*last days

Uploading some pictures from my phone from our last weeks in Salt Lake: 

I did plant a small garden this year.  I ate the green beans with pasta a few times and Edie ate all the sun gold tomatoes - no one else got any :)  My roma plants did really well but I only got to eat a few before we left.

This was such a cute photo session with Edie and Jubilee :) ... and :( 

 
Of course the moms don't ever get a picture together until the last moment.  I love this friend - that statement doesn't say much.. but the tears streaming down my cheeks at just writing them do :(

I just love this one.  Sam kept running after her as we were leaving, giving her a dandelion or whispering something silly in her ear.

Last bike ride to the library:

Wednesday night at Bryan and Jen's with takeout Chanon Thai.  Moved on afterward to Tia's backyard for more wine and some fun little presents for Graham and Vera. I put Edie down at home and came back over - when will I ever have such an awesome setup where I can put my baby down about 25 feet away from the party?

 

Someday I will have a garden as successful as my neighbors':

Tia's dirt pile:

taking some last pictures before we headed out... this is the bottom of the closet door where we had marked the girls' growth... read closely :)

As you can see, Vera liked to get measured.

Playing at the Gateway fountain with Jack and Fiona.  These two friends just click. And of course I have no picture of their mom and me :(

Dinner at Pago with my dear friend Shannon.  We had some special treatment, including a little series of mini appetizers like this gazpacho here.  I loved seeing the girls enjoying such a delicious gourmet meal!  Shannon is such a wonderful friend, I'm so glad we met at that ill-fated restaurant job a few years ago :)

Building fairy houses around this tree at Liberty Park... I hope we meet some good friends here that will play like this with Vera.  She was driving me nuts this morning - I think she needs her friends.

We had to get out of the house for a showing and so went to the park where Graham and Vera ran through the fountains, they were pretty funny:

It's so sad [sorry you're probably like O-K Anne I get it that you're sad :)] to do that final cleaning in your empty house.  A little easier knowing that we'll be back at some point in the near future.  Should have gotten the biggest Uhaul :/

Just about to leave...  looking at this picture makes me glad at least that drive is over!  Whew - 10 hours by myself in the Volvo with 2 non-napping girls and a bunny.  I treated myself to a grande coffee frapuccino with an extra shot in Elko :) [usually a regular ol' latte kind of girl]

 ***

there will be more!  I need to peruse Ben's phone....   and I still need to make the blog private. I figure Mr. Stalker can see where we used to live :)

*packing up

I wrote this sometime last week before we left and am just posting it now. I will say that we are excited for this next little chapter and are so thankful we have this option to live here near family with so much help while Ben works to get a university job. It's just hard :(

 

....... sigh. I don't even know where to start.  

I just hate moving, I hate ripping up the roots that you've let grow, breaking up the little community you made for yourself. I can picture every major move I've made: driving away towards college - seeing through my tears my dad and Tamara waving from the driveway on Iris Street, flying away from La Plata just when things had settled and it felt like home, driving away from Tacoma just devastated and sad that we could never recreate our life as college students, coming home to Tamara and I's lonely apartment after she'd left, driving away from San Diego with Ben - he driving my old Saab in front of me on the 395 - excited but unbelieving that my life as a single unit was over.  Following Ben and the Uhaul out of Missoula, completely blinded by my tears but comforted with my last Big Dipper milkshake :)  I just can't wait for the day we know [as well as you can, I guess] that we are going to stay in a place. 

This move is particularly hard. Like really hard. I haven't lived anywhere this long since my childhood home and there's just something about where your babies are born, the relationships not only you make but that they do too!  It definitely took us a couple years to really feel happy here, to really love it.  I am just so grateful for the amazing friendships we did make and it freaking KILLS me that we are leaving.  Like when you pull up a tomato plant and there is a ton of resistance and then you hear the roots breaking and popping - that's what I feel like.  I know perfectly well we will see our friends as often as we can and that we will maintain our friendships - those are the kind of friends we make.  

I just keep mourning that these routines and habits and this little home won't exist anymore as it does now.  The view from our kitchen table of Tia's, the walk to the park, Vera running down to Graham's house when we see them out front and just what awesome neighbors they are, riding bikes to our amazing library, Tuesdays at Jack and Fifi's house, long long mornings spent at Sam and Mimi's, Red Butte Gardens with them too, Ben staking out the meth house or the maybe-brothel across the street [haha I won't miss that but it's true! don't tell potential buyers...], his midnight walks with Boone to the park, the walk up from "our" parking spot at church, our wonderful pastors and the familiar caring faces there, Vera holding Jack's hand on the way to Sunday School, my brother stopping by on his lunch break, his kids' birthday dinners, the walk to Coffee Garden, Tia. Oh my goodness I just think about Tia and our friendship with her and how much the girls love her and the tears just start streaming.  Or the twins and their mama who I could already tell was a kindred spirit long before they were all born. Yep there have been a lot of tears.

There's a lot more to say... [I was too tired at the time to finish that thought!]

 

I could NOT take these pictures down that Vera had put up on all the doors to decorate, too sad.

...or my little clothesline downstairs where I randomly put up pictures or cards or things that inspired.  The picture of Vera from Rock Creek, the little dried flowers Matty collected in Park City after her baptism.  I tried to take them down before Tahoe to get ready for the listing and just couldn't do it either. 

*privatizando

Before I share too many details about our move, Vera starting school (!) etc., I am going to make our blog private.  I haven't looked up exactly how to do this, but I know I will need to have a list of email addresses that can view the blog.  Basically you view a private blog while signed onto your google account, it's pretty easy to do and it doesn't have to be a google/gmail address.  Please send me your email address or leave it in the comments here and I can get this going...   thanks!

*las montañas

Yesterday we hiked up in Big Cottonwood Canyon to Solitude Lake. It was a perfect little hike, a mile past the Silver Lake boardwalk.  Ben and I really savored the day, thankful for the gorgeous mountains we've been able to enjoy these 6 years.

 

This is going to be one of my favorite pictures ever :)  

Vera was being so sweet: holding Edie's hand and just being a good, kind big sister without any parental prompting.

***

Last week Ben's dad came out for a day to take advantage of the beautiful Utah mountains as well. He and Ben spent the day fishing on Strawberry Reservoir and then came back to take us girls out for a fancy dinner at Fresco. How sweet is the picture of them kissing their Grandpop?

 

*103

It was a hot hot day today and we were stuck at home without a car. It's gone surprisingly well and I'm just blogging about it now as we wait for Ben and Mike to get back from fishing.

The girls played mama and baby with the cushions on the floor - one of the first times they've really played - and Edie really got what was going on. They played in the sprinkler and sandbox, colored, took a bath, had a Popsicle at Tia's, watched Bug's Life ( one of those times I wish Edie would just sit and watch a whole movie!)...

I love the picture of Edie basking in the sun and of the two of them in the cushions :)

*un sábado

Before we move, I want to have as many normal, everyday days as we can.  Ben actually drove a trailer over this morning and so the girls and I were alone for the day.  We started the morning out at the farmer's market with Jen and Graham.  It was pleasantly uncrowded and not too hot - pretty nice!  Besides our snacks, I bought corn, peaches and broccolini.

Cute little friends:

***

Later in the afternoon I taught Vera the "stay on the cushions or the crocodile will eat you" game:

She turned it into "we are going on a trip on a boat and need a bunch of snacks and books and all our toys" on the couch game.  I took this picture of her being sweet to Edie - something we are not seeing so much lately :(

 

I knew we needed to get out again at some point and so we walked/biked to a gelato place on the other side of the park.  I made them eat a token dinner before we left and basically counted the ice cream for our meal.  Vera got lemon poppyseed which she surprisingly loved.  Edie had chocolate peanut butter [she loves choc!] and I got honey lavendar and hazelnut :)

"cheese!"

We stopped at the little playground for a while on our way back:

 

On the final stretch home, we stopped to take pictures near the greenhouse. I just love this building - I think it's been there like........ 100 years?  I don't know, ask Ben :)

I like this picture.

Vera wanted to take a bunch of the flowers - it would be fun to get her a little throw away film camera some time...

I asked Edie to put her arm around her sister and she said no and ran away:

I just love mini daisies:

and that's our Saturday!

***

*on the way to Emerald Bay...

10 seconds later:

I love this picture! When your babies start to grow up, you get to hold their sleeping bodies less and less, and I savored the moment snuggling her up in this little nest on the floor.  She stayed asleep here on the boat for over an hour while the rest of us hiked up to the falls.  Ben stayed with her :)

Vera was a decent little trooper on the hike - only complaining that she was hot about a dozen times :)  I say that seriously - she usually isn't up for much of a hike, but she did really well!

Emerald Bay is so beautiful - huge tall trees, Tahoe granite everywhere, smell of the Sierras...

I love this picture of us in front of the Vikingsholm just after Edie woke up:

*anyone else get that "on the way to Emerald Bay" song stuck in their head?

*as a child I always hunkered down in the bow of the boat on the way to Emerald Bay, sure we were going to crash and die :)