Last Monday a surprise snowstorm — unexpected in what has otherwise been an unusually mild winter — transformed the view from our living room window into this scene:
Clara loved it and immediately went outside to play:
Just a week later, the scene couldn’t be more different — here’s what our view looks like now:
And Clara is sporting a completely different outfit for a much warmer climate:
True to our anniversary resolution, we slipped away to Maui, Hawaii to celebrate a bunch of reasons at once: finishing our book, our upcoming five-year anniversary this July, milestone birthdays (I’m turning 30 in March and John celebrated his last November), and pretty much any other small excuse we could think of — like Clara’s adorable new four-syllable words (escalator, helicopter, anemone!).
This is actually our first real vacation flight since our 2007 honeymoon in Alaska, and it’s the first week off from blogging we’ve ever taken in the 4.5 years we’ve been doing this. We’re excited to be somewhere new, to unplug for a bit, and to give Clara a week of island adventures.
We’ll still drop in with a photo or short update during the week, and we scheduled a few posts before we left to keep things moving (including some small kitchen progress). We also lined up a pretty sweet giveaway valued at nearly $500 that will go live tomorrow (Monday) — though our posting times are five hours behind our usual schedule while we’re in Hawaii, so it might not appear exactly at 10 or 2. The main goal, though, is to relax, recharge, and soak up quality family time.
We’ll be back to our regular home improvement content next Monday, but we’ll pop in here and there until then. Please forgive us if we’re slower to reply to comments — we’re trying to be present. When we return we’ll be energized and ready to tackle a long list of projects: cork floors in the kitchen, three untouched bathrooms, a new walk-out deck, converting the carport to a garage, adding crown molding and wainscoting, a full sunroom makeover, a complete playroom transformation, and more. These are the projects we talk about late into the night, even from halfway across the ocean.
Since Clara is traveling with us, we’ll share details about how she handled the flights and adjusted to the time change soon — possibly next week over on Young House Life. Because of quarantine rules we couldn’t bring Burger along, so he’s at home with our house sitters (friends and family are taking turns staying with him while we’re away). We call him at least twice a day to check in — he’s getting plenty of love and attention — and maybe he’ll even inspire one of our house guests to lay some cork flooring while they’re there. Stranger things have happened with a persuasive chihuahua around.
To any Maui locals or fellow travelers: please say hello if you spot us doing the full tourist routine. You’ll find us by the pale legs — they’re so white they almost look blue — which will probably be a dead giveaway.
And yes, my skirt is twisted a few inches too far to the right in that last photo. I can’t be the only one who battles skirt-spin, can I?