This feels like a particularly peculiar moment to come back to weekly blog posts. With Covid-19 keeping me close to home, aside from the slow and subtle shift in seasons my life week to week changes very little. Then again, it seems that now more than ever I'll be thankful to have a record of the subtle shifts in my life through this pandemic. It’s also a reassuring reminder that, while so much remains unpredictable in the world right now, nothing will last forever. It may feel slow at times, but seasons change, and life goes on. Last week's heat wave broke, and over the course of this week, I found myself happily digging out more than one sweater I'd stashed in the back of my closet. We had a few delightfully rainy days, enough that I had the chance to do some Saturday morning weeding in a warm rain. The weeding was long overdue - our backyard has rapidly become a broad sea of yellow, and it feels as though I wouldn’t grow dandelions more effectively if I were to actively try!
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Since my sister in law and her family moved to California shortly after my oldest niece was born, I've missed many birthdays, both my niece's and nephew's. I know that soon they'll both be too old to have any interest in having their boring old aunt crash their birthday party, so I've talked about making a birthday trip for years. This year, with no major plans late in the summer, Andy and I were finally able to make it down to California to attend our niece's 5th birthday party. As a happily childless adult, a 5th birthday party was an overwhelming occasion, although my sister-in-law's genius plan to rent a bounce house for the party kept most of the craziness contained. Happily, our visit was long enough that we also had time to just enjoy relaxing with family. As always, the trip made me dream of the future, when their family will be back in Washington and we can spend time together whenever we want!
Read moreLife: Week 32
Week two of smoky, hot, stifling weather. If I was feeling ready for fall before, now I'm practically ready to move to the southern hemisphere for legitimate winter! After letting the poor air quality keep me indoors most of last week, I finally gave up and decided that I needed to get outside, weather be damned. I had a busy weekend, so I didn't make it out for any hikes, but taking a short walk in the afternoon a few times over the week was about all I could handle with the smoke. Finally, Saturday night we got some rain to clear out the smoke and restore the mountain views I'd missed so much!
Read moreLife: Week 32
Summer is back with a vengeance! We had a lovely cool few days early this last week, but by the weekend, temperatures had climbed back to a summery 85°. According to the forecast, they'll continue to climb higher over the next week. In past summers, when temps are this high, I'd spend the weekend a home reading trail reports from other hikers, thinking they were insane to be hiking in the heat. This year, Andy and I were those crazy hikers. Not only did we hit the trail this weekend, we went on our longest, most difficult backpacking trip of the year. Crazy indeed!
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