Backyards

So my last post talked about the baby grand piano someone was giving away. I've been meaning to write about our other big find last month. We frequently see people listing their wood towers/tree houses/swing sets, etc. for free on Craig's List...all you have to do is disassemble them (which still is a LOT of work). The catch is you have to respond in the first half hour to have any chance at getting them, since around here posts on Craig's Lists are highly viewed and responded too. (Don't forget our van sold on Craig's List in five hours!) So once we decided we wanted to do this, we watched faithfully and luckily were able to get one that was only 15 minutes away. This proved to be a necessary part of the ordeal as we had to make multiple trips. The set is old, and we had to buy lots of bolts, nuts, and screws...and sandpaper and stain...and replace a couple wood pieces...but it's worth it when you see how much those new sets cost and that's completely out of the question for us right now! We didn't actually plan it this way, but Bekah sort of started saying it was one of her birthday presents. And she will use it well.

This first picture is how it was in the people's yard we got it from (partially already disassembled) and the second picture is it starting to go up in our backyard. (It's much more put together now, but I don't have a picture of that yet and if I waited I'd never get this posted. :) It's just the tower and slide and a baby swing, not the wood swings next to it, but we plan to price out adding that on later. For now, our tree swing is very loved!

I keep saying this, but the longer we are in this house the more I love it. For the last month or so, I'm loving the backyard. The late afternoon sun hits it just right to make it appear magical when the kids (that's including us parents who get to act like kids again!) are out back swinging and singing and riding bikes and scooters and drawing chalk and playing tag and water gun fights and playing catch and soccer and frisbee and grilling dinners and toasting marshmallows...I love our back yard. It may be hard to tell from pictures we've posted before on the family website, but it seems to be just the right dimensions for us right now. And sometime soon we're going to start planting a garden. (If you would have told me that when I was a teenager I would never have believed it! Thanks, mom, for making me learn.) I'm sure there are people out there who are so glad they don't own a house and are content to rent forever, but owning a piece of land just does something for me. It's like I can claim a small corner of the world and make it a safe haven and create a small dent in the world for good. Where we can be who we want to be instead of held back by landlord rules and/or condo rules. I love being able to send Bekah out the side door into a fully fenced yard and look out my kitchen window while washing dishes and just watch her think and explore or chase bubbles she's able to blow herself now. The list could go on forever. Even James can't get enough of being outside. We just bought a kiddie pool so we can have even more fun out back. So as long as the mosquitoes stay away and the weather is good, you know where you'll probably find us. After having to rent for the last several years and the last two of those years in a one-bedroom dormitory apartment, this almost feels too good to be true. I think I can even say that though trials are hard, I'm glad God sends them because I would never feel this much joy at what many might think is having so little while times are tight right now if I hadn't already been without what we have now. So enduring the one-bedroom was worth it, enduring the constant partying of freshman was worth it (well, maybe not the 2AM fire alarms), enduring cinderblock third-floor apartments with no AC was worth it, and yes, even enduring having no place to call home for a month and a half almost this time last year...was worth it.

"For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If it were not so...righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad.
...
And [Adam and Eve] would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.
But behold, all things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things."
2 Nephi 2: 11, 23-24