work day and big news

And so the day sets on our exciting family work day, and the yard is bathed in the light of the new fixture on the garage.

Friends, it's been a journey. We haven't posted about it, but more than six months ago, we decided to list out house for sale. We've been here 11 years. The boys don't remember living in any other home. But we've run out of space, and the boys just keep getting bigger. We've been talking for years about getting a house with one more bedroom and a basement where they could have a rec room ... and the time has finally come.

It took 183 days between the time we listed our house and the time we accepted an offer. Possibly these were the longest, most stressful 183 days of my life. They were filled with cleaning, staging, more cleaning, more staging, frantically leaving the house with the dog at the last minute in the middle of my work shift and hanging out at my cousin Amelia's house or Gramps's house or basically anywhere with an internet connection and people who didn't mind hosting us. On the weekends, every time we had a showing (and there were a LOT of showings), we loaded up kids and dog and drove around town if it wasn't nice or went to the park if it was nice (and since the house was up for sale for the entire winter, there were a lot of not-nice days). And for six months, we heard that our house wasn't "just right," that the rooms were too small, or the basement ceilings were too low, or we needed to change this thing or that thing. It was hard on all of us, but most especially the boys. Each of us was ready to throw in the towel more than once.

But lo! One day we had a showing in the morning, and I went over to Amelia's house and hung out with her husband, Todd, and Pluto for a couple of hours while I worked and Todd did his schoolwork. As I was heading home, our realtor texted that the same people wanted to see the house again that afternoon. Weird, right? As it turns out, the people were a couple in a long-distance relationship. The woman lives and works nearby, but the man had flown in from Arizona for the week to look at houses and go to job interviews. So the man came in the morning, and the woman got off work at noon and came back with him for the second showing. And they liked our house! A few days later, we came to an agreement to sell, and we entered the next anxiety-making phase of the process: inspection.

And that's where the work day comes in. The buyers are getting an FHA loan, which means there are some extra conditions to be met (like the stairways have to have railings, and there can't be any chipped paint anywhere, stuff like that). So today my family came over for the day to help us tackle all the projects. My dad put up the garage light (thus ending the eight-year saga of the unfinished garage light!), and he and Joe worked on the railings. Mike did a bunch of projects around the house, including some wiring things and working on the outside. Bethany and I took down all the exterior doors, sanded and patched them, and repainted them. And J and Carleen helped with various projects, including painting that last section of the awful basement wall. So now everything looks fresh and clean and welcoming ... just in time for us to head out the door.

So now the search is on (well, ongoing) for a new place. Let the fun begin!

submitted without comment

I got a text from my Aunt Dana that read: "OMG, what’s Henry’s face doing on you?!"

(This was my first communion, so I would have been about the same age Henry is now. It's really uncanny to my eye.)

miles thomas!

Saturday afternoon we loaded up the fancy loaner van (mine is in the shop) and headed to Naperville to meet our new nephew/cousin, Miles Thomas. What a sweet boy! You'll be shocked (shocked!) to learn that Max was the only one of the boys who was actually interested in holding the baby. Side note: Max still says he wants to be a teacher, but man that's a hard job. I think he'd be *much* better off as a pediatrician, even with the extra schooling. But that's a talk for another day.

I got to spend plenty of time cuddling my sweet new nephew during dinner so Erin could have both hands free to eat and direct the other kids (I remember those hectic days with a newborn ... just barely). Among the older kids, there was much playing outside, which resulted in mud everywhere, including all over Liam's phone, but everything cleaned up fairly well (except for Henry's shoes and pants, which ended up not being salvageable at all). And as always, we tried to get a picture of all the cousins, with very limited success.

spring saturday

We had to get out of the house for a couple of hours today, so we picked up the younger Kruyer kids and headed to Freedom Park, which is the newest park in town. It has all sorts of unusual equipment compared to the other parks. While we were on our way there, my brother called to see what we were doing, then he and Carleen met us at the park for a couple hours of playtime. And of course, J got in on the action, pushing the kids on the merry-go-round and trying out all the equipment along the way. So much fun!

After the park, J reminded me that Liam had a piece selected for the student art show at the local gallery. I'm glad he reminded me, or I might have forgotten to go see it! Anyway, we dropped off the cousins, then J and Carleen accompanied us to the art gallery, where we got to see Liam's rendition of a comic book ... villain? hero? ambiguously moral but utterly compelling antihero? I'm not sure, but I like his artwork!

two out of three is very bad

Friends, we haven't had an outing like this one in a while. It finally warmed up enough to get out and about, so we decided a family hike at Potato Creek was in order. Unfortunately, Henry decided he wasn't on board with the plan. So for the whole mile (that's right, one single mile), he complained bitterly and called us all sorts of names and generally made the whole day unpleasant. He might have been having what my dad calls a MEAN PAIN. In fact, I think that's a pretty accurate diagnosis. So there are no pictures of Mr. MEAN PAIN Henry, but Liam, Max, and Pluto seemed to enjoy being outdoors, mean brother notwithstanding.

back to school, finally

After a week off, the flooding has receded, and the boys are finally back at school. The house is so quiet! Pluto and I aren't sure what to do with ourselves. Well, we weren't, but apparently he's decided to take a nice long nap right on Liam's slides. Puppy love!

the great flood

Friends, it's been a challenging week in Plymouth. In the span of 36 hours, it rained and rained and rained. Basically, in those 36 hours, we got the equivalent of a whole winter's worth of precipitation. And since the ground is still frozen and there was still snow on the ground that the rain subsequently melted ... there was really nowhere for all that water to go. (Note: These aren't my pictures, but they represent the flooding pretty well.)

The schools were open on Tuesday but have been closed since then. The river is supposed to crest tonight, and then the water will slowly recede, but so much damage has been done. We are lucky because our house is far enough away from the river that the flooding wasn't bad in our neighborhood. Which is not to say it didn't exist. Our house is up on a little hill, so we stayed dry, but you can see here that the bottom of our yard flooded, and that our neighbors had outright lakes (and most likely flooded basements).

I doubt schools will be open Monday, and it's going to be a long, long recovery for a lot of people and businesses. Yikes.

max at twelve

This year, Max had real trouble when people asked what he wanted for his birthday. He said he was interested in some video games, but not enough to want people to spend money on them. He is always in the market for new hooded sweatshirts, he said (and it's true; that kid has an endless array of hoodies), but he wasn't excited about that either. Basically, he told me, he is happy with what he has, and he doesn't really need anything else. In the end, he asked for money for his (woefully inadequate) college fund, which made us proud of him and grateful to everyone who contributed.

At 12, our Max is still the sly charmer of the bunch. He makes friends easily, has patience for miles (as long as your name isn't Liam or Henry), and makes everyone around him feel welcome and happy. He has a core group of best friends who have been together since they started school, but he also has a wide and ever-growing circle of other friends. Trust me, it's impossible to escape his charm when he gives you that impish smile.

Max is setting his own path at school, too. He is in advanced classes for every subject, but he's definitely showing a preference for language over math. (This could be because he's not a fan of his math teacher, but it also could be that he just isn't a math person. I guess only time will tell.) He still loves reading — every morning when I go upstairs to collect laundry and turn off lights (sheesh, boys!) I find at least three or four books in his bed because he loves to lay in bed and read. He needs to work on the cleanup/organizational aspects of life, but I'm a lot more forgiving when the mess is books.

This year, Max has taken some major steps toward finding his voice. After a crushing defeat in fifth grade, this year he was easily elected to the student council, and he's had a blast helping with everything from penny wars (this is a coin-based fundraiser they do at school) to assembling Val-o-grams, which he is doing this week in anticipation of Valentine's Day. He also joined the service club this year, which involves doing things like running the concession stand at sporting events. Every time I pick him up after one of these things, I find that he's more talkative and animated than usual. He really likes being part of everything — and telling us all about it. He continues to love spending time with his younger cousins, and he still wants to be a teacher when he grows up. And on the physical side, not only did he join Mike and Liam for the whole 30 miles of Bike the Drive this year, but he also hiked the challenging Ramsey Cascade Trail with Mike while we were in Gatlinburg.

Today is a snow day, so school is closed. Max is spending the day curled up in a blanket, reading and playing video games and bickering with his brothers and cuddling with his dog. Ah, to be 12 again!

Happy birthday, Max! We love you, and we can't wait to see what the next year brings.

eagles weekend!

It's that time of year again — time to freeze our butts off while standing around looking for birds!

Like last year, Johnny and Erin and the kids joined us, but this year we had an even bigger group. Barb and Kevin came, along with several members of Erin's family. I've never met some of them, so I had some concerns about how everything would work out, but it turned out to be a whole lot of fun!

We arrived on Friday night and went out early Saturday morning to see the eagles, and they didn't disappoint. The last count we heard was 125! Amazingly, after going out to see the eagles and having breakfast, we all went back to the room, and Mike and I napped the morning away while the boys just hung out and played video games. It was so peaceful. I would do that every day if I could. Seriously. Just a perfect rainy morning with my fellas.

In the afternoon, everyone else arrived, and we all spent some time seeing programs, walking around, hanging out in the lodge, etc. until dinnertime. We took a little walk with Barb down to Sunset Point, which is really pretty. We all had dinner together, and after that, all the kids went swimming and everyone wore themselves out. Hurrah!

Then Sunday morning it was up early again and back to it. There were fewer eagles (something like 68), but the sunrise was just beautiful, so I took lots of pictures. 

After another breakfast at the lodge, we all packed up and checked out. Barb and Kevin had missed the sunrise eagle watch and wanted to see the covered bridge, so they headed out to do that. Meanwhile, Johnny and Erin and kids joined us, along with Erin's aunt and her grandson, for a hike. We took the same trail as last year, but how different it was! This time it was covered in a river of ice, which made things very pretty if somewhat challenging to navigate. Just like last year, the kids all loved it. Lucy seems to have gotten over calling all the eagles "balden," which makes me a little sad, but I guess time marches on. Richie decided this weekend that he and Liam were BFFs, which was pretty great. It was fun to watch them together. Jesse was his normal happy self, and he even let me hold him ... for a minute. 

All in all, a very successful weekend and a much-needed break for us. But we really need to make a point of doing some hikes with the cousins when it's *not* the dead of winter!

happy birthday, pluto!

My, how our Pluto has grown! He's gone from a 10-pound cuddly puppy to an 80-pound full-size DOG. Max, for reference, has also grown, just not nearly as much.

happy new year!

Happy 2018, friends! We're hoping it's an improvement on 2017. (I would say it has to be an improvement, but I don't want to press our collective luck.) We don't have any formal resolutions, but we are hoping to make some changes this year around the old CFHQ. For example, depending on how things go, we're hoping to get Pluto a companion (NOT in the breeding sense, oh no) so he doesn't feel so sad when his visitors go back home. Right now, Lily is visiting, and I have a feeling he will be seriously let down when she leaves tomorrow.

Anyway, we hope your year (and ours!) is filled with new and happy adventures, and plenty of time with the people you love. Here's to travel, and long meandering conversations, and walks in the woods, and finding a way to make a difference in the world. And here's to the people who know you best, and show you in unexpected ways. Like my mom, who made these perfect pillows for us for Christmas.

Friends, in short, here's to you!

adventures in (terrifying) parenting

Max and Henry spent yesterday afternoon with my dad, while Liam and I went shopping with my mom. While we were gone, Dad, as he often does, decided to include the boys in what he was doing — in this case, rewiring some lights in his garage. Max declined to help, but Henry was glad to go out and get dirty. So out they went, and up to the attic of the garage. They finished the first light and were moving to the second, and just as Dad looked up and said, "Henry, don't step off that b—," HENRY STEPPED OFF THAT BOARD. And fell through the attic floor/garage ceiling.

According to my dad, it all happened really fast "just like in a movie." One second Henry was there, and the next he was gone. According to Henry, it was all "just a blur of weird shapes and then I landed." Henry called up to my dad that he was okay, but Dad was already rushing to get down from the attic — he went so fast he ripped his clothes on something along the way. And then the next thing Henry tells Dad is that his music teacher died that way (falling through his attic onto his garage floor). Which is true, and will stick in many of the kids' minds as their first real experience with death, so I'm not surprised Henry brought it up.

I know, you're waiting for the dramatic conclusion. It was a Christmas miracle: He scraped his armpit on something on the way down, but that was the only injury he sustained in the fall. We are all counting our lucky stars around here, especially when you consider where he landed. (Note: My dad's garage is ... not the cleanest or least crowded place in the world.) I would say we should buy a lottery ticket or something, but I think we won the jackpot already.