How's the house? A lot of people have been asking. The answer is that our remodel is rolling along. Still some big items waiting on other big items (redoing sidewalk in front of the house waiting for sewer repair and burying power line, for instance ... and then fence placement waiting for sidewalk to be complete). But electric and plumbing and drywall all done. We are soon to make our final choices on paint colors and get going on painting.

Some of our favorite things in the new house will probably be the small touches that we thought of along the way, such as this window that now connects the living room and the hallway leading to the rest of the house. It will have a "hockey puck" light recessed in the top and we plan to keep a vase of flowers there, our version of a Japanese tokonoma, a "beauty place" in the entryway of a home. A real tokonoma would have room for flowers, a poem on a scroll, and other items reflecting the season.

We are still hoping to move in mid-December. I am already hatching elaborate plans for keeping the dogs and kids out of the way during the couple of days of the actual move -- possibly involving my mom staying with the dogs in a hotel nearby to serve as a "base camp." For sure we hope to be settled in by Christmas.