Musings

There's a lot happening in the world right now. Some things that impact all of us like the presidential election. Some things that impact many of us like Lance and his latest news. Some things that impact my closest friends and family like our wedding.

It's hard to balance all that's going on right now and still focus on trying to get through the day to day to-dos. Some days feel really hectic and tense.   I have done what I can to influence the presidential outcome (yay for early voting in Texas) and will continue to do what I can do to ensure that LIVESTRONG is seen as a separate entity from Lance.  Now I must focus on my wedding.  This is the only wedding I'm planning to have and it's such an exciting and memorable time.

I have heard many times that the wedding day will fly by. That I will hardly remember anything.  I'm sure this will happen to me (because why wouldn't it if it does to everyone else) so I really want to make the most of the time I have leading up to the wedding.

I'm officially off work for 3 weeks now. This is the longest I have ever taken off work and the timing is good and bad. Currently my days are filled with errands and self care and beginning to welcome visitors into town.

Katie and Rob arrived from England on Saturday night and we spent most of Sunday with them. It was so special to me. Not only because it was great to see Katie but I loved getting to spend more time with Rob and for them to get to know Carl.

So I apologize if I'm not the greatest blogger in the coming weeks as family arrives and our free time is taken up with last minute errands. And as we head off to Spain (without my computer!) and enjoy our much needed honeymoon.  But I will have some great stories to share in a couple of weeks!

This Weekend's Projects

I had my last work trip (before the wedding) this past week. While it was in one of my favorite cities (NYC) at my favorite time of year, I was happy to come home on Friday night and put in a full weekend of wedding related prep and errands. With officially less than 2 weeks left every second counts (yes, that was a purposeful reference to Lance's book).

Carl's dad came in town to help with some land related projects. The final things to complete are the following:

1. The step up onto the deck
2. The dance floor
3. Final land prep and clean up

Carl and his dad got some of the step completed on Saturday but it was pouring down rain (even hailing) a lot of the day, which delayed some of their progress. I went out to the land and brought them lunch and worked on my signage plan.  I now have the wood selected and the list of signs I need to make. This is a project for next week, once I'm off work.

The dance floor supplies are all bought and should be completed next weekend, along with a big group clean up.  It really does feel like it's all finally coming together.

The big project today was beer bottling!  Carl brewed 20 gallons of beer a couple of weeks ago and today began the assembly line to prep for distribution.

Carl and I have worked on many projects together but I think this may have been our most successful. It really highlighted both our strengths - Carl and his physical strength and inventive strategies and my efficiency and process expertise.  We were unstoppable.

First, there was bottle soaking.  We had to clean the over 200 beer bottles in a large tub.

Then we had to rinse. We had to ensure the soap and residue was all gone.

Then we moved inside to begin the bottling process.

Carl had to do something to get each jug flowing to then pour into the individual (freshly cleaned) bottles.

Then I got to cap them!

All in all it took us about 6 hours. But I felt a huge accomplishment that we have almost 200 beers for our friends and family to enjoy during our ceremony.  It was well worth the mess that was our kitchen for a few hours.

Now only one more (albeit hectic) week of work before the final prep, wedding and honeymoon are finally here!

Licenses and Brews

This week, Carl and I went to get our marriage license.  I did a lot of research ahead of time to confirm that we could get it in Travis County even though we're getting married in Blanco County. I couldn't find a clear answer so we just went to the County Clerk's office and asked. The only thing they seem to care about in Texas is if you are related. Turns out, you can't get married if that's the case.

So, it's official, we have our marriage license! And in 22 short days we'll be married.

In other news, Carl took on another project for our wedding this past week and home brewed our ceremony beer.  While we'll have kegs for the reception, Carl made beer for our guests to enjoy when they arrive and during the ceremony. I love how many personal touches we're going to have at the wedding. It makes all of this so worth it.

Where In The World Is Mellie?

I've been a bit of a slacker lately on writing blog posts. But it's certainly not because I don't have plenty to write about.  I've just hardly been home.

In the past 10 days I've been the following places.  Austin to Los Angeles to Santa Barbara back to Los Angeles to Austin.  Then Austin to Baltimore to Norfolk to Chicago and back to Austin.  Finally Austin to Chicago and back to Austin.

In between all this travel I've had to try to keep up with work and plan our wedding, which is less than 4 weeks away now. Carl wasn't traveling during this time so while it was sad we weren't both in Austin together I was happy to know he was home with Buster and the chickens.

Oh, the chickens. Sadly I have a Barley update. After a few days of not returning home (again), Carl confirmed his suspicion that she was nesting under the shed and found her little body and over a dozen eggs.  Sadly the eggs were no good and Barley was no longer for this world.  So then there were 4 chickens, 2 of which are now laying eggs.

While a lot of these trips have been work related I did enjoy a long weekend in Santa Barbara with Chris, Missy, Lucie and Audrey.  It was beautiful and we enjoyed lots of great sunsets and time in the pool.

So now I'm home (and so is Carl for some of the time!) until October 10, which will be my last work travel before the wedding.  So the countdown to the wedding and the much awaited honeymoon continues.

Dogs

When Max was still alive, part of my daily (actually twice daily) routine was taking him on walks.  I did this before and after work. Every day.  And I loved it.  It was so much a part of my routine.

For some reason I never got into this habit with Buster. I'm not sure if it's because when I first got Buster he had leg surgery and had activity limitations for 6 weeks. Or maybe I didn't feel ready to share that experience with Buster so soon after Max. Or maybe I just got lazy?

I certainly know I got busier.  I never had to walk Max in the dark before work because I got to work later. I'm often leaving my house before it's light out now so I'm not sure when I would do this.

But every so often I do walk Buster.  And he loves it! It makes him so happy.  Instead of walking him every day he gets to do different things than Max ever did. He goes to doggy daycare once/week and goes out with Carl on adventures in Dripping Springs (and really all over). He's even been camping all over Texas.

Sometimes I can't believe that I've actually  had Buster longer than Max.  Max will always hold a special place in my heart (and on our bookshelf where his ashes are). He'll always be my first dog.  But I love Buster very much and he's such a happy dog. Especially when I walk him, which I did yesterday.

We went for a 45 minute walk after work because the weather has been so amazing lately.  He loved it (let's be honest, he loves going in the car regardless of where we end up) and I loved it afterwards when he slept for hours.

Runaway Chicken

So I'm pretty pleased that we're still getting about one egg/day. It's impossible to tell which chicken is laying them (although we suspect Patricia).  We can tell you one thing for sure - it's not Barley.

How would I know you might ask?

Well, because Barley seems to have found another home. Some days. Most nights.

It's unclear what she is doing but let me tell you how this was all discovered.

Last week both Carl and I were out of town for a night and our neighbors put the chickens away one night. When they put them in their coup, they noticed there were only 4 and Barley was missing. After some searching and coming back the next morning, she was nowhere to be found.

Carl got home the next day and looked for her more (in the rain) and another night passed without her coming home.

I feared the worst and felt very emotional about it.

Then the next day, Carl texted me a picture that she had returned home! I was surprised and relieved and curious - what had she done for 2 nights?

Well, shortly after her return (literally just a few hours), she was gone, again. And was gone all weekend.

And, you guessed it, she showed back up today (she is the all black one below). Just in time to eat it seems. 

So now I'm just annoyed.  I have no idea what she is doing.  Carl is now suspicious that she's actually created a nest for herself under the shed because he saw her go under there one day.  I tried to look and see if there were any eggs (which would of course be annoying if there is a pile of eggs under there) and couldn't see anything.

Long story short.  Barley is a trouble maker but I still want her to come home.

Breakfast Anyone?

I have been waiting to say (or type) these words for months....We have eggs!

Finally, some of the chickens started laying eggs and I am ecstatic (I almost typed eggstatic on purpose but then thought it was cheesy but I sort of couldn't resist anyway).

Our five chickens turn 6 months old next week but since they turned 4 months old (which is typically the earliest chickens will lay eggs) I have been anxiously awaiting this day.  Due to the heat and the fact that they are less likely to lay eggs during extreme temperatures, I was trying to be patient.

So today when I went to let them out in the morning and saw two brown, perfect looking eggs I screamed.  I literally was jumping up and down in our yard like I'd just won a game show.  I even scared Buster a little bit.

So while it's hard to tell if one or two of them have finally started taking some action, I'm hoping that they will soon all follow suit since they all seem to do the same thing all the time already.

We've been collecting empty egg cartons for months and finally got to use one of them today to put the two little eggs in.  I'll wait to eat them with Carl when he gets home this weekend and hopefully we'll be able to share other eggs with our friends and neighbors who have part of the chicken stock.

Luckily for these chickens this happened.  Carl was threatening them with chicken soup and rotisserie chicken warnings.  Whatever works! I just hope the 104 degree day we had today won't put a stop to their production.