Political Animals

I was walking around the side of the house in the dark last night (a cat messily eating a mouse on your doorstep is a great incentive to find an alternative entrance) and I froze in place.  Something was moving stealthily through the dead leaves.  It was big...it was mean...and it sounded very, very hungry.  I whirled around, and, oh!  It was just a horse.

We've got horse farms across from us, catty-corner, and a few houses down, and they're frequently up by the fence line and therefore quite close.  It seems like they've been feeding more heavily in the fields lately, even through the night, so the fierce creature I heard was just pawing through the leaves to get to grass.  Phew!

Speaking of nighttime visitors, we still have Trey Snouty visiting quite frequently.  It's easy to see that he's been in some kind of tangle...besides the dragging leg and the shortened tail, his ears are chewed to ribbons.

We have another possum that's started coming around, too.  He's bolder, more robust, and Todd gave him a great misnomer: Snoot Gingrich.  Ha!

Besides trying to keep up with the growing crowd on the front porch, we've been frantically unloading storage units and hauling boxes around.  The barn looked full enough before...

...but is even more full now!

Thirty boxes of books and craft supplies were hauled upstairs to my office and I spent 3 full days in pajamas, digging and sorting and piling (with frequent trips to the barn for my regular work). What a job!  But it's finally done and everything (except for my paper cutters and rubber stamps, location TBD) is put away.

Fabric, stickers, felt, ink, glitter, adhesives, buttons, quilt supplies, yarn, ongoing projects, embroidery supplies, watercolors, colored pencils and paper, construction paper, embellishments, card stock...all tidily sorted, labeled, and put away. 

More work needs to be done in my office...a cabinet built for puzzles, a scary-looking gas wall heater removed, another bookcase added (opposite wall is just bookshelves!) but it feels SO much more peaceful and home-like up here. 

We also brought about 30 boxes of household goods in...baking supplies, pottery, wall art, odds and ends...so you can imagine how messy the downstairs is right now.  But it feels so good to see our things again, even though it's still incomplete (fireplace to be built, trim in dining room, curtains).

Progress!

Looking forward to getting this finished up over the next few days so that we can take a cue from Bosewichte and...