This is secretly my favorite time of year. Sure, there’s a lot of hype about summers in Seattle and it’s usually for good reason – for three to four blissful months, we enjoy sun and warmer temperatures, with incredible vistas of mountains and sparkling water seemingly everywhere you look. Sometimes the energy is so great that I half expect people to break out into song and dance. But summertime also comes with a lot of pressure. Pressure to plan a hike, go out on a boat, picnic in the park, collect blackberries, go up to the islands and eat every meal outside (with the tomatoes that you lovingly grew in your organic garden of course). So of course, when people plan a visit we always tell them, “come in the summer!”.
And they did. This year, we had 13 family members stay at our house between July and October! We’ve loved showing our family our house (some hadn’t visited in 4-5 years!) and new favorite spots around the city and it’s been a good lesson on how our house can accommodate 4-6 people at any given time. (Note to self: we really should think about adding that second bathroom in the basement.)
On top of all that, summer is also the informal start for new house projects. Even though we didn’t tackle quite as much as we had originally planned for 2011, we’re still pretty exhausted and ready for a break.
On Monday night, I snuck this picture of Kyle out in the shop (assembling his new grinder!). It was a blustery and rainy evening, but I felt a sense of calmness and anticipation for a slower pace of life. I’m sure by February I’ll be looking at flights to Hawaii, but for now – I’m good.
I’ve noticed that we tend to spend the first part of the year researching and designing, go through summer in full remodel mode, then spend the last few months decompressing and finishing up small projects. Does anyone else have this remodel cycle?
Even though we’re slowing down, we’re not putting away our work jorts (ok, the jorts are going in storage, but the jeans will stay). We have a list of smaller projects to keep us busy, some of which we’re pretty excited about. But those projects will be interlaced with lots of reading, movie watching, cooking and kitten snuggling. I can’t wait. In fact, just writing this post has officially pushed me over the edge. I’m making cocoa.