Velveteen House II

When there's a holiday, school break time, I am reminded of my original Velveteen House post, click here. Why? Though Dawson is still living at home while going to college, it's during these break times that our home gets more worn with wear. Like with the dialogue in the Velveteen Rabbit classic book, "by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby."

Dawson, Splarah and Conner, are currently eating jalepeno grilled cheese panini sandwiches and tomato soup they just made for themselves for lunch. They are sanding Dawson's new desk he's making in his bedroom. (He just painted his floor red, "to coordinate with the red in my ceiling!", which is red sponged over black, which him and Gary did probably a year ago, needing to re-drywall it.

Yesterday morning, walking into the kitchen, Dawson was making pancakes. Since I go into a nutrition talk when they bring home Bisquick, he was being witty, saying he was making them from scratch ... "I've already been out this morning gathering whole grains to grind, and squeezing chickens for eggs" ... Cute! ... I have to smile.

I never know who's sleeping here. Splarah and Lizzy have often been in the guest room and it's been a mix from Conner, Aaron, Caleb to Nick lately, sleeping scattered about (since Dawson's room is disastrously torn apart, with most everything in Heather's old room or the storage room next to Monte's office).

Young people were at the kitchen table drinking sparkling apple cider from goblets, and playing card games, when Monte and me got home from a party. We didn't know they'd be there since they were ice skating for New Year's Eve at Evergreen Lake. But since they were going skiing for the next two days, they decided to sleep here and leave from here.

And now that Dawson is learning to weld and forge metal, people want to participate and experience it too. So young people are wanting to hang out and play. 

House guests come and go. Like yesterday, a young couple we'd not seen for awhile were here for a bit. Everyone loves the well worn wood floor in our great room and don't think we should refinish it. Some people don't come out of the guest bathroom for awhile, cuz they're either reading or writing more graffiti on our chalkboard paint wall.

Ministering seems to come our way. This season of Monte's and my life is full of visiting young people and scientists wanting to hang out here. More memories for the walls of this Velveteen House to bounce off - memories full of stories. Like a plaque in our house says, "Home is where your story begins."