Simple Pleasures

Who knew a trip to the post office would be so fun? We just had to run in to mail the garage door opener to the new owners of our old house. (Yes, we SOLD our house and it officially closed July 25th, after being on the market since last August! Whew!) Outside, there were some lovely mud puddles in the gravel driveway, and Elodie was sporting her new rain boots that we scored from garage-saleing over the weekend and Xander had just gotten a new little boat at library story time, so we really couldn't help but spend some time splashing around. The boat did not float, but Xander didn't seem to mind--he had fun just throwing rocks and making huge splashes. He was even able to skip some rocks in these giant Alaskan-sized puddles. It has been raining for about 2 days, after all. While we were playing, the sun came out and it was one of those moments of simple pleasure that made me wonder, "how could it get any better than this?"

Well, Hazel started to realize that she was being ripped off because I wouldn't put her down to let her splash in the mud puddles and taste the rocks, so she and I started chasing Xander around to distract her from her woes. As Xander ran over to the edge of the forest (forest is pretty much everywhere in Delta Junction), he shouted, "Ooooh, strawberries!" We've had lots of fun discovering and picking wild strawberries around here, so Elodie ran up to get in on the berry picking action. Then Xander said, "No, raspberries!" And he was right. These were the first wild raspberries we've discovered, and it was actually quite a jackpot. After we picked all the ripe ones off of the first little bush, we meandered a bit deeper into the forest and kept finding more and more. We spent the next half hour eating and collecting raspberries in Hazel's bottle that I found in the car.

There were actually enough raspberries that Xander and Elodie were able to save some to bring home. Elodie thought of the yogurt we have brewing here at home and got pretty excited about having fresh wild raspberries with homemade yogurt for breakfast. Xander and Elodie both declared that it was the best, BEST day! Does it get any better than this?

Internet Dependence

When we moved to rural Montana in the winter and "finally" got internet after a week, I said to myself that it really didn't matter how small the town or how removed I was from my family--with the internet, I have the whole world at my fingertips, right?

So you can imagine my dismay when after talking with Alaska Communications Services at least 6 times in the last 2 weeks, I was informed that although our house is all set up for DSL and the previous occupants had it, they are not allowed to sell it to us because demand exceeds supply in our little town; they oversold and it is affecting the speed of DSL for those lucky enough to have gotten in on it. No soup for you! They have a device that lets your PC get Wireless Internet like smart phones have, but they said that in our particular area, that would probably be about as slow as dial-up. So there's satellite internet we could get, but the equipment and installation cost is $775. Are you kidding me? Thus, we are continuing to limp along with Aaron's smart phone and the library.

Oh, how I miss internet at home. Blogging after the kids go to bed, or at least while Hazel is taking a nap and not crawling all over my lap here at the library. Apparently, it's making me feel rather disconnected from my family. I had a dream the other night that I was visiting my sister Marliese and she had had a little baby boy. I was shocked--"you never told me you had a baby?!" "Yeah I did, he was born last November. We named him Mitchell." "No, seriously, I never heard a thing about it." I'm just saying, that better not happen!!

I want to skype and blog and do all those things to minimize the miles. The fact that this feels like such a trial for me makes me realize just how internet dependent I've become. Kinda pathetic, huh? Millions of people have led perfectly happy lives without it. I guess I'm just supposed to enjoy the simplicity of life up here and the quality time with our nuclear family. Maybe I'll be able to be a much better mom without that distraction. Maybe it'll be refreshing to be kinda disconnected. Maybe?