Catching Up

Lately my blog has become a tiny source of guilt. I hate tiny sources of guilt (also large sources of guilt). I keep thinking, "Oh, I need to blog about when people came and when this happened and that finished duck coup). Haven't done it. Our pictures are in three different places, my thoughts are in 100 different places, my time is focused on many things and catching-up-on-the-blog falls low down on the list.

And so I'm going to forget about the pictures on my phone and Kip's phone and the regular camera and just do what I can with what I have. Usually that involves a lot of words. Sorry. If you know me, you know that I tend to favor words anyway. And they are so very free and uncomplicated (by which I mean--they do not need to be downloaded from various electronic sources).

So at the end of March, Kip's family came (minus our brother-in-law who had work to do--bah). We had a super lovely vacation and some super lovely weather to go with it. Up to that point, it had been raining for approximately ever-since-it-stopped-snowing, and we had flooding and I was somewhat worried that they would get here and the entire city of Evansville would be one huge mud puddle (that's what we here in Evansville call early spring). But fortunately it stopped raining most of the time (though we did get at least one downpour in order to impress our Utah/California relatives). We played outside and ate outside (Kip's parents always remind me of the joys of eating outdoors) and watched birds and just had a great time. I was kind of worried that everyone would get bored and want to go do big exciting things, but most of the time the kids were just happily playing and when I asked my sister-in-law, Shelle,  if there was anything she wanted to do or if she wanted to get out of the house, she was content to just let the kids play and hang out together. That's my idea of a great vacation. We did go to McDonald's as a family, which is a tradition that my kids now fully look forward to when Grandma and Grandpa come. Shelle and I took a yoga class together and cooked our little hearts out. Kip and his parents began working on the project that would be our new front porch. And our kids are getting old enough that we could even embark upon the great Pace tradition of playing Pit. I was so so sad when they left. I always am.

A day or two after they left, we got our ducks.

And Kip worked diligently to finish our front porch, which is now so lovely and wonderful and bigger that it's hard to even remember the death-trap-of-brick-porch-that-was-falling-apart-and-crumbling-beneath-our-feet porch.

finished porch; isn't it beautiful