Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

community

5 on Friday: A few of my favorite things

Months ago I started this feature on the blog, mostly because I like lists. (I write stuff on lists just so I can cross them off.)

This week: five of my (current) favorite things.

1. Nutella. Or the knock-off Aldi brand of Nutella. I’m not a Nutella expert but the generic stuff is good. And maybe, just maybe, I’ve been eating it off a spoon while I wait for the bread to toast.

2. Cutthroat Kitchen. I’ve only seen one episode on Food Network, starring Alton Brown’s evil twin (not really, but the look he’s got going for this show makes him look less food-nerd and more evil mastermind), but I’m hooked. We have access to Food Network right now thanks to a cable deal we got when we moved, and it. is. dangerous.

3. Church. We’re having so much fun connecting with our new church community, and the kids are super comfortable with the teachers and other people they meet. This week, after watching a baptism at church, they baptized all their stuffed animals in a tub full of “baptist water.” (Not real water.) And at least once a week, they “play church.”

4. Aldi. I’ve sort of rediscovered this grocery store. Not only do they sell food cheap, they sell good food cheap, and they have a lot of variety. I can get orange crackers (think goldfish only in penguin shapes) that don’t have any artificial colors in them. And the aforementioned chocolate hazelnut spread. And goat cheese (don’t ask). I’m always amazed at the total bill. A cart load of groceries for half the cost of other grocery stores. Okay, Aldi endorsement done.

5. Country roads. I’ve never really considered myself a country girl. I grew up in town. It was a smallish town, but still in town as opposed to in the country. Where we live now is borderline: used to be country but now it’s developed. When traveling around, we have options–we can take the highway or we can take back roads through residential areas. About 90 percent of the time, I’m on the back roads, avoiding the highway and its stress, even if I could get somewhere 5 or 10 minutes faster. Maybe I’m really a country girl at heart. Or maybe I’m just getting old. (No offense, of course, to any “old” people I know. I’m embracing my inner geezer.)

What we've been up to

So, it’s been two weeks since this called “moving” happened to us.

And I say it that way because that’s how it feels. Like it happened to us and we didn’t have much to do with any of it.

Early on a Saturday morning, a bunch of people showed up at our old house to load up our big stuff.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Okay, who am I kidding? They loaded up most of our stuff. And did it with such skill and precision that I was left speechless. (Our front lawn looked like we were having the world’s largest garage sale, yet I was assured by our new friends that it would all fit. They were right.)

In two hours we had cleared the old house and most of the stuff we wanted to take with us and were on our way to our new place, where a couple more friends met us and Phil’s boss brought Chick-fil-A sandwiches. (I don’t think it was my imagination that the crew worked a little faster when they heard the CFA was coming.) Such a blessing. In less than an hour at the new place, all the vehicles and the trailer were unloaded and by 12:30 Phil and I were on our own at the new place. Tired. Overwhelmed. And so, so thankful.

See, these people who showed up, most of them we barely know. They’re from our new church and while we know names and faces and Phil has spent some time with some of them, they still aren’t close friends or anything. I was so humbled by their willingness to drive up to our old house and spend a morning helping us move. I didn’t feel like we’d earned that. (Like we have to earn kindness.) They just totally knocked our socks off.

So, we’ve been unpacking. And cleaning. And donating. And decluttering.

And loving our new place.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Our second night there, we saw this lovely sunset behind our house. Swoon.

We’re slowly making it a home.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The week after the move, we cleaned up and cleaned out the old house and turned in our keys. A few days later, Phil and I left for Nashville for a marriage conference. We had a little free time.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

We walked around the park where Nashville’s replica of The Parthenon is. And we ate dinner at The Loveless Cafe.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA This is the face Phil makes when he’s eating the best piece of ham he’s ever had in his life. Southern soul food at its best. And totally worth the two-hour wait to be seated. (Which nearly caused us to have a “loveless” marriage as we disagreed over what to do when faced with that long of a wait.)

And on our way to breakfast Sunday morning, we walked downtown, which smells like beer and urine after what I assume was a typical Saturday night. It’s quieter on a Sunday morning but the smell is something I won’t soon forget.

We passed the Ryman, which reminds me that I know little to nothing about music history. OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

And we stopped at the river to take a picture of us, something we rarely do right now, especially when life has been so busy and full.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

And after a rendezvous with my parents, we got the kids back after two weeks and made our way back toward Pennsylvania.

We stopped at the rest area, just across the border and took this picture to remind us of how far we’d come.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAFive years ago, it looked something like this.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

So. Much. Has changed.

That’s a little of what we’ve been up to. I hope to be back to blogging regularly in August. (At which time our daughter will be going off to kindergarten. Because we haven’t had enough change this year.)

Thanks for sticking with us on this crazy rollercoaster journey we call our life.