Sproing

Yikes.

Y’ever just feel like the fast forward button is stuck on?

It’s spring–well, it was spring, until winter came back, but let’s not dwell–so that certainly plays a part, unleashing wild rips of energy. I won’t lead you to believe that I’m overly productive, but spring has definitely kicked me into a higher gear, and something about the possibility of a COVID spring as well… well, that’s exhilarating. We’ve been getting out and seeing folks under the wide open skies, managing safe visits with kids and grandkids, and generally looking forward to more nice weather and baby steps towards normalcy.

Got m’Pfizer #2 today, so that there’s a big, monstrous step, and I will take it!

Sarah gets her #2 on Saturday, and by Pascha, our household will be fully vaxxed and marinated. Whew.

I heard a rumor that our whole parish will be 80% shot up by then; does my heart good. Bring on the Christ is Risens!

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So the same week as Rosita the Fita took us over to see B and Kyle and Baby Elliot, we also got to see a few others of the bunch.

Court came over with the boys for the day. Splendid and exhausting. Honestly, how do people grandparent when they’re older than 44?

Anyway, we haven’t seen them in person since October. That is a long time, as any other Grandma will tell you. Duo calls are great, but they just don’t hold a candle to snuggles.

We had a nice, long day of stories and Little People and bouncing and trucks and dragging and walking and swinging and a great deal of eating.

Gerard has exited the terrible twos and is quite the gentleman. Grandpa may or may not have fallen asleep on the couch mid-day, and Gerard silently retrieved a nearby blanket and draped it over him. He walked away, back towards me and the minefield of toys and gestured backwards, whispering, “Das so sweet.” What a hoot.

Jerome, 11 months in the body of a 6-month old, is a miniature little human, and it’s honestly alarming to watch him climb around and almost walk in that undersized frame. He’s like the Dreamworks babies, with the personalities not quite fitting their stature.

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Then we got out to Hoffman Hills with both AJ and Will. I don’t think we’ve actually been in the same room as AJ since COVID descended. She happened to be around home for a weekend away from college, and we jumped at the chance to see her. And Will–even though he moved back to Colfax with his mom in January–we haven’t been able to visit with him safely yet either. Enter Spring, and a great day out at Hoffman.

This means that, counting the visit to MKE to see Rachel, and counting Emily stopping in before the grand adventures, I got to see all 7 kids and all 3 grandkids in the space of a month. Not bad for a pandemic. Have I mentioned how ready I am for this to be over?

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What else?

Well, I’ve been getting sick of:

1. The growing collection of plants deposited behind the dining table by the sliding glass door, this being the prime plant real estate in our house, but also an annoying tripping hazard, and not the best aesthetic.
2. The barren plot of carpet under our front windows, the space Larry the Lizard has filled for many years, only to be ousted by the annual Christmas tree.
3. The aloe plant atrophying in the corner of the dining room, too high and sheltered to thrive.
4. All the browned and dead tips on every spider plant in the house, because I do not have a green thumb, but am sadly effective at dehydrating and binding the feet of every green thing that I encounter.

So I got all Botano-EMT and stuff and did some rescuing.

First there was the trimming of the tips; removing the evidence of the neglect.

Then there was the implementation of a regular watering routine, something I’ve never maintained for more than a few weeks.

And then there was a bit of redecorating. Larry’s space had been vacant for too long, a desolate memorial in need of sprucing up, and some new life. He would have wanted it that way. He was a very pragmatic lizard.

So I dug out one of my mom’s old yoga benches that Larry’s Love, Rachel was hoarding in her abandoned closet, as well as a tiny little stool from the basement–I believe my ex-husband’s grandpa made it, but I think 17.5 years in my basement transfers ownership via adverse possession or squatter’s rights, or at least the laws of abandonment–and created some levels by the front window. A conservatory of sorts. Nevermind that half of the plants are actually Emily’s, and that some day she will reclaim them and leave another sad hole. For now, it is beauteous.

There are still plants all over the house, including behind the dining table in front of the glass sliders. But they are all happier, and they are all one in solidarity, demanding water every few days. They’ve survived so many years of drought and shame, I can only hope they forgive me and press on into the light and better days ahead.

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And what of that traveling kid, the owner of so many plants?

Emily and Emmett, affectionately referred to (by me) as Em&Em, are somewhere in CA at the moment. They’ve worked their way through skiing in CO, Arches, Mesa Verde, Petrified Forest and Painted Desert, Grand Canyon, and Zion, and are probably leaving Joshua Tree in their wakes today.

Also, according to the postcard on my island, they’ve nabbed 5 Hawaii license plates already. No idea how they stand on the rest of the plate collection, but at least HI is covered.

The Honda trucks on, and their adventures grow. And they haven’t actually paid for a campsite yet. I think I need to look into this boondocking thing a little more…

So.

Jealous.

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ALSO…

We slept on our new bed for the first time last night!

Here’s the old one, attractively perched in the living room, alongside the box its usurping successor came in:

That Verlo has served us well, since before there was even an us. But it has passed it’s expiration date, and as we are on a similar path, the old bod needs something a bit cushier.

I realized this frustrating fact when I spent that week out in Utah with Emily. At the Marriott. With the nice beds. I came home, flopped into my own bed, and every morning since, I HURT.

There were several problems:

#1, and one we’ve been acutely aware of, the Verlo saggeth, and the hubs and I spend a lot of time climbing back out to the sides so as not to smother one another. This creates a situation where your body is not entirely relaxed at any time while in bed with your partner, but always working to hold you up. This is not optimal.

#2, another that has been driving us batty, the Verlo hath turned into a veritable trampoline, and a sniff from one slanted end of the mattress sets the whole works to a’bouncin’. This is absolutely not optimal. We have been passively on the hunt for a couple of months, for new accommodations, on the basis of these two factors alone.

#3 came to light upon my return from the Marriott, when I realized that somehow, even with all that bounce, and even with all that sag, that bed is a board. I suspect that this is not a new feature, but one that my old body has recently deemed unacceptable. The hunt ramped up some when I got home.

First, we had to clean out the bedroom. It’s been a collection zone for 15 years, so that wasn’t the most pleasant experience for all of the residents of the room, but we made it through, and we’re still married.

Then we had to build a frame. I knew we wanted one of those bed-in-a-box deals, and I suspected rather heavily that a good deal of our issues with the current setup were due to the box spring and frame, so why not take them out of the picture altogether and go for a platform frame?

Seeing as I’ve built every other bed on the main floor of this house–running the gamut from a double bunk with a lofted sidecar and many, many bookshelves; a single loft with even more bookshelves; two plain and simple twins with lovely little bedside tables; and finally on to the masterpiece that is the bed above the piano in my office, also replete with shelving–all fashioned from the dimensional lumber and barn boards in our shed–I figured it was time to build the queen of all queen frames. No more faulty, bouncy, squeaky components, nossir.

But this is also the point in most plans of action that find me doing everything BUT attacking the project.

I like to make the plans. Then I wait for the elves to show up.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. It was time to make a mattress decision, place the order, and force my own hand in the construction of a frame. This was the only way anything was going to happen.

We went with a Nectar, mostly because it has a full year to trial the beast and be sure she’s the bed for us. Also, because it was the cheapest option. Also, it came with a slew of free stuff, so why not let it be first in line to attempt to woo us? If the Nectar doesn’t work out, we’ll try the Tuft and Needle Mint. Yes, there is a Plan C, D, E, and F, but hopes are high that Plans A or B will pull us through. And we get to keep the free gifts. 😉

And THEN, when we knew the box would be rolling off the truck within days, then and only then did I make the magic happen. Also, I employed the husband as sawyer on his day off, which he was very excited about, but which cut construction time down by at least 60%.

What did we learn? That the frame and box spring were indeed the bulk of the problem. That old Verlo is in pretty good shape, actually. It’s just not a good fit for this decrepit pelvis anymore. Sad. Take away the slightly-more-pliable-than-is-healthy box spring and the rickety frame, and NOW we’re truly sleeping on a board.

Finally the Nectar arrived, we gave it the appropriate time to unfurl and settle and otherwise inflate to it’s optimal shape and size, and after only a few nights on the board, we got to sleep on the new guy.

How was the night? It was lovely. There’s a bit of an adjustment period to these fancy foam mattresses, so no verdict yet, but the night was promising. Time will tell…

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That’s about all I know. Somehow I start posts every other day, and I never actually get around to writing them.

Here’s to another conglomerate catch-up…

May your spring be filled with green and lovely things, happy and healthy faces, and lots of safe time with both,
KJ