Dear Grandpa,
It was your time to go, and I didn’t get to say exactly how I felt before you left. The last few months have been hard on you, and I am glad you are in a better place now. I will always remember when I would visit, and you would come home from work and play cards with us. Grandma would make delicious peanut butter fudge, and you would joke around. You will be missed, but I know you’ll be looking down us. Please know that I love you.
Love,
April
We had the opportunity a few weeks ago to take a hike at Glen Helen and get some family shots. To be honest, I get caught up sometimes with the house and doing this or that, and it takes Steve to ground me and bring my back to Earth and realize what it is that’s important. He has been wanting to take this hike for a while and get some photos of the waterfall and us, and I would continually put it off for one project or another. I am so thankful that we finally made it there, and I thank you for everything you do for me, Steve.
So some people know this already, but we recently adopted a male cat named Tito. I wasn’t really sure how I’d do with a cat, because I don’t like them on the counters in the kitchen. My grandmother assured me that you can train your cat not to do that. With that in mind, we started looking, and we almost became owners of a kitten when the cat at Steve’s work gave birth. We held out, and all of the cats were adopted.
About a week later, a friend of mine asked if we would want Tito, and we gladly accepted. We were allowed to take him home for a trial period to see how well he and Elway adjusted to each other to make sure it was a right fit. At first I was nervous just because Elway is so large. I know that he had no intentions of hurting Tito, but I wasn’t sure if we would understand he couldn’t really play with the cat in the way you can another dog.
We spent about a week taking baby steps to introduce them, and everything went well. Tito is also missing 1/4 of his front left paw, so I wasn’t sure how he’d be able to get around the house with Elway there. He sure is speedy when he wants to be though.
Now you would hardly know that they just met a little over two weeks ago. They lay together, and when Tito is in a goofy mood they play together. Elway licks Tito so that he’s soaking wet, and Tito still has no interest in playing with Elway’s bone. However, we can leave them alone together and know that they’re safe and keeping each other company.
No weight limit.
Whew! I can’t even believe it’s been over a month since I’ve posted. Life has been rather hectic and busy, and trying to get to bed before midnight has been something I’ve only accomplished several times.
In exactly one week and one day, the house will be ours! I can’t express how excited we are to move in and take pictures. We haven’t bought a single solitary item for the house because we were waiting until we moved in to make sure they were really what we wanted. So we’re chomping at the bit to buy some new things for the house.
When we move in though, we’ll have a lot of minor things that we’ll need to do for the house to make it feel more like ours before winter hits. Very first thing, we’ll need to repair the fence. The existing fence is still there, but since the previous owners did not have a dog, they removed the back portion to make a drive up to the back of the house. Also, you can sort of tell from the photo, the fence doesn’t meet the front of the house. So we will need to put the fence back up, and once we get it up and in working order, we want to paint it a shiny new white color and seal it to protect it before winter hits.
Additionally, we want to paint the interior first floor. While we can wait a little longer to do this, we want to get it done before it’s too cold to open the windows for ventilation. After quizzing a few sources (here & here & here) via Twitter we’ve decided to go with Benjamin Moore for the plum paint color we chose for the dining room and kitchen. It’s a bit pricier, but to be honest, with such a dark color I don’t want to be painting over and over again. The lighter blue we may choose to go with Behr, but if we love Benjamin Moore for the plum, we’ll just go with them again for the blue, too.
Now I must get back to packing!
My totally fabulous aunt sent me this postcard in the mail. Actually, this is the second one she’s sent, and I LOVE receiving them. How nice is it to receive a piece of mail that isn’t a bill- quite nice!
She also runs this lovely shop on Etsy, Basts Boutique. I love her jewelry!
