Some R&R at a B&B

... is in the very near future for D and me. We're taking a little road trip over the long weekend to see the Cascades, explore Washington wine country and visit friends of ours in Idaho -- the perfect wind-up to summer before I really buckle down with the writing (a whenever-inspiration-hits kind of thing that does not exempt weekends and holidays from its schedule).

I did get some solid hours in this week on a scene (I know, I know, it sounds like so little!). It's evolving. My thesis director is pleased with my approach -- focusing on writing scenes to get at their emotional resonances before anything else -- so no concerns there either. She's also given me a tentative schedule for the semester with work due every three weeks or so, which will be very helpful. For a while, the plan was just that I would submit a big chunk of the manuscript after Thanksgiving, and that had me very nervous as I could see myself procrastinating until the last minute and then turning in something I didn't feel good about.

We've been making progress on our garden as well -- the irises got transplanted two weeks ago as planned and we've found the sprinkler valve at last. So now our poor yellowed grass is slowly coming back to life. To keep the weeds from reclaiming the iris bed, we picked up little perennial mums to create a border. Apparently, they bloom into the fall, so we'll be able to enjoy the color for quite some time. We were also able to get some wonderful lavender plants to flank the flagstones leading up to our front walk, as well as hens-and-chicks to place in between the stones themselves (see below).

It's nice to have something so delightful to nurture as we're putting down our own roots here. I know it'll help with the thesis stress for sure. If I didn't have the whole job search thing that I'm also supposed to be working on right now, I'd almost be able to say I felt like my life was in balance again ...