We have now completed the painting in almost every room. I’ve determined that doing a mural in the living room was probably NOT my most brilliant decision. It has, however, been a relaxing way to make some progress when I’m too tired, or my legs and arms hurt too much to continue with the rolling and the “over my head” painting.

I did manage to paint the quote over the mantle that I wanted to paint (Thoreau, of course). But, I don’t know if I’m going to redo the lettering. Most of it is ok, but the first letter (a “G”) looks a little odd and it bugs me.

We made the final truck-load from the cabin to the city. The only thing left is a car load or two.

Considering how LITTLE furniture we owned, the house is coming together amazingly well. I may do a “frugal moment” blog when I finish up to share how inexpensively it was all done. I’ve found several treasure-troves — yard sales, second hand shops and consignment places — around the city that have made it far less financially taxing to set up a new home than I expected it to be.

All my beautiful furniture and antiques were stolen when they were in a storage unit in Liberty, Kentucky — way back when I moved to the farm. Since I was building a cabin (and was completely broke with the purchase of the farm and the rearing of the children), I never replaced anything. By the time I could afford to do so, I didn’t want to buy until the cabin was finished. So, I never bought anything to replace the things I lost.

Wayne had very little furniture when we married, so we get to start basically from scratch. That was a depressing thought at first, but the deals and the finds have been amazing. It’s been like a treasure hunt!

I turned off the computer and left it here at the cabin this weekend. That’s Soooooo unlike me! But it was nice to be free of the urge to check the blog, check and respond to email and work on business projects with so much home and moving stuff on my shoulders. I’ve made enough progress after this weekend that I should be able to concentrate again next week.

Wayne starts his new job today (best wishes, sweetie!) and the kids and I will be up there full time starting Friday.

I’ve been a little too busy to blog regularly. I try to run an update when I can — between the travels to and from Lexington and the long hours of painting, cleaning and preparing a new home. I did take the time to respond to a “shame on you” comment from one of my readers about my post on Russell County Education. I’m sure it is difficult to be an educator anywhere… but I stand by my belief that schools should be a place to learn, rather than a state-funded babysitting service that I neither want or need. But, my (always) vocal views seem to have raised a few eyebrows.

I hope to have things settled by the beginning of next week. Every time I think it’s almost there, something else happens and throws a wrench in the works. Maybe this time, things will go smoothly. I have managed to set up a place to work in the house for when it’s too hot or too cold to work comfortably in Serenity. It will be nice to have that option, even if I work in the mobile office most of the time. Besides, it may take a few weeks to get her moved up to the new house.

Alex is so excited about her new pet — a parakeet. It’s a good-natured, even-tempered bird and is much more loving than any parakeet I ever had. Alex is enamored, and is charmingly careful and overprotective.

She has managed to teach the bird to ride a mechanical (battery operated) walking horse that she picked up at a yard sale this weekend. It’s the funniest thing watching that bird ride the horse. (I may try to get some footage of that for the blog later.)

She’s also convinced that she will be able to teach the bird to talk. Byron has thanked me multiple times for getting her a bird, so her jabbering is not always aimed at him.

I keep reminding him that he, too, was nine once… and I keep taunting him with all the gory details of how challenging he was at that age. He was a terror at nine and rather than admit that, he simply claims that he went from being 8-years-old to being 10.

Personally, I worry that Alex will wait for her “terror” phase until she is a teenager. I certainly would rather handle it sooner, rather than later, and I just KNOW it’s coming!

I’ll dread that later… but for now, I need to get back to work.