November 16, 2025 Sunday

Greetings!

Another busy week unpacking.  Lots of pictures!  Made a lot of progress.

First, though, it was really bothering me--when did Allie start turning gray?  I went back to look and I didn't have to look far.  This was a picture right after we moved mid-August.

By around September...a little bit on one side.

October was showing some more...

...by November!  How weird!

The move was more stressful on Allie than I ever imagined--lol!  Turned her gray.  OR--the face off with Blink, who wanted to attack her, made a bigger impression than we thought.  

Was a busy Tuesday.  The furnace guy was here at 9:30 in the morning.  All is well with the furnace and set for the winter.  The boys were off school and Leah was home.  Leah had a few hours before they were going to an event at the Zoo...so she got several things done on the Leah list.  My bidet is working!  (Really startling and strange at first, but I do like it!)  She put up my magnetic knife holder.  And surprised me with the shelf unit below that she found at IKEA last time she was there.  Love it!

She moved some things up into the higher shelves in the kitchen for me and we did some planning to order some additional shelving for the kitchen cabinets and the bathroom cabinet...and to get another shelf or two for the laundry room.  (Since she wants to add shelves, I don't need to organize the pantry in there right now.)

She was going to put the larger lazy susan she had gotten for under the kitchen sink in there for me...started to take everything out...and discovered it was still leaking!  You may recall they came out and couldn't find anything before.  She called them again and they said they would come out later in the afternoon that very day.

Two guys showed up again but one was older this time.  (Sometimes there is wisdom with age.)  They monkeyed around a long time and finally found the culprit of the slow, minor leak. Water from above sitting around the edge of this plug (for if you want to add a soap dispenser or something) will leak down below.  (McFamily are all really splashy.)

The only way to seal it would be to silicone it, but that wears out and needs to be replaced every so often.  Plus if they did that today they would have to charge us, but if they didn't--no charge.  He said some sinks are just built this way and don't have enough protection from above.  He told us he had a sink with two plugs on it at home and his wife has to put washcloths over them and be careful about spilled and dripped water.  (Figures that a plumber's wife is dealing with this at home--like when I lived with a guy who worked in a grocery store who could never remember to bring home milk or bread--or my aunt's car always needing something fixed for ages when her husband was a mechanic--lol!)  No silicone for us.

Anyways, for now I put the drain plug over it that has a rubber gasket around it.  Leah already found a different kind of plug online to order that can be screwed down tight from beneath so it shouldn't leak.

Was an eventful day.  When they came back from the Zoo Leah came down and organized all the stuff under the sink for me!  Nice!

I've been trying to trick Allie into learning what steps are.  Putting her treats on the top step so she has to stand on them at least.

They aren't really cat treats.  It's a different brand of cat food that she doesn't get but I found out she would actually eat--lol!

Has she gone beyond the first step?  Not sure.  I put a few kernels on the seat of the red chair in front of the cat bed.  She ate them but I missed it.  I know she didn't go up into the cat bed, though.  Will keep trying.  The joke is now that even if she and Blink got along Allie probably wouldn't be able to figure out how to get upstairs--lol!  She was definitely an apartment cat before I got her--lol!

Now that I got my knives out of the drawer, I was able to shift things around and make one drawer for my towels.  Was thinking I would have to donate some of them.  So, that's nice.  And I had room for my little cloth napkins, too!

I got the folding tables cleared off once again by Thursday.

Temporarily moved the rollie carts over by the hutches.

The kitchen is looking good!  More counter space and is now feeling more "normal".

Dagan hauled out nine more boxes on Thursday night.

The boys were down with a package that came for me.  (The little red trays came and came early--end of the tray saga!!)  Liam always leaves his artistic mark on the frig arranging the magnets.

Ian had his recorder from music class with him.  I was unpacking.  Liam asked if he could take the Amazon box and packing paper upstairs to make a fort.  Sure!

Ian asked for paper and a pen to write down notes so he could compose some music on his recorder.  They just learned the notes in school and he was really interested.  Sure!  Turned out Ian was down here for a couple of hours.  He was asking my opinion on which notes went together better and writing down the sequence.  Since he was so intrigued by the recorder...I got out my kalimba to show him.  The four things on the side are magnets you can use to stick the kalimba on a box for better resonation.

Which is how I have kept it for maybe 20 years.

I know nothing about how to play notes or read music...but it sounds so melodic and calming you almost can't make it sound bad even just plucking away randomly on it.  So, that is what non-musical me has done every so often over the last couple decades...just played with it.  

Anyways, Ian LOVED it!  Worked better for his smaller hands without the box.  He wanted to compose something.  Made up a little ditty and practiced it.  Then recorded it on his phone (several times till he got it right) so he could bring it up and show Mama and Daddy and Laim.  

He stayed and played more with the Kalimba.  I showed him kalimba players on YouTube and actually found the company I bought it from so 

!long ago...Kalimba Magic.  Things have changed so much!  

[The last two paragraphs--Blogger went absolutely nutty out of the blue and then wouldn't let me fix what it did.  If I backspaced it would backspace the line above or below--just weird!  Anyways, I wanted to add that there are so many kalimba things online these days--for sale and on youtube!!]

Then Ian remembered Liam had wanted me to come up to see his fort--but it had been just when my back had given out with the unpacking and I had to sit and rest it for a good long while.  Ian said he could go upstairs and make a video of the fort and actually go inside, which I couldn't anyways.   And so he did!  That was great.

Then he showed me he had a kind of metal detector app on his phone...and he was beeping all over my apartment...and seeing how far away it had to be to beep (in a very annoying manner, BTW) and could it detect through the top of an end table...until he finally had to go upstairs to eat dinner and get ready for bed.  Really reminded me of our Gramma Days!!  Another reason I want to get moved in and unpacked and organized...so I won't spend all my energy every day on doing that, you know?  So I can spend some time with the boys and playing with art or making cards.  Something to look forward to, for sure.  :)

So much so that I worked off and on all day on Friday on those nine boxes.

Just kept sticking things in drawers--lol!  Trying the best I could to put like things together.

Also stopped and did some flower petals here and there.  They have to dry in-between anyways.

I finished the nine boxes and late Friday night Dagan brought out the last six living room boxes!

Petals here and there...not good, but good for my soul.  Not the best paper and not used to these brushes, but I knew that would be the case and don't care--lol!  :) :)

There is a lot to do in the studio!  My part will be done for now.  But they have to finish putting together the bookcases (another top layer up high), move things around, find the rest of the furniture that's already together, put together the matching wall shelf unit--then they go up on the walls in the corner--and the tables put back together.

The four U-Haul boxes left in there are mostly books.  Not going to unpack those yet as I don't know if they will go in the studio or the living room.  So, there's a lot of things to move out of the studio to get them out of the way for the finishing of that room.

Once I get done with the last six boxes we can move some things out on the folding tables for the time being.  Note: under the table in the center are the stack of shower curtain containers!  I was too sore to switch them when I found them...but will soon.  You betcha!!  ;)

Oh, and the U-Haul box under the table is the second donation box started.  

I did get the basic flower done...or done enough to move on to a new blank page.  ;)

Allie also likes to watch from the bathroom when I am painting.  She likes those soft rugs in there.

Unpacked the huge memory foam pillow and the blanket I had put on top for Allie before we moved.  She was happy to find that under the table!  LOL!

This is how far I have gotten with the last "L" boxes.  Two boxes unpacked--one put away, one not yet.

This is what is waiting once we get the studio finished and ready for unpacking.  The storage area across from my front door is pretty full!  Most of this is mine.

See...some of the studio furniture is back in this storage area buried under boxes.

And way back in the corner is the wall shelf unit that has held so many of my bottle, tube, and jar paints for about a decade.

Was so surprised they still sold them...so there will be two of them up on the walls in the studio.

Leah came across this round rug and thought it looked so much like my rugs in the apartment she asked if I would like it at the bottom of the stairs outside my door.  Sure!!  She slid over the orange one she'd put down here just for something to be there and arranged some plant pots to hold it down to uncurl it.  May need some other kind of carpet tape for this one, eh?  It is a lot like my rugs, isn't it?  Nice!

So, another week behind me and I am almost done unpacking the boxes that were in the studio!  Oh, and I did find the box with my special little brown teapot!  Way in the corner of the tables where I can't reach it yet, but I will show you.  Probably the last box I unload...for a while, anyways.  Now I will have to wait for Dagan and Leah to get the studio all organized and finished being put together.  I was going to say that I will use this break to get used to these quill paint brushes--but yesterday I spied the box that came over early with my paint brushes in it sitting on one of the studio hutches...lol!  I could dig out some of my favorite brushes if I feel so inclined.  Doesn't really matter so much on this cheaper paper.  The paper may make it harder to do the transparent flowers (no matter what brush I use) but I could do other things.  Would be fine for pen and watercolor, I bet.  Yup--I want to get these boxes emptied and put away from on the tables and then have a nice break.  Hopefully not too long of a break...but that is out of my hands.

Anyways, I am not moving too fast today after all the boxes I did this last week, but I did get the crock pot going for some hamburger stew.  I should reach the milestone of finishing boxes that were in here in the apartment this week.  That's a big one!  Then it's onward to the storage area boxes.  It would be so nice to be unpacked before Christmas...even if things are shoved here and there.  Can deal with getting better organized later, right?  Till next week, my friends...best to you and have a really wonderful week!  :)