I can not believe it is. August twenty third already. We came up from Florida to Michigan on the 23 of May . . . THREE months ago ! How is that possible? I remember thinking when we drove up here that I would be in MI maybe two or three WEEKS . . . and here I am three MONTHS later just loving life in this amazing country setting.
I miss my grand kids something fierce, especially the two that I would normally see every two or three days but some how or other we have stayed connected and made due with phone calls, texts and FaceTime. I would love to share this place up here with them because I know they would love it as much as I do. I can only imagine the looks on their faces each night watching the deer come up to the yard for their nightly snack of corn. That and all the different birds that show up each day to empty the bird feeder outside the kitchen window.
But the very best part of being in Michigan this summer is the weather. This afternoon The Man and I were sitting outside on the patio commenting on the sad fact that the majority of people in our country are HOT and sweaty for most of the summer. We tried to remember if there was any point in the past three months that we were hot and sweaty and there was only ONE day that we could remember it being uncomfortably warm. No where near the heat and humidity that we left in Florida. I think I may have discovered the very perfect life and even though this technically puts me in the dreaded category of "Snow Bird" I think I will continue with this life style for as long as I can.
If The Man doesn't work me to death.
This country living, as wonderful as it is and as much as I do love it, sure does keep you busy. I was thinking today that if I were home in Florida I would probably be sitting on the couch catching up on the three million episodes of different Netflix or Prime shows that I have not watched in three months all the while stuffing my face with junk food. It would be way too hot to do anything outside and thanks to Covid-19 the community pool is closed so there is no way I would be leaving the comfort of my air conditioning. Up here I am out side every day, all day. Because of his breathing issues The Man does not go outside as much as I do which is good because it gives me the opportunity to have some time to myself.
EXCEPT . . . if there is anything to be done outside I am the one who gets to do it. With the exception of cutting the lawn. For some reason The Man is hesitant to let me drive his lawn mower. Perhaps that is a very good thing so I'm not complaining because I have many other things to keep me busy. First and foremost is sitting under that big old Maple tree with a good book.
I usually can't sit still for too long so I break up my time with walking around the apple trees picking up dead wood and tossing it in the fire pit so that every week or so we can burn the branches. These trees are all pretty old, even older than me, so there is always a lot of wood to be gathered. ( A perk of living out in the country is that you can burn things you want to get rid of, as long as it's not the barn or the house. The Man tells the story of when he first moved out here he knocked down half of the old barn and burned it, much to the dismay of the neighbors down the road who thought the house was on fire and called the local fire department. The fireman were NOT happy!) I also have a flower bed that I have been working on cleaning out but that may take me a couple of years to get done.
Maybe all my "puttering" around has inspired The Man or maybe he just figured out he has some one dumb enough to enjoy doing all these things. What ever the reason this summer The Man has FINALLY decided to get rid of some of the stuff that is here. Last week he announced that he would like me to take some pictures of a FEW things in the attic and we would post them on Craigs List. We tried this with some things last year and it went no where but we thought we'd give it another try. Unfortunately Craigs List was WAY too complicated for out ancient brains so I called my daughter-in-law in Atlanta to ask for some help with our postings. Knowing who she was dealing with she suggested The Man and I post our stuff on Facebook Market Place. FANTASTIC IDEA !!! It was sooooooooo easy and the responses came in immediately.
The only problem is that The Man has gotten Market Place fever and is now ready to sell EVERYTHING! As I have written in the past this is something that needed to be done but little did I realize I would be the one up in the attic and out in the garage pulling stuff out of nooks and crannies, closets and trunks.
This past Friday I got to go up into the attic, which is accessed by a steep flight of stairs in the living room. My mission was to take pictures of EVERYTHING that is up there so that The Man could see what he wanted to sell. (No way would he make it up those stairs with his COPD) Thank Heavens for the digital camera on my phone. Up to this point I had only been up in the Attic once before so I was actually excited to go explore this unchartered territory. There are three large rooms up there, one is finished to be a bedroom, the other two have floor and walls but are only set up for storage. I was like a kid in a candy shop !!
The bedroom space had an assortment of things that had obviously just been put up there after The Man's wife died. There are beautiful wool blankets that she wove from the wool that she spun from the sheep that they raised. (This woman was WAY out of my league when it comes to crafts. I don't think there is a single craft that she did not master but that is a whole different blog.)
The other two rooms looked like someone had emptied a warehouse and stuffed everything into the space of two bedrooms. I can't even begin to list the things that I found up there but suffice to say we now have a parlor FILLED with weaving and spinning items ranging from spinning wheels, (yes . . .plural . . wheels, as in more than one) to yarn, wooL and a ton of things that I don't have a clue what they are.
Thankfully The Man was using his brain and had one of the neighbor kids come over on Saturday to help me bring all this stuff from the attic to the parlor where it is laid out like a showroom. I doubt I could have been up and down those attic stairs more than once so Cooper, the kid, did all the lifting and carrying.
And the reason for bringing it all down to the living room . . . this morning we had a husband and wife from Indiana drive NINE hours to come see what The Man had for sale. They had seen one of the items we had posted on Facebook and called us on Friday to say they were interested in the electric spinning wheel. (Who knew such a thing even existed! I sure as hell didn't.) Once The Man got talking to them they realized there was a treasure trove of things they wanted. And so they got into their car last night and drove all this way to come over here this morning where they almost cried when they saw what was here.
This Indiana couple raise Alpacas and Lamas and the wife spins the hair from them into thread which she then weaves into who knows what. It was so awesome to see how excited she was over some of the stuff that we had here and it gave The Man a good feeling knowing his things were going to someone who REALLY appreciated them.
Only problem is The Man is ready to sell all the other things that are here in this house and THAT means you know who will be digging in more closets and crannies. I think I'll go sit under that Maple tree so he can't find me.
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