Progress Report: Spring 2010

Although I'v e been relatively quiet lately, progress has been made on our many spring projects. I know you are burning with curiosity to know, for example, whether or not we have yet built a dock, and how my seedlings are coming along.

Way back when, on Easter weekend, it got really hot. We headed up to the land on the Friday to see what the damage to our trailer was after the winter, since we'd meant to build a little shelter over it but never got around to it. When I opened the door, it smelled no different than if we'd been there the weekend before, though it was filled with kayaks and a bunch of mouse poo. Not an excessive amount, but I can see that one or two mice had used it as their private apartment for the winter. There is one area, below a window frame, that sustained some water damage and probably began to mold, but I think it's an easy repair job, if we even bother doing it at all. I think we may just plug the hole and call it a day.

We also plotted out a spot for our dock. It won't sit right smack in front of our cottage, because right smack in front of our cottage (future cottage) is our beach, and we don't want to lose beach space, especially not with a toddler or two in our future. Also the water is quite shallow there. So, the dock will be way off to the right of our cottage view, and we may not even catch a clear glimpse of it through the trees. In its future spot, the water drops down a bit more steeply, so we will actually have something to dive into without fear of whacking our heads on the bottom of the lake.

Speaking of the dock, hey docks aren't cheap are they? I thought we were being clever building it ourselves, but by the time we purchased the floats ($1600), the hardware ($500) and the wood ($1000) this is not an inexpensive enterprise. We're not screwing around with it though – we bought the right stuff for all, because this is a major investment and we don't want to be doing repairs constantly or jerry-rigging things. It will be built using real black plastic dock floats, proper galvanized gigantic heavy-duty hardware, and cedar (western red and local white). Because our spot is so shallow, and because we want the dock to be a place where groups of people can hang out and have a good time, it's not a tiny dock either – it will be two 8x12-foot sections, hinged together (because who can maneuver an 8x24 dock into place?), plus an 8-foot long ramp (2 of those feet are on land). This dock will be 8 feet wide, and about 30 feet long, all-in. No wonder it is so costly. Anyway, soon we'll have the wood at our place and we're going to lay it all out according to our plan, mark it all up, pre-drill what we can, and figure out all the possible glitches before we get on-site, where the terrain is steep and there's no power save for what our tiny generator can produce (one tool at a time).

Also of note, and also using our 'money cannon' as my hubby likes to call it (as in "ok whatever. Load up the money cannon and fire.") We recently had new eavestrough and sofit installed on the house and I must be getting old because I was inordinately excited by it. And it actually came in under budget for once – I was thrilled. Next, our trusty handyman Stuart is coming to FINISH the siding on our house. I never want to see another piece of blue siding again. The three walls to be done are all high up, and I can no longer negotiate a ladder, so Stuart will do us the honours next week. I am also excited for this, probably way too excited. I can't wait until the damn house is finished. I'm tired of describing it as "mostly blue, but with some green walls, and the windows are mostly red but some are still white…"

Aside from all this, we moved the living room furniture around in anticipation of the baby's arrival and the moving of the t.v. from the back bedroom into the living room. Of course this will necessitate bringing in an electrician to fiddle with some wiring and install a new plug, so there's light over our couch, but whatever. The money cannon's getting a good workout this year, and things will finally be done for awhile.

The seedlings must be coming up by now, because I planted them like two weeks ago and they've been on timers ever since. I will check them tonight. I planted three varieties of tomatoes and hot cayenne peppers, so this weekend I'll put in a bunch of basil. I am a bit pissed off because my garlic started to sprout in the garden, but I have only about 5 heads – I think something ate it over the winter or in the fall. I think I may try to stick some more in while the weather's still chilly, for a bit of a later crop. I have to source some sweet potato seedlings/seed potatoes (however they grow) because I want to plant them up at the land, where on Easter weekend I cleared a spot (with a BBQ fork – I was unprepared) and planted a whole whack of onions. I have high hopes for my cottage garden.

Everything else in the garden is coming up gangbusters. It's been an early spring (probably everywhere) so things shot up early, and then stalled a bit when the weather cooled. But still, the apple trees are in bud, and the pear tree that got knocked over by Mr. Plow this winter (root ball and all, and stuck under a snowbank, so nothing even got bent) is happily replanted and growing, I believe.

We had a baby shower thrown in our honour last weekend. It was early (I was only 22 weeks) but still, it was really lovely to be spoiled rotten by our friends. We are lucky. Baby equipment is well in-hand – in fact I am off after this writing to pick up an infant car seat from my good friend Anne, who bought it last August for her baby, who was large and grew out of it quickly. The crib has been ordered and is on its way, and soon we will go and get that stroller that I've been eyeing. I officially need no more baby onesies in 0-3 month size, since I went mad and bought everything tiny that was cute and caught my eye. Our baby will be pantsless, but decked out in consistently adorable onesies. Ah well, she'll be born in August. She won't need pants for a month or two. I set up a baby registry at Babies R Us but I think I stuck a bunch of onesies on there as well because I lack control, apparently.

The belly's grown too. I'm not enormous – I am not a large pregnant woman, as it turns out. I am showing but people still give me a confused look when they see me, in certain outfits. I haven't gained all that much weight (maybe 10 lbs so far?), I still have whatever waist I used to have (not much of one to start with) and thanks to my mom, I've been dressing well. I haven't gotten sloppy yet, though I guess there's lots of time for that this summer, when the weather turns hot. I had glimpses of that on Easter weekend, when I had to dig out some horrible old shorts that were largish and fasten them with a hair elastic around the top button. It was humbling, to say the least. Mama's gotta take a trip to find some maternity shorts, and probably maternity yoga pants too, because soon my old yoga pants will no longer cut it. Here is anonymous photographic evidence:

This is long, so I will end it here. I will write again and post pictures as I promised ages ago.