Longest Day of the Year

We spent the evening of the longest day of the year playing in the yard, working on the car, and watching lightning bugs.

We're getting settled into our house in Chicago. It's not Chicago-proper, we're just a few miles outside of the city itself in a little suburb that reminds me of a smaller Rose Park. It's like Rose Park (in Salt Lake) in both architecture and era. It's smaller in that this neighborhood is smaller and the individual houses and lots are smaller. The houses next door are REALLY close to ours, like about four feet between our wall and theirs. Our garage even smells like my grandpa's Rose Park garage.

We've been having some car problems.  We had to take the Ford in for a repair, and now that we have it back, Nick is fixing the brakes on the Honda.  They started to make a squeaking noise when you weren't breaking, so he has replaced all the brake pads (as maintenance) and replaced some cylinders, which should fix the problem.  If being a doctor hadn't worked out, maybe he would have been a mechanic.  As a side note, google has totally changed how you fix cars.  You google your symptoms, find out what other people did and if it fixed the problem.  It really saves you a lot of time and money because you're not just throwing parts at things to see if it will fix it.  Nick had a problem with the disassembly, and googled it on the phone to see if anyone had similar problems and how they fixed it.  Someone had, Nick used their idea and it worked.

Henry loves having a yard. He goes to the back door and knocks on it, telling me he wants to go out to play. He loves to play on the Little Tikes play set a St Louis ward member gave us. He loves to play with bubbles. And for some unknown reason, he loves to get handfuls of topsoil and put it on the barbecue.

The garden here is pretty tiny- about the same square footage as a door. Even so, I find it's out of control already. I recognize some of the plants, but many I'm still wondering it's a weed or not. I did plant some basil, a tomato, and a jalapeno plant for Nick.

I can identify chives and dill, but that's about it.  If you have any idea what those little daisy things are, leave a comment.  Feel free to identify which things are weeds too.
We are having a major ant problem in the kitchen, and a minor one everywhere else. We bought commercial ant poison. The ants will have nothing to do with it, and continue looking for any crumb on the counter but pay no attention to the ant bait. Tomorrow I'm putting out borax-laced hot dog meat, which I hear they'll go crazy for. It should also kill them.


I still can't find most things. I have a lot of unpacking to do, and even more organizing. It's probably going to be a little chaotic for a while.