We moved.

It was crappy, despite enormous help from the Big Cooks.* We're all exhausted and pretty frayed around the edges. Poor Skipper is not happy, and now when she sees us move anything larger than herself - box, bag, furniture, whatever - she starts screaming. You can almost hear her brain: "Noooo!!!! Don't change ANYTHING ELSE!!!!! No more change!" I kind of agree.

Things are starting to stabilize. We spent an exorbitant amount of money on a new bed (we've been sleeping on our sad old full-sized futon for 10 months), which will be delivered today. I'm pretty sure that's going to change my life.

Dutch had a terrific two-day camping trip (overlapping with the move) last week with my uncle and aunt. She feels very grown-up, and she had a great time - I'll post some pictures later.








*Who booked tickets for a fun short visit to Portland before we scheduled our move to fall exactly during their stay. They may never visit again.

We/re moving.

We're moving. On THURSDAY. We're pretty topsy-turvy.

This is what's going well in our life right now: Skipper can continue to attend daycare.* I got a call from the daycare office manager on Thursday while I was on the bus, and she told me that Skipper was excluded from daycare until August 16, because she wasn't immunized against chickenpox and one of her classmates has come down with it. This is the policy of the Multnomah County Health Department.** I completely freaked out and burst into tears and had to hang up on the nice lady, who felt really bad. I sobbed quietly to myself for a few minutes (this is okay to do on the bus) because HOLY SHIT our lives are so nutso right now and we're MOVING and we have NO MONEY to pay for a babysitter for three weeks and OH MY GOD what are we going to DO!? Then I calmed down and called back and talked to a different staffmember, and burst into tears all over again, and sobbed for a few more minutes. Then I called Cook who said "Oh my god. What are we going to do?" and then said "Wait a minute. Didn't I get Skipper vaccinated for chickenpox the last time I took the girls for shots?" "No," I scoffed, "why would you have done that?" (we both think the chickenpox vaccine is stupid, and Dutch only got it recently because she needs it for kindergarten). Then I freaked out some more. Then I called him again and he said "I'm pretty sure she got that shot."I called the doctor, just in case. And, yes, she's vaccinated. No problem. Cook recalls that he felt after the appointment that he'd been bullied into getting more vaccines than he felt comfortable doing. I am SO grateful that he got bullied into it.

Anyway, that's what our life is like right now. I had to call the daycare back and apologize to everybody I'd cried all over. They were very nice about it.

So that's the good news this week! Actually, we're also looking forward to living in our new apartment, which is just a 10-minute walk from Dutch's school and THREE frequent-service bus lines! Woohoo!

*At least until the end of August, when my student discount expires, and her tuition goes up to $1400/month. We're sad to be saying goodbye to the daycare, because it's been great, and Skipper has loved it (well, at least for the last 7 months), but sheesh. $1400 is a lot of money.

**Which has declined to hire me a number of times. Clearly, they have bad judgement all around.

No squirrels, at least

I haven't had much to say, or much time to say it in, lately. Things are changing - we've applied for an apartment, Dutch lost yet another tooth and read a whole book with only 4 helping hints, Skipper pooped in the potty and threw a toy in the toilet, my tomatoes are infested with some sort of fly... life goes on. I still have no job. I've caught on belatedly to an author and an internet phenomenon (what? I'm SLOW, okay?), both of which I'm enjoying.

Today I taught Skipper to say "Bye-bye, booger." I think this is my greatest parenting accomplishment so date. So to you I say "Bahbah, boohghah."

Oh, dear

Moving often during childhood is bad for you. (According to the NY Times Fashion & Style section.)

Mundane miscellany

Yesterday we got the results of Dutch's school lottery - she didn't get into the two language immersion programs (which we really wanted), but she did get into another neighborhood school, and she's waitlisted for the Spanish immersion program there. This means that we don't have to move before school starts, which is a relief. She's pretty excited to have a place to pin her kindergarten dreams to.

Also, four kids in Skipper's daycare class have hand, foot, and mouth disease. Some other kids are out for other reasons, so Skipper was the only kid present yesterday. She had three teachers at her disposal. The teachers sent a handout home with us at the end of the day with information about HFM, including the helpful reassurance that it is NOT the same as mad cow disease. Phew.

Also, Skipper's walking a lot more, demanding to nurse every fourteen minutes, shrieking when thwarted, and hitting people* in the face. Toddlers are so adorable.

That's the news here. Strangely, the employers at the job I really really want have not yet contacted me to beg me to work for them. Maybe I'll get that call today.


*Mostly me, actually. She also specializes in grabbing glasses off people's faces.

Up in the air, without George Clooney

I'm going to graduate in June.* I have no idea what will happen after that. Actually, we know that Dutch will be in kindergarten. Somewhere. That's ALL WE KNOW about the fall. There are all sorts of scenarios. Cook and I both have remote possibilities of permanentification of our current jobs. I have to start applying seriously for permanent jobs all over the country starting in April-ish. The public school transfer lottery takes place in mid-March, though if Dutch gets into none of the programs for which we apply, we'll probably just have to move to the catchment area for a different school before September.** In the meantime, we have to attend six meetings for the various programs, and fill out a ton of paperwork, just in case.

We really have no idea what we're doing.

In other news (consistent, though, with the theme of total cluelessness), today Dutch had an Art Sale, in spite of my efforts and Cook's to persuade her that she needed to think the idea through a little more. She stood at the end of our driveway with a crumpled brown paper bag containing three battered (and, truth be told, ugly) artworks brought home from daycare over the last year. She had no sign and no table, and it was raining. And cold. Plus, the foot traffic on our street is pretty much limited to the crazy guy with the bandages wrapped around his head and the dog with the poop-crusted back end, and a steady trickle of down-and-out trudgers walking to the stab-n-grab convenience store down the street to get cigarettes. No art was sold in her 45-minute shift. While I was peeved by Dutch's cranky insistence on doing something so ridiculous, and even kind of embarassed by the whole venture, I also felt grudgingly respectful of her determination and slightly charmed by the sheer weirdness of it. She may not have a ton of potential as an artist or an entrepreneur, but she has the courage of her convictions.

*I AM! No matter how hard my group project buddies try to drag me down.

** We believe in public school, and in investing in your neighborhood school. But we don't want to continue to live in our current neighborhood, due to the long bus commute downtown, and we have reason to believe that Dutch is not a child who will do well with school-switching. So we need to start investing in a different neighborhood school in a neighborhood where we might be able to stay. Besides, the neighborhood school in our neighborhood burned down in the fall, so the kids are busing across town, which is crappy.

We moved.

It happened. We're alive. There's a lot of unpacking to do now.

Still alive

I am still here. Now all four of us are sick (to varying degrees) and I have lots of homework and I am having terrible insomnia, and I don't know how the stuff remaining in our apartment is going to get packed. I am feeling very sorry for myself. If my entire reading audience (no, really, ALL of you) could fly out to Portland this weekend, that would be very helpful.

If you can't make it, you should take a moment on Saturday to think of us. Set down your mug of coffee and your paper, put your slippered feet up on the ottoman, look out the window at the beautiful fall weather, tip your head back in your easy chair... and think of us. Moving. All day.

I'll be thinking of you. Actually, I'll be thinking of how nice it'll be once we've settled in, and the fact that our housemates are cooking us a big welcome-home dinner on Sunday. Once I've stopped whining.

Really, what I want to know is WHY DO WE HAVE SO MANY BOOKS!?!? WHY!!!!!!!

For want of a nail.

Holy crapola - things are crazy here. Skipper and Dutch have colds, and Skipper is sliming everything in that special unique way of snotty babies everywhere. We've finally started packing (because hey, we're moving IN A WEEK!!), and we keep having cascades of minor problems. Here is an example:

We need to sell our bed. It won't fit in our new home. In order to sell the bed, we needed to take a picture of it to post on Craigslist. The camera lens is broken, so we needed to find the other lens, which hadn't been seen in over a year. We finally found it, but it's not going to work (it's a zoom lens, and we can't get far enough away from the bed unless we climb the tree outside the window). So we're going to make a video of it instead. I just wish someone would be our spokesmodel, like maybe this guy.

Anyway, things are crazy. I have tons of homework, and tons of packing, and Skipper's snotty nose made her want to nurse all night, so I'm exhausted. I shouldn't even be taking the time to write this. I'll tell you all about my exciting new job and exciting classes when I have time, like maybe in January.

Ye shall receive

Oh you generous people of the internets! It has come to my attention that when I post my shopping list, it makes kind people send me gift certificates! I suddenly fear that I will receive 25 travel mugs for my birthday. I didn't mean to hint that I wanted my vast reading audience to get me stuff - I'm just thoughtless, not actually that manipulative. And you all are so nice. One of you, Mr. Currently Struggling About Whether or Not to Take a Lucrative But Morally Dubious Job, even tipped me off to an example of the beauty of the internet - a website devoted to the art of drinking coffee while biking.

I plan to spend my first (oh so very small) paycheck at a cool store where more stylish people than myself consign their clothes. So what I really need, actually, is somebody to come and give me advice about What To Buy. I have no style at all* and desperately need a personal shopper. Since everybody I know has more fashion sense than me, any of you who might be reading this are qualified. Let me know when you'd like to come.

Hey, did I mention I'd like to get a laptop, too? And a pony? With a farm to go with it?

Apropos of nothing, I was just reading a bodice-ripper (a pretty good one, too!), and it actually contained the phrase "heaving bosom." Hooray! I realized yesterday after accepting the job that my time for reading for fun is rapidly coming to a close, what with the job starting in two weeks and school starting in a week and a half. And, oh, yes, the move, in three weeks. So I'm trying to cram in as much reading (trash and non-trash) as possible, rather than spending my time, say, packing, or cleaning, or anything productive. Gosh, I'd better start rustling up boxes.


* My taste could best be described as "Clothes that aren't horribly uncomfortable, are cheap at the thrift store, don't need to be dry-cleaned, and aren't white, because all my clothes eventually turn grey and I can't be bothered to change my laundering habits." Though I do know enough to be able to recognize that Dutch's current outfit - hot pink t-shirt, green shorts, white knee socks, and ballet-shoe-slippers - is just not quite right.

Change

So. Skipper has started daycare.* I have been offered a part-time job** and will probably take it, though not without queasy feelings.*** Dutch has a loose tooth.**** We're moving in less than 4 weeks.***** School starts in less than two weeks. Cook's job will be finished in probably three weeks.

What's up with you?

* In a very loose sense - she spent 45 minutes there without a parent today, and we'll probably try for 2 hours on Monday.

** I haven't been keeping this a secret. I applied two days ago, interviewed yesterday, and interviewed again today.

***I'll probably elaborate on all this later, but it involves very low pay and a VERY long commute.

**** Dentist Google says almost-five is within the realm of normal for natural tooth loss. Which is good, because the first tooth she lost (at age 2, in a playground mishap) was seriously traumatic for me. Normal is nice.

*****AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

It's official

So we're moving. We really are. We're moving from a very small two-bedroom apartment to a house. A SHARED house. We're going to live with Emma Goldman and Brendan Behan, with whom we've celebrated a number of holidays and eaten a number of large meals. We will have three rooms and a bathroom to ourselves, and share the kitchen, dining room, living room, yard, and basement storage. (Storage! Hooray!)

We're looking forward to it, in spite of some reservations about the normal issues* involved in sharing living space. Cook and I last lived with people other than each other (and our offspring) in 1998. Now we'll be dealing with those normal issues with the offspring in tow, which means we'll have to make sure the kids don't make life miserable for Brendan and Emma (both of whom Dutch adores and would love to follow around all day every day, talking incessantly), and we'll also have to do a lot of parenting in front of witnesses. It could be good for us. It could be good for Dutch and Skipper to live with other adults, too. It'll decrease our ecological footprint. We'll be able to garden! There's a dog!

Anyway, we're moving in early October, most likely. I'm dreading the physical move, as we are moving into an upstairs space with an awkward stair situation. Should be fun!


* Chores. Dishes left in the sink. Having to wear clothes when going into the kitchen to make coffee in the morning. Having to say "good morning" in a non-cranky way when going into the kitchen to make coffee in the morning. That sort of thing. But we'll have separate phones. We even have separate refrigerators, which is kind of awesome.

A Report

So far, the new apartment beats the old apartment. Here's the score:
Old Apartment: Rats in plumbing (-1), drafty (-1), expensive (-1), crappy landlord (-1), splintery floor (-1), crappy stove (-1), crappy lighting in bathroom (-1), great neighborhood (+2), lots of space (+1) = -4

New Apartment: drafty (-1), probably moldy (-2), excellent lighting in bathroom (+1), good neighborhood (+1), decent kitchen with fullsize appliances (+1), not very much space (-1), not so expensive (+1) = 0

I'm pretty happy with 0.

Competence: The Hygiene Hypothesis

Dutch hated moving. She told us so a number of times, and also repeatedly suggested that we move BACK to our old apartment. On moving day, she and I got a ride to our new home from our wonderful friends who helped us move, and after we all got out of the car, she refused to budge, saying that she didn't want to go to our new house. As I was exhausted and carrying a bunch of crap, I got pretty annoyed and more or less bodily dragged her across the street.

But she seems to have put all that behind her now. She's pretty happy here, and the main contributing factor is that in this apartment, she can easily reach the bathroom faucet and the medicine cabinet. Because of this technical breakthrough, she is suddenly enthusiastic about washing her hands and brushing her teeth. Her hatred of wiping her own butt is suddenly a thing of the past (she always demanded that Cook or I do it so she wouldn't have to have her hands washed), and she now carries out whole bathroom episodes without assistance, and with (as far as we can tell) reasonably decent hygiene. She brushes her teeth four or five times a day. (She is also an excellent spitter, thanks to special tutoring from Uncle Taekwondo.) She's just thrilled to be so independent, and we're thrilled to be leaving the butt-wiping days behind us.

We're Back

We got our phone a day earlier than anticipated. However, we still have eighty freaking billion things to do before our life resumes tomorrow. Our new place is very nice, but we're still trying to figure out how to cram all our crap into its smallness. We have also made the unpleasant discovery that the walls and windows are so poorly insulated that in the morning they're all (except the interior walls) wet with condensation. We will be spending a lot of time wiping off mildew for the next few months, alas. Hopefully not being sickened by nasty black mold growing in the walls.

BUT we survived the move! Hooray!

Au Revoir

Due to some not-so-stellar planning, we will be phone-less for the next three days. Also internet-less. Farewell, computer-land!

Ups and Downs

My god - we're moving in LESS THAN 48 HOURS!!!! Agh!!!!

Apparently we've been in denial. I'm ashamed to say how much remains unpacked. Let's just say that Dutch's room is entirely unpacked, because she is in profound denial, and has already announced that she is NOT moving, that Cook and I can move and she will live here by herself. I'm not sure how she's going to make rent, but given this morning's conversation, I suspect it will involve street corners.

The good news is that we did manage to get some stuff (including pretty much all the books) moved last weekend with The Big Cooks and their rented minivan, so we are already a tiny fraction moved in!

The bad news is that we still have vast piles of crap to move. How can we possibly have accumulated so much crap?

The other good news is that we found yet another rat in the toilet tonight, giving us a good reason to not regret moving. (And yes, the lid was down yet again, so we are 100% confident that it came either up from the sewer or down the vent from the roof, not from inside the apartment.) This rat was dead. I'm not sure if that's better or worse.
Here's a picture. Sorry if it grosses you out, but since I was the one who found it, I have no sympathy. I'm telling you, KEEP THE LID CLOSED!!!

Moooooooooving

So the new place is much smaller than our current place (about a third smaller), so we have to figure out how to cram our sprawling life into it. We made a graph paper scale diagram, and have been busily cutting out scale furniture. It looks like we have approximately the same square footage of furniture surface as we do floor surface. Some things will have to go.

Otherwise, it's a nicer place, with much more responsible management, and it'll cost $200 less a month, which is VERY nice. It's in a walkable neighborhood (though we're giving up the cool local co-op grocery for a QFC, which is sad), and the bus ride downtown (and to Dutch's daycare) is actually a little shorter.

Cook and I start school Monday, so we will have to do all our packing next weekend (and today). It's going to be a hectic few weeks! I guess I should go set up some boxes.

Scary.

We have a new home! We'll be moving in two weeks.

Update

We found an apartment! If they accept our application, we will be moving in three weeks, to a remote southern corner of the city. Further bulletins as events warrant. (Also, many thanks to Taekwando Uncle and his family for loaning us the car that took us to the apartment, which is 90 painful minutes away by bus and a breezy 30 by car.) It has all happened very quickly - we gave notice yesterday, our current landlord showed our apartment 3 hours later, and we saw three places today, including the One We Want. But this is just the beginning - if all goes well, we'll be in our new home 3 weeks from today, and lots of things have to happen very quickly in the interim. Dutch has no idea of what the next month holds in store for her. I'd better go buy some packing tape.