In our new home at last

The move has been accomplished! At long last, we are in our new house in Joshua Tree. I won't go into great length about the gritty details, other than to say I am SO HAPPY it is over. It was fairly rocky, and now, to top it all off, we have been without internet for four days! I am going into withdrawal! There has been a grave error on the part of our internet service provider, and they have offered us DIAL UP for free until they can hook up our DSL. Have you been on dial up after having high speed?? WHOA, is it SLOOOOOOWWW... So I am afraid there will be no photos joining this blog for a while. Sorry, but I just don't have the patience for that.

Things you should never move without:
gloves
a hand truck
the biggest moving truck you can afford.

I hope we won't be moving again in a long, long, long, long time.

Impending move

I am just counting the days (6!) until we move into our new house. I wish we could skip over the moving part, and just be there, already settled. I don't know why, but moving traumatizes me. I guess I am just a homebody, and when my home gets uprooted, it throws me off. Something like that.

I don't have anything exciting to report, but I will share with you some little butterfly drawings I did yesterday. I was doing research, helping a friend with a design for a tattoo. I think my favorite one is the greeny gold one. I forgot the name of that one. The one at the top is called "Apollo". By the way, it is unprecedented for me to share drawings from my sketchbook. You guys must have earned my trust, or something... Have a nice Monday!

We are here

We are here at last. Palm Springs, or more accurately, Rancho Mirage. Moving is a pain (have I mentioned that already?) The packing, the driving, the stress of leaving behind loved friends and family and heading to a new place. As someone wisely said to me in Salida, "You know what you are going to lose, what you don't know is what you are going to gain." Those words have helped me. I have been trying to focus on what I am going to gain - however unknown - rather than lamenting the things I will lose. It has been no easy task. I will miss you, Salida!



The drive here went very well. Matthias drove the very large truck, filled to the brim. His mother went with him. His father drove his car, also filled to the brim. I drove my own car, with Mr. Pono in the back seat, travelling in style. He was so good the whole trip! He mostly slept on the drive. He even stayed in hotel rooms, two nights in a row! He took it all in stride, with much less trouble than I had expected. (I think I have been more upset than he has been. Maybe there are advantages to being a dog.)

We drove through Utah, and what sights we passed! I stopped more than I should have, to snap some photos, and to saturate my eyes. I would love to drive that way another time, when I don't feel pressure to get along, so that I could linger even more with the landscape there. We stayed in Mesquite, NV the first night (Sunday) at a casino. Pono got to eat a bit of my ice cream cone from McDonalds for being such an amazing traveller. (this is not a common occurance for either of us, I SWEAR!!!)

We arrived in the afternoon Monday, but spent another night in a hotel, just so we weren't rushing to find bedding and put together beds after such a long drive. That was a good idea, as we were all tired. By Tuesday afternoon, the truck was unloaded into our rental house. Amazing how much faster it is to UNLOAD.

Now Matthias' parents have gone home, and Matthias is off on another trip. Pono and I are trying to settle into a new place without unpacking. Does this seem like an oxymoron to anyone else? I still haven't found my shampoo. It's been over 100 degrees the past couple of days, and Pono likes sleeping on the tile floor where it's cool. But we're HERE!

Another snowy day

Even though I am a couple days behind with this news, I have to tell you that it snowed, yes, SNOWED on Wednesday night. So on our hike Thursday morning, I got a chance to take yet MORE photos of snow on juniper bushes. There wasn't any snow in town, but I only had to hike up about 600 feet to encounter some of that lovely white stuff. There were some complaints in town about the cold and icky weather, but I have to admit, I do love snow. I just wish it wasn't accompanied by cold! ha. It was really beautiful, with low hanging clouds, obscuring the tops of the peaks. What little of the mountains you could see were frosted with a bit of white. Unbeatable! The other benefit to all of this moisture is that everything is turning brilliantly green. Here is a photo of brand new oak leaves, with one old one that just won't give up.

After the hike with Mr. Pono the dog, I piled all my paper and ink into the car and headed over to my friend Carla's house. She and I printed monotypes up at AVAC Thursday. It was a good day, even if a little short. We were both feeling too busy and tired to do a full day. It was still fun, and here is one of the more successful prints I did. I used a copper wire to make the lavendar line in the bottom part of the print. I really like how that turned out. I do need a title for this one, if any of you have a suggestion. I have been working a lot on using new colors and color combinations, but sometimes the best colors come when I am cleaning my palette. So I decided to photograph the partially cleaned palette for a reference. Cool, isn't it?

Matthias, my husband, is finally home! I drove to Denver yesterday and picked him up at DIA. I am so happy to have him home again. Pono loves it, too. We are a complete family, once more. Matthias has vacation right now, so he will be able to stay here and help with the move, much to my great relief. I am not good at packing, but he is good at it, and fast. Yay!