We’ve been living at my husband’s parents’ acreage for one week now, and so far so good! It’s been a very atypical week for our family, so we haven’t settled into any sort of normal routine.
A lot has happened this week! I had my birthday; it didn’t really feel like a birthday so much this year, but that’s life. My brother-in-law also got married, and my in-laws hosted both the rehearsal dinner and the gift opening dinner, with over 100 guests total. My husband was a groomsman, and we worked on his speech; we sang during the signing and practiced our song lots. I even helped my in-laws with some suggestions for their speech! We chose a date to move, booked our flights, applied for our Australian visitor and New Zealand working holiday visas, and were quickly approved for both. We announced our moving date and destination to our friends and family, and have had lots of conversations about the move. We saw most of our extended family due to the wedding festivities, and there were lots of guns, tannerite, quads and blowing up things, which are frequent family activities. So as I say, this was quite the week!
We moved in on my 31st birthday, so my husband and I had a nice wine and my birthday cheesecake in his brother’s childhood bedroom, across the hall from his parents. It was different than our living room, of course, but still comfortable.
I spent the weekdays doing what I usually do, minus tv, because they only have one channel. Instead of the usual morning show while I eat breakfast, I visited with my mother-in-law most mornings. This, in my opinion, was a better use of time than watching tv would have been anyways.
Something that stood out to me this week was how hard working my mother-in-law is. I got to witness her in action all week as she prepared food for both of the huge meals they were hosting. By the time I showed my face in the kitchen on Monday morning, she had already completed several batches of home made buns, and perhaps a few pies. When I got home later that evening, she was still in the kitchen, and had accomplished more pies and several lasagnas. Tuesday looked much the same, as did Wednesday afternoon once she returned from volunteering at a Mom’s group at our church.
She thinks she isn’t good at organizing and planing ahead, but she had pages and pages of lists of all her meal plans for each meal, and was working well ahead to get everything prepped in time. There were so many pies and cakes, salads, buns, meats, lasagnas and sides! She had even arranged for some friends to come and help serve during the rehearsal dinner so she could socialize with her guests.
As I write this, those two meals are done, but Thanksgiving is tomorrow, and the in-laws are hosting our family for that as well! The turkey literally had to come out of the freezer on the morning of the wedding! They amazed me this week with all of the money, effort and love that went into both of the wedding meals, and Thanksgiving. In the midst of all of this, she apologized to me for not putting on a birthday dinner to celebrate me. Let’s just say she’s completely excused!
As my in-laws kept showing up from each trip into town with more and more groceries, I’d ask what the new stuff was all for. “This is for Thursday, and this is for Saturday… no that’s for Thanksgiving.”
Oh and did I mention that they don’t have a dishwasher??? Yes. Everything gets washed and dried by hand here.
We’ve been busy with so many of our own things this week, but we’ve been able to step in and help a bit with prep and clean up, and hopefully we’ve made a bit of a difference for them.
Thankfully they also let us change the doorknob to our room with one that locks. We’ve had so many people in the house this week, that it’s nice to know I have one room, at the least, that’s my private space. I learned more than ever last summer when we lived in our camper out here, that I am a really private person. I value my privacy much more than I ever realized. In being a private person, I find sharing space is hard for me; I’m trying to be as respectful of their routines as possible, and they have been really good at giving us our space and alone time as well. I’m very aware that we are guests in their space, and I’m reminding myself to be grateful that we were welcomed in, to spend this last month at home with family.
A few of the guys ended up getting ready for the wedding in our room, so our teddy bears and string of Christmas lights will forever be in their photos!
I’m hoping for a quieter week ahead, and more relaxation time for all of us! This first week has sure been a whirlwind of activity, but we have seen a lot of our family. We won’t see them for a long time once we leave, and I’m already missing some of them. I have a lot to be thankful and grateful for.
Thanks for reading, blog family, and Happy Canadian Thanksgiving!
Cherished Life by Chelsea 