Laundry Day

(Stacey writing.)

You know how dogs are supposed to lower your blood pressure? Not ours. We awoke to the sound of her relieving herself all over the carpet on Brock’s side of the bed. I tried to give her the benefit of the doubt since she’s on a medicine that increases her thirst and also makes her have to go more, but the truth of it is she could hold it for most of the day the day before. She has done this a couple of other times on this trip and it always seems to happen after a day where she was left alone for most of the day so it feels like it is a payback thing.

Other than that, today was about mostly about school and laundry for the kids and I and pretty much all work for Brock.

Late morning, Bryn, Spence, Sky and I loaded up to head to the nearest Laundromat. I let Brighton stay home this time so that he could work on his computer game that he is creating. There is laundry available here at the park, but it seemed a little expensive and I wasn’t sure if the dryers would work well. Plus, I had a comforter and Heidi’s blankets to wash that needed a bigger front loader type machine. Evidently, the Laundromat is only about 3 and a half miles away, but we have to drive 8 and half miles around the long way since whatever happened last year that washed out the bridge between here and there.

We got to the laundry and found that there was no one else there. That always feels good, like I get the pick of the machines. I had to fight with the change machine to get it to break down my twenty, but eventually I won. ;o) After we got all our loads started washing, we walked over to the grocery store across the parking lot and got some cold drinks (super high humidity again) and some crackers and cheese and some more cash because it became clear that my $20 wasn’t going to cut it.

By the time we walked back into the laundry, pretty much all five loads had cycled down and were ready for the dryers. The dryers were the kind where you get 5 minutes for each quarter you feed it. I started them all off with 30 minutes or less depending on what the load was. None of the loads ended up being done with the time amount of my first estimate. Those machines seemed hungry for quarters, but eventually we got everything pretty nearly dry and so, a couple of hours after we started, we loaded everything back up into the Yukon and headed home with my quarter supply about thirty bucks lighter. Not sure now if I shouldn’t have just used the machines here at the park, but at least I got the comforter done. It’s been in the way, in a bag in our storage compartment, for awhile, and I was glad to get it out of there.

When we got home to the trailer, the older kids and I still had a little school to finish up. We only have a couple more days of our core work so we don’t want to slack off now. The kids were all dying to go swimming and I thought it would feel pretty good too given how hot and humid it is and how really hot it had been in the laundry. As we were trying to finish up our last book, the thunder began to rumble. The skies had grown incredibly grey. Skylar in particular was very grumbly that we weren’t going to get to swim since he saw some lightning. (Can you picture him telling me about the lightning, impatiently, with his eyebrows down and his lips pursed? Like would I ever get finished?) I tried to reassure him that since we are staying here for the rest of the week, there will be another opportunity for pool time. Tomorrow is forecasted to be in the 90’s with the same humidity again.

After the storm rolled past, (it was short-lived, we hardly got any rain, just a few sprinkles), he was completed distracted by playing with lots of neighborhood kids and having a ball running all over the place outside.

After dinner, he and Dad got in some one-on-one on the basketball court. It was a nice evening with a little of the humidity blown away by the storm and the temperatures a little cooler thankfully.

PS If we happen to miss a day's blog, please don't worry, the data (& cell!) coverage here is very weak and inconsistent and although I had the blog ready, I wasn't able to post last night.