2026, March 2-8

Mike surprised Hallie and the kids by showing up in Springville late in the week. 

Earlier in the week, March progressed normally. Hallie's tattoo is healing up nicely. Her right arm is her Disney arm.  

Fergus is ever alert to Eliza. He's been spending nights with her lately. 

After visiting with the realtor and stager, Hallie is feeling the reality of getting the house ready to be sold. We have a lot of little things to do. Part of the overall task involves freshening up the outside of the house, decluttering, and removing a lot of what makes the house individually ours. 

Apparently there was a lunar eclipse Wednesday night into Thursday morning visible in parts of Montana. Mike had rain and clouds, so he didn't see anything other than a near-full moon early Wednesday evening. 

On Thursday, Hallie sent Mike a few vague texts asking about whether he had meetings on Friday. Turned out that what she was really asking was whether he could come down and help out with getting the house ready. And it also turned out that Mike's coworker and her husband happened to be coming down to Utah that very afternoon. So Mike quickly asked if he could bum a ride, ran to his apartment to grab some clothes, and was on the road to Utah within a couple of hours of Hallie's texts. We live in an amazing world that a person can wake up in one state contemplating another set of quiet activities on and around campus and before bedtime be back home in the thrall of all the moving drama. Pinkbox helps (and so does seeing everybody for the first time since Christmas break). 

We spent the weekend packing boxes, cleaning bedrooms and the office, and babysitting the neighbors' dogs. This little figurine we got years ago in a Kinder Surprise egg and which we adopted as our house's kitchen witch will make the trip up north along with dozens of boxes as we vacate the house of most of what makes it our own to make it look more enticing to prospective future owners.  

Eliza continues to enjoy her online high school experience. This week included creating a Venn Diagram comparing and contrasting two countries and their influence on world culture and finishing up an origami art class. Here are some of her projects, replacements made this week for others made with origami paper last week that accidently got thrown out in the cleaning frenzy before they got photographed as evidence of Eliza's successful completion of her work. 

No trip down to Springville is complete without neighborhood walks with Kai. Mike captured signs of spring in birdsong and flower. 

The kids are having a hard time working on their rooms on their own. Landon fell asleep cleaning out under his bed. Poor guy!

Here is just a sampling of a morning's worth of packing. Joy. 

Pinkbox helped, and so did Thrify Chocolate Malted Crunch. This is not to say that we only ate junk food. In fact, we had some tasty wholesome oatmeal and protein-rich carne asada quesadillas. We just happened to get two fun treats this week to act as the metaphorical "spoonful of sugar" as we get serious about the move. 

2026, February 23-March 1

We had a pretty uneventful week. Nice to see signs of spring as we move into March. 

Hallie got to help the preschoolers learn some of the alphabet this week. She even colored a cat that resembled Fergus. 

She and the kids have been cleaning the house and getting items sorted for staging purposes. 

Mike had some shifting weather this week. On Tuesday, he woke up to a dusting of snow. 

Fergus appreciates it when Hallie picks him up to get on the bed. It's tough getting old.

Mike's snowflake-bedecked windows became an object of interest to the LAB preschoolers. They're the only ones that have anything on them. 

The stager came over later in the week, and Alicia helped Hallie set some things ready. This meant sweet Brooklyn got to come over to visit while Eliza did school. 

Spring seems to have made a tentative start in Springville. While sitting outside with the girls, Hallie spied this ladybug on her blanket.

As Mike walked back to his apartment, he caught fully half a dozen young deer from the herd taking an afternoon meal. 

Hallie decided on the spur of the moment that it was time to get another tattoo. She's known what design she has wanted for a while. 

She went to Spencer Cox, an artist we have known since he was a kid in Camarillo. Nice result! The real deal will look a bit different after it heals. 

The weekend in Missoula was absolutely spring-like. So gorgeous! Mike spent some time outside taking in the sun rays. He had a little friend come check out what he was up to (and maybe see if he had a snack to share. Maybe next time).  

The sunsets and rolling clouds generally have created quite the palette of colors overhead. 

(This wasn't Mike's picture but it was from Missoula this week.)

On Saturday, Hallie, Eliza, and Amanda went to a bracelet-making activity at a local bookstore in town called The Pumpkin Cottage. 

Eliza and Hallie have been looking after the neighbors' dogs this week. Val is always so full of energy! 

On Sunday, Mike took in a short novel anthology on the Oval along with the other sunbathers. It contained Asimov's Profession and Campbell's Who Goes There? (both of which inspired some well-known sci-fi movies). This collection also has Longyear's Enemy Mine (inspiration for the great 1985 movie of the same name with Louis Gossett, Jr. and Dennis Quaid), which he read earlier in the week. 

 

2026, February 16-22

Oh? We heard it was winter. We finally got a taste of it while getting the house ready for staging, cheering on the Olympic athletes, and watching a movie that gave us nostalgia for Japan. 

The prayers sent to the Sacred Whale seem to have had their effect, as not only Utah but also Montana got some snow this week. 

(Also, turn the files into trials already!)

We had Presidents' Day off on Monday. Fergus seems content to make sure everyone is up bright and early each morning, so this meant Hallie didn't get to sleep in. Later in the week, Eliza figured out that if she fed him in the garage and left the side door open, he could have his food and exit too. Sharp cookie. 

Kai came back from a few days over at Brittany's. Both he and Ferg cozied right up to Mom. 

Most of the week was spent with the Winter Olympics on screen at least some of the time each day while Hallie made efforts to pack and start the staging process for the house. This is no small task. 

Eliza had a literal run-in with a car while biking near Smith's. She was extremely lucky that she didn't get seriously injured, and hopefully she'll take the admonition to wear a helmet more seriously in the future. 

As mentioned above, we got some of that elusive frozen precipitation. It's not Hallie's favorite thing to have it while walking the dog, but better some snow now than no water in the summer. 

Fancy ube coconut cold foam Hallie got to sample before the public on March 3rd. 

Kai finally got his chance to be immortalized in a Christmas ornament. 

The snow really started coming down. At one point, Landon said six inches had fallen. Maybe up in the mountains. Down in the valleys, we got a good amount though. Mike in Missoula got some snow in the hills and a lot of chill wind, but very little actual snow on the ground near campus.   

Hallie made a thing while working with her preschoolers. They were using dot markers. To pass the time she thought she should make some too. 

This is a mysterious broken thing. This is actually the part at the top of the door where a ball goes in to help keep the door shut. Hallie pulled it out to take a picture of it so she could find a replacement. 

Eliza helped out with cleaning and dusting after our realtor and Alicia helped Hallie identify all the areas that needed to be spruced up to stage the house. 

This is one relaxed kitty. Happiness is a warm lap in a cozy bed. 

Earlier in the week, Mike watched the movie Rental Family, and Hallie got Amanda and Landon and Jocie together to watch it on Saturday night (accompanied by Japanese take-out, of course). Such a fun reminder of our trip to Japan! 

Look at Frankie and Kai. Aww! 

Eliza opted to clean her room and will watch the movie at some other point. Here's a sampling of her Stitches and their variants. 

Bit by bit, our home is moving away from being ours into becoming someone else's dream. 

And we are thinking ahead to our own dreams up north (Hello, deer).

Here's some late day love from Eliza to end the week.