This is what our back yard looked like when Miriam was able to care for it. There was a big vegetable garden over the bridge to the right, which was my estate.
My garden never looked as good as Miriam's, and that was OK.
Jenny the black cat got herself into a lot of pictures. She was a good feline.

shrinking wood shop

My cabinet shop was 450 square feet in the main room.

That is way too small, but I made it work by using compact machinery and by moving assembled cabinets out of the shop immediately on completion.

It worked, but now I am shrinking that shop into a 200 square foot space. No wide belt sander, not even a chop saw. The base under the planer was reduced to about 10" including a set of good castors. The air compressor goes on a similar base with castors.

The difference is in output. The old shop was setup and designed to build kitchen and bath cabinets, using a lot of 4 by 8 foot panels, and doing the job fairly quickly. Once the cabinets for the house are finished the shop will morph into a small wood shop.

My goal in retirement is to write, to read, to do some art work AND a little wood work now and then. Not having a wood shop available has been a pain, but I have a lot of other projects.

Besides, have you seen what the outside of this place looks like? Don't look.

I have a lot of frozen blueberries.

They should have been eaten before now and they are not in their prime because of that, but they are still pretty good and will go in a lot of good food.

My kitchen is not complete here by a long shot, but it is close enough to begin doing some serious cooking!

the freezer is in place

There are a lot of ways to judge whether your house is a home and there are a lot of ways to feel like you are moved into a new place.

One of those is when the freezer and it's contents are safely put in the proper place!

I write this at 5:30 in the morning. When I went to bed the now defrosted and moved freezer was warm and I did not want to put my frozen food into it, so I went to bed with the freezer going and my food still in coolers, which I borrowed from my cousin Tom.

At 4 this morning I woke to the call of nature, and thought: "Ahh, this is the time to reload the freezer." That task is complete along with an inventory of the contents.

I need to study up on how to use a freezer really efficiently, meaning how to find the stuff after you put it in there. Not sure on that one, but it does seem that even 13 cubic feet is a LOT Of frozen food for one person.

Freezing and canning season is coming on soon. I don't have a garden here this year so there won't be any production here, but I'll buy some fruit and fresh veggies when the price is right and "put them away."

Miriam and I would have had a good time doing this together, but alas that is not the game now. I will trudge on, trying to eat well and within my budget. She taught me a lot (so did my mother and grandmothers) about canning and freezing. I am glad and I have been blessed.

What kind of a ding bat would design a house like that?
Ahh, it was me.
Originally the front of the house was a greenhouse, designed to provide solar heat. It worked exceptionally well in July and August, now the space has become nice big closets!

new day

There once was 5 happy people living in this house, now there is just me.

But it is so good to be back in my old/new house. The house is so full of good memories and I am glad for every one of them.

Miriam is being fussed over and taken better care of than I ever could. They are courteous and compassionate. I can rest assured on that one, and i do.

Once this was a house with an acre, a shop and a foot bridge over the the "creek" in the back yard. I sold the shop and acre (it was more than I could handle), the foot bridge is a memory and I have one quite small building lot and a small house.

It is enough, I am blessed. Yesterday was close to 100. The house had been closed up for a couple of weeks. But I opened it up last night and the cool Idaho night did it's work and right now it is close to being too cool in here.

That is what I thought would happen when I designed the house 38 years ago. I am not an engineer, so I did not have formulas or numbers, so I guessed, and most of the time my guesses were adequate.

So, it is good to be home, to luxuriate in my shower (the one with the big rain style shoer head that is fastened to the ceiling!

I love her

Top: Miriam at 17 on my Harley
In Portland a few years ago
Miriam  making a face at me
I love every one of your faces Miriam.

abandonment

There is no way one can leave the person they love without grief and 2nd thoughts.

The place can be the best in the world, every thing can be perfect, but when you walk out of the home where she lives I feel profoundly guilty of abandonment.

She is doing well, but when I got there this afternoon, all she could say was; "Get me out of here." I cannot begin to understand how he mind works now days (I had enough trouble for the first 50 years of our marriage!).

So I sit here wondering about the whole idea of placement. I know it is totally necessary, but I don't have to like it and I don't.