This weekend was quite busy! Our days are filled with working and then getting ready for the next batch of visitors or packing our bags for our next trip. No complaints here! I'm so glad to see family whenever we can. This weekend it was my parents. They came in on Friday and we had fun going to get apples from Johnson's Farm. Then we did "work" around the house the next day. My dad installed the new battery in the Golf (yes!). He and Chris sanded down the back of our front door and then I painted it while my mom played with Eliot in the swing. The back of our front door has been scratched up and flaking paint since we moved in. The previous owner had a dog with separation anxiety, so it was in bad shape. It looks so much better now! We did a few other things around the house and then had dinner at my aunt's.
Over the weekend, our boiler broke. Over the weekend, our boiler was fixed. Phew! When we turned it on, it sounded like someone was slamming a hammer into the pipes and radiators. I hate that sound. It did the same thing last year when we started it at first, so we called to get it tuned up right away. The service man said it was normal, just the pipes expanding. I didn't believe it, but the sound did go away. This year, there was that sound again. Horrible slamming! It just didn't seem right. As it turns out, it wasn't right. Our boiler shut itself off due to all of the excessive pressure. Made sense to me that the pipes and radiators were making that sound due to too much pressure.... We called a different service company. Apparently, a valve wasn't working quite right and there was too much water. He tinkered with it and got it operational. If it acts up again, we will replace the valve, but it seems to be doing fine.
My parents are back at home now with our dogs. Life with dachshunds is loud, but you never realize just how loud until they're gone. I miss the little guys! My parents are "dog sitting" so Chris, Eliot, and I can go to Williamsburg for a few days. Then we'll go to Chesapeake for a quick, overnight trip, grab the pups, and head back to Lynchburg just in time for Christopher's parents to come in town next weekend for parents' weekend at Elizabeth's college--which means they all get to hang out with us at our house instead. See what I mean about staying on the road and welcoming family in all the time?
Little bits of me has felt melancholy, though. I don't mean to complain or whine. I feel conflicted, really. I am happy with now. I love time with our families, Eliot is at a fun age, and Lynchburg is beautiful in the fall. I love our jobs. At the same time, I look forward to things changing and life evolving. Where will we be in a year? I wonder if or where we will move. I wonder what it will be like for Eliot to be older, bigger, and doing more things. I wonder when we will have our second baby and if that baby will be a boy or a girl--and who the baby will look like. As I am beginning my dissertation course tomorrow, I wonder what it will be like to be finished with the thing. I think that is the source of my angst. I'm anxious. I want my dissertation to be done and over and done done done with school for a while, but I haven't even started yet. Probably not the best approach. Sometimes I'd like to fast forward through life to the next part, but then I look at photos like the one below and yearn to freeze life--to freeze that baby boy and his baby cheeks and stunning eye lashes. Good thing I don't have a life remote because I'm sure I'd make all the wrong choices. Instead I'll try to savor each moment, love on that baby, and accept all of the changes that will surely come.
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