Don't ask

Starting Week Four of waiting for our builder to give us the final quote.  In other words, nothing on the house-to-be is happening.  Nothing!  Well, actually, a few things are happening, but only by the sweat of our own personal brows.

Not that we blame our builder.  It's just that we happened to pick a bad time to build a house because we are in a house-building-boom and anyone related to construction is not that anxious to add to their work load.  Apparently, for example, the truss-building people are swamped and have not yet sent their quote to our builder.  "It usually never takes this long", we are told.   So it drags on.

We, however, have been working our little hearts out.  Our five acres is now minus 11 trees on or very near where the house-to-be will someday sit.  Husband in his safety chaps has been wielding a chainsaw and felling trees while I drag the limbs (not his, thank goodness) and firewood into piles.  We hope there will be no neighboring wild fires before we can get it all cleaned up.

One pile of many.

Upside:  I am excited about the firewood and about building our first fire in our wood-stove-to-be.  It has been 15 years since we've heated with wood and we've missed it.

Downside:  This whole moving onto rural acreage thing was supposed to end yard work forevermore.  The Yard Plan was to do what is called xeriscape, or in other words, pretty much nothing.  Except for a narrow perimeter around the house, leave the land like we found it.   Something one best not do in a subdivision if one wants to be liked by one's neighbors.

But lately I've been sensing local nervousness about the above-mentioned wild fires and reading too many fear-mongering booklets telling us to keep everything cleaned up and mowed.  So we may have jumped from the proverbial frying pan into the (wild) fire.  Husband is still holding out that, once all set up, there will be little to do, but I'm not so sure.

The property out here is covered with trees of one variety -- the juniper.  And I've decided junipers look nice from a distance, in a grouped setting.  But standing close to one of them and really giving it a visual once over ..... these things are not that pretty.  The fear-mongering booklets say to cut away any dead branches but that would take out large portions of nearly EVERY tree.  You've got to give them some credit for being hardy enough to grow in this sandy terrain .... but most are one quarter dead already.

So now that we are into June and the summer is well underway, I am wondering about what we will be in next winter.  Hopefully not the Beast again ..... because last winter and its ice storms wasn't fun.  We haven't planned on doing another southern escape like we did this year, but it may have to happen.  We'll see.  In the meantime, don't bother asking.  I'll let you know when something finally happens.  You'll probably read about it in the headlines.  

Things I have missed in a "Sticks 'n Bricks"

That's RV-speak for a house.  I have said many times that the comfort of living in a motorhome has been top-notch ..... but there are a few things I miss:

1.  Space for my kids to gather.

2.  Long showers .... although when we're hooked up in a campground, we can shower as long as we want.  It's just that most of the time, we're not in a campground and the tank levels become all-important.

3.  Security in bad weather.  We've had our share of leaks and frozen slides this past winter.  [Review: Slides are those portions of a motorhome that (when parked) expand out for more space so we don't have to climb over the bed to reach the closet.]  During the ice storms that besieged us in recent months, the slides literally froze open with a thick layer of ice on top.  This is not good when it's time to drive to the all-necessary dump station.  (See #2, no pun intended)

4.  Hard ice cream.  Our freezer is sufficient, but not ideal.  And all soft ice cream should (in my opinion) come directly, and exclusively, from Dairy Queen.

5.  Decorating.  Presently I cannot buy a piece of art, or pottery, or any of a million knickknacks that women, in general, tend to fill their homes with.  (This actually has been a good thing.)

6.  Unlimited water drainage.  I miss not having to dump the used dish water into the toilet to keep the other tank from getting too full.  Again, it's all about the tanks.  Getting water is easy.  Getting rid of it, not so much.

7.  Being able to use my blow dryer, vacuum cleaner, toaster, electric fry pan, etc., WITHOUT first turning off the space heaters.  (We have a perfectly good furnace but it uses propane which must be refilled via driving to some place that sells it.  So we use electric space heaters quite a bit.)  I have notes attached to most of these appliances to remind me.  The notes do not work.  We are always reflipping the breaker and restarting Husband's computer, preceded by a loud "Darn-it!" from Yours Truly.

8.  Air conditioning.  Yeah, we have that too.  But it's a little noisy and we seldom turn it on. The point was to not BE where it's hot, which has proven to be more complicated than it sounds.

9.  My washer and dryer.  I have gained intimate familiarity with too many laundromats.  PLUS the "fun" of hauling my basket of dirty clothes across a very public parking lot in a town where I know people.  (The miserably few non-handicap parking spaces close to the laundromat door are almost always full.)

10.  A garage.  I had a rude reminder last winter about having to scrape frost off car windows. T'was a lesson in empathy for chronic garage-less-ness.

What I DON'T miss:

1.  Yardwork.

2.  Large spaces to clean, including multiple bathrooms.

3.  Yardwork.

4.   Cable/satellite TV.  This one surprised me.  I discovered that as long as I have Wifi, I'm happy.

5.  A dishwasher.  Not kidding.

6.  Stairs and/or having to walk more than a dozen steps to anything indoors.

7.  A large closet.  Still not kidding.

8.  All the stuff.

9.  Yardwork.

The other side o' the fence

I figured you all needed a breather after my last few rapid-fire posts from our trip ..... hence the quiet spell.

So what's new?

I don't know if I have formally announced here in The Blog that we will be building our next home in, and moving to, central Oregon.  In the desert.  Where the deer and the rattlesnakes play.  It's a bit of a change for this Pacific NW webfoot.

Last fall we purchased five acres in an area called the Crooked River Ranch, a few miles north of Redmond.  Other than my two college years in Idaho, this will be my first experience of living more than 20 miles from where I grew up.  T'is time.

The Husband is giddy with the expected sunshine, close proximity of multiple fishing holes, and the relatively inexpensive membership to a nearby golf club.  I am simply happy about the change.  And the privacy that acreage affords.  And our view ....

(Meet our new neighbors, the Three Sisters mountains.  We call them, "The Girls".)

..... and our firm plan of natural and very minimal landscaping -- meaning -- never maintaining a lawn again.  Ever.

We will be three hours from our previous home and our business, which is now mostly run by Capable 2nd Son .... and three hours from many wonderful longtime friends.  We plan to return monthly to assist Capable Son in the functioning of said business, and to see our other kids, and of course, the Grands.  Plus to fulfill responsibilities in this lovely building....

If you fall into the categories of #1-Family or, #2-Wonderful Friends ..... just know that we will have guest rooms.  And we will expect visits.

One of our motivations for this move is to make a place for the Grands to create memories.  We have plans for hikes, camping, building forts, exploring the canyons.  And Husband is SURE that they will want to learn fly fishing ..... We hope to play pickle ball and swim the local ranch pool.  And we plan to finally set up our kiln and pottery wheel properly.

No, we have not broken ground yet which means it is all still in the surreal stage.  We have our house plans and are still deciding how much dirt must be moved from one place to another to create a level pad for the house.  It all takes time .... blah, blah, blah.

So what about the Beast?  When we move into the new house, it will go up for sale and hopefully there will be some money left over to buy a small trailer for future travel.  If not, we'll dig out the tent and camping gear.

Anyway, we have no plans for more big trips in the Beast.  Just back and forth over the coming months, from the business to the new house as it emerges from the sand and sagebrush.

By the way, we are thinking of naming it, so I will be accepting submissions for ideas.  (Favorite Daughter -- that's your cue. )

They say the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.  Well, we've spent enough time in the desert side of this "fence" to know it definitely isn't greener.  Which is fine by me 'cause I will not have to mow it.