She's home.

Last November, we adopted a cat from an animal shelter in Sacramento. We named her Kinzie.

Kinzie seemed so grateful to us for giving her a home and a family. She followed us everywhere in the house, and pushed her furry little head and paws close to our bodies as we slept.

Kinzie was about a year old when we adopted her. She had been in the shelter for almost two months at that point. Sometimes I wonder what she lived through during her first year of life. I wonder how she ended up in the shelter. I wonder what she looked like when she was a kitten, how little her meow must have sounded. It wrenches my heart to wonder. I deeply hope she was in a good home, that she was loved.

I often gaze at Kinzie in wonder. She has no idea how much joy she gives us.  And she teaches us so much.

I strive every day to give Kinzie the best life possible, the life that she deserves.

Last night we got our offer accepted on the house of our dreams. Kinzie, who has traveled with us from the shelter in Sacramento, to our condo in Chicago, across the country in our Honda back to California, to the home of my doting parents for the past few months while we searched and searched and searched for a house … is now moving with us to her forever home.

It's been a wonderful first year with you, our little moo cat. We love you so much.

A letter to my future home.

Dear future home,

It's taking us a while to find you. We're trying to be patient, because my husband and I are expected by society to have acquired this virtue by now. Unfortunately, Chuck and I are both the youngest in our families, and so are prone to violent tantrums rather than patience when we don't get our way. We also heighten each other's impatience, going to bed every night talking for hours about our wild dreams for the place where we will finally settle and start our family.

Even though we lack patience, we are even worse at compromising. Or settling. No, compromising. We know, future home, that you won't be perfect. We're not asking for perfection. We're just asking for an arbitrary combination of qualities that we're convinced we can't live without.

We need:

1. A master bedroom that will comfortably fit a king-sized bed. This is non-negotiable. I flail when I sleep, and so does my husband, and so does our cat.
2. The house needs to back into nature, not neighbors. This is possibly negotiable. But we want to see trees, or maybe a creek, or something nature-y like that, instead of someone else's house. Neighbors on either side of us is fine, just not behind us. I don't care if you think that's weird.
3. We need to hear crickets. This is more a Chuck requirement, but I'm going with it because I excel at marriage. We can't have road noise or anything that reminds us of a city. This is probably fatigue from that time we owned a place in the middle of downtown Chicago (um that was a few months ago), where most of our time outdoors was accompanied by honking cabs, tourists, and the smell of cigarette and car smoke. Actually we still own that place, and we still love it, but we refer to that as our 'young people' place. We are now looking for an 'old people' place, which needs to be a lot more quiet.
4. Our cat must love the house. That's just the way it is.

Is that too much to ask? Do you exist? We know you do. We just haven't found you yet. Please come to us. We can't wait to meet you.

Love,
Chuck, Erica & Kinzie

The ones who do.

Sunday mornings at the BBC.

When I was single, I used to go to the BBC to have after-dinner drinks with a date. Now that I'm married, I go there with Chuck on Sunday mornings to watch the Green Bay Packers play. I rag on football all the time, but I'd take this over dating any day.

Rose Garden.

At the Sacramento Capitol grounds.

Sweetness.

Dairy Queen in Monroe, WI

Leatherby's Family Creamery in Sacramento

CALIFORNIA!!!!!!!!

Hello, Sacramento traffic. Our family is completely exhausted. Did you know we've driven over 2,000 miles in 30 hours over the last three days? This is the first time we've seen so many cars on the road in a while. Usually it was just our little Honda hanging out with semi trucks that were also out for the long haul on 80.

We're back! And we're thrilled. A special thank you to Labor Day and time zone changes (we gained two hours going from Central > Mountain > Pacific time) for cutting us a break today and giving us time to rest and recoup.

Nevada.

Trees! Haven't seen these in a while.

Pit Stop at Winnemucca.

Mexican food run at Mariscos El Ray.

Fuel.

Utah.

Beautiful red mountains.

Chinese takeout at Golden Pearl,
Salt Lake City.

Speeding by the Great Salt Lake.

Wyoming.