Detachment

It's crazy to me that we are just a few days away from moving. I feel like I've been packing our house for for a month - because I have been, really. "Slow and steady wins the race". 

I'm sorry to say we finished 6th grade rather uneventfully. If you can call giving away and selling half of our belongings while we crammed 7 extra days worth of classes into the past three weeks, uneventful. We did reach our goal to be done early so we can focus on the season at hand... saying good-bye to Partridge Lane. And we did go for our traditional last-day-of-school ice cream.  

Now that our agreements have been scheduled for the moving and cleaning, our orders are placed for a new kitchen, flooring and your new bed and bedding, our existing stuff is mostly boxed, the dogs and cat are all riled up, and we are ready to go, it's time to slow down even a bit more. 
It's time to take this all in and thank God. It's time to look around a last time or two and get ready to let go.

I read this beautiful post about the Moment of Detachment this morning:

"The hour of this new day is clearly defined to the dandelion globe; it is marked by detachment. There is no sense of wrenching; it stands ready, holding up its little life, not knowing when or where or how the wind that blows where it will may carry it away. It holds itself no longer for its own keeping, only as something to be given; a breath does the rest..."

I'm letting go - detaching - from the owl's and the morning birds' melody on the silence I've learned to rest in. Detaching from the sights and smells I've come to understand and thrive in these past years. From the woods. From the space. From being left alone. From forgetting about all the people and imagining we're it. 

I'm letting go and letting God guide us to whatever He desires for us. I'm looking forward to detaching from this place, these years, this story, what lay ahead here for us, and what didn't. 

I'm not quite to the readiness of grabbing on to anything else. I'm not sure if or when that will be my position at all. But I am sure we are setting sail on the wind. Making a journey to be planted again, someplace now and different - someplace away. 

I can. not. wait.   

Blueberry Bups

Son, I'm back to writing to you. With Blueberry Willow dot com in place now, all my personal house blogging can be done separately, as it should be. And here, I'll only store the little parts of this journey that belong to you.

You and your Dad and I have been doing some planning about what we'd like our Blueberry home to look like when we are in it. We've also been dreaming and planning about all the things we'd like to do outside of it once we are there and able to afford the time and cost of traveling together. 

You have very strong and specific interests in both areas. There are places you would not like to travel to, and many places you absolutely light up at the mention of. England, California, and Australia being of your top picks. 

Where design is concerned, you love minimalism and the rich and famous look. Silver, gold, crystal. You want white couches and walls, and rugs, and blankets, and tables... 

Do you remember this blue bowl?

One day you and I were in the store, and I was looking for some small bowls...

you picked this one up and were admiring it in awe. 

I was surprised you liked it and asked if it was what you thought I should get. 

You told me that it would not fit with the style of our home, 

but that it would fit with the style of your own home one day.

That was when you started to share with me that you love the look of lavish.

When we started talking about how your bedroom and living space in the Blueberry home should look, you wanted nothing else. 

One day, when I peeked on craigslist to see about getting a chandelier for your downstairs space at Blueberry, I found the exact one we liked, locally, for $25! We bought it the next morning and it's packed up and ready to go.

While we aren't planning to go all "MC Hammer" (who was a rapper who went broke spending all his money on expensive things including a gold plated toilet), we are going to incorporate some of your fitting style preferences into our new house design.

Having prefaced with all of that, I'm not a huge rummage sale goer. I do appreciate the nature of it all. But I'm a purger, so shopping peoples' discarded doesn't usually add up for me.

This particular day was our village rummage sale, and I was avoiding it like the plague. On my way home from somewhere I was scoping things out, recognizing that more now than ever I'd have no business at a rummage sale. I'm trying to sell and give away over half of what we own before we finish packing!

But there was one sign I kept seeing. Not all that distinct from the others, and nothing about it was familiar. But I could not stop the feeling that there must be something there for the new house that God really wanted me to have. Eventually, I obliged. 

As much as I imagined it was for me, whatever God had in store that would be so dear to my heart, I was even more pleased to discover that it was actually something for you. Something specific and just right... 

Beautiful, old crystal and silver platters. Real, and amazing! I paid just a few dollars each for these things, and there were SO many options it was hard for me to choose. I even found a HUGE set of Oneida silverware that fits this style so much better than the heavy, thick, contemporary stuff we had. 

I'm so grateful to God for you, Ezekiel. Your interest in these details at such a young age might surprise other people, but not those who know you well. It falls right inline with how intricately involved you are in everything you do. Nothing passes by you without your valuable consideration. Not the words you speak to your friends, or the way your friends chose to behave. Not your plans for the day or for your future. What you put in your body, where you put your energy and efforts, how you invest in the people around you... it's amazing to watch you process and chose so intentionally. You are amazing to me.  

I hope these shiny, rich little accents we get to have with us at our Blueberry house make you feel half as special as you are. I'm enjoying these exciting (and a little scary) days of planning and dreaming of Blueberry along side of you. 

The Space In-between

We've just been waiting - while the inspections, appraisals, and legal work in preparation of moving happens around us. We're calm and enjoying our last month in our Partridge Home. Trying to keep things as normal as possible. Dreaming and planning...

Zeek and I are on target to finish school a week early so we can be done with 6th grade the day before we move. 

We're still plugging away at purging and selling the things we aren't going to be taking with us. 

We hired a moving company to do a lot of the heavy work on the big day. Also, I hired a cleaning crew to do the move out here so we can focus on our new home. 

The dogs will be going to the center for a couple of days so they don't have to be in the mix of all the change until the initial move is over. We are praying they transition well to the city. Here, they struggle to keep calm if a person is taking a walk on our quiet street! We still haven't decided exactly what we will do for their outdoor space at Blueberry yet. It will best be determined once we are living there. 

We are setting things up with our builders to get moving on remodeling as soon as we get in. 

I have a nice long list of things that need to be done, most of which I have put on hold to savor the season and not rush past it. I think today is a good day to start slowly plucking away at it again. I'm amazed how ready I am in my heart. It's an interesting time in this space between leaving here and going there. I'm doing my best to process and enjoy all the uniqueness. 

But mostly I'm spending my time daydreaming.
Oh Blueberry Lane...