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My weekend May 19, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Home wreckers , 11 comments

Saturday

Sunday

The Trees Speak–Part 3 May 16, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Current Affairs , 1 comment so far

(ah-ha! Omegamom is right about Karma)

Jay and Ray discussed some of the costs. Now these people still had lawn furniture in their living room. NOT KIDDING YOU! Turns out to cut down the trees cost $10K. Julie wanted the yard leveled, Ray didn’t. However, Julie won that argument. Numbers like $30K were running around. These numbers just didn’t make sense! To kill trees? 

The stumps were removed, the yard leveled. A sprinkler system was added (Hello? I thought the yard was too wet!) and new grass planted. We stopped mowing the front corner of the lot out of spite so they would have to do it.

One day, I noticed that Ray hadn’t been around much lately. I checked with our neighborhood gossip group and it turns out that Ray left her. Yes, they were getting a divorce! Suddenly there was a flurry of activity around Julie’s house. Now think about this, a 4 bedroom colonial, with a full basement, 2 car garage, and an extra room between the kitchen and garage for 1 person. And a dog. We miss Ziti the dog.

Julie had the following done: All rooms repainted (in purple), the house painted from yellow with white trim to white with purple and black trim. All electric redone. Kitchen redone (with purple glass tiles and purple light fixtures). Did I mention the purple? New massive stove. 52 inch plasma tv. I swear, Ray must have paid her a ton to get that divorce!

In June, last year, we got an email from our buyer broker. He still emails us property info. He said that our neighbor was selling the house and could we tell him about it. ???? We found out that  yes, Julie was selling her house on craigslist! For (sit down, especially if you are in a small city) $699,999. Jay and I laughed out loud at that price.

This April, she sold the house (the rumor was about $630,000-which would be a loss for her given how much money she threw into the place). We now have new neighbors. Ones that wave to us! Who smile! I love it!

And we plan on adding two more trees next year…and to add even more if we make an addition to our house.

I think the trees are happy too!

The trees speak–Part 2 May 15, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Life...otherwise , 5 comments

We had a very crazy moving day. My friend was having a memorial for her stillborn Trisomy 18 son. My MIL was in town to help with the move, we asked a friend to stay at our old house with the movers because we had the memorial to attend. We did all of this.

We threw Soleil in a box. Because we could. We slowly got the house together. My friend’s mother-in-law and mine set up our kitchen. I still don’t get how they set it up.

On April 6, I finally got around to hanging a shower curtain that wasn’t musty in our shower. As I stood on my tiptoes on a step stool to hang the pressure rod, my calf muscle ripped. I heard it before I felt it. I spent the remainder of my birthday in the hospital trying to determine if I broke a bone, ripped the Achilles or if I had ripped the muscle. 3rd degree tear. I was on crutches for weeks.

The house next to ours had sold about the same time ours did. We moved in about the same time. The owners were Ray and Julie (not their real names) and they were a quiet couple. We had decided against that house because it was so big, and it needed lots of repairs. Every room needed to be repainted in ours, but in that house, every room also needed wall repairs. They spent the first year fixing up the interior while we tried to do the same while I hobbled on crutches.

One day, we saw that Julie was marking trees on their yard with orange ribbons. We went over and asked. They were planning to remove a few trees because their basement was so wet. (huh?) Julie explained that the trees must be preventing the sun from soaking up the water in the ground, therefore, they were removing trees (anyone else see the problem here? Anyone???) We were concerned because our yard is lower than theirs and some of the trees they marked were close to our border. We drew up an agreement that if we agreed for them to remove three trees that were at the edge of the property, they would replace it with a flowering tree. We came home one day and found the trees gone. About 30 trees. The beautifully treed property was now just filled with stumps.

We couldn’t believe it. All stumps. Yucky dead stumps. We were shocked by the loss. It was as if someone had ripped out our souls. It was horrifying. I admit, I cried. Over the next few weeks, Jay would talk with Ray about things. Turns out, he didn’t want to pay for stump removal. He didn’t realize how horrible it would look. Then after about 5 weeks, they got the property surveyed.

The front corner where we had been mowing was suddenly revealed to be on THEIR side, but the three trees that they removed, the ones we signed an agreement about? Completely, totally on our property. OMG! The survey was so they could level the land and remove the stumps. Because the three stumps were on "our side" they refused to remove them. And they started to yell at us for mowing the front corner.

good.

 

(Images from GlobeXplorer (copywrited?)

April 2001

We were so upset by the turn of events, that we bought three trees to put on that side of our property, two evergreens and 1 Japanese dogwood. Julie screamed at us when they were planted. "We just got rid of the stupid trees! How dare you plant them so close to our property!" I was good. I WANTED to give her the finger, but I didn’t. I was good.

(see why we were upset? SEE???)

The trees speak—part 1 May 14, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Life...otherwise , 2 comments

Several years ago, we had a screaming insane bouncing baby girl. Jay’s family (aka the towering behemoths) came to visit. We quickly realized we needed a bigger house. We started the house search in September. After visited house after house after house, I was getting discouraged. To be honest, I enjoyed the McMansions (ducking from the readers!), but the layouts were less than desirable. Either the dinning room was set funny, or the living room was from to back, which I don’t like. It just didn’t work!

Finally, we saw several houses in our current town. There were two houses on one street that were both for sale. The neighbors decided to move to a retirement community together. The first house was a split entry and the second was a full colonial with a basement. We walked through both. The second was about $65K more than the first. Soleil needed a bottle and I sat on the couch of the lower level of the first house. The paneled walls gave me the willies and the bar (yes BAR) was a little weird. But slowly, I could see this becoming our house! I really could.

Jay and I decided on an offer. The night before we were to put it in, I was wallowing in my PPD. I had just been diagnosed and I was panicking. Jay called our broker and canceled the offer. Then he had a trip for a meeting. A friend came over for an evening and we talked about the house. I told her my fears and slowly worked through them. When Jay got back, I told him that we needed to put in an offer. One offer. Take it or leave it. We arranged a sliding price scale (stupid of us) for different closing dates. Now I know that we should have closed earlier and gotten work done before we moved in. They took our offer.

We moved in March 31. The house was warm and welcoming. It needed some work (read pull down that damn wallpaper) and I needed to paint the downstairs and REMOVE THE BAR, but we had a new, and larger space.

Watching the rain May 13, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Depression , add a comment

The other night, I was in bed, resting on Jay’s chest. I listened to his heart, his breathing and then I sighed.

He asked "what’s going on?".

And I said "I’m angry"

And I was. I was angry at depression. My depression is cyclic, often tied to my menstrual cycle, as it is with most women. As our chemicals bounce up and down, we see our depression coming towards us and disappear. When I see it coming towards me, I get ANGRY. Why do I have to get depressed? WHY?

I have a great family, a great life. WHY WHY WHY????

It is like watching a horror movie. You see the stupid thing that the person is about to do. You yell at them to stop! For the love of peanut butter and chocolate, STOP! But they do it anyway. That is what it feels like to me. I see the depression coming. I am furious that it exists, horrified that it is moving at me and I can’t move, yet I can’t stop it. I can’t turn away.

And then you find you can’t put the emotions into words. As hard as you try, you can’t do it.

 

And today’s winner of silly holiday goes to… May 11, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Current Affairs , add a comment

MOTHER’S DAY!

 Yes, a whole day dedicated to MOM! You know MOM!

Listen, I would rather get a kiss from a kid who just finished roasted garlic hummus…

I would rather get a silly card with an "I love you because you read to me and Luna"…

I would rather make you scones for breakfast…

I would rather play and explore with you…

Than be the center of attention because the calendar said to.

Happy Mother’s day. Every day.

Droopy May 10, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Current Affairs, Depression , add a comment

 

PSA: Books About the Ice Age May 8, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 1 comment so far

IF you should allow your 5 year old child to select her own books out of the public library and she happens to choose a 3rd grade level book on the Ice Age and it should happen to mention the animal diatryma, DON’T READ IT BEFORE BEDTIME. She is still awake and telling me she is scared that it will come and rip her apart!

 

Oy vey! 

I’m an astronomer, Jim, not an arborist! May 8, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Current Affairs, Kids , 1 comment so far

Since the snows have left and the flowers have first poked out of the ground, the girls have been asking Jay and I to identify EVERY fricken flower on the planet. And trees. Don’t forget the trees. Now, I can figure out the basics, the maples, the oaks, the pines, the beech. I know which tree in our yard is a dogwood (because we planted it two years ago). Yesterday, Luna found a beautiful tree covered with pink blossoms. I believe it is an apple tree and that it was an apple blossom. But I am not sure… Sigh…

I guess I need to learn alot more about trees, eh?

Luna’s teacher stopped me today as I was dropping her off. Apparently a student spilled something all over the table and made a mess. Luna shook her head and said "Oy Vey!". All of the other kids looked at her and asked about it. She said "That’s what Jewish people say when you make a mess!"

This morning I fed my kids Pop Tarts. I hang my head in shame. and then I gave them each a glass of milk. As I turn to get my cereal (the only true breakfast food) I hear a clunk of plastic and the girls yell L’chaim! as they are clinking their glasses together.

Ah….

 

Playing Favorites May 7, 2008

Posted by spacemom in : Life...otherwise, Kids , 2 comments

The interstellar Medium is - a fortune teller from Alpha Centuri

My former adviser had a question on his Astronomy 101 test that asked what the Interstellar medium was. My favorite choice was "a fortune teller from Alpha Centuri".  It always made me think of my favorite book, "A Wrinkle in Time" . One chapter is devoted to a visit to a Happy Medium. I love this chapter as the characters get to explore themselves and their companions.

Recently, Soleil asked for a visit to the local library. I said yes and she excitedly selected 4 books. One of the books was "A Wind in the Door", the third book about the Murry family from "Wrinkle". I told her that the book was a llittle above her level, but if she really wanted it, we could start with the first book, "Wrinkle".

Over 4 days, we read this book together. My girls curled next to me while I tried to use proper intonations for Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who and Mrs. Which. I didn’t even try to pronounce the Greek quotes of Mrs. Who. I did draw out the words for Mrs. Which. We covered the whole grounds of love, caring, math, tessering, and five dimensional space.

Soleil often interrupted to ask what words meant. At first she enjoyed the idea of all of the children bouncing balls and jumping rope in rhythm, until she realized they had no choice. Luna got scared when she discovered the true nature of IT.

But in the end, love won out and everyone returned home to land in the twins broccoli patch.

And I have now introduced the girls to my favorite book of all time.