Coming Together

I'm trying something new and emailing to my blog. I want to be able to update from China, but Blogger is blocked there so I'm hoping this will work. Also, I've turned on Comment Moderation which is a bit annoying, but I feel is necessary because some spam comments have found their way here. I don't want anyone to follow a link from a comment on my blog and end up on some site of dubious nature.

I feel like things are finally falling into place around here. The girls' room is painted and Evelyn has actually been sleeping in there since it was made all pretty with her dress up clothes and toys. We did not set up the crib in there because we feel Alice will want to be close to us for awhile. We haven't set up the crib in our room yet either - it remains on the list of things to do. I'm down to two lists - things I still need to pack (which gets shorter day by day,) and things that need to get done before we leave. Some if these items have to wait until the week before, so the last couple of days I have tried to relax and spend some quality time with the kids. On Wednesday the weather had warmed up a bit, so I took them to a local spray park where they have fountains and geysers and kids had a fantastic time splashing around while I started knitting a sun hat. This turned out to be quite a fast knit and I finished it up yesterday while a beef stew was simmering in the crock pot. My friend Tara D (Rain City Fiber Arts) made a grass-fed beef run to Three Sisters in Oak Harbor last month and I was surprised at how reasonable the prices were. She picked some up for me and it has been nice to have a well-stocked freezer for a change. 

Today we're taking care of some things we should have done a long time ago... Phil and I are getting our wills and power-of-attorneys witnessed and notarized. Sigh... It's something no parent wants to think about, but when you are traveling halfway around the world without your children you have to plan for the worst case scenario. I know we will miss them terribly while we are away so I'm doing my best to distract myself with pretty colors and luscious fiber. Pushing my luck here, but I'm going to try and attach two photos to this post - one of the sunhat, and one of the lovely baby sweater I finished for Alice. It is my own handspun Targhee wool, fingering weight. She won't be able to wear it outside because it will be very hot and very humid in Guangzhou, but they've told us to keep her wrapped up in the air-conditioned hotel room so she might be able to wear it inside. #