Wow. Three and a half years since my last post. The whole thing looks different. More like a Google Doc instead of, well, whatever blogger used to look like.
Anyway, we leave for Costa Rica in 6 days, and you know what that means. Time to start blogging again. I started keeping a journal during my first trip to Costa Rica in 1994, and I've done it every trip since then. So I can't stop now!
Today is Bella's 15th birthday. She has a few friends over for her first "non-party." You get to a certain age where you just want to hang out with friends on your birthday and not be bound to all the expected rituals of a birthday party: the activities, the cake, the presents, thank-you goody bags, etc. So they're in the family room watching a movie right now. We had pizza. Strawberries and whipped cream for dessert. But not a party!
As we prepare to be gone for six weeks, we've made a list of things to get done before we leave. Here are some of the things on the list, in varying stages of completion:
Clean out the bonus room. This is the big one. The bonus room, the converted garage room, has been our storage unit since we moved into the house four years ago. The plan was to clean it out and turn it into a usable room (guest room, or practice room) some time this year. When Alex decided to make it his new bedroom, the ball got rolling fast. When that boy has his mind set on something, he goes all in. We still have many boxes of stuff to declutter (they're now located in the front living room) but the bonus room is 100% Alex's new room, and his old room is a proper guest room with two twin beds.
Get a portable generator. Gainesville has a lot of trees. And though we rarely get the direct brunt of hurricanes, we always get some doozies of thunderstorms. Trees blow down. Power goes out. I never thought we needed a generator, until a couple of months ago, when a fallen tree knocked out power in our neighborhood for over 12 hours. We lost a lot of what we had in our two fridges and freezer (and I had just gone grocery shopping, unfortunately). If we'd had a generator, it would have been less stressful, and we would have saved all that food. I thought if I was going to get one, I should get one before we leave, so that whoever is house sitting can use it if they need it. Florida recently had a tax-free week for storm preparation supplies, so I bought the generator then. Just about ready to give it trial run. Compared to cleaning out the bonus room, getting a generator doesn't seem like a big deal, but it actually takes a lot of setup and maintenance.
Build Cristina a new desk. Cristina's work office doesn't really have a good place for her to work (other than bodywork on the massage table). She needs a good work desk at home for her business. For a while I wanted to make a big desk by buying a butcher block counter top from IKEA and putting it across two filing cabinets. We finally made it happen, but it took a drive to Jacksonville and a harrowing strapped-to-the-roof tarp-less drive home in a thunderstorm (the countertop survived). The filing cabinets have been painted and the desk will be assembled soon.
There are many other little things on our to-do list, but my blogging endurance needs to be built back up, so I'll close this for now.
6 days!
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