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Hello, lovely folk.

Let's just smile knowingly at one another, nod understandingly, and acknowledge, with little to-do, that it has been a while between posts. And then let us all move on gracefully. Like swans.

I know many of you have been waiting patiently for the moment when the major upheavals in my life stopped outweighing the peace I needed to gather my thoughts for blogging purposes, and I do believe we are close to that moment. Hurrah! We are now safely on the other side of moving house/province/job etc. and are beginning the slow process of making London, Ontario our home.

I had grand plans for the move, and expectations about timelines for unpacking and settling in that would, in hindsight, make even the most miraculous of miracle workers laugh loudly. That is why, three weeks into our arrival here, we are only fully set up in two rooms (the kitchen/dining room and the bathroom) with all the other rooms trailing behind in various states of disarray. Many rooms are functional, but their dominant aesthetic is one that heavily employs what I like to call The Exploding Box motif. It's not as stylish as it sounds, would you believe.

Exhibit A. My studio.

In my defense, I'd just like to say that this particular Exploding Box, which sees all of my creative life strewn rakishly across all available flat surfaces in the room, was "helped" along by our moving company. While the brochure promised packers (and unpackers) in neatly ironed uniforms treating your prized possessions as if they were rare and priceless artifacts from a lost civilisation, in reality we got the Lads Wiv' Tattoos (barbed-wire-around-the-neck kind of tattoos) who, while courteous, polite and hardworking, just wanted out of the there as quickly as they could and treated much of our stuff like rugby balls - designed to be thrown, fallen on, drop kicked or just generally squeezed very tightly while dodging tackles from other very large men. Luckily piles of fabric and thread can withstand such manly treatment. Not so much one of our chest of drawers, unfortunately.

Nevertheless, despite the chaos and the heat (who knew Canada could be hot?!!), signs of settling are beginning to appear.

Exhibit B. The carefully arranged gatherings of small collections on window sills.

Now I just need somewhere to put my clothes (somewhere, that is, that doesn't require me climbing over them, or burrowing under them, to achieve other tasks around the house) and we may be able to tick off another room as Complete.

As for the rest of the cast - my One True Love and the ever-growing Littlest One Inside - are both fine and flourishing. The foster dogs have found their "forever homes" and despite loud, unbecoming sobbing on my behalf we are delighted that they are now with new families where they are much loved and, from all reports, settled and happy (and sleeping on way more pieces of plush furnishing than we ever allowed - even in our weakest moments).

It's good to be back, people. Thanks for hanging in there.