i am so proud of myself!

the night of great-grandma’s funeral, we drove from oly to des moines for a celebration at my grandmother’s house. on the way, nat and i got distracted by my father’s house (it’s right on the way, i couldn’t not stop by) and were gifted an abundance of fruit - canned peaches, dried apples, jam jam jam, amazing grapes (how sweet) and a big bag of apples. i spent a day soon after paring them, and when i was done i noticed… that some neighbors had a bunch of apples sitting in buckets with a sign that said, of course, “free apples.”

so i pared some more. and now there is so much applesauce.

i’ve been piecing together my canning knowledge with information from The Internets, and in one minute (yes, i will be taking a break from typing this), there will be a third jar of applesauce successfully canned!

and we’re at three. there are probably ten or so more to go, as there’s a giant bowl still of applesauce, and then the apple butter. for a total of six dollar’s worth of financial investment, and hecka more time - something that i have a fair amout of, for now. i got the jars from great-grandma, and the only thing that we purchased was the lids. whenever i hear them sucking in, actually sealing, i feel like jumping up and down.

( giant weekend field trip part three - monday )

part three includes going to the remains of never never land with nat’s friend ann.  there are a few pictures here.  it was a sad trip lacking the touchstones of its sweet memories, so it was an appropriate that it was in the middle of the forest that my mother called and learned about my great-grandmother’s passing.

it’s, unsurprisingly, still hard.  i visited her in the hospital a week before she died - she’d had a stroke - and she was looking not-so-awesome, but having trouble breathing.  i felt guilty going on the field trip, rather than staying in town to keep visiting her, but i think it’s best that i had adventures rather than watching her deteriorate - she was always more of the adventure type.  you can see a picture of her from the fifties (when she was 47) here, and her obituary is online here.  it was amazing to have the entire family in town, many folks whom i haven’t seen since her 90th birthday.

butter is currently cleaning his paw while it rests on my wrist.  nat is sleeping. 

i’m hoping to, sometime in the next few weeks, stop by the schilter family farm in order to do some pumpkin-buying and hayriding.  i’ve been wanting to do the like ever since october crisped in, and upon some research decided on schilter - which turns out to be a good choice, as it seems like they were family friends… some of them were at the funeral and, in looking at the history of the farm, they share a swiss and dairy-related heritage.

since the adventures and stresses chronicled above, i’ve mostly been working and sleeping and working and sleeping.  it’s so chilly here!  i’m currently wearing polarfleece socks and still have freezy feet.

(parts one and two.)

i know, i know - part three is still pending. i’m trying to get the apartment packed up, which is really hard to do when i’m… not packing at all. that needs to start now - better, a few days ago. as a filler, here’s a picture of butter banana and i.

the truth is, the purpose of our trip wasn’t so much a happy one.  we were headed to the funeral of a friend of nat’s.  after a few hours on the road we made it to pasco, to a lovely service.  we headed home still sad, and were excited about the opportunity to distract ourselves by visiting the teapot dome.  …but we couldn’t find it.  we did, however, see this.

so, we turned around and headed a few miles back toward granger - yes, granger: where the dinosaurs roam.  nat and i had a great time taking the dinosaur drive, and taking pictures with all of the dinosaurs - you can see the full set here.

oh! i can’t believe it, i almost forgot. after we went to the darigold dairy fair (soooo underwhelming), a few hours down the road we stopped by snoqualmie falls, which was so. so. beautiful.

and we headed home. sunday was lacking in adventures, since i had orientation at work. but info on monday’s adventures is pending.

(part three here!)

last weekend, nat and i had a fairly extensive field trip.  he had worked sixteen days straight, and finally had four days off.  the initial plan was to go to spokane, but we didn’t make it that far.

our first adventure was to the puyallup fair, nat and i went with our friend will.   immediately upon arrival i ate a scone, in order to not be disowned by my family.  we went on the skyride in order to get our bearings, after which we rollercoastered! and then headed to the hobby hall where we saw amazing things including legobama and the vegetable displays. after that we saw the wonder of the steilacoom dance company (led by the silver stars) and headed up to the home goods exhibits, which were fascinating and crazy.  i was most interested in the table settings, i think, because really - what kind of competition is that?

we wandered around and saw the animals and were magnetically drawn (back) to the 4H dog show, after which we saw the jest in time circus which was pretty cute (i don’t usually like clowning, even though i have some clown friends, so “cute” is saying a lot).  i bought a red nose.  after that, nat and will went on the giant slide!!  “welcome to the puyallup giant slide, one of the largest slides ever built.”

then, we all went on the ferris wheel, which was an appropriately long ride for our money.  will took a shmoopy picture of nat and i.  we then abandoned him to wait forever for his fiancee to pick him up and take him home, while we headed to ruth’s chris steakhouse for my grandparents’ overwhelmingly fancy 50th anniversary party.  we brought a change of clothes to the fair, but still felt underdressed.  it was lovely, and so nice that my grands were able to celebrate such an important occasion.

upon leaving dinner in bellevue, we headed over the pass.  i had high hopes of making it to pasco that night, but we made it as far as ellensburg, tired and grumpy.  we ended up staying at the i-90 inn motel (classy, eh?) which i was surprised was pretty darn clean.  we sunk into bed exhausted, and i woke up at some point in the middle of the night to the bed settling, because it had just… broken.  from us rolling over.  awesome.

(part two here!)

so last time i posted, i linked to this comic, where the text is “3D dinosaurs no way” and “3D cheesemaking omg.”  … last weekend, nat and i had adventures that actually included both of those things, in roadside tourist attraction form.  i will share more once i’ve uploaded the pictures, but golly it was awesome.

my favorite quote of the day, from nat about butter:

i covet this poster like crazy, but it’s $30.

my great-grandmother passed away on sunday, after a week’s worth of post-stroke sleeping.  she lived such a long and wonderful life; she was my favorite lady.  i was her namesake for eighteen years, and will always remember her.  i’m mostly still numb, i think.

every so often, my favorite comic publishes a(nother) strip that makes me squeal “that’s my (new) favorite!” … i’ll admit that i was really behind on things, since it was published more than a year ago, but this is my favorite.  the trouble with claiming a favorite, though, is that not long after, i always find one like this one which argues and tries to take its place.

i save comics that i like a lot, so that i can devour in batches when i am sad about things like how my great-grandmother just had a stroke.

my small orange friend is back in town, which is fantastic.  he is getting along well in our new household.  i bought a car.  that’s how he got up here, me driving for thirteen hours from san francisco to olympia.  it was a good idea in my head.

it seems like my new apartment comes with built-in trans friends, and also crafty friends?  so that is pretty neat of it.  i’ve been stepping up my knitting game due to peer pressure, yarn donations and halloween (all combine, actually, to equal - remember what i said last year?).  knitting is good.

this is like i’ve taken all of my boring entries and combined them into one meta-boring-entry.  i mean, i got bored in the middle of it.  i’m going to go back to cleaning the house, and you know that means something.

i can see the matterhorn mountain from my window. my mother’s at a conference here at the disneyland hotel, so i’m relaxing in a bed that’s not mine. i need to get to work soon; i have proofreading to do, but for now it’s relaxytime.

i’ve been on an adventuretrip for a little while - on sunday i took a bus to the train to portland, then headed over to the zine symposium. the symposium was was pretty delightful - even if i was only there for a little while. it’s probably for the best, because had i been there longer, i’d only have managed to spend even more money. as it is i spent too much, but i also traded some of my button stock, and that comes together to mean that i have a pretty lot of awesome stuff. it was weird for me to be at the symposium because i really have no idea where to start with zines. i mean, there are *so many* that it’s overwhelming - even when it’s just single people with multiple zines they’ve written at one table it’s tricky figuring out which one of theirs i want. because they’re all awesome exciting promising.

so, um. end zine symposium tangent. i left my atm card in a machine up there, i realized as i went to pay for my dinner at the portland airport. fortunately i had enough cash, so was allowed to get on my plane to san diego.

in san diego i… bought a car. and filled it up with a bunch of my stuff. and then drove it up here.

full circle so far. on friday i’m driving up to san francisco, staying the night there, then picking up mr. butter banana saturday morning and heading to olympia, where i will take the giant step of… moving in with my boyfriend. i’m excited and worried and hopeful and we’ll see how it all goes.

i need to get a job.

i didn’t get the job. i mean, i might get the job in the future. but they’re not going to hire me as immediately as they had suggested. so i’m frustrated, and not sure where to go from here with some of my plans.

nat came home today and excitedly announced that he was surprising me with dinner guests (or an invitation to be dinner guests? i wasn’t paying too much attention, because). the response he got was perhaps not as he expected, as it involved me groaning (and whining!) in a fetal position. after consultation with said potential dinner companion as to where a low income health clinic could be found (yay after-hours and the lack of health insurance) and a visit to the doctor (i hate doctor visits), it was determined that i had a bladder infection. go go team awesome. i’m feeling a little better now, still not-so-great but stunned by nat’s rockstardom around a medical ‘emergency’ and the related anxiety/incompetence that builds in me around medical situations.

it was my mom’s birthday yesterday! it sounds like she had a great day, which is what she deserves. part of the frustration with changing plans is that i was hoping to see her this weekend, and now i’m not sure if i should head down there or not.

those are the things on my mind, this 3:35am. i’m heading back to sleep, and hope that your rest is better than mine.

although it’s been raining wonderfully for the past seven hours, and that’s perfect.

i’m almost afraid to tell you about how things are going well and seeming to come together, because it seems like whenever i tell you that things fall apart again. but. i’m pending on a job, have a pretty-sure-thing place to live, and am going to probably buy a car sometime next week. yes, after a summer of not growing up, this is where we get to. more plans, but pretty secure plans.

i’m still feeling pretty young, so recently graduated and recently smitten. every time i tell myself i’m not going to get seriously involved with somebody… i do. i mean, i was single for a year this time, which is… better for me than the, what, month or two between my last big relationships? but i’m surprised that i’m letting myself fall this hard. i’m trying my best to trust, but also to be prepared for implosion at any point. i think we both are.

so yeah. staying in olympia for a while. this boy also dreams of running off to amsterdam, so maybe (when our powers combine!) we can make that happen at some point.

i need to head to sophie’s house to water her plant. i like when she’s gone and i can sleep at her house, but i like even more when she’s in town and i can spend time with her! i have this evil plan that by being her only friend left in town, i can be her newbestfriend. don’t tell her, though. i’m keeping it on the down-low. only telling the internet, nobody else.