Fun road trip up to the cabin with Sarah & Ida! Harry Potter audiobook, interesting conversation, and the excitement of heading out of town. 🙂

Road trip adventure..tree down over the road that leads to the cabin…fell down in the 4 hours between Alisa’s arrival and ours. Thanks for the chainsaw rescue, Bob! 😉

Cabin welcome. Arrived just in time for steak dinner. What?!? Oh yes, so happy Alisa & Bob were celebrating their anniversary in style. Lucky us! Happy Anniversary. Thank you! 🙂

Cabin cabinating. Coffee on the porch, listening to the wind in the trees, birds wings, chipmunk sounds. Smelling the woodsy air. So so good.

Cabin walking. Trees. Mushrooms. Trees.

You’ll notice some changes in the look of this blog in the coming days. I’m making some changes and playing with some new features. Thanks for your patience while the site undergoes who knows what kinds of goofiness! 😊

If you’re looking for a giggle today, you might check out this article. A few of these tweets made me laugh out loud. Happy Tuesday, folks!

100 Funny Parenting Tweets

As always, my days are filled with people and places, sights and sounds, and critters and creations that fill me with joy. Here are a few from the past couple weeks.

Sharing Ida’s 3rd birthday with other folks who adore her. 🎉🎈🎉
Singing with Pam, Peggy, and Mary Kay. What a wonderful treat!!

Listening to Sarah and Ida play the “I love….” game. So sweet!

Calli the katydid (so named because Ida says she looks like a callipitter!!) who seems to live in our kitchen.

Game night with Katie, Cina, Sarah and Janene and Eric. So. Much. Fun!!

Good doc appts – weaning off 2 meds now! Woohoo!

Fun and funny meetings with clients.

No-meeting days. 😉

Our ever-changing windowsill menagerie.

Newly vacuumed floors! (Right up there with clean sheets fresh from the dryer.)

Super entertaining work chats with Sara.

Playing with Ida, who enjoys putting on lotion (“it’s so cozy!”) after squeezing it out of the tube in a rainbow shape. 🌈

Getting my hands and feet dirty while playing in the garden.

Clean hands and feet after that. 😁

Ever-improving fence-line garden. So pretty!

Pouring rain. Thunderstorms. Sprinkles. Gullywashers.

Rainbows and petrichor.

Sunshine.

Chickens!!

So many wonderful visits, dinners, walks, coffees, meetings, appointments and adventures with the beautiful people in my life. I am continually amazed at my incredible luck in being surrounded by the best people. Wowsers!

Somatic Experiencing training with Terri. I can already see how helpful this is going to be for me.

Painting with toddlers. Purple footed fun! 😄

Newly painted living room complete with new light fixtures, curtain rods, outlets & light switches. I feel like a princess surrounded by beautiful things. 👑

Cheezy girls – friends for more than 30 years. Lucky us!

Friends who really get me…and give me t-shirts that prove it. 🤣

Fantastic appts with my docs and Luna’s doc. For me – no colonoscopy for at least 9 months — maybe even a whole year!! For Luna – meds for her UTI (and fewer messes for me, then!)

Our chickens’ first field trip outside. So much fun!

Slappy-Flashy singers and cute boob jokes.

I know I say it all the time, but I am humbled and amazed by the people in my life. ❤️ Not sure how I got so lucky, but I am going to notice and appreciate every moment of it.

I so appreciate this article: It’s Not About Race. It is a beautifully clear and poignant explanation of how systemic racism came about, what it does, and the ways I unwittingly participate in it. Because I am white and therefore enjoy the privilege that has resulted from normalizing Western European behaviors and ideas, it takes some work for me to understand how and why this happened. Still more work to understand how I perpetuate the system and what I can do to change it. I SO appreciate smart people willing to explain it to me in a way I can absorb. #grateful

What lovely weather the past few days! Sunshine and thunderstorms in perfect balance (for my taste, anyway)!

I know I mentioned this before, but OMG chickens!!

You can see our little baby in actions on my Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/dianakorpi/videos/10155503536178851/

Uh, the date! I mean really. 7/17/17 is pretty freaking awesome.

More chicken coop progress despite the hot hot hotness. You are the best, Mckenzie. 😊

Having had really good energy for several months now. Every day that I walk more than 12,000 steps (most days the past few months) I am SO grateful to have the energy to do that. I am appreciating the hard work my heart is doing to let me live such a good, rich life. ❤️

Surplus energy during cabin week – even got to play tether ball (which is hilarious. I am not tall.) and go for walks and canoe and paddleboat rides. What a change from last summer. And what a thrill!!

Um, chickens. Chickens! You guys. They are so amazing!

I haven’t been posting very regularly, but it’s mostly because I am so busy appreciating all the goodness of my life that I forget to share it with you. 💕

If you haven’t seen a post from me in awhile, you can assume that I am appreciating some or all of the following…

Family and friends who fill my heart and my days with joy.

Special events, regular events, silliness, sweetness, surprises.

Weather in all its glorious states. Okay, maybe not the sticky hot humid weather. On those days, you can assume I am very, very busy appreciating AC. So hard. 😉

Fun interactions with people I don’t know, unexpected laughs and smiles, amusing and amazing sights and sounds, memories of hilarity and the making of more such memories, animals, flowers, sunshine, food, coffee, art, learning, growing, making and learning from mistakes, games, laughter, shared time and space, and all the little things that make our lives easier, more comfortable, more interesting, more full.

And for the next few months, you can be sure I will be appreciating (many times a day) our CHICKENS! O M G. So in love.

 

More Lego fun.

Sunday morning box fun with Ida.

More progress on Project Chickens. Mckenzie has been hard at work every day, rain or shine. It’s amazing!

Guess what? I can cook! And bake! This week we enjoyed lemon chicken, fried rice, peach-strawberry pie, and enchiladas (next time I’ll use only 2 serranos. My English/Finnish background has not prepared me for that kind of HOT.) 😉

Getting to make and enjoy said deliciousness with my favorite people. 💙

Mini pies to test out new recipes. Strawberry+black raspberry=Yes! Strawberry+banana and strawberry+nectarine=meh. Just FYI.

The most adorable, funny, awe-inspiring, wonderful roommates. Srsly. So. Much Cuteness.

Old saw + new blade = lumber cutting success!

An abundance of black raspberries. Thanks to Mckenzie’s pruning last year, we can actually reach them to harvest this year!

The latest addition to my office wall o’ inspiration. See me learning to chill?! 🤣

Gorgeous weather and the energy to get in 10,000 steps most days! Way to go heart. Maybe I can keep you!! 😁

Drinking coffee and watching morning storms with the family.

Post-storm puddle walks.

Ida and the balloons!

Sorting through 2 more bins of stuff and donating most of it.

Newly organized and cleaned kitchen.

Sarah’s immersion blender!!

Protein smoothies (see above). 😉

Planning fun summer plans.

My Pride Month colored work spreadsheet. Because rainbow.

Good results from 2nd colonoscopy. No cancer, no surgery or new drug treatment imminent!

All the days that don’t involve colonoscopy or prep. Srsly. 😆

Field trip with Sarah to watch and learn about the printing process. SO. COOL! (And so loud!)

Strawberry picking with the family. Perfect weather for picking 30 lbs of strawberries. 😁

Batch cooking weekend with Sarah. So much done!

Fun meals with funny people.

Fresh strawberry pie with coconut whipped cream. O M G.

The successful purchasing, transporting, and installing of our new (to us), $75 stove.
Goodbye 30+ year old monstrosity! Hello new friend!

Progress on Project Chickens!