If you don’t know that I have a fondness for little things, you will find out. Things that I might normally see of a certain size, but I come across an unusual small size, seem to tickle my fancy. 🙂 For example:
Adorable itty bitty milk jug
You might see this small size milk everywhere, but when I have seem them they are in cartons or bottles. This one is a jug. The most adorable little jug. My husband would not let me buy it just to have the jug. I was reminded of all that I had to discard in order to get my suitcase to a reasonable weight. Yeah, but, this is LITTLE! He still said no. Sigh.
A few days later we were at another market (no, I don’t spend all of my time in grocery stores. I think) and we were looking at the candy section. My kids have had a fondness for Double Decker candy bars for years. It was always a big deal when one of us would find them in a shop, or I talked my brother into schlepping them from Germany. Usually one found its way into their Christmas stocking. Imagine my delight when I saw this –
Dinky Deckers. I love it!
Even the name is adorable!
I’m certain these won’t be the only the little items that I find. I’ll post them as I see them. You maybe ignore if you choose – but it makes me happy.
We have been asked by some locals what is the most difficult part thus far of this experience. We’ve fumbled for an answer, the most obvious to us is that it was incredibly hard to leave everything, and everyone, that we know and love behind. But, that was a given. At this point, and it is early days yet, I feel that the most difficult adjustment has been remembering that we are not on vacation. We are living here. It’s a different mind set (no, I cannot have dessert every night).
We have been very fortunate in having our hosts, Rick and Joanne here. They know so many people! In addition, they have both gone out of their way to make certain that our stay will be comfortable. This includes buying a small BBQ so my grilling freak husband can use it! Rick also took us to a couple of out of the way sights – I’ll detail those in a moment. Many thanks to them both for their kindness.
What have we done? What have we seen? Well, anyone who knows me knows that my first stop would be the bakery in town. I was most certainly not disappointed! Marguerite’s is absolutely delicious. I admit, shamefacedly, that I neglected to take a photo of my yummy pancakes. I shall whip myself with fresh pasta from Aldi for that mistake. Other critical reconnoitering was done at 3 of the 4 grocery stores in the village. The Tesco is a bit further walk – we will go there tomorrow morning. I have to figure out which ones I like best! We have learned to always carry a €1 coin and a €2 coin when going to the grocery store. Why? Because that is how you get a shopping cart. You put the appropriate coin in a slot on the handle (depends on the store what denomination of coin is required), this releases a chain and allows you to take a cart. When you return the cart to the cart park area and reattach the chain your coin is released. Funny, there are no carts just sitting in the parking lot here.
Yesterday morning Rick took us out in his car (I remembered to go to the passenger side!!!). He had a couple of out of the way sights to show us. The first place we stopped was St Bridgid’s Well.
Sorry this image isn’t the greatest. The bottom left corner is where the explanation of the well is.
Essentially, if you drink from this well you should be cured of any pains you may have. It is a naturally occurring, artesian well. The water was amazingly clear and crisp. So far, so good on the pains.
The next stop was at a path that goes through an old train tunnel. The path was closed for renovations (a second tunnel under the highway is being constructed so that the path connects with the Great Southern Trail). No, mom/dad, we did not hop a fence that said keep out…
How did I get this photo if we didn’t hop a fence? I found it laying around. Or something like that.A view of the countryside
Our final stop was at Glenquin Castle. It’s on this random back country road but happens to be one of the finest examples of tower castles in Ireland.
I didn’t do any posts while we were in Connecticut. Bad me.
One of the places my daughter in law and I went was to Costco. Now, this is not a big deal in the Pacific Northwest – we had a Costco 5 minutes from the house. And there aren’t many areas in our general vicinity that were more than 15 minutes from a Costco. It was an hour drive to the nearest Costco from Groton. An hour! Not because there was traffic, but because it was that far away. How do these people survive? And then the parking lot…it was adorable. It was a mini Costco parking lot.
That’s it. That’s all the parking lot there is…how bizarre
We had a wonderful time with our daughter in law and grandson. We didn’t get to spend nearly enough time with our oldest son though. Uncle Sam required his presence far more than we appreciated. We went to the zoo, explored Mystic Seaport, walked around Mystic itself (Sift (a newer bakery/cafe in town) – you stole my heart!) and just generally enjoyed our time there. My mom flew to Connecticut for the last couple of days that we were there. It was very strange leaving her behind. She heads to Germany today.
While we loved our time in Connecticut, it is now time for the new adventure to begin! I didn’t intend to start it by losing my passport while in the hotel in Boston. Okay, I didn’t lose it, I just couldn’t figure out where I had put it. After begging for some assistance from St Anthony it suddenly popped into my brain where I had stashed it. Not a good few moments there.
Our ride to the west coast of Ireland…
Let me start with the negative and get that out of the way…I now understand people who are driven to violence over seat backs being reclined all the way back. You see, we are spoiled, Alaska Airlines (always our choice if available) has a special seat design. You don’t get a seat back reclined to the point where it is 6 inches from your face. This lovely 757 – seriously didn’t realize these were still flying – has a terrible seat design. Yes, I do have long legs, but when that woman in front of me put her seat all the way back I could not even sit forward in my seat, I had to turn. It was hand’s down the most uncomfortable plane ride I have ever had. Done whining.
Now we are in Newcastle West, Co. Limerick, Republic of Ireland!!! As I sit here typing I am looking out the window at the partial remains of the Earl of Desmond’s castle from the 15th century.
My view : )
We are very fortunate to be staying at a flat owned by a couple from Salem, OR so we have bonded over our northwesterness. Rick and Joanne happen to be here working on their other properties, so we have some time with them. Rick seems to know everyone in town! The bonus to that is that he took us onto private land that happens to have the remains of a Knights Templar stronghold from the 11th century!! Oh yeah, the history nut in me geeked out. This wasn’t some fixed up castle, this was incredible! We were able to climb around – carefully.
We are at the end of our first day in Ireland and it is wonderful indeed. Now to try to shake the exhaustion. We arrived at 6:00AM and have pushed through but brain fog is setting in.
This is it. All of it. And I have to say that while we thought we were organized, we really weren’t. The learning curve is rather large on this one. There will be significant rethinking of everything once we are in Connecticut. Where we should arrive right about dawn. But then we will be with Most Adorable Grandson (and his parents). That makes everything good.
Lesson #2 came at SeaTac. There was no pre-check line the direction we wanted to go, but we decided to use that security check anyway, instead of going down to the main one. MISTAKE. Yes, we got the cute little card that allowed us to keep our shoes and jackets on, but all of the electronics had to come out. Oh yes, all of them. This failed on the fun-o-meter. There we were, trying to find everything in our poorly organized bags, get it into bins, trying to keep track of the many bins it took – just a disaster all around. Lesson learned, thank you very much.
To the children we are leaving here in the Northwest, we will miss you terribly (spouses and grandpuppies included). To the many friends we have had to say so long to (and the many we didn’t get a chance to see), we will miss you terribly. To all of our wonderful family: stay healthy, get healthy, we will miss you terribly too. We will be back before you know it. Besides…we have to get all the stuff we ended up leaving at my dad’s! To all my shoes and clothes that I left behind, I will miss you terribly too
So here we go: on another adventure together. The first adventure was raising three wonderful children together. Now, for another one…
This blog idea is a work in progress. Forgive me while I learn
Who? What? What?!?!?! Yeah. Us too. The quick version of the back story here: I had some health issues about 3 years ago (things are much improved) but it made the husband and I take stock of our lives, where we are, where we’ve been and where do we want to go from here. We want to see things! We want to live in a different place and really get to know it. We want to experience the world. We were fortunate enough that his supervisors were willing to find a way to work with this crazy idea. He’s worked remotely for a while now – he’s just going to be really remote sometimes, to support us on our grand adventure.
The house is sold. The emptiness seems to make it easier to say goodbye. A wonderful, young family has purchased it and will add their memories to the ones we’ve made here. A house is more than the materials it is built from. It is the people and their thoughts, emotions and actions that make a house a home. The new owners know that they are getting a home. A happy home. Not a perfect home, but a happy one.
I’m wrapping up my full time employment. My boss couldn’t be more supportive. I will miss everyone there and it has been a fantastic place to work.
Saying goodbye (see you later really) to friends and family is hard. Saying goodbye to my therapist, acupuncturist, massage therapist, and medical providers (you know who you are!) is hard. Saying goodbye to this beautiful valley that we have been blessed to live in is hard. Tulips will always make me think of home. But a grand, new adventure awaits!
