bugs and beer and fridge magnets

(above photo: This bug is eating our Corkscrew Hazel! Anyone know what it is? And if insecticidal soap will work on it?)

I was highly interested (and relieved) to read how many of you still have unpacked boxes from previous moves. From Beckett, for example:

"We've lived in this house for about 12 years now. We still have boxes from several moves ago out in the garage. They'll probably be there when we die and the boys will have to go through all that old stuff and Riley will say: "What did they save this for??" and Casey will say: "Come on, you know Dad never threw anything away. Wow, some of these computer games are from back in the 80's!!! Wonder if they're worth anything, since those old antique computers they ran on are out here somewhere..."

I grew up moving a lot; it wasn't until I went to high school that I discovered that some people didn't have boxes of stuff; all their stuff was unpacked.

What a concept."

All this unpacking hasn't been great for my tendinitis; Jeff's been doing all the heavy work and I've been doing it a bit at a time, but there's just so much to do. One corner of my office is now filled with boxes. I think I'm going to give my arms a break this weekend, when my friend Rand comes to visit (our very first houseguest!). It's been ages since he and I have been able to hang out for any extended period, so I'm very much looking forward to seeing him again. Allison will be joining us for dinner on Saturday; I'm planning a "make your own handroll sushi" meal. I had lunch with Allison earlier this week; it's easier for us to get together now that I'm living further north (and she's on summer vacation right now, of course).

Some pics...

My friend Walter has his first beer in nearly 20 years, in celebration of his birthday:



Some housewarming goodies from my sister, yum:


Check out my new magnetic wall! I have way too many fridge magnets to put up, so am limiting myself to magnetic poetry and a few magnets at a time. When I get bored of black, I may paint something over this and still use it as a magnetic wall.



I LOVE my new home office.

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unpacking

(Photo above: my office, a work in progress. If you click through to Flickr, you can see Javascript tags for objects in the room)

Happy birthday to our friend Walter!

So I ended up using two pint cans of magnetic paint. One can gave me about five coats; I tested the magnetic pull with small piece of fridge poetry from Ruth (the word "chair") and it seemed pretty weak to me, so I bought another can.

Tips for those using magnetic paint: It dries VERY QUICKLY. The instructions advise using a roller brush and then smoothing over with a foam brush for each coat of paint, but I found I didn't have time for the second brush...the paint was already dry! I smartened up by the second can of paint and using a foam roller brush, but the previous coats of paint were already pretty rough and textured.

Ah well, I figure it'll just make the wall more interesting. :-) I've also decided to leave the section black, and paint a frame around it as well as add a night scene.

Thanks to Parki and Walter for their help over the weekend! Jeff now has a workbench set-up in the toolroom, and one of our storage lockers has been emptied. Here's what's still left in the other one:



A ton to unpack. I feel as if we've been packing and unpacking and moving forever. Though I can't really complain, considering what Scott and Amanda are going through! A quickie survey: How many of you still have boxes that were never unpacked from your last move?

Jeff doesn't tend to take photos of me when we're away and I keep forgetting to stick a camera in his hand when he's free and ask, so our photo albums tend to be records of what appears to be Jeff on various trips by himself or with our family and friends. Here's proof that I actually was at the cottage with my sister and her family last month (thanks to my sister for the photo):



In case you're curious, I'm watching Jeff and my nieces in the lake. Either that, or I'm daydreaming about the day we're finally fully moved in and unpacked and I can get back to my writing fulltime....

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