Peaceful.

I'm sitting in my living room, alone. No TV, no music, no jibber jabber. Snow just laid down outside the door (the "thunk" of her plopping down is unmistakable), keeping watch, staying close to me. Oh how I love this dog.

Our house makes its familiar, comforting noises: the fridge hums, the water cooler makes its water cooler sounds, the clock is ticking, there's the occasional car driving by outside.

It is so peaceful. I can feel the stress falling off me.
After two days of sheer craziness and whirlwind activity, this is heaven. Aaaaahhhh. :)

Rich and our youngest left today for Germany where I will join them next week.

That was me the last 2 days:
 Elastigirl, pulled loooooong.

So the last 48 hours consisted of frantic packing, last-minute fence mending, organizing a ton of feed, cleaning the barn, buying travel insurance in the nick of time for the kid, mental lists that seemed 10 feet long, a dinner with another one of the girls, and a day at work thrown in the mix.
Not enough sleep.

A stressful and long drive to the airport in the thick of rush hour (which resulted in them being the last ones to check in! That has never happened before.). 

Still a never-ending stream of workers, assessors and insurance people coming and going due to the ongoing flood saga in our basement. I feel I'm always the last to know when they show up or what they are doing; they just appear and make noise.

The deafening dryers that were running for about 5 days straight are shut off now; the thick plastic tunnel that cut off the back door (and our main daily entrance) is gone; they are not supposed to come back for 2 weeks. Hallelujah!

Now it's quiet. And oh how I enjoy it! I met a dear friend for dinner, some much-needed girl talk and sangria; did the chores outside; and am now happily typing away.

But it's bed time now for this girl. I will leave you with a few pictures I took lately, nothing special; just ordinary life.

Good night lovebugs!

I miss that face already. 5 days!