Growing Pains

I might have explained long ago how terribly fragile I can be at times, but I'm pretty sure I didn't, Dear Reader(s), so as not to scare you away. And now I find myself trying to make a go of things in this relationship with the Best Guy in the World, and not really knowing how to do it very well. If this one doesn't work out, I know it will be all on me.

The Wall of Broken Instruments

The house is not coming along as quickly as I'd hoped, given that we have a Christmas Party scheduled for Scottie's co-workers looming on the horizon (December 12th!?), but every once in awhile we take the time to put something together just because it feels right. Enter, the Wall of Broken Instruments:

The first time I visited Scott's apartment, I noticed he had two instruments hanging artfully on his wall; an obviously broken violin, and a (not so obviously) broken trombone. As with all things having to do with Scott, I thought this was awesome. Not only was it exactly the sort of thing I would do, but I actually had my own collection of broken violins. Obviously, this relationship was meant to be.


Once upon a time, my mother dated a man who lived with his grandmother (my mother has, at times, also been a Sucker for Strays). Grandma Storbakken repaired broken violins, and she had HUNDREDS of them, mostly stacked in their cases in her bathtub. My mom's relationship with Grandma Storbakken lasted longer than her relationship with the grandson, and eventually we ended up with about ten broken violins. My sister and I each picked out our favorites, and I proudly displayed mine in my room until the time when I moved off to Alaska. She's pared down the collection over the years, but the last remaining holdouts have now joined Scottie Doo's trombone and violin for our wall.


And this is how we begin the combining of two lives that have been very separate until now. One little bit at a time.

The Best Thing

Okay, maybe it's only ONE of the best things, but it's still a best thing nonetheless. One of the BEST things about moving in with Scott, is that once we get finished unpacking all of these damn boxes, we get to hang the art! I think I may have mentioned it in passing, but I'm sure I didn't expand on it at the time. Scott is an artist. He can actually think up a picture in his head and then draw or paint it. I think that is magic. I play around with material and shoot people scathing looks if they call me a crafter, but he is unquestionably one who makes art. And NOW I get to be a person who lives in a house that has REAL ART on the walls!

Not all of this will hang on our walls, but you definitely get to see what I mean when I say the guy is magic. How on earth did I end up with such an amazing person in my life?

OMG!

I've been absent of late, dear reader(s), and the only explanation is that my life right this moment is in total and complete chaos. Let me reassure you straight away that the chaos is of the good sort however, and then settle in while I give you a timeline:

09/27/2008 - Scott takes Tasha to a town she's never been to before, and she falls in love with the town. If you had been eavesdropping on the conversation in the car on the drive back to Pleasantville, you might have heard Tasha ask Scott if he'd want to live in this perfect town, "maybe in a year or so".

10/04/2008 - Scott and Tasha decide to take Boo and Baby plus nephew to Perfect Town, for a fun day of shopping. Whilst driving around in neighborhoods off the planned itinerary, Scott spots a 'For Rent' sign and suggests Tasha should call on it. Tasha complies, thinking Scott is curious about the market in Perfect Town. Tasha tells Scott how much rent is, then admits that even though rent would be $100 cheaper than what she is currently paying, the increase in costs for the commute would not make it worthwhile to move now. Scott tells Tasha a secret, which is that he thinks he's ready to move in with her.

10/06/2008 - Scott and Tasha drive out to Perfect Town, and put in an application to rent house built in 1912.

10/09/2008 - Scott and Tasha learn they are not The Chosen Ones for 1912 house.

10/10/2008 - Not knowing where they will be moving in Perfect Town, but knowing they have to make a decision today, both Scott and Tasha put in notices to vacate their current dwellings. They have advised their respective landlords that they will be moving out by.the.last.day.in.October. Tasha is concerned she might need her head examined for making such a rash decision, however the call of Perfect Town and Best Guy Ever are very enticing. Tasha foolishly thinks she'll be able to move four people, two dogs, and two cats from two different places in 20 days, even though she doesn't even know where they'll be moving to. Tasha believes that with Scott, all things are possible.

10/12/2008 - Tasha goes out of town for a work-related overnight stay. She leaves Scott in the hands of old friend Jody, to go looking for places to live. Jody is a real estate agent, and has secret resources for such things. They find one house that seems great, and call Tasha as she sits on a chartered bus full of co-workers on her way to Oregon. Tasha is happy they found a place, but is lukewarm on the particulars. New house in a new area of Perfect Town, in a neighborhood with lots of rules. Tasha hates neighborhoods with rules.

10/14/2008 (a.m.) - The house Jody and Scott saw is not available, but there is another house in the same (ugh) neighborhood, also less than 5 years old (ugh again). Jody wants Tasha to see it after work. Scott tells Tasha there is another house they looked at on Sunday that he thinks she'll like, and tells Tasha to ask Jody to look at it. Jody says she can if they really want to, but tells Tasha that Scott really didn't seem to like it when they looked at it the first time, and must only be suggesting it to make Tasha happy. Jody says the house is on a busy street and it's old. Jody says it won't be as good for the kids. Jody says it doesn't have a park with a climbing wall next door. Tasha still wants to look at it, and has to insist about 20 times via email.

10/14/2008 (p.m.) - Tasha hates the neighborhood of the newer house, and hates the newer house itself. She stands in the backyard with Scott to discuss whether they want to apply to rent the house, and she feels the surrounding two story houses looming over her from the back and both sides of the yard, and thinks they might be taking all of the available oxygen, because she feels like she can't breathe. They decide no, and get lost trying to leave the colossal neighborhood of identical houses, complete with identical plants in identical front yards. They pass the sign that they first saw when driving in, which says "All license plates are recorded by video surveillance". Tasha shudders. Over dinner with Jody, Tasha insists they see the older house that Jody hates. Jody is reluctant, but concedes. Tasha loves it.

10/15/2008 - Jody informs Tasha that the original place, the one Scott loved so much, is available. Tasha panics a little, not knowing which one Scott will want to try for. Scott says to try for the one Tasha loves. Jody insists Scott will be miserable, and that the kids were "creeped out" by it.

10/16/2008 - Application accepted, everything looks good.

10/17/2008-10/20/2008 - Mostly packing and freaking out. With two places to pack and clean, and two deposits to get back, tension levels are high.

10/21/2008 - Indoor soccer. Scott and Tasha play for Tasha's work team, despite fear of re-injuring Tasha's achilles tendon. Everyone finishes unscathed, although the game was lost.

10/22/2008 - More packing and freaking out

10/23/2008 - The walk through with the leasing agent. He tells about the house, and Tasha falls more in love. It was built sometime between 1894 and 1901 at a different location in Perfect Town, then eventually moved to where it sits now. The lot it sits on used to be quite a bit bigger, but the city divided the lot to put in a road (which explains why it sits on a triangular piece of land). The cedar tree in the yard is hundreds of years old.

10/24/2008 - The actual moving in begins after Tasha puts in a half day at the office. Of course half as much is accomplished as was expected.

10/25/2008 - More moving of Tasha's house, and preliminary packing of Scott's house.

10/26/2008 - Moving of Scott's house

10/29/2008 - Tasha takes most of a day off to clean her house. There's a lot more to be done than she expected. When Scott gets off work they head to his house to "finish" cleaning there. There's more to be done than expected. Head home at 10pm, feeling like there's still a ton to be done.

10/30/2008 - After work Tasha decides to try and get some unpacking done at the new house. Tasha decides to surprise Scott (who is at his house again, moving the last of the boxes), by attempting to arrange the living room. The couch falls through one of the bay windows.

10/31/2008 - Tasha calls glass companies from work, and Scott spends his day off finishing up at his old house. He turns in the keys. One down, two to go!

11/01/2008 - It's Saturday, and Tasha has to put in a full day at the office. Before work they head to the Uhaul to rent a vehicle for hauling stuff from Tasha's old house to the dump. Things get a little harried when they learn that the vehicle available at 9am won't work, and they'll have to come back at 3:30pm. With the dump closing at 5:30pm it will be cutting it tight, but there are no other options. They make it to the dump with two minutes to spare.

11/02/2008 - Tasha puts in about 6 hours at the old house (including the emergency trip to Target when it's discovered that the old house has **no** toilet paper), and then calls it good. The house looks better than when they moved in for the most part, excluding the paint splatters in the dining room from the budding Jackson Pollack who we call Solstice.

11/04/08 - Tasha is trying to regain her sanity.

(This post was started November 1st, but not published until November 4th)

How to Remove Bubblegum from the Dryer (and other hints to retain your sanity)

1. Discover mysterious black skid marks coating the interior of the dryer. Trace the origin back to the offending wad of gum, which will be lodged on the undersides of one of the fin-things in the drum of the dryer. Curse twice under your breath.
2. Scream at the nearest child. Remind them that they are not yet allowed to chew gum for reasons JUST LIKE THIS.
3. Try to scrape cold gum out from inside dryer. Recognize that the gum has fused with the metal, and has now become one with the dryer.
4. Recognize that the gum has only fused with the metal while the dryer is cold. Once the dryer is warm and drying a load of, say, black work clothes, the gum will fuse with the work clothes.
5. Turn dryer on to let it heat up the gum. Curse three more times under your breath and find yourself muttering things your mother used to say, such as, "All day I work my fingers to the bone, and this is the thanks I get?". Since no one is around to hear you say this, it's okay to laugh at yourself because you KNOW you don't really work your fingers to the bone. You're a credit union branch manager, not a coal miner.
6. Open the dryer and scrub the gum off with the plastic cup that you use to measure the laundry detergent.
7. Realize that the entire reason you need to do a load of laundry right now is that your nine year old daughter's only pair of tennis shoes are coated with dog poop. Decide that the dog poop-covered tennis shoes should do an excellent job of removing the rest of the gum from inside the dryer.
8. Laugh.

The Miracle of Life

Meet Eric and Alexis, newest grandkids to my step-mom Cindy, and her husband, the guy I call Dad.

The kiddos are having a rough go of things, owing to the fact that they were born on September 6th five months early. I didn't get any pictures until yesterday, but the report is that little Lexie is having the tougher time of the two.

We're sending all the loving, healing thoughts we have their way, and I would be grateful to everyone else if they could do the same!

The Magic

This is an actual conversation I had with Scott this morning. I absolutely adore that I can have conversations with him like this, because he understands exactly what it is I'm trying to say. That, and it proves that each of us is just as weird and dorky as the other.

Me: I wish I could tell you in some new way exactly how much you mean to me. I'm not sure the ways I've been saying it say it right. Maybe.... I think if I found out tomorrow that you were allergic to Raisin Nut Bran, and you couldn't be in the same room with Raisin Nut Bran...

Him: Or be with anyone who had eaten Raisin Nut Bran...

Me: Right, or be with anyone who had eaten Raisin Nut Bran, then I would give up eating Raisin Nut Bran forever, and I would do ALL the grocery shopping (which I hate) so you wouldn't have to be in the same building as the Raisin Nut Bran...

Him: What if I just couldn't be in the cereal aisle, or the aisles on either side of the cereal aisle?

Me: I'm not taking any chances! And if you needed to buy gas at a convenience store and the pay-at-the-pump option was not available, I would go inside that convenience store and check the shelf myself to make sure they did not stock Raisin Nut Bran in the small selection of cereals that they do have.

Him: Would you ask the clerk to make sure their was no Raisin Nut Bran in the back, or anywhere else on the premises?

Me: Yes. I would even double check anything the clerk told me, just to make sure he could be trusted. THAT'S how much I love you.

Him: Awwww... that's a lot.

Sometimes the magic is about explaining things in ways they've never been explained before...

Awesome!

I just found this, and I SO want to do it!

Seriously. The directions are here.

Once upon a time I would have done this without having to find it done by someone else first. I am, after all, the girl who had a collection of Barbie dolls SPECIFICALLY so I could make my own Barbie doll chandelier - picture if you will about 8 Barbies laying on their backs with their legs in the air, balancing their own heads (or the head of a friend, who knows?) on their dainty little mutant-feet. That chandelier never materialized except in my head, but it would have ROCKED. I was the cool girl at one time in my life. The girl who made her own clothes like the infamous Superman dress and the Sonics skirt; the girl who had a purple television covered with cowboys and indians and crocodiles and insects. Where did that girl go?!

Oh. I remember. That girl met a guy who didn't like weird girls, and they got married. Ugh. The girl threw away all her cool shoes, and sold all of her cool music, and gave away all of her cool clothes. That girl had to go into hiding. All she was able to save was one small box of Nine Inch Nails cds, and the memory of how to make cool things.

And so she's figuring out what that will all mean now, because she can be the cool girl that she really is again. She's "finding herself" all over again at 34...

Sick Day

It was a loooong night last night, what with Baby throwing up ALL over the bathroom floor, several times in the toilet, and THANKFULLY, not once in a bed, his OR mine. I became an amateur forensics expert, noticing that Baby had apparently eaten fast food recently, owing to the copious amounts of thinly sliced pickles present on the bathroom floor. Twenty questions later we deduced that the offending meal must have been eaten at school, and once his body expelled it all his listlessness seemed to improve a bit. But here we are, home today... doing our best to rest while we watch The Tick on DVD. I'm not complaining... The Tick is my favorite, second only to Superman.

Checking In

The weather has turned a nice blustery overcast sort of raininess that’s exactly perfect for this time of year, unless you happen to need to be outside with a hammer and some nails as Scotty-Do does this weekend. I just want to be inside with some knitting or a book and a fire in the fireplace, but I’m afraid the war with the fleas has escalated, and at this point they seem to be winning. I wish I could tell if I’ve won any of the many battles Scotty-Do and I are waging, because at this point I’m ready to abandon ship and let the fleas take over this place as I move somewhere else entirely. All I want is to know we’ve done at least a little bit of damage – some sort of flea body count or something. The fleas are mum on the whole subject, but the little buggers are popping up more frequently now than in the past, so I fear soon they may be ready to team together to physically throw us out on our ears. This has led to some rather interesting conversations between me and Scott, as we hypothesize the proper way to kill fleas with a miniature machine gun or tiny sword. I can’t understand exactly why this is even happening, as the cats we own don’t even go outside!

The ideas are starting to gather for what to make for Christmas this year, and I can feel the itch that means it’s time to get moving. That’s a good thing. And now for some blurry cell phone pictures taken a week ago on Saturday while Boo was at a skating party.

NOW I Understand!

The mini-vacation was as magicalificent and superfantastic as anything I’d experienced up to this point. I FINALLY understand why people take vacations. This could be addictive.

We drove our four hours to Eastern Washington , which appeared to be an entirely different country from the one we were supposed to be in. The part of Washington I’ve grown up in, I’ve come to know and love really, is GREEN. This Eastern Washington place is comprised of miles and miles of brown, with the occasional yellow thrown in to break up the monotony. We passed some sort of dust-devil-tornado things. We passed wheat. We passed rocks. The music was good, but most of the way I stared at Scott. As great as he is when I look at him from the front, I found that I appreciate him just as much when staring at him from the side. He’s pretty awesome.

We went to a Blues Festival and rented a house with seven other people for four days.

There was lots of alcohol;

There was a boat;

There was cliff diving.

People who have recently been on crutches should not try cliff diving from any point that requires a running start. That sort of thing can end disastrously if you’re not a ninja cat like me. I jumped off this cliff and showed everyone my ninja skillz by turning my fall into a sort of running-down-the-cliff move. I was pretty impressed with myself, but I think everyone else thought I was an idiot. I don’t think we have any photographic evidence of my brush with death.

Scott jumped off this rock (I didn't have a tape measure, but it was at LEAST 65 feet high. No joke),

while I sat in the boat below trying to hide my tears behind my enormous sunglasses. A guy like this only comes around once every 34 years, and I’d really like for him to stay awhile…

We didn’t get home until about midnight Sunday night, and so far the week has been mostly about assimilating ourselves back into normal society. Scott has turned my garage into some sort of organized haven completely void of any boxes of ex-boyfriend stuff, cleaned my toilets and refrigerator, joined me in the war against the fleas, and somehow negotiated a peace between the canine and feline factions of the house. He’s pretty humble and low key about it, but I’m convinced Scott is magical.

And the Good Karma Just Keeps On Coming

Boo had to go to the Pleasantville Urgent Care place yesterday because she had trouble opening her jaw once again. Some mothers might see this as a golden opportunity for a break from their wee ones, but we have enough trouble hearing what Boo has to say as it is, without throwing any more adversity into the mix. The last time this happened the guy at the Urgent Care place thought it might be a blocked saliva gland and prescribed a three-times-daily antibiotic. I don’t know about anybody else, but I’m not organized enough to EAT three times daily, much less remember to administer an antibiotic that makes Boo gag every time she swallows it. And for some reason the more unpleasant I find a task, the less likely I am to perform it to perfection, go figure. So I was not looking forward to going back to the Urgent Care.

After our requisite hour of waiting with people sitting in my personal space bubble, either coughing their death rattle coughs or bleeding profusely all over the waiting room periodicals, we finally were granted access to the inner sanctum of the examination area. I recognized the exam room as the one I’ve been in almost a half dozen times this year already, and I waited patiently until our Doc-of-the-Day came in. You know it’s a bad sign when the random doctor assigned to your wee one’s case walks in the room and looks at you (it’s not your chart in his hand, after all), and says, “I know you!”. What you really want to ask him is if he remembers what it is you came in for, because he’s the doctor that saw you when you had the horrible bladder infection. It’s not so much WHAT you had that is embarrassing, so much as all the details you told him to make sure you ruled out any other horrific girl problems that it could have been, because all you knew at the time was that peeing made you want to cry. A bladder infection sounded like such a normal problem for that amount of pain.

Doc-of-the-Day turned his attention to Boo and pronounced her problem as teeth-grinding related, and suggested Motrin to alleviate the pain. Yeay! And then Doc-of –the-Day took his service WAY past compliance with the Hippocratic Oath and talked to Boo about Harry Potter (which she is completely obsessed with). “Do you have all the books?” he asked my little sunshine of sweetness. “All of them except the 6th one” she said innocently. “Well then let me bring that one in for you tomorrow,” said Doc-of-the-Day, thereby turning himself into a hero for my little Luna-Boo. And can you believe this? I just called the Pleasantville Urgent Care facility, and Doc-of-the-Day DID remember to bring that particular book in today. I’m thinking that the karmic wheel of fortune has REALLY decided to make things easier on us this year, recognizing of course that last year left me feeling particularly beat up at the end of it all. So I am on my way out the door to go pick up one Harry Potter book six from the doc, tonight I need to pack for my trip, and tomorrow after work I will be dropping two children and two bicycles off at Grandma’s for four days of staying up way past their bedtime and eating cereal with chocolate milk on it, all so I can go away for four days with my Favorite Grown Up Person, Scott. We are going to a Blues Festival in Eastern Washington, renting a house with a ton of people Scott knows through work, and enjoying being with each other. NOW do you see why I don’t think things could get any better? This is bliss.

-T