I have surfaced from the chaos!!!

I had to laugh when I was unpacking my spreaders... from snowmen to  tropical. Just like me!

   I am back... that 2 week hiatus form the blogging world was due to extreme fatigue from 18 hour days. I believe I am in CA and this house for life because I DO NOT WANT TO MOVE AGAIN!
  We closed on the house on March 7th and moved in on the 9th. The nice guys with the huge van brought all of our stuff from Wisconsin and carried it all in our new home. The nice guys also put together all the many items they had disassembled for the long journey including but not limited to: dining room table, all the end tables, bar stools, floor fan, bikes, Dave's fancy desk.... I have to say the only things that have small issues now are the 2 floor lamps that they weren't able to take apart and the journey was hard on them. My fix it guy, Dave, took care of the issues. The nice guys did not help me figure out where to put all the stuff in a new house without a basement! They spell words differently out here.... basement is spelled g-a-r-a-g-e. You may laugh but until you try to go from a house with a full basement to a house without you have no idea! Now I know why Dave was insistent on a 3 car garage. I also understand why there are so many storage businesses here. My friend Jane was the greatest help since she was Midwestern born and had to cram 5 people's stuff into their CA home when her hubby ( Linda D.'s older brother who she loves dearly most of the time!) was transferred here.  Jane kindly explained that I could not fill 2 shelves in my cupboards with cookbooks unless I wanted my dishes down the hall by the bedrooms! So I chose my most used and stashed the rest in the hallway space.  It is a bit amusing to see what is in the sitting room's built-in bookcase lower cabinet.... games, serving platters and tupperware!  Whatever works! I must brag about said garage... everything is put away in a cabinet or on shelves and all the boxes are gone. Not bad for being here 1 week. We have a corner on Rubbermaid bins.

The kitchen looked like this for about 5 days. Those dish pack boxes had reams of paper in them.   While unpacking them I was thinking longingly of our 1 bedroom apt in Carlsbad with the 4 plates, 4 bowls, 4 mugs, etc.  The simple life! Saturday brought with it lots of friends to welcome us. First came that lovely family ( Dave and Jeannie and  their adorable children that live nearby bearing homemade cinnamon rolls.  Next came our friends Duane and Verla bearing citrus and avocado offerings and their guests from ND. Then Ross and Marilyn and clan arrived bearing sweet breads. Finally, my lifesaver Jane came and brought us lunch and stayed to unpack boxes and give much needed advice.

I heard the mower start and in less than 15 minutes Dave was done mowing our grass.  Green grass is great but we are glad that most of our 0.6 acre is in stone. Water is precious here. Today it is really raining which is like watching $$$ fall from the sky. Our water bill will be less!

This is a common sight- iceplant grows in mounds and as groundcover. The slopes are ablaze in magenta

Myrtle Creek Nursery- heaven in earth! I only bought 6 plants- not bad. Very tempting and only 3 miles away.  The jasmine will be awesome on our fence!

Our neighborhood.

Driving down the road to our house

And we are home. More pics to follow in future posts

We did it! 2 hours at the DMV and $$- we are registered CA drivers. Well all for now- Dave is waiting- we have a date for pizza with IA State basketball game.