You can't take it with you...

As much as we love this house and all the things in it that have made it our lovely home for almost 7 years, we are letting go.  If we could pick it up (lots of balloons, perhaps?) and move with it we would.  Instead we are getting a strong lesson in attachment. At the end of the day things are just things. It's the people and experiences in your life that make it rich.  There will always be memories.  And this blog to live on in cybereternity.

Thus begins our new journey "on the other side." We know it will be greener, literally, but let's hope that we'll find what we are truly looking for. Good people, good scenery, good food, and more to explore than we even imagine.  Chapter 2 can be found at thehappiestdog.wordpress.com.  Follow us on our epic adventure. We're either insane or geniuses!

Thank you to all who have found our life even slightly entertaining.  We'll leave you with a few final tidbits of life at 211 Virginia Ave, Morehead City, NC.

Tail-less squirrel--our buddy.

We finally got to taste our asparagus--all 2 trees of it. Probably means it won't come up next year, but it will probably get mowed over anyway.

Celebrating a milestone in the closing process during Mom's visit.

Our yard sale. We put birds on things, but nobody got it.

The butterfly weed keeps getting better every year.

My garden finally filled in the way I wanted!

My coneflowers were especially beautiful this year.

We were glad to see the Hawthorne we planted has become someone else's home.

I remember when this redbud was delivered to us -- in the mailbox at only 12" high.

Wish us luck!

Best wishes, Zephyr!

To Zephyr,
  You were a good little car. You took Lisa safely back and forth to Wilmington many times. You were there for all our kayaking trips. You got us to Ohio and back and never complained about all the dog hair. You transported Zippie safely to Asheville, among all the houseplants.  You hauled load after load of sand and pebbles for the front walk and we didn't break you. Best of all, you brought Lisa to NC, and closer to me.

You were a fun car to drive.  Here's wishing you new adventures and new roads to travel.  And here's to 131,000 more miles!!

Easter fun

Happy Easter everyone!  I hope the Easter Bunny made it to your house...

Lisa and I were busy yesterday preparing--we dyed our easter eggs (thanks Annie and Tom for saving the white ones for us!) using onion skins and turmeric.  We wrapped the eggs in the skins to add some effect.

 Here I am at the big reveal:

Look how cool they turned out!

Larisa gave us the tip to throw grains of rice in between the onion skins to give it that speckled look.  The dye even seemed to get darker and lighter in spots over time, too.

You can also use cabbage and beets for dyes, but we kept it simple.  We also didn't soak them quite as long as suggested, so they could have been dyed even darker.

Today Lisa kept up with our easter egg hunt tradition and hid plastic eggs for me around the yard. Yet another year with no candy inside, but I'm OK with that. I don't know if Vivian is, though.

It has been a cool spring, so there hasn't been much to report on recently, except that things are very slowly waking up.  Our peas are only about 6 inches high -- this time last year we were harvesting already.

We were excited to see our pileated woodpecker returned to the neighborhood -- we haven't seen any for a few years:

Our lovely redbud is blooming at a glacial pace, but should be at peak in just a few more days...

And one of our dahlias is just starting to peek out of the ground! Thanks to our most recent issue of Sunset (thanks Christie and Julie), I've recently become aware of a 45 acre dahlia farm just south of Portland.  Heaven.

One year older

Happy Birthday Lisa!  

Sharon and Gene came for a visit on their way home from Florida, and helped us celebrate Lisa's birthday.

The evening was complete with pizza, presents, and a fancy cake. We love our sweets, but even this may be too much to handle. May have to freeze a section for later...

May the next year be raspberry-filled and covered in frosting!

Holiday Greetings from Virginia Ave!

 A quick shot of our modest but festive Christmas lights:

 

Happy Holidays and we can't wait to see everyone soon!

Live in the now

It is so easy to get stuck in that revolving door of life -- work, errands, complain about work, clean the house, complain about aches and pains, clean the house again (I'm looking at you, Vivian). There are so many things that can stress you out, if you let it.  Sometimes you need to take a deep breath and stop for a second. This past weekend, we did just that, if only for a short time.

As much as we complain about where we live, there's no denying it is beautiful here and we need to appreciate it as much as we can while we can. We can have a picnic and take a walk on the beach in mid-November in a t-shirt and jeans. Not bad. And we have a good dog.

Family photo!

And no, we haven't dealt with our broken dryer, but the sun is doing a fabulous job!

Two-time Champ

For the second year in a row, Lisa won her lab's pumpkin carving contest. She said she tried not to win, but looked pretty happy when she told me the news that evening. She was even more excited to see her creation come to life as darkness fell!