These are some of the babies, who are now half a foot long. Hoping they make it through the winter in good form.

Right now it’s melting as if somebody had taken a giant hair dryer to the town.

Jane is in the kitchen applying copper contact paper to the nice shelves, which we want to keep nice, and I am making a large pot of split pea and ham soup. This is one of those can’t make a mistake kind of recipes, teaspoon black pepper, teaspoon salt, diced ham, two packets of split peas and 16 cups of water, to cook in the Crockpot from noon til supper. It’s impossible to have a seasonal chill with that kind of soup for supper.

Hawaii had a bit of a scare. Thank goodness it was just a scare. Mt St Helens is acting up again, but that’s the normal thing for an active volcano to do.

We’re waiting for a thaw so that Scott can set up his tile saw to work with our backsplash. It needs water to cool it, meaning a hose. We could arrange that, but working while standing in snow, not so much.

We’re also working toward the great garage sale. We have decided after a lifetime of moves (together, moving Jane TO Oklahoma, then moving from one house to another IN OKC, then moving to the third-floor N. Spokane apartment over the cliff and creek, to moving again (on a month’s notice) to another third-floor apartment in Spokane Valley, and finally to here—we have acquired too many things that only fit one residence, only to have it useless in the next, and we have brought along far too many boxes. We are going to shed all sorts of things, from chairs to pots and pans, and the clothes—I just realized my favorite sweatshirt is about 20 years old. I refuse to give it up, but that’s the state of the closet. We are now starting on the dreaded basement, where the ghosts of previous fishtanks vie with weaving projects there’s just no room for in this house.