comments: 75

The best visit ever. Dear, sweet treasures in my life.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Can't Hardly Wait comments: 112

We are so lucky! Our friends are coming to visit us! The plane gets in this afternoon. My heart is bubbling over. So, so, so excited. So excited.

Sunshine Day comments: 45

The weather here has been so glorious the past few days it's almost all I can think about. And talk about. I think my life revolves around the weather more than I think it does. Getting outside into the sunshine this weekend was like a dream. We had my family over for Easter lunch and got to spend most of the day outside. My mom made that beautiful strawberry shortcake!

I'm off to the woods before the rain starts up again. Back in a bit!

Riverside Silverlight comments: 72

I made my go-to birthday cake

and baked some bread for turkey sandwiches

and we headed out to the woods.

The light was silver, it didn't rain (miracle), and was actually quite warm (warm relative to the freezing downpour that is our new normal here in P-town) down by the water. There was even a touch of humidity which felt absolutely wonderful. (That's something I never, ever thought I'd say in my life. But there it is.)

It was so beautiful. It smelled like pine trees and river. I love the sound of the water gurgling by.

Happy, happy birthday, dearest Keely.

Oh how I love days like this.

Our New Sofa comments: 32

I'm excited, because in a few weeks — maybe any day now, I've kind of lost track — we'll be getting our new sofa. It's called the "Nelson" by Van Gogh. It looks like this, but in sort of a mouse-brown/gray Ultrasuede. I got it at Sofa Table Chair from my friend Susan (her new store out in West Linn is so cool). Right now she has a coupon for 15% off of any custom order sofa!

I had very specific requirements for my sofa, and that very specifically limited the sofa I could have. Firstly, I had to have a "tightback" with no back pillows, since my dog sits on top of those while looking out the window and squashes them flat. Secondly, it had to be dirt-colored non-stainable fabric, because we are a dirty family. I also told her I wanted the "big butt" cushion — mine will have extra padding or something, for big butts that tend to . . . stay put . . . for long periods of time (like mine). I'm going to ask my accountant if I can write off the sofa as my second home office. I really didn't feel sooooo bad about buying a new sofa because, you know, it's for work. I certainly don't spend a dime on, like, work clothes. And our old sofa has basically been reduced to a pile of pillows. It is a squashy, quilt-covered, very-low pile of pillows. My sister said it reminds her of a baby's crib. A giant baby's crib for me. I can't stand it anymore. I can barely get out of it anymore. So, I'm very psyched about the Nelson. I'd better call and see when it's supposed to come — I think it takes six to eight weeks. I can't remember when I ordered it but it was definitely sometime in June.

When we got back from camping, we had houseguests here at the house, Andy's aunt and uncle and their grandson, for the rest of the weekend. Their arrival reminded me of their last visit, several years ago, which had a funny story about our old sofa. In the morning, Uncle George, Aunt Nancy, and I were sitting around the living room, drinking coffee and watching the Today show. It was 2004, an election year, so I remember the candidates were debating. I was sitting on the right side of the sofa, kind of curled up with my elbow on the arm of the sofa, leaning toward the TV. But my elbow had been hurting me lately, so at that very moment I was sort of rubbing it, and straightening it, and massaging it. I often think I'm getting tennis elbow from all the crocheting I do, with my elbow propped up too high on the arm of the sofa.

So I was sitting there rubbing my elbow and feeling a little worried when George, who was watching the candidates talk to Matt Lauer, turned to me and said, "Alicia, if you don't mind my asking, which way do you lean?" And I said, still rubbing my elbow, thinking he'd read my mind, "Well, it's so funny you should ask because I was just thinking, you know, I have been leaning so much to the right [pointing to the arm of the sofa] but my elbow is killing me lately, so I'm wondering if I should move over to the left, and lean that way? I mean, I don't know. Will that help?" I figured he'd have some magic answer, seeing as how he'd just miraculously asked the question I'd been silently asking myself. I looked up and George and Nancy were staring at me uncomprehendingly. It occurred to me that they meant lean politically, not physically. Ohhhhh! I was laughing too hard to answer. The world's going to hell in a hand-basket, but my elbow hurts, so, you know, ow, me and my elbow.

Raise your hand if you saw that one coming, 'cause I sure didn't.

Mmmkay, playing catch-up today, trying to answer emails, phone calls, get my lists together, write, clean the studio, get myself together. I haven't checked out anyone's blog in two months — it's awful. I miss it. That's my R&R time and I'm missing it and y'all terribly. So I'm going to try and get my act back together. I really want to be all caught up this week. I want to make some new pillows for my new sofa!

My Birthday comments: 60

Today is my birthday. It's also the same day that my dad died, six years ago. He was 54.

This is one of my favorite pictures of him. It is my sister Susie, my sister Julie, and me with him at Julie's wedding many years ago now. He looks really happy in this picture, I think, and sort of boyish. There is something about the way he is standing --as if we pulled him into the picture and he wasn't quite sure what to do -- that I find incomparably charming. This is the way I like to remember him, sort of pleasantly surprised with the world.

He was a complicated, charismatic person. People have told me all my life that they've never met anyone like my dad, and I have never been able to successfully describe him, or what it was like to be his daughter. It wasn't easy. When I remember him, I try to put together all the little things I thought were sweet and nice. He wanted me to open an herb store, like one we'd seen on vacation once in Galena, Illinois. He thought I should marry a farmer and have a simple life. He pronounced the words "salad" and "talent" and "balance" in a really weird way I could never imitate. We both liked those programs at the end of the year that showed all the highlights of things that had happened. He liked Martha Stewart and Cheryl Ladd. He had one speed (slow). He bought my cat Violet gourmet cat food, though he claimed to not like cats. He liked vikings. When he met Andy, who he adored, he said, "I like Andy. He's irrepressible, and he's a lot taller than that little black cloud that follows you around." He wouldn't let me go to one of the colleges he visited with me because the graffiti in the bathroom was too stupid. He loved the farmer's market in Missoula, and couldn't believe how beautiful all the peeled onions looked together. His favorite album was the Eagles' Desperado. He loved Northern Exposure and was very sad when Joel left. He always liked to stop and get a Cinnabon at the mall. He wanted me to be a writer. He made us take walks in the woods all the time. He never once complained about the clothes we wore, or said we couldn't sleep over somewhere or have someone else sleep over. He called our friends our "little friends." He liked to say "Good enough for rock 'n' roll," "Right shoulder up!" (so that I would self-correct the slight curve in my spine), and "Stay alert, stay alive." The last two of these would enrage me when I heard them. He made excellent chili. His favorite cereal was Sugar Corn Pops. He always had a boat but couldn't swim, and wore a life-jacket on shore. He was afraid to fly. He always wanted to travel to Africa but never did. He had very green eyes. He loved wolves.

I miss you Dad. I hope you're okay up there. I wish you were down here.