The Countdown

Time always gets away from me.  I'm always surprised by how long it's been since I posted last.  We've been busy.  I feel like we're down to the final countdown on the house.  For a while there, it was in days (and very stressful), two days ago, we got an extension on our construction loan.  I believe that Dennis asked for six more weeks for us.  We had about three weeks to go, so I think that gives us a total of nine more weeks.  Hopefully, we'll be done before that.  Anyway, in other news....

Lexi - checking out that baby on the Pampers bag.

Random day at home.

 As you can see, this blogger thing is still tricking me, but I'm learning.

 I believe I mentioned this before - Summer, this would be evidence of the pee on the floor.  She was close, at least.

Summer has a good life, napping during the day with her sippy and a bag of cookies over there.  My, my.

 Almost all of the hard floors are installed at the house.  This is an upstairs bathroom. 

Currently working on the trim.

Something about this picture (the living room) makes me feel like we have a long way to go.

 Anyway, lately Lexi has been accused of looking like an Asian.  She's been accused of a lot of things.  I'm not really seeing the Asian part.  (Hello people, did anyone notice that her dad is a Native American?)  Scott = able to get a tan in the shade.

 So I listened to "To Kill a Mockingbird" on CD lately.  Forgot what a great book that is.  In fact, I think that book was wasted on me in high school.  I recall getting really distracted by the whole concept that the kids called their dad "Atticus".  Hello, that would be "dad" to you.  And that their names were so weird, anyway.  Atticus?  Jem?  Scout?  Spell Jem with an "i" at least.  Sigh.  Anyway, so I would recommend it.

Indoors, when Miss Maudie wanted to say something lengthy she spread her fingers on her knees and settled her bridgework. This she did, and we waited.

“I simply want to tell you that there are some men in this world who were born to do our unpleasant jobs for us. Your father’s one of them.”
“Oh,” said Jem. “Well.”
“Don’t you oh well me, sir,” Miss Maudie replied, recognizing Jem’s fatalistic noises, “you are not old enough to appreciate what I said.”

A man stands in the gap and does what must be done.


I was trying to share some of the wisdom from this book with Summer.  "Courage is not a man with a gun."  Summer, being a deep thinker, ran off and started shouting "gun!"  This is great - I'm sure this will come back and haunt me someday.

Yes - major victory for Summer.  Two paci's at once. 

Apparently she's learning the concept - "if some is good, more is better."  (I heard that one from the so-called ultra-running world.  This is how marathons and such things came to be.  My other favorite line from those people:  "Moderation in all things, including moderation.")

This picture is not photo-shopped.  She actually fell asleep on the couch!!  Usually getting Summer to go to sleep is an all day job, and it requires perfect conditions.  Her room - no distractions, white noise, paci, blanket, etc.

 So, speaking of books, while I was listening to books on CD, I thought I'd catch up on the John Grisham books I haven't read.  What is going on with that man?  I recall reading one of his books that I couldn't put down.  Many late nights on account of his books, and now I have one that I've renewed three times already.  It's just not interesting.  Too bad - he appears to be going off the deep end.

Ahem, evidence.  Summer bit Lexi on the arm.  Hope this habit is short-lived.

 If we were anywhere near a beach, I would truly have buried my head in the sand yesterday.  Out of the blue, Scott said to me:  "do you want to know where the Jeep is now?"  (resounding no!  No, I don't want to hear about the Jeep.  I know there's no good news involved there.)  Anyway, the whole story - back in October (October!!), the Jeep was putting out black smoke, so I was going to take it in to get looked at, per Scott's recommendation, to Need 4 Speed Automotive in downtown Bastrop.  (Scott:  "I know those guys there are all kinda...Harley guys, but they're really nice.")

Intelligent conversation between me and the owner, appropriately named Danny:
Danny: So, what's the problem?
me: Well, there's like this black smoke.  I mean, it's a diesel, so there's always black smoke, but it's really serious black smoke.
Danny:  Is the check engine light on?
me: Well, yeah, but that's always on, so that's not like anything new.
Danny: Ahhhhm, yeah, I think you need to bring that in as soon as you can.

Sometimes, it takes saying things out loud to realize how dumb you are.  We had been driving around with the check engine light on for about a year or so.  Stopped at AutoZone a few times, and every time they checked it, nothing really came up.  In hindsight, I think it's because their diagnostic thing couldn't communicate with our very strange vehicle.  The Need 4 Speed guys kept the Jeep for a day and said they couldn't fix it because they were not familiar with our strange little 4-cylinder diesel mobile.  (Apparently, these diesel Liberty's were only made for two years, so they're a little unique.)  They told us we'd need to take it to a Chrystler dealership, but not the one in town (Benny Boyd's), those guys, apparently, are crazy.  So we took it to Southpoint Dodge in Austin.  They had it a month.  They, too, are crazy.  And bad customer service.  We brought the Jeep back to the country to Bastrop Auto Works.  They said they were familiar with that type of engine.  They've had it for a couple months now.  First they said it was the fuel injectors (all 4 of them are bad!).  Fixed them, still not better.  Trying this, trying that.  And now, (drumroll) they took it over to Benny Boyd's.  (Insert theme music "Better buy from Benny and you'll get a better buy.  Come to Benny Boyd's in Bastop, blah, blah, blah....and then the very enthusiastic sign off "Beeeeennnnnnnnnnnny Booooooooooooooy'ds Y'aaaaaaaaaalllllllllll."  and i remember that we are in Texas.)  Anyway, back to the real story, so the Jeep is at Benny Boyd's anyway.  Sigh.  For a long time now, I have quietly been accepting the fact that I may never have a vehicle of our own again.  Still borrowing the Rassi's van.  (As Miss Nancy said "What would yall do without your pastor?")

 Anyway, moving on.  Today, I am contemplating whether it matters if we have a vehicle or not.  We don't have roads around here.  Lane called the other day and said he couldn't get home - the road was closed and there was no detour.  Me, believing in common sense and other idealistic things like that, thought maybe he was crazy.  No.  Not crazy at all.  The main road is closed.  Washed out in a flood we had.  Oh, I totally forgot to write about that.  Six inches in one night.  Drought = officially over.  Heard people talking in town about the need for flood insurance around here.  Seriously. also heard a story about a house that had burned, they are currently rebuilding, and were flooded.  Maybe this is a sign.  Or maybe that is a case of "when it hasn't been your day, your week, your month, or even your year".  Sometime I feel like I'm about to put myself in that category.  Anyway, so now, if I were to go to town, in the borrowed van, it requires driving through bobcatville, a third world country, and an unnamed mountain range.  All this, just to get a gallon of milk.  Maybe I should just stay home.

More on the "good luck moving into this house anytime in the next two months"

Vanity that Scott made for the bathroom, sorry I didn't get all of it in the picture.

Doors and trim

Better picture of doors and trim.

Okay, seem to be overloaded with sleeping pictures.  One very true excuse is that neither of these babies poses for pictures for me, and our camera is being weird about any picture that I take when the camera is not perfectly still.  Anyway, maybe I should run along.  Usually I do posts at night, but now I'm writing in the middle of the day and have Lex on lap and Summer tromping around in Lane's boots.  (Yes, they reach the very top of her legs.)  Have a very happy week!