January 1: New Year, New Plans!

So we have a new year, and a new decade! Hello!

We were out of town since Tuesday (Dec 29th), at a beautiful cottage on Anderson Island, Washington. The island is only accessible by ferry, which made it an instant favorite of A's (and mine, truth be told!). The island is also not hugely developed -- only one restaurant, one general store (which doubles as the real estate office, as well). It's pretty darn charming. We were lucky enough to be able to book it with our friends, Mikey and Carrie, and Su and Todd.

Mikey and Carrie arrived up on Monday, and we drove up Tuesday. We had some early indications, though, that the cottage might have some problems: when we called the property owner to report a rusted/broken pipe in the bathroom (which rendered the sink unusable), she didn't know what to do, so she called a neighbor and the neighbor brought over a roll of black electrical tape. OK, well, G went ahead and got the parts to fix the pipe, and we figured we'd do it ourselves. Check.

We got out to the island, but had a little trouble finding the place. We called Mikey, and he confirmed that we did have to drive the van (dear god!) down the two-track, switch-backed "drive-way" down the cliff to the house. Holy crap! G, of course, had no problem with this. I was thinking about breathing into a bag.

Our room was quite lovely -- huge, comfy king-sized bed, great bedding. Enough room for a pack-and-play. Poor Mikey and Carrie (and later, Su and Todd) were stuck in very, very small rooms -- not real bedrooms -- under the roof. Mikey mentioned banging his knees multiple times when trying to roll over -- that's how tight they were in there.

Wednesday we just sorta loafed around, reading, playing games, and checking out the spectacular views. G and I had a tremendous night playing euchre (our once-in-a-decade-moment, perhaps?), and closed out Mikey and Carrie. They did have much better luck when we started switching chairs, so perhaps feng shui was against them in their original seats?

Thursday we got a little more ambitious and went to the Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium. It was nice, but raining like mad. A had a *tremendous* melt-down, which was a little traumatizing for everyone. We beat a hasty retreat for the island, hoping that we'd all feel a bit better about the situation. Su and Todd made it out, as well, which was great. They brought out some excellent soul food for dinner, which we all enjoyed.

We welcomed in the new decade with a champagne tasting (the $60 good champagne is, in fact, better than the $6 stuff--go figure!) and a heated debate as to the merits of 10-year plans and the highs and lows of the preceding decade. We didn't last much past midnight, which is perhaps not surprising.

Unfortunately, this morning, we awoke to the cottage being without water. The pipe that brings the water from either the well or the island's water supply broke this morning, and we didn't have the tools to fix it. In any case, we decided to vacate the property, as we couldn't brush our teeth, shower, or make coffee -- all, of rather significant importance. We all stopped for lunch at Red Robins, A's favorite. He wolfed down pizza and apple slices. We then drove home in a good bit of rain.

Apparently, though, we missed the annual Portland snow -- about four inches fell on Tuesday. We just caught a few flurries on the way up to the cottage.

While we were a little bummed that the cottage turned out to not work out, it was great seeing our friends for as long as we did, and now at least we'll have the weekend to get ready for the upcoming week, which promises to be an adventure, as A will be heading back to school.

By the way, G and I have deemed the purging project a great success. G took about three loads of "stuff" to Goodwill, and the house feels a lot lighter for our efforts. I still have to take back a few gifts that we ended up not giving the boys (things that I would like more than they would!), but the house is getting closer to being organized. Now, to get the Christmas presents into their "places!"

I think I mentioned this a few days ago, but my next project is to figure out a way to reduce the amount of waste that we produce at our house (including what we recycle). It's really way too much for my comfort level. Mimi and Hea's Christmas present of a bamboo compost pot will be the first part of our efforts -- all food wastes need to go into the compost bin, instead of me taking the easy way out and putting it down the disposal.