope my other blog readers will check it out!
Now, back to those boxes...

across the way

First, Nancy definitely gets the most seriously funny/embarrassing award for the last set of comments. Wow, getting stuck in your cupboard with your Great Pyrenees beats my story any day of the week! However did you get out of that cupboard? (Oh wait, are you still partially stuck in there?!-- I worried I was never getting out of that dress, believe me.)

Now, packing continues over here, and the most interesting part are the professor's packing activities and observations. This is our 4th move in 11 years of marriage. It's different because we've lived in this house for a longer period than any other house (hence, more stuff accumulated) and because we're moving to another country this time. You can't believe the amount of bureaucracy involved in crossing a border. EVERYTHING has paperwork attached to it.

Every box in the household must have its contents listed, valued, and numbered as we pack so it's declared part of our household and no duty is incurred as we cross the border and go through customs. Both dogs need to have their rabies certification paperwork. (no problem there.) Both cars have to have a special letter from the car company (GM and Ford) indicating there are no outstanding recalls on this automobile. Everything is like this. The "things to do" list goes on...and on. (I'll try not to bore you with that.)

Each night I worry I haven't packed enough boxes that day. I'm averaging 5-10 boxes right now...and it's 27 days until we move. (I'm probably ok, right?!) The professor reassures me that, if anything, I'm more efficient about this now than we used to be. He thinks we have something like 200 or more boxes worth. I get rid of a lot...and the professor packs all his earthly possessions...yesterday, I think he packed 30 long sleeve shirts. (30!) --Stuff reassures him, so he has a lot of it. I have more fiber and yarn than I care to admit.... to anyone.

Anyway, as I pack, I've been watching the neighborhood. It's a quiet time of year. Most of the students are away. However, there was interesting activity across the street. You may remember, if you're a longtime blog reader, my stories in 2006 about the crack house? Well, that house was bought by a concerned neighbor in late 2004 or 2005. He's been renovating it, off and on, ever since. It looks great now, it's been rebuilt from the foundation up, and aside from occasional construction noise, it's been wonderful to live across from this house! It's still empty, but looking very good now. Maybe soon a family will move in.

So, I look out the window last week as I'm packing boxes. I hear noise and see they are tearing off the old gutters. The next day, the gutter repair folks come.

If you live near an Amish or Old Order Mennonite community, you recognize immediately from these people's clothes that it's either an Amish or Mennonite run business. I suspect it's Amish, since the countryside near us has several Amish communities. In fact, one of our Friday night dinner guests wondered if it was "Mr. Shrock's company" as he knows that family does gutter repair! (small city, right?!) Although these religious communities stick to old traditions, they use trucks and other modern things in their business lives.


I was careful not to take any focused photos of their faces--that's considered very bad manners in their religious tradition--to shoot photos of someone's face. However, you can just about see here that one of young men is talking on a cell phone. He's either doing business or he's in that period of an Amish teenager's life called Rumspringa. (literally, "running around")

Anyhow, it's amazing what you can see from one's second story window! After they left, I realized how much I've observed without leaving home here. It's certainly run the gamut from crack house to Amish gutter repair!

Any weird observations from your windows to report? How many boxes did you pack for your last move? Weigh in! Let me know...and Andrea, yes, I too have done drunk packing. It's not generally a good plan for me. Don't drink and pack! For this move, I'm sticking to pie!