1. I am definitely over my cold (did not have any stuffiness or sniffles today) and slept a lot better last night. Still woke up a few times, but was able to get back to sleep quickly.

2. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it, but a house at the end of our street (four doors down) has been semi-abandoned for about thirty years and fully abandoned for at least 10-15. It's a house with attached apartments, and the house has been unoccupied for about thirty, and a few people in the apartments hung on for longer due to the rent being low, even though the landlord was, according to people we knew in one of them who moved out earlier than the stragglers, completely MIA. It's been slowly falling down in that time (a few years ago I noticed some of the stairs outside were missing) and after years of squatters that eventually led to a small fire (thankfully fire department responded quickly and no major damage was done), the windows and doors were boarded up, and a few years after that a chainlink fence was put around it.

Now finally starting last month they are working to remodel it! I assumed at first it would just be completely torn down and something new put up, but after they stripped it down to the bare bones, earlier this week new lumber appeared on the site and they started replacing bad spots and reinforcing things. Apparently it had asbestos inside, as when they first started work on it, it was all hazmatted up and had warning signs around. I'm really curious to see what it will look like when it's all done.

3. This morning I noticed a puzzle piece on the floor under the desk and knew right away it was too large for the puzzle I'm currently working on. Sure enough, it's from the Country Bear Jamboree one we just finished. Which I put out in the little library a couple days ago! D: I always am so careful when putting the puzzles away, especially if it's one I'm going to give away. I'd hate to give away a puzzle with a missing piece. But thankfully when I went out to check, the puzzle had still not been taken, so I was able to add the piece back in. I will be even more careful from now on!

4. Jasper's so handsome.

1. Finished another puzzle!



This is from the same new series as the Stitch one, but this one has proper square corners. Carla is actually the one who finished it (and worked on it a lot throughout), though I did do about half of it.

2. I continue to feel very stuffed up but otherwise not sick? I guess I'll take that over being properly sick, but it's not a lot of fun. My lips were so chapped today from breathing through my mouth and I only got about an hour, maybe an hour and a half of sleep last night because I was tossing and turning. Though if I felt properly sick I'd also feel like I could take off work, but since I feel otherwise fine and there's a lot of work to do, I've still been going in (masked).

3. Friday afternoon I was feeling really stressed and anxious about work, which caused me to just keep obsessively running over things in my mind all that night and through Saturday, which is not great when I just want to enjoy the weekend and not think about work, but this week has felt better, like we are making real progress and can meet the deadline and that things will be okay. It just feels like there's a lot on my shoulders at a very late stage in the game, and I don't love that.

4. Chloe's got the right idea.