The Hazard Chronicles

In the last post, I mentioned how sometimes it's the quirky little shared things in marriage that make them so good. Then I started looking around our house, and realize that it's not just a marriage. It's our whole family. Every family has a slightly different personality that is made up of individuals, their ages, and their interests. We certainly have some things that I think are uniquely "us." Some of them I really like, like our ski trips or our reading out loud at night time. Some of them maybe highlight what we don't care so much about, like our lack of a cohesive home décor, perpetually unmade beds, or kitchen cupboards which say more about whoever the last person was who unloaded the dishwasher rather than any sort of systemic organization scheme. Either way- this is us. It's who we are. 

Here are a few other little things. For this post I simply took 10 minutes to walk around the house. I took pictures of things that we have always taken for granted, but that to a third party might make you go "huh." Enjoy!

When we moved into this house, we had no furniture. But there was some wood on the side of the house, and a "For Sale" sign on our front lawn. The day we moved in, I built this bed out of these materials. Though the mattress has been updated, this is still the bed that Rachel and I sleep in every night. That white post is from the sign.

I don't know who started this, but it has been going on for a while now. Why? I don't think anyone knows. But we have a milk carton lid collection in our refrigerator, and the lid never actually stays on the milk. But that's okay.

Lyle sits in the home gym. If you know, you know.

 Here's another little reference that has been part of our home for so long that I almost forgot to take a photo. Again, if you know, you know. And yes, there is a lighthouse on the opposite wall :)

I cringe whenever I see this stupid pile of socks, but it is working. So, our kids are constantly getting their socks mixed up. And then they were sneaking into each other's room to get "their" socks back- but since there was never clear ownership in the first place, it just caused arguments. So they had a meeting and decided that kid socks would just go in a pile on the floor of the hallway closet, and then anyone could take them at any time. I think it was supposed to be a temporary thing, but it has been...a while...and it seems to be working. It's dumb, but we don't want to mess with it.

I know that Halloween is just around the corner, so maybe you are thinking this is our seasonal decoration. Wrong. This guy has been on our roof for over a year. He changes position from time to time, but he is always there, watching over the neighborhood. His pet is a more recent acquisition that just appeared one day. I don't even know who put it there. Before long we may have a whole skeleton family up there! I'm sure our neighbors love us.

We do a lot of things, and spontaneity is something we work hard to maintain. This is the back of my car. Three climbing ropes and a climbing pack with shoes/harnesses, two concert chairs, two skateboards, four tennis rackets, a pair of rollerblades, and an emergency jump-starter/air compressor. This is where these items belong, pretty much all the time. The van and the Prius look pretty similar. The Durango has a fold-down mattress in the back for impromptu overnight trips.

I will admit to being surprised by our "smoking" toilet. At the same time, I wasn't surprised at all. Little pranks like this are the status quo. A common one is for people to take dry-erase markers and spruce up our framed photos. Or hide little cutout pieces of paper in the light fixtures for a silhouette effect. For the longest time we had the word "gullible" taped on the ceiling above the kitchen table.

This is the permanent location of the ladder. Because, you know, getting on the roof is an every-day sort of activity.

If the skeleton on the roof is perpetual Halloween, then this guy is our perpetual Christmas. These decorations have been there since last December. At this point, I think we'll just leave them alone until January at least. 

Not so exciting is the little home office we built under our stairs. The cool part is actually not seen, as it was built into the wall when we did this project. Time capsules, favorite toys not played with any more, and roughly 70 boxes of old dental office stuff are all walled in behind that little shelf. Maybe we'll open it up again one day. If not, then somebody down the line is in for a surprise. We have a similar time capsule under the floor in the attic of our Wallace house.

We're quirky in some ways. It's fun. Have a good week!