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This post brought to you by my phone, acting as a mobile hotspot! I went to a Verizon office and see what they could do for me, and was able to change two plans with one gig of data each to a single shared plan with ten gigs of data – as long as Tim doesn’t watch too many videos on how to repair a truck, I should be fine for using this for half an hour or so every day or other day… I’m going to time myself online, checking before and after to see how much data I used, and see how I can parse it out throughout the month. And hopefully soon we’ll have another alternative, even if we have to go to satellite internet instead of hard line.

First kill on the property goes to Lindy – Tim was walking her the other day and she dived head-first into a pile of leaves, thrashed around a bit, and then Tim heard a surprised squeak, followed by Lindy triumphantly tossing around her new squeak toy. It didn’t play with her for very long, sadly. Also, now she dives into every leaf pile she sees, hoping there’s another surprise inside.

We are walking the dogs – multiple times a day – since we haven’t had time to finish the fence yet. Walking the dogs isn’t the hard drama you might think, after a lifetime of just letting them out into the back yard. They’ve been learning the new routine quickly. They get a walk with Tim and I before he leaves for work. They get another walk about an hour after he leaves, and I walk them about every two or three hours after that, even if it’s just from the house to the studio and back. Then they might get a walk with both of us when he gets home, they definitely get a walk after their dinner (that’s their “business” walk), and they get one more walk after we eat dinner. Then I can take my shoes off! That’s the only “hard” part, although it’s not “hard” as much as “challenging to remember not to take my shoes off”… In my normal routine, I’m usually out of shoes and into pajamas by about the time we feed the dogs dinner.

Speaking of dinner, we’re able to cook now! After about two weeks of not being able to use the new stove, thinking it had been struck by lightning (after which, Joe installed a whole-house surge protector that covers both the house and the studio and is rated for something like 100,000 volts)… we even ordered the new part that Tim found online that had something to do with the error message… it came in and we were so!excited! We could finally cook again! Nope. Same error message. Meanwhile, we’d bought a new grill and a new microwave (the old one still being in the old house and will live there until we’re done doing those renovations), so we could at least eat something that’s not raw. Tim did a little more research, bought some electrical tester tool, and discovered the whole time it had actually been a problem with the outlet. He replaced the outlet, now we can cook.

Which means shopping for groceries in a new store! It’s so ALIEN. Almost none of the brands are the same as what I’m used to seeing. I mean, of course the house/generic brand is different, but…well, for example, the cheese brand is different. Half of the cheese display isn’t even real cheese, it’s cheese food substitute. What the fuck is that? Is it related to how half of the butter display is ginormous containers of Country Crock? And if you want creamed vegetables in a can, you can get them in sizes geared towards family reunions. It will take me a while to learn the new store, that’s for sure.

Yesterday I started a 15% off sale at HaldeCraft (go! Shop! Now! Use the code “15acres” – no quotes – to get 15% off any and all purchases of currently in-stock items between now and May 16th!) and today I’m packing up orders as best I can, to take with me into town later this week to mail out (although depending on how much data just publishing this, checking email, and touching base on Ravelry and Facebook uses, I may be able to buy postage online… but let’s see how today goes first). All of my stock is out here, even if most of my supplies to make more things aren’t… but about half the things are still in boxes. Fortunately I labeled well! As I’m moving box after box, finding things, using the top of the dog crate as a staging area as I wrap ceramics, I’m wondering to myself…. “would I rather still be at the other house, cramped, doing this? Or here, with everything in chaos, but knowing in a month or two this will all even out and in a year I probably won’t even remember how chaotic this was?” And to that, I answer, “bring on the chaos.” Thank goodness, I’m starting to get over the initial “My god, what have I done” and am moving into the next verse, “This is not my beautiful house!”