A drought

Posted by Terry McNichols

It's not often that I come to Sunday and find I don't have a post written for Monday's blog. But this week I am having a drought, along with the rest of the Pacific Northwest. As you read in Leona's Friday post, it's not all work for any of us who take our sunshine as seriously as we do here. We have been very busy playing and trying to keep cool. However, playing can be a lot of work!

My drought is brought on by the extreme busy-ness of my household currently. My daughter and family are moving to Texas for her husband's advanced schooling. This means the loss in proximity to two darling grandsons, not to mention daughter and spouse! I will need extensive sympathy/empathy while I continue to process my personal losses in the months ahead. In the meantime, however, our house is very busy. Daughter and 2 boys (3 year old and 5 month old) moved in with us a week ago and will be staying for another 10 days. We are in the thick of diapers, bathtimes, stories, "play with me's," toys everywhere -- a happy chaos this house hasn't known for some time. We have a very small, perfectly adequate house for two people. With 5 people, that does change!

In the middle of all of this, we are having a lot of fun. I am reminded of my own days as a young mother. I had almost forgotten how little free time a mother (or father) of two actually has. It is easy for us to forget how much physical labor is actually involved. With three adults in the house, we can tag team at times, but it is still an amazing amount of work to just keep the status quo. My hat is tipped to all of you parents out there.

We are cramming the days with experiences to help jog the memories of our grandsons when they are in Texas. But today is a drought day for my blog writing. I feel the drought in my soul advancing as the day for the departure of these dear little boys approaches. I'm sure this will give me plenty to write about in the future.
(Photo by Jettgirl, shared via Flickr)