Things are looking up.
We got the carpets cleaned so I no longer feel like I have to decontaminate everything that touches the floor.
The pet store smell is mostly gone. Either it was defeated by the carpets getting cleaned, or we've replaced it with our own personal aroma.
Our house-neighbor helped Jeremy put in a window AC unit so that we don't slowly bake to death in our upstairs bedroom at night.
The Provo library has the best Storytime I've ever seen, and it's within walking distance of our house through quiet, sidewalked neighborhoods.
Jeremy worked it out with his boss and scored dinner for us every night with the Arabic students, so that's less cooking I have to do in our ghetto kitchen. It's not quite a summer of no cooking, but it's wonderful.
Our landlord said we could use the swingset in the side yard he set up for his grandkids. I think we three girls spend at least an hour a day there, Miriam and I on the seesaw and Magdalena in the baby seat swing. We swing and chat and talk about the great mysteries of life (why is the Y on the mountain so big?) and then swing some more.
We made friends with our punk neighbors, whose front door is located approximately 12 inches from ours, so we see each other a lot. They hang out and skateboard in front of the house some evenings, which the girls (and Jeremy) enjoy watching. They curse a lot while they do it, but I'm hoping Miriam and Magdalena don't pick up on that too much. Last night, Jeremy broke out the laptop and showed these young punk skaters his own skateboarding videos from 1994. They were impressed.
Then we all ate watermelon together.
Things are looking up.