My own belated 28th

I turned 28 two days ago. Skirting close to 30, feel like 16, and will tell everyone I'm 25 like Grandpa Van Galen did until his own children became 25 along with him. The above cake was from the 5th of July, when family was over to celebrate three summer birthdays. Company is now gone, and so is my 9-year-old. He flew with my youngest sister to my parents in Michigan for over 3 weeks of grandparent fun. Martin and I will fly out with the babes in August for my middle sister's wedding and to reclaim my oldest child.

For the 15th, I made taco salad and lemon cheesecake bars and took Anne to the pool. We spend the hottest parts of the day inside, fill the time with nursing, naps and chores, get outside in the cooler early morning for walks and to the pool in the evening. Our family just isn't cut out for southern living, and we are hardly south.

My husband is applying to jobs in Helena, Montana in hopes we might move out there to be with his dad and brother this fall before we have to sign another year's lease here. Because we are over-occupancy in the current location, we have to move to a bigger place in September - after we just moved last year! Otherwise, we'd be able to go month-to-month with rent and it wouldn't matter when Martin found a position in Montana, but with moving to a bigger place, it's another year's lease agreement. Urgh! So, we get lucky and head west by September 14 or stay in Virginia another year. At least we will not have the time constriction next year, we will not be bound with lease agreements after Sept. '09.

We knew we did not want to settle down in our current location, and renting has done us well for the 3 to 5 years we planned to stay here. Martin and I want to stay and settle in the next place we go, and we've done a lot of consideration about where - near family in Michigan or Wisconsin or Montana? Someplace new like Colorado or New England? Washington state where I once lived? Canada sounds nice.... We've decided on being close to family, and there were many other factors that draw us out west opposed to our beloved Great Lakes area. Too many and too personal to go into, but we also joked that we'll just swap houses with my sister for vacations as she and her soon-to-be husband have relocated to L'Anse in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. So, everything is in limbo at the moment. We have to move, but will it be 200 feet away or 2,000 miles?