My family. kkitten42, Karl (HeraldoftheAbyss), Sascha, Gabriel, Eric, Zoe the Siberian Husky, Ari Cat, and this evening our newest clan member, Ayla the Australian Shepherd.

Yes, I did rate the critters as part of the family. They're individuals and part of the whole that is our family. I'm not picking favorites between Kitten and Karl and the children, and the dog/s are part of the family too. I would miss Zoe the world's most well behaved canine if she was gone. Ari Cat has been my closest companion all his life, from the time he was six weeks old.

It's bad juju to pick favorites among the people you love. Those are the ones I love, in my household. Lisa my Thursday Night art pal is part of the clan too, even though she doesn't live with us.

I swear it feels as if I moved here last week. My room is as clean as if I moved here last week and just finished unpacking. Everything has been gone through. Everything has been sorted. Books are shelved. Art is on the walls -- and rearranged to take down some pieces and put up others, a good way to keep good art from fading in the light.

Today, this afternoon, Karl just vacuumed and steamed the carpet. It's three shades lighter, beautifully clean, still damp and soft on my feet. That's what's giving it the new-home feeling, the scrubbed carpet. We pretty much dusted most of the surfaces on Monday when Eric helped me move furniture and sort everything into its new places. The middle of the room is still spacious, with lots and lots of cool floor space to spread out. I could cut mats easily without bumping into stuff, even the giant mat boards.

This isn't the first time he's steamed my room. He does that four or five times a year and it's a big deal to me every time. I think that more than anything has been helping to keep my dust allergy down, that and the more frequent vacuuming. It gets dirty. People track through, I track through, Ari sheds a whole lot of his fur and various types of dirt get ground into the floor. Toddlers come in and play on the floor carrying dirt from their outdoor excursions and random children's art mediums.

But this feels like a new beginning. I have this lazy easy small smile on my face that won't go away, because it's just too cool to be here and have everything in a good sensible place. It's as big a step in organizing as it was the last time I organized my art area and moved the table over by my chair.

The next steps in organizing will be to get a small dresser to act as a taboret and make even better use of the space in my art/writing area. Plus a medium to small dresser to go at the end of the bed and hold clothing, that'll eliminate the clothing tubs and let me reorganize that and not have stacks of clean laundry in a laundry bin at the foot of the bed.

Winter is good for crafts. I might look at getting cheap furniture this winter and refinishing it when I'm indoors puttering instead of getting to go outside and do plein air. I have flip flops now, but today is humid and overcast without the kind of sunny directional brightness I really want for outdoor painting.

I packed up a little khaki shoulder bag sort of like a miniature back pack, with a pocket field box of watercolors, small watercolor block and postcard pad I want to finish up in OSWOAs, a small sketchbook or two, small sets of Conte crayons and the 24 color set of Koh I Noor Progresso colored pencils for working outside or just grabbing and heading out if we go to the park or something cool like that. All the small art supplies that beg to be used for travel are in one place easily grabbed for going out in the yard.

I put some ACEO blanks in some of the pockets too, so that if I get moved to do ACEOs in this medium or that it'll be easy.

So while I'm taking it easy today, I'm also enjoying my clean new environment and deep relaxing, about to start puttering with some art. I cut some more Fabriano Artistico ACEO blanks, the hot press watercolor paper is much better for ACEOs than cold press because it allows more detail.

It's a good day and I'm very grateful to Karl and Eric for helping me get this place as clean as if I moved. It's amazing to me to live somewhere for two years and not be sinking into overwhelming filth through not being able to take care of even a room by myself. It's funny, but I think that is some of why I moved so many times even back in the 90s -- if it got too bad and needed a deep cleaning, I wasn't able to either do it or get help with it to make it possible. But if I moved it was easier to rope in friends to help me move. Moving is more of an emergency. Cleaning up is more of a chore. Perceived need versus real need, if I hadn't moved all those times I'd have lasted longer on my own... but that would have taken help that wasn't there.