Where do I start? How do you cover the amount of time we have been back in the US? Yes, we left Tsamaya in Turkey and flew back to the US on October 29, 2019. Yes, it is now July 2021 and we are still here. This is definitely not what was planned, but that seems to be the rule for all due to the outbreak of covid.
To start, when we first arrived back in the US, we found that we were definitely not too late to participate in the annual ritual of raking leaves. That was one of the first tasks we did as we are fortunate that our Village picks up the leaves each year if you get them out to road in time. This is so much better than bagging them all! Unfortunately, we do have a lovely Norwegian maple tree which is great for shade, but it usually doesnt drop its leaves until after the Village stops picking up leaves. As we are in Upstate NY, we knew snow would and our first dusting occurred on November 8, 2019. Fortunately, it was just a dusting, but it definitely gets you into the
One annual event in our village that as Bob says, tells you a lot about our area, is the Holiday Tractor Parade that is held in November. It is definitely a farming area and this parade only allows tractors in it with the rule that they must decorate with a minimum of 1,000 lights. The tractors range in size from what you see on the very large farms around here down to and including garden tractors – lots of fun for all – we havent missed one yet since moving here!
The holidays are a good time for getting together with family and friends as well as continue a few traditions. This includes the baking of lots of Christmas cookies to be given out to friends and of course leaving a few at home so we have some for Santa of course! The first Christmas back was more normal in being able to get together with everyone in person, but of course with covid this past Christmas was more limited in how many people could get together so much more subdued as Im sure everyone can relate to.
we get in winter of course there was shoveling needed, but fortunately Bob has a snowblower that does most of the work. Even so, we did have a couple of big storms that seemed to almost bury the snowblower and took Bob much longer to deal with. We used to say we never enjoyed winter much (did I say we arent into winter sports?) when we were working but we now realize that winter isnt as bad when you are retired as you dont have to go out early in the morning to get to work or drive on the roads that may not plowed yet. With retirement you can just sit back, enjoy the view of the beautiful snow and have another cup of coffee or tea until things clear up more (or just wait to go for another day). Some of the benefits of retirement for any of you that arent there yet.
Our plan was to head back to Tsamaya near the end of March or beginning of April, 2020, but as you are all aware this is when covid hit with a vengeance so no flights back to Turkey. No one knew how
long things would be abnormal but fortunately we bought our house back in 2015 so we had a base to stay.
When things dont go as planned, then you need up with plan B (or are we on to C or D)? With having bought an old house there were plenty of projects to Bob was very productive over this time period with building cabinets for our back entrance way, putting a tile floor down on the side porch, putting slate on the porch wall (a very clever idea of his that worked out great), turning old doors into shutters, finishing up lots of window trim (not one of his favorites), making a few clocks as gifts, building a whole new sewing center for me, rebuilding our front porch and numerous other projects Im sure I have left out. He definitely has been productive and enjoying being in his shop for a longer period of time. Hopefully he will be OK to give up the shop for a while when we head back to Tsamaya.
baby quilt for a friend we met on our travels. Made a fun lap quilt and am still working on finishing up a queen size quilt for us.
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