The One year mark

September marks the one year anniversary of moving to Chinle so I thought I would share some of my thoughts:

The Quirks

• Just accept that you will have to drive 2 hours to a real grocery store for exotic food items, such as: chicken breasts, bowtie pasta, and non-moldy strawberries


• Kids will tell Rachel that she and any other white girl "look like twins" (I guess they don't notice that with their theory they don't realize that they would all qualify as 'twins' as well)
  
• You will run into cows and horses on the road when you are driving ...and sheep and cows when you go for a jog


• You have to get any items containing alcohol from behind the counter at the grocery store: mouthwash, hairspray, vanilla (but you won't care when you realize that at least the store does carry it after all)


• After you have seen your tap water turn brown on many occasasions it is impossible to ever see it as "clean" no matter how clear it looks
  
• biligana means "white person"--good to know since they could be talking about me
• one weekend here is nice and relaxing, the 2nd weekend in a row will be complete boredom, and the 3rd on will be pure torture :-)


• School will get canceled due to a light dusting of snow OR rain, mud, dust storms, or the Chinle high school basketball team being in the championships (not the "official" reason they gave...but everyone knows it is true) :-)
• Stray dogs are everywhere...(and there are about 15 in my neighbors yard barking right now since she rescues them and tries to find homes for them...a nice thought--but mad are they loud! Although...I guess it is better than having a rooster wake me up at the crack of dawn like one of my friends :-)
  

some of the reasons why somedays it isn't so bad

• Vacations are easy to justify when they are necessary for your sanity, in the year we lived in Chandler I think we only left town twice. The first 6 months here we left about every other weekend, that has slowed down a bit but we usually leave once a month. We went to Phoenix too many times to count, skiing twice, to Cedar City 3 times, (including once to St George), Vegas for our anniversary, Seattle, Durango, and Boston. Hmmmmm....where to next? ;-)
  
  (forgot to post this pic of Rach on a bungee jump in Colorado--jumping sky high!)


• Shopping is waaaay easy to justify when you are in a big city, and if I want something, I get it, because who knows when I will get another chance (none of that, 'hmmm I probably shouldn't, maybe I should think about it a few days' -stuff) :-)
• It snowed just enough to have fun (sledding, snowmen, icicle fights) but not too much that we ever had to shovel it (which is good...because we don't have a shovel)


• The friends--a with the common bond of being stuck in the middle of nowhere together. Some have been here longer than others (ranging from 9 years to 3 months), and they pass on all their tips to us newbies. I hosted a girls night last night and we had a lot of fun-we had smoothies and even stayed up till midnight chatting--wooo! I know you will all be suprised to hear that it was the first one I have organized, I guess I have been feeling a bit out of my comfort zone, but now I feel like my old self and I plan on having many more get-togethers in the near future :-)

• Story Hour at the school Library (stopped for the summer but it should be starting up again in a few weeks--and is easily a highlight for the week. They also do lots of crafts--many of which I would not expect to see in a library (for ex: shaving cream on tables)
  
  
  


• Rainbows--I have seen so many gorgeous, HUGE rainbows over the past month it is unreal. Anything that brings a smile to your face is a good thing.

• Listening to Rachel babble and sing away...in Navajo...not sure if she even know what she is saying, but she is definitely picking up the jist of the language.
• Running into people you know at the grocery store, at school, etc. Once you are settled there are benefits of living in a small town.
• Smelling the fresh scent of clean laundry from the laundramat in the grocery store parking lot, it is a nice change from the bland smell of dirt.

Today is a great day!

How does my garden grow?

YAY! Most things are still alive! :-) And I have my very own corn field. Need I say more?

We have already eaten 4 tomates and there are plenty more. My grass is filling in...still has a way to go...but not bad. (How would you trim this much grass? not enough to justify buying a mower...maybe a weed wacker or some hedging shears...but what to do for now...scissors? ;-)

Our sunflowers are getting tall, the pumpkins and watermelon are full of blossoms and one pumpkin and one watermelon has made their appearance.

Rachel's carrots are chugging along too...only bummer is that it appears that all those bushy stems are attached to only 6 carrots. Oh well.

The first pictures were taken about a month ago (when I started writing this post)

and here are pics from today

Getting the flu sucks - but getting the flu when you planned to leave for the 3 day weekend triple sucks!
Amber