Rachael Eliker's Blog, page 42

Uncharted

Hercules joined us on our nature walk.One of our favorite Sunday family pastimes is to go on nature walks together. At our other houses, we'd visit the animals or discover new plants (like our giant, delicious smelling blue moon wisteria) and now that we're in a new house with new property, we have a whole new set of adventures awaiting us.
So, after we had called the grandmas, we decided to go explore a practically uncharted part of our property. It doesn't sound like much, but thirteen acres...

The Boy Who

So proud to be two!It seems like only yesterday that our hardy, handsome, happy boy Henry was born but somehow, we blinked and he's already two! While he certainly is a strong willed, independent kid, deep down, he always has been. It's just now, he can really express himself. He's talking up a storm, often wanders off in search of adventures, can play incredibly rough (just ask his sisters how hard he can bite) yet be one of the most tender, soft-hearted children I know. Seriously, you shoul...

New Harmony

It's been a week since we moved out of our beloved home in Clayton and started off on a new adventure over in Martinsville. All in all, the process, while it had it's rocky, nail-biting and anxiety-inducing days, went as well as expected. Selling our house was a breeze compared to buying the new house--the couple was, unfortunately, going through a divorce and quite obviously didn't want to have to sell, resulting in attempts to make the process very taxing for us. We're talking abo...

Get Moving

This was in my fortune cookie recently: I agree. It's about time. So we've started.  One thing: packing and moving is tiring. Nap first, anyone?

Lasts

Our beautiful Indiana mansion.This coming week is the week: we're moving. Everyone is excited and busily working to be ready but I wouldn't be honest if I didn't admit it's all a bit bittersweet. Every time we move away from somewhere, whether it's something we've known about for years, like when Jack finished up school and Iowa and we relocated to Indiana for work, or whether it's a move that's come quite unexpectedly, like this move, that came about within a matter of weeks, I always c...

Extraction

So. Much. Honey.As if we weren't busy enough packing up an entire farm worth of things, Jack mentioned that we should probably harvest a couple of the hives so we didn't lose the honey when we transport the bees (don't even ask me how Jack's planning on doing that). The first night, Jack did the Italian hive, that turns out, was missing a queen and was quickly dying. Most likely, they are the bees who swarmed and made their home in the hive up front and though ants, wax worms, and wasps were...

School, Take One

In the blink of an eye, Evelyn and Claire were finishing up kindergarten and second grade and it was time for summer to start. But, in a matter of a few weeks, we felt prompted that it was time to move, we found a house we loved, finished our major home improvement projects and shortly after that, began the grueling showing, buying/selling, inspecting, appraising, and packing. And just like that, summer was already over and the girls were starting first and third grade.
It's amazing how many k...

There Are Marshmallows

It's amazing how fast our living room went from this...  ...to this. Now that all the rocky negotiations are over with, we've been given the green light to pack. First, we have been raiding our local Menards on an almost daily basis, picking out the best boxes for packing and hauling them home. They give them to us for free, which may have something to do with how much money we've spent there over the past decade. That or because we're willing to dig through the recycling bin to find them....

Finally Summer

Our neighbor giving everyone a ride back after they helped unload the brush.All summer, I've felt kind of bad for my kids. It seems like we've barely done anything fun because we've been so preoccupied with fixing and cleaning the house in preparation for showings, inspections, appraisals, and ultimately selling the house that we've had little time left for those happy summer memories. Thank goodness most of the house stuff is done and this past week, we had visiting family, which always guar...

Timber!

Thank goodness for lifts!Since we're mostly done with the house prior to selling our house, we had to turn our attention to a couple of the nearby trees who'd died from the emerald ash borer (I seriously loathe those insects and the devastation they spread). The once tall, proud, full-canopied ash trees were reduced to dead timber in a matter of years once they were fully infested.
Before we had considered moving, we had toyed with the idea of knocking down the two trees because they were...