Starts and a Finish

Dear Mom,
School has started, projects are nearing completion and others are finished with great satisfaction.

The Young Lady started her Junior year of High School and I was able to take a First Day of School photo on the front porch. A clear sign of Growing Up-  the Starbucks Light Vanilla Frappuccino in her hand.

A week later we moved The Young Man back to IU for his Junior year. On the hottest, humid-est move-in day, for us, so far. With the longest walk from vehicle to dorm, for us, so far. Thank heaven his room has AC and we only had one flight of stairs. After making several trips back and forth, laden like pack mules, and still faced with transporting the really bulky, heavy stuff, we decided to risk our parking spots to pull into a drive meant for Official Vehicles Only to do a quick unload, thus cutting our walking and carrying distance in half. Since mine was the vehicle with said Heavy Load, I pulled into the drive with My Hero and the Young Man standing by. They unloaded onto the sidewalk in record time and I almost as quickly pulled around and began a new hunt for a parking spot. I lucked out and got a spot even closer than my previous one! My Hero babysat the load on the sidewalk while I was parking and the Young Man took a load to his room. As I approached My Hero in his perch on the sidewalk, I saw him signing a clipboard and handing it back to two camera wielding folks. When I got to him, he flashed me a huge smile and proudly stated that he was "going to be on a website somewhere".  Last week, the Young Man forwarded this photo from one of IU's Facebook pages.

Yes, there he is, in a garage sale rescued dorm chair, with the mini fridge. 

While we were moving in, I noticed several resourceful people pulling collapsable wagons loaded with belongings. We are going to have one of those for the next move. 

*******

After 20ish years, our backyard barn was an eyesore. We needed a new one, and one with a bit more useable space. After unloading and dismantling the old barn, and storing all its contents in the garage, we finally got the new, cute little backyard building painted and reloaded. This one has two sets of doors- one for easy access to the things kept there, and one for John, Dear to drive in and out. We are calling it our cottage because it is probably the closest we will ever coming to owning one!

We've really accomplished a lot of home improvement projects this summer. The kitchen facelift is almost complete! I can't wait to show you how it looks!

Love,

Kim