The gift of laundry

I’m tired.  Almost flattened kind of tired.  We had a whole lot of lovely friends show up yesterday, and it was awesome, but after the holidays (which were amazing, and super easy, but still exhausting… you know what opening presents and eating rich foods is like, and if you don’t at this time of year, you should invite yourself to my house and I’ll show you) it was… well, tiring.  There is a chance that I’m mostly tired because I carried a three year old friend up the big hill from the beach, but I’m going to blame it on the holidays.

One of my favourite parts of the holidays was giving Jeremy’s brother a sweater I had knit for him.  He asked me to knit him one 2 summers ago, so last year for Christmas I gave him yarn, and then this year I gave him the sweater.  It’s the EXACT same sweater that I knit for Jer a couple of years ago, and taking photos of the two of them at the beach was awesome.

One of my other favourite parts of the holidays was the ridiculous dog bone that our neighbour got Mia.  Smoked cow knuckle.  She devoured it in a morning and didn’t poop right for 2 days.  She’s (almost) back on track.  That may have been too much information.  Sorry.

Jer’s brother also got a chainsaw mill for Christmas.  He came over and used it with Jer’s chainsaw.  Now Jeremy is ogling one of his own on the internet.  I got a new laundry rack on pulleys that attaches to the ceiling.  It’s really cool.  I did laundry on Christmas day to try it out.  I’m not guaranteeing how long THAT’S going to last, and it certainly didn’t convince me to put the laundry away… I don’t know what kind of gift that would take.  

The post that wasn’t posted

I wrote a post a couple of weeks ago.  I thought I posted it.  Ended up I saved it and didn’t post it.  Oops.  It said that

“It was our dog.  Maybe that’s why the really pretty bunting didn’t seem to work.  Maybe that’s why it happened on weekends, when Jer happens to spend more time indoors.  He caught her with a chicken in her mouth.  She ran.  He chased her.  The chickens had the eggs scared out of them and we haven’t had an egg in over a week.  The dog seems better now (I don’t even want to remember how angry and hurt and sad I was), and the chickens are, I think, sorting themselves back out.  They must be kind of lonely, as our flock went from 11 to 5 in a matter of a couple of weeks.

Today was Family Day in BC.  That means I didn’t have to go to work.  So I spent the day marking papers, hanging with some of Jer’s fam, and playing in the snow.  I like the snow.

I got a haircut.  I bought new glasses.  I’ll show you a picture when I get the glasses.  They’re blue.  That’s all you need to know for now.”

I have the glasses now.  They’re awesome.  And they allow me to see.  It’s awesome.  I’ll get you a picture asap, promise.    Today I went to watch a play at my school.  It was awesome.  Lots of awesome.  An organization came to our school on Tuesday, had an audition with our kids, cast them, rehearsed with them all week, and today there were 2 shows.  So amazing.  I also went for coffee… I’ve finally found the cafe in Courtenay that makes amazing coffee, and it’s going to change my life.

Spring really started to spring here this week – there were crocuses, the nettles were up and almost at edible height, the owls came back, and an eagle perched in a tree in our yard (that has nothing to do with spring – it was just really cool).  Then it snowed.  I don’t know where that leaves the flowers or the nettles, but spring is starting.  I can feel it.

Perfect Christmas break

Happy New Years, Merry Christmas, and what a lovely, lovely holiday.  Jer, Mia and I spent almost a week in Tofino with my mom and stepdad over Christmas.  It was the absolute perfect vacation.  I find it difficult to sit and read or knit for more than half an hour or so at a time when I’m home as there are always a million things to do – chop some wood, stack some wood, plant some bulbs, braid some garlic, do some dishes, ask Jeremy to do some dishes, sweep, mop, dust, sweep, mark student work, weed, plant, harvest and on and on and on.  But Tofino’s not like that.  Sure, there are things to do.  Like walk on the beach with my dog.  And eat food.  And put dishes into the DISHWASHER (Jer’s my dishwasher, but he doesn’t like it when I put dishes in him).  And snuggle my dog.  And read, and knit, and do crossword puzzles, and knit, and knit.  I got to knit and read for hours at a time and I didn’t feel guilty about it.  Ever.  Vacations should always be about having time to read and knit and not feel guilty.  That should be their purpose.

Speaking of which, I bought over 5000 yards of yarn today to knit with.  That’s a lot of knitting.  I dreamed about knitting last night.  This break is also about finishing projects, especially ones that have been sitting for months.  2 pairs of socks and 2 sweaters.  Awesome.

Vacations should also be about friends.  We had 5 come and spend New Years with us.  We had a fire and roasted marshmallows and a certain 5 year old became covered in sticky goo.  He had it in his (long curly) hair.  I thought Mia had rubbed up against a sappy tree.  But really, she’d just rubbed against a sticky boy.

Vacations should also be about getting some things done.  We rearranged some furniture, tapped our maple trees, and did some firewood for next year.  Tomorrow is the beginning of the weekend, and I’m ready.  Perfect Christmas break.

I found this under the boardwalk at the exact same place we stepped off to let a couple pass. YES!

Dusty Road Craft Collective

It was the Denman Island Craft Faire this weekend.  Jer and I participated in the Faire a couple of years ago, when we first arrived, and didn’t really understand the caliber of the Faire.  Last year I was too busy knitting sweaters for loved ones to knit small, sellable items for strangers, so we abstained.  This year we decided to share a table with our most loveliest of neighbours, and it was awesome.  Our table was overflowing with beautiful things at the beginning of the weekend, and was pretty sparse by the end.  Cutting boards, pizza peels, mustard, oat cakes, biscotti, sundried tomatoes, chickens, bags, purses, clutches, knitting, stuffed owls.  We had.  All of it.  And we did it with friends and we were successful, and I felt validated as a crafter.  Awesome.  AND our neighbours were still willing to sit at a table with us and sell our things after our dog chased their new-to-them cat up a tree.  He came back down all by himself.  We did apologize…

Plus it snowed.  And I got a snow day.  The Friday before the Faire, someone decided to grant me the freebiest of freebie days.  I’m pretty lucky.

  

Orwell underwater

So I cut down a tree.  It was my first one.  Here’s a stop-motion animation of the event!

Please note the really pretty handmade leather sheath holding a hand-welded Hori hori… all created on Denman, and bought for me for my birthday. Lucky girl.

Jeremy said that when I wrote on facebook  that I’d cut a tree down,most people would think I was cutting down a Christmas tree… he said that I should say I fell a tree instead.  So I did that too.  I fell me a tree.  It was a maple.  It was scary as heck, and my muscles all hurt, but it was exhilarating and awesome and I’m proud of myself.

Meanwhile, Jeremy hung curtains.   Aren’t they pretty?  We should be proud of him too.  This is obviously not true.  Jeremy taught me how to cut a tree down, and was taking pictures of me while I was doing it.  However, he also DID hang curtains this week, to try to keep some of our lovely warm air in our living space, and not vent it out through the holes in the windows.  He also put in a new fancy water tap, so that our water doesn’t taste like stinky sulfur!  Yes, we planned on putting it in immediately after we moved, but it’s in now, and isn’t it nice?  Especially when the camera is focusing on the clean utensils in the background?

Underwater, of course

We went to the distillery on Hornby on Saturday.  It was…

(I couldn’t figure out what adjective to use right now, so I looked on my “farm mac” – all of the keys are a really dirty shade of brown – thesaurus for another word for cool and it’s informal options are “trendy, funky, with it, hip, big, happening, groovy, phat, kicky, fly”.  I don’t like those.  Points to someone who can find me that right adjective.  It’s certainly not “groovy” or “fly”.)

I felt like the still belonged in an Orwellian underwater H.G. Wells undersea space odyssey journey.  It was one of the prettiest things I’ve ever seen.  Apart from my puppy, obviously.

Less pretty these days than normal, as she is in a “rolling in poop twice a day” phase

  The company was founded by an Icebreaker Captain and an organic chemist… you should go.  It’s the real deal.

So is roasting sausages over a bush fire.  They were delicious.

It’s almost December. You’re allowed to sing. I promise.

This log has a piece of flagging tape on it from when part of our fenced-in farm area was a path through to Dusty Road from our house.  We flagged the path off because I was perpetually getting lost.  I get lost less now.  Not a lot less, but less.  It was a little sad to see it burning,

And, finally, I dug up my gladiolas.  They were diseased with thrips this year, so we’re hoping to treat them and have better luck next year.  Any advice?