We'll Miss This

Our new house is about 40 minutes away from our current house, and I keep telling myself that that is close enough that we don't have to say a final good-bye to anyone or anything.  We can come back to visit anytime we want, and with any luck our old friends will come visit us at our new house, too!

But still, we're going to miss the favorite friends that we have made on our street.

Emma and her sweet friend Little Leah have a special bond.  It was a lot easier to make the decision to move when we were all quarantined.  Now they are going to put up a fight!

These two are soaking in all of the natural and organic playtime they can.

So are these two- Noah and his buddy Maddex.  We're going to miss these friends!

We're going to miss the beautiful landscaping that we put into this yard- so many of the plants have stories of friendship behind them and I'm sad that we have to leave them all behind.

We'll miss the closeness to friends that don't live on our street but are still nearby.  I don't expect there will be much popping over happening at the new house.

We'll miss our favorite park!

 And it's secret forts

and tall towers.  

 Pictured in the background of this silly pup-in-a-backpack selfie, we're going to miss our elementary school so much.  All of the kids entire elementary school experiences (except the first six months of Leah's kindergarten year) happened at this school.

We might miss the feeling of "done" that this house has.  We've worked hard for 7 years to make it what we wanted it to be, and we are done with projects here.  The to-do list at the new house is a long one, which is both exciting and exhausting.

I'm going to miss this light that streams into the house every evening and illuminates whichever baby is currently reading on the couch. 

Laney will miss the foot traffic that passes our house every day.  The rest of us won't.  I'm not sure what she'll bark at now.  Birds and deer, I guess.

I'm going to miss the familiarity of the town- where to donate clothes, which roads to drive down and which to avoid, which local restaurants are worth revisiting.  Doctors and dentists and hair stylists and teachers and vets and parks and favorite grocery stores and church family all have to be replaced, and for a while nothing will feel familiar.

I'm going to miss the physical presence of the memories we've made in this house.  I can sit at my spot at the dinner table and remember a time when I nursed a highly fussy baby Noah there.  I can remember what the rooms looked like when Leah was in the library, Adam and Emma shared the big room and Noah was in the nursery.  I look at the river rock border and remember the year that everyone seemed to be racing to put landscaping in and we turned a blind eye to it for the summer in favor of a few great vacations, then worked our tails off getting it right like we wanted the next summer.  I remember the day that Leah slid into the fridge and dented it with her head, and the time Adam climbed the outside of the stairs to dust, and the hundreds of times the kids have chased each other around and around and around the table.  It's all here, and I'm just glad that the best parts of these memories- the babies- are coming with me to the new house to make a lifetime of new memories!

And I'm more grateful than ever for the dedication and re-dedication to blogging that carries our family history with us, wherever we go.

Packing Helpers

Some of my helpers want to play in boxes

 Some of them want to play with the toys I just packed up. Despite the numerous times we've purged toys around here there are still plenty- plenty!- of activities to choose from, but somehow Noah and Emma especially always want to play with the very trains, blocks, MagnaTiles, board games or art supplies I just happened to pack up. Every time!

"Hey look!  I got one of those little hats like the ice cream men always wear in books!"

One of my helpers just likes to steal any toys that she can sink her teeth into, 

or sprawl out for belly scratches at somewhat inconvenient times

 We've been blessed with a plethora of moving supplies from generous friends and neighbors that are lucky enough to be on the other end of the moving adventure. 

 And we've started dismantling all of the pieces of home that aren't staying with the house.  It's like we're hitting the rewind button on the seven years that we've spent fluffing this sweet nest, taking down decor and filling in the holes and erasing our family's personality in this house that we've called home.

It's a very bittersweet and very busy time, and we're all looking forward to the day that we can exhale in our new house, still surrounded by the chaos and boxes and mess of moving, but finally in position to settle in to our new life!

Hard to Remember

It's hard to remember a time when we were up and out the door at 7:35 in the morning.  Dressed, fed, ready to take on the challenges of a long and hard day at school and work and life. 

It's hard to remember a time when Jason was more consistently at the station than at this desk. 

 It's hard to remember a life when face masks were foreign, when large gatherings were normal, and  getting together with friends didn't require a preliminary conversation about level of social distancing everyone is comfortable with.

Or a time when we knew that we had to be somewhere at a certain time and we were there.  Church every Wednesday and Sunday, piano lessons every Wednesday and Thursday, baseball every weekend, orchestra every Tuesday.  Lots of get-togethers and activities and upcoming events.  We haven't had a whole lot of that for the last three months, and it has been so strange and so wonderful, surely in part because we know that it's temporary.  This life is great because we know it won't last forever.

Life has changed so much.  Sabbath day church at home is sometimes at 10:30, sometimes at noon.  And it has been so wonderful and I can't help but think that in small part that is because we aren't scrambling to get out the door at a certain time.  The clock has always been a trigger point for me.

It's hard to imagine a day when we will have to go back to a regularly scheduled life.  What will life look like in the fall?  Will we go back to school, to schedules, to stress?  Or will we resist it all more than ever because we know that, for better or worse, one way or another, at the cost of things that are worth giving up, there is another way.

All we can do right now is pray for a better hybrid of life than the one we once knew.  Shorter school days, less days in the office, more time to learn and relax and enjoy life together as a family.

A shift on perspective and a chance to refocus on the things that matter most.  That has been the biggest blessing of the coronavirus.

Saying Goodbye to Ledges

We made a list of all the north-of-town places that we wanted to enjoy one more time before moving south, and Ledges was at the top of my list!  I remember the first summer we lived in Iowa- Jason sent me a picture of himself in Ledges while the rest of us were visiting family in Utah, and I thought there was no way he could still be in Iowa.  What a magical place!  We love to visit several times each year, and I thought it would be too far to continue the tradition once we're in our new house.  As it turns out, Ledges is only 51 minutes from our new house, not nearly as bad as I expected compared to the current 38 minute drive- we're still trying to figure out just how south and west of some of our favorite places we're really going to be!

The day was made extra fun when some of our favorite friends joined us!  My sweet friend Alina always packs food along, and boy to my kids love her for it!

First up, a hike to the Lost Lake.

And then a nice long and cool stroll down the creek, 

past the ledges of sandstone

across fallen trees, 

over mossy boulders, 

and into the shade when needed.  

We used to say that the funnest part of Ledges was the ridiculous car-splashing-over-the-creek part, 

and the drivers were happy to deliver the fun on this hot summer day.  

But this time around we discovered something even more ridiculous and exciting- complete with steps carved out by years of eager little climbers- 

a mud slide!!

Which was extra fun because we recently watched Honey I Shrunk the Kids and this felt exactly like some of the scenes from that movie. 

Kind of a disgusting way to wrap up the day, but it sure was fun and memorable!

And not pictured, the three different snakes, blue jays, red-winged black birds, turtles, dozens of hopping frogs and adorable scurrying squinnies (the Iowa term for chipmunks that our whole family has picked up on, even though no one agrees with my suggestion to get local and start calling dinner supper!), the lovely little picnic we had after we made our way back to the car and said good-bye to our friends, or the quiet ride home in which 75% of the kids dozed, exhausted from a long day of fun.  It was a day to remember!

Bike Mania

Teaching Noah how to ride a two-wheeler has been a months-long endeavor at our house.  We have taken several trips over to the crazy duck pond park to help him gain confidence on his bike on the grassy fields.  We've tried encouraging, we've tried bribing- every child who can ride their own bike to the nearby frozen yogurt shop earns a treat for the whole family!  But nothing seemed to be working with Noah.  He doesn't want to get hurt, he doesn't want to go fast, and he really just doesn't care about riding a two-wheeler.  

Makes for a tough sell.  

 
 
And now the clock is really ticking because our new house has no sidewalks, steeper hills, and no nearby.... anything that one might be interested in biking to.  We weren't quite sure what else to do, until one day last week Adam and Noah created Bike Mania, a game with 14 levels in which Noah has to ride his bike, earning Bike Bucks along the way which he can redeem for rest time, and which will eventually lead him to Level 14- Orange Leaf!

And lo and behold, it worked!  He's more confident on his bike that I've ever seen.  It shouldn't come as a surprise given that Adam is the most relaxed, laid back child of our whole family.  He is patient, kind, and encouraging, and I think there might be a well-earned double scoop of ice cream in his future!

And of course, extra ice cream for Noah for being brave enough to get up and get back on his bike again and again, even if it does seem to treat him like this-