chaos?! of course

The last couple of weeks have been COMPLETE chaos.  I'm beginning to think that we either thrive on it or can't figure out a way to live without it.

Swink1 headed out the door on a Tuesday to visit his dadio down in Houston for a few days while the swinklets and i  attempted to finish the house. By Thursday I was beat down and pretty much sick & tired of dealing with cleaning and sorting and packing so we took off with some friends for the mountains.  Swink3's bestest friend in the whole world and his family were going camping and since his mom is pretty darn cool she invited us along. Thurs. - Sun. was a great time of zip-lining, fishing, grilling, tank wars, playing in mountain creeks, bb guns, s'mores, rain, hiking, archery, hanging out, and fun. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and it made us leaving a tiny bit easier on the boys. We are sure gonna miss that family :-(

We came back on Sunday to spend the evening with Swink1 then on Monday i went into the hospital for surgery. It was planned. It was fine. There will be more info coming soon. I was discharged from the hospital on Wed. morning and Swink1 left for the East Coast that night.

The new job puts us in rather close proximately to the capital of the US. He had to start his new job on the 15th so out the door he went and away on an adventure.

The swinklets and i are camping in our friend's basement now. Interesting. The friend is wonderful and amazing and incredibly generous - as are her daughters. They have made us feel very at home and welcome so I'd like to leave before they get sick and tired of us :-)

All the above being said; we plan on hitting the open road Thursday morning. We have spent the last week spending time with people we cherish and will dearly miss when we leave here. That's the worst part of leaving...saying "see ya later."


I would have pictures but alas...all of them are on a disk & this handy computer that I'm using doesn't have a disk drive :-/ hmmm...

Packin' up & cleanin' out

One of the more difficult tasks of clearing out our things is letting go of stuff. Not all stuff; I've had no troubles selling picture frames, furniture, clothes or decor items. Wanna know what gets me?

Books.
Books are my weakness. The stack of books we are passed on to others was enormous. The stack of books we kept is... not so much. How do I choose between so many wonderful stories and so many helpful ideas? The piles of books that have lead me in a new directon stretch along the wall. The countless times I've snuggled with the swinklets and rhymed or learned about new things or enjoyed familiar characters are represented in the little hardbound editions.

Yes I have a Kindle (though at the moment I think it's done for) and yes we can check books out at the library but it's not the same as the giant collection of treasured tomes that we had.

It's time now for new people to grow and for new kiddos to enjoy getting to know the wonderful inhabitants of those many places.

Goodbye sweet friends...may we meet again someday.