Settling into the house is a process. There are still books in boxes and closets because they can’t be on proper shelves. We are still acquiring things for baking and cooking because we haven’t gotten our full repertoire replaced yet. I’m still getting home schooling supplies because I hadn’t anticipated continuing to home school and so that wasn’t an early priority. I’m having to reimagine pieces of the house/property because we are using it more and differently than I thought we would when we first bought it. This is mixed. I’m glad I haven’t started painting at all.

Given how many things are still breaking in the house I am so glad I haven’t started painting. Looks like the ceiling in the kitchen and the dining room will have to come down because there are so many plumbing problems with the upstairs and we have tried all the second (first?) floor fixes that can be done and we still have massive leaks that are causing damage to the drywall. Plasterboard? Language is hard. So that’s exciting. And expensive. And inconvenient with lockdown.

I’m still in that existential exhaustion phase. It is good and bad that I can’t be making friends at this point. This Sunday is the usual last frost date for my gardening region. I’m going to start some seeds this week. Saturday is supposed to get down to 1 overnight. This week the high is 16. That’s feeling so balmy over here.

I have a lot of dirt to move around. Seedling soil. Top soil to put on top of where the herb garden is going to go. But I’m tired. It is going to take three or four weeks to dig the pond at the rate we are going. It may take all summer for me to finish the stairs I am putting into the hill in the front of the house. I am doing a few hours a week on each project. And by “a few hours” I mean two or three. I am doing so many different things that I am not focusing hard on any one thing.

I am baking a lot. Cooking is taking up a lot of time. Cleaning the kitchen is my largest time sink. Rhubarb crumble is becoming a weekly thing as we get big bunches from the veg box. I had no idea I would like it so much. I’m making cinnamon everything because I don’t like the store bought versions here. I make stuff that tastes more American.

I’m being a pill because one of my friends teased me and said she has never seen me make anything other than macaroni and cheese. She didn’t think I could cook; she thought I had Noah do all of it. This is like when the kids made a comment a few years ago about how only Noah knew how to cook because I was in the middle of a huge project and I hadn’t cooked in months. If you only come over on days when I am working 10-12 hours a day on a project no you don’t see me cook.

So because I am an insecure nitwit my cooking is getting elaborate and intense. I cook a lot of vegetables. I am elaborate with my seasoning. I am doing things that take many steps and multiple hours. Why? Because that way I prove that I am not just a user taking advantage of Noah. Also because he and I cook very differently and I appreciate the variety in diet.

Not long ago I heard the term “flexitarian” to refer to people trying to use fewer animal products in food. We are not vegan (or even very close) but it’s a process. Cooking vegetables and making them taste good is harder than just doing meat and starch.

Also baking. Lots of baking. I am doing my part to fatten the curve.

I feel like balancing everyone’s needs will always be a process. Different people change what they need as time goes by and adapting and figuring out what is reasonable and what is possible and what we can actually sustain is ever shifting. As soon as I think we have a pattern we blink and everything changes.

I’m taking this isolation period as a good time to try to remove sources of stress in my life. It’s a process. But I have three children. So I will always have stress. ha.

I’m really struggling with what I can write about going forward. If I write about my difficult moments or issues then people will be cruel. I used to accept that as the cost of doing business. These days… I don’t feel the same way. If people are going to be cruel I can just retreat into the positive family experience I am creating in my house. I no longer have any need to have any desperate need to have people in my life at the price of being put down. I’m not desperate. That’s a nice feeling.

But people are cruel. So what can I write about.