Our Weekend in Citrus Heights & Some Things I Miss

What We Were Up To This Weekend

• Arrived in the evening Wednesday night, watched TV with Aunt Trinity before collapsing in bed
• Thursday, went grocery shopping, ran a few errands
• Took the pups on a walk
• Made Turnip and Potato Soup & more Butternut Squash bread with baked pears and ice cream for dinner
• Watched "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" (o.k... I liked the bits about India being overwhelming to live in, haha)
• On Friday, took Aunt Trinity to the airport (she's visiting friends in L.A. this weekend)
• Visited Temple Coffee, got a french press cup of coffee and some thai tea
• Made a website for Trinity's counseling practice
• Went to see "Seven Psychopaths" (excellent!)
• Did absolutely nothing (I read webcomics & watched youtube videos of horse eventing and rodents taking baths) until the evening, when we watched "Tales from the Crypt" and "Mirrormask" (really weird, but I liked it... it was like "Labyrinth" on crack and without David Bowie)
• Jamie tried to make croissants (which actually turned out pretty good)
• On Friday we did chores (dishes, laundry, sweeping)
• And took a little trip to Apple Hill with Erin & Jeff Orr, friends who have recently moved to the Sacramento Area! We visited the Jack Russell Farms Brewery and tasted some beers, then went over to Para Vi Winery (which was very good) and ended at Apple Ridge Farms, where I made friends with a pygmy goat and we ate apple desserts for dinner. ;)
• Today we are enjoying a quiet Sunday.

It's been a good weekend! ;)

Thoughts From the Road

"Elvish Singing" by Alan Lee (from "The Hobbit")

I still need to write that post about my issues with minimalism. But we are keeping busy, and that's a good thing. I will say a few words about my more recent struggles with being "homeless" and unemployed. ;)

I am missing a few things being a vagabond. Since we got married we've been in a kind of Limbo... not knowing where we will be in the next year and so not being able to really settle into any place. Our first year of marriage we lived in my parent's pool house (300 square feet, which isn't as bad as it sounds), our second we lived in a space twice that size (and accumulated twice the stuff), but neither felt like home because neither was permanent, and mentally I can't fully settle in and "make it mine," knowing that in the back of my head. So in general, while I'm used to living in Limbo, I'm quite tired of it. At least this current state of Limbo changes location on a weekly basis. But there are things you take for granted about having a home and an income.

I am missing stability. I am missing routine. I am missing going shopping (I didn't shop hardly at all before but now that it's not an option I feel deprived, haha). I am missing having pets (but I am enjoying other people's pets along the way). I am missing having everything in it's place instead of digging through a box or bag. I miss having options in my wardrobe (I wish I had kept more shirts and brought less hats). I'm sick of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I want sushi and I want thai food and I want to order pizza just because I don't feel like cooking (on the flip side, I have lost more weight, and as an American female I really can't complain about that, haha).

In some ways it's going to be a long year. Maybe I will adjust, or maybe I'm just a homebody at heart. But the good far outweighs the bad, and like we keep hearing from friends and family, this is the opportunity of a lifetime, and I refuse to succumb to the siren's call of the white picket fence, as alluring as it sounds (well, my version of a "white picket fence" looks more like a Hobbit-hole with a driftwood fence around the front garden, but they really are the same thing after all). My Hobbit-hole days are ahead of me, but for now I must venture out of the Shire. ;) There will be plenty of time for Hobbiting later. And it's not like we're roughing it at all... we have full bellies and warm beds and we are always surrounded by loved ones! So really, I can't complain.

Tomorrow we move on again, but this time it's a short jaunt over to Novato, CA.