2009

What a year it has been. Everyone I know is ready to say goodbye to 2009 and I hope for better things for everyone in 2010, most especially new jobs for everyone that I know (and all those that I don't know) who lost jobs as a result of the economy . I've been very fortunate to have secure jobs for most of my working life and count my blessings that I have a stable job that I enjoy.

2009 did bring us some great things, and I don't want to forget them among all of the bad news that this year will be remembered for:

- we visited the Big Apple for the first time in the spring (during the swine flu scare). I fell in love with the city, though I don't think I could ever live there.

- we found and moved into our dream house. house hunting was new to me, and quite an adventure! house selling was even tougher, and I don't wish to repeat the experience anytime soon. We're all settled in, decorating is a work in progress, and we have LOVED having so many people over to the house, including several overnight guests.

- we welcomed 2 members to our family: our niece was born in July and Kevin's cousin married his beautiful bride Julie in October.

We're spending New Year's Eve at a friend's house, and want to wish everyone a happy and prosperous 2010!! Be safe tonight and see you next year :)

Galveston

Kevin and I came to Galveston for a couple of days to have some R&R. Its been a while since we had a vacation, the summer was spent selling the house and getting ready to move.

We are staying at the historic Tremont House on the Strand, a great location since we can leave the car parked and walk around the Strand. We walked in and out of most of the stores yesterday, and enjoyed a wine bar - called "Bacchus". Many of the stores have signs saying how high the water got during Hurricane Ike - way over my head in all the buildings I've seen! - and we've been sad to see how many shops and businesses didn't reopen after Ike. Several stores have posters showing the damage they had, they've come a long way and knowing how far they've come (and how far the city has to go) makes me very happy we decided to come here to give them our business and spend our money.

Today we went to the Lone Star Flight museum, and toured the Moody Mansion - what a gorgeous house! and the furnishings are all from the Moody family. There is so much history in that house, amazing to know it withstood the 1900 hurricane. Each of these places also had a lot of damage from Ike and another place we tried to see (railroad museum) is being rebuilt in 2010. It will take quite a while for Galveston to be back to where they were pre-Ike.

Today was rainy and cold, great weather to go get hot chocolate at the Nestle cafe *yum*

Christmas

We had a great Christmas, including celebrations with both sides of the family. I love seeing our nephew open his gifts - the Transformers were a big hit, though it did take Kevin and me both working on it to figure out how to transform it back to a vehicle (how is a 4 year old supposed to do it?). We received many wonderful gifts from our families - my favorites: a spice rack for our pantry door (complete with installation by my father-in-law), and a fireplace set from my parents. - With the work we've done and gifts we've received the house decoration is really getting complete! We finally have a place to put up a set of clocks we got 2 years ago, it really fills in the wall above the stair landing.

We were able to spend time with a lot of great people over the holidays - I had a girlie movie night (Julie & Julia) right before Christmas, and we were able to spend time with Kevin's grandmother and husband, and had another movie night with my sister, brother and his wife after Christmas. We love having people over to the new house and hope to have more gatherings in 2010!

On Christmas Eve, we had a scare with Smokey. He had a seizure, first one in all the time we've had him. It was scary, mostly because I wasn't sure what was happening and we love our crazy little dog. He came out of it really quickly and has been back to his normal self ever since. We talked to the emergency vet that night and followed up with our usual vet once they opened up after the holiday. We had a quiet night that night and have kept an eye on him ever since. According to both vets, he may not have another one for months or years, or maybe never.

See ya next year!

I am ready for Christmas! I wrapped the last of our gifts last night - it is an 'IOU' gift since what we ordered for my father-in-law in NOVEMBER hasn't come in yet (grumble, grumble), but it should be here before the end of the week, and he'll have something to open when we do Christmas with Kevin's family tonight. His grandmother and her hubby (and dogs) drove in yesterday, so we'll get to see the whole family tonight. I love this time of year - the decorations (we drove around the neighborhood looking at lights over the weekend), the music, seeing family - and am looking forward to some relaxation (and no alarm clocks!) the rest of this week and next. We'll celebrate with Kevin's family tonight, with my family on Christmas day, and Kevin and I will have a short vacation to Galveston next week.

Today is my last day to work for the year! WOOHOO! I've moved all of my outstanding to-dos to after the holiday - it says due next month but it is really due next year (next decade if you really want to scare yourself about how time flies). It is a ghost town here at work, which has made it possible for me to get a lot done, but also problematic to get hold of anyone who I need to get answers from. Luckily all the 'gotta get done' is already done.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Santa tracking has come a long way since I was a kid. I remember watching the weather as a kid to see the red blip that was Rudolph's nose. Now NORAD will track him, complete with Facebook and twitter updates...

Christmas decorations

We took some photos of our Christmas decorations. I love how festive it makes the house look. I'm sure we'll add more decorations each year. There are also some photos of the petting zoo that our neighborhood had as part of the Winter festival - with BABY DEER!

Christmas Gathering

We had a great day yesterday! Kevin's entire family gets together each year for Christmas and this year they all came to our house.

The food for the event is a collective effort - making it easier on those hosting since everyone brings a little bit. It also making it taste better since everyone brings their specialties. I wish I'd taken a photo of the food, it was quite a spread - Kevin smoked a turkey (turned out great!), his uncle brought a ham, and there were all the fixings for sandwiches, cheese dip, guacamole, veggie tray, bean dip, pickle/olive tray, and desserts galore! My mother-in-law made hosting easy -- she handled the assignments of who brings what and also provided disposable plates and utensils. They even let us leave Smokey at their house for the day, since it would just be too much activity for him. We counted it up and there were 22 people in the house - 17 adults and 5 kids. I didn't think we could fit that many people in our house, but we did :)

From the time everyone got there it was chaos, but great fun. The 4 kids spent most of the time upstairs with the Wii. I didn't even know our nephew had arrived since he went straight upstairs to play with the other kids. It sounded like a herd of elephants running around upstairs, but they had a great time! We thought ahead and had Kevin's brother bring their Wii controllers so each of the 4 kids had their own - avoiding a lot of tears.....they barely ate they were so excited to see each other and play the games. He is good at the bowling game and they love rockband.

We all had a great time eating and visiting, and watching the kids open their gifts. We have gifts too - a white elephant gift exchange. Its funny to see what everyone brings...this year was the year of 'as seen on tv' - there was not one but 2 different Snuggies, a Perfect Brownie, and a laptop stand. Lottery tickets always show up. We were happy with what we got - Terminator Salvation blu-ray for Kevin and cute serving bowls (one that looks like an avocado and another that looks like a jalapeno pepper) for me.

The only one who didn't enjoy the day was our little niece Kendall, they brought her home for much of the party since she just couldn't get to sleep. We think she may be getting a tooth for Christmas, causing her to be UNHAPPY.. poor little gal.

We'd used having this event as an excuse to deck out the decorations for the house - this will be an ongoing effort since we'll add a little each year - this year we've added stockings, a wreath for the front door, garland on the stairs, and a set of light up candles in the yard.

We hope the kids were as exhausted as we were by the end of the night!!

Snow

Its snowing in downtown Houston! I was not really excited about it since I have to be at work and it makes me worry for the driving conditions going home, but it is beautiful. I looked up from my work to see it steadily coming down outside my window.

This is the first time we've ever had snow 2 years in row (blog from last year's snow), 34th time Houston has EVER had snow (since record keeping started in the late 1800s).

I've already seens posts of people laughing at how excited/freaked we are, but its rare for us and knowing how badly people drive in the rain its cause for concern...and celebration.....

Dangers of Social networking

Earlier this week I had to attend a meeting at Houston Community College (HCC), so I put headed to HCC for a meeting as my status on Twitter and Facebook.

A person I went to high school with commented on my status saying, "I've spent the day reading about hepatocellular carcinoma and found your status confusing." I saw the comment and thought it was odd to make that connection, but could find an h and two cs in the phrase, so it is probably also abbreviated HCC in medical literature. I also realize that your frame of reference will lead you to read abbreviations in certain ways...my job is its own alphabet soup of abbreviations. I went on about my business and didn't think anything more of it.

My poor mother-in-law read it and some part of her thought I might have it! She even researched it and called my hubby, who was unaware of my FB status , at home. I can only imagine how confused he was.

I hope I never have a disease such as that, but if I do or for any serious news I won't break it to people via facebook/twitter/whatever social networking site I'm using by then...

I know there are much more serious dangers with social websites, but that is the most recent one I've encountered, and now that my mother-in-law knows I'm fine, it is funny in a strange way.

Gobble Gobble

I love long weekends..I love being off from work long enough to forget what day it is :) It was a busy weekend, but a good one...

I worked Wednesday, seemed like I was the only person at work ~ I know I wasn't, since I saw other people, but it was definitely a skeleton crew. I probably could've taken the day off, but didn't have any real plans to go anywhere, didn't have to cook or travel, and I had made plans to go out that night with some former coworkers I hadn't seen in years so it made more sense for me to be in town...if I'd have stayed home I wouldn't have driven in. Kevin did take the day off and enjoyed a gorgeous morning at a park nearby - brought his bike and his camera. I wish we had cold weather more often, but it is pretty nice in many ways to live in a place we can be outdoors in the winter...most people put bikes up for the winter, we put ours away for the summer.

Thursday and Friday we spent with each side of the family. Living closer to Kevin's family made driving to spend the day with his family really no drive at all. Unfortunately, that means the drive to my family is longer, but still an easy day trip. Great to see both sides of the family, and I got my fix of turkey and pie...

Saturday morning we attended CPR training. It had been years since I'd taken a class and Kevin never had taken it before. He'd been wanting to take one since someone knowing CPR saved his uncle this past summer and now that we're moved and settled we were able to take the course. Its changed since I took it last time, and I know I understand it better. Having a small class (only 3 of us) gave us a lot of time for individual questions. I hope that if I were to ever need to do it, I could help someone by doing CPR...

That night we met up with another former coworker in town for the holiday (HI SHARON!) She was able to put a group together to go to Cafe Adobe - we used to eat there almost on a weekly basis, my waistline is thankful I don't anymore....It was great to see everyone! I worked with her my first job out of college, the first "real" job, and we had a lot of fun and I learned a lot during my time with them.

Sunday was a heartbreaker of a day. I was able to go to the Texans game, and the first half was wonderful but then they just fell apart and got walked all over the entire second half. Its tough to be a Texans fan. The highlight of the day - before the game we tailgated with St Arnold's (local brewery). It was the first time we were able to do so, and we'll definitely do it again. We had to walk around the Astrodome to find where they were - I had never seen how many tailgaters there really were...there must be as many people OUTSIDE the stadium as in it! We found out where their lot was and finally found it.....how we did, I don't really know. I was looking for a flag or their tie-dye Bentley, but Kevin and his dad saw the trailer....They don't have food, but they have beer on tap! I cannot wait until they can give tours at the newery (new-brewery)!

Draperies

I got a photo of the drapes, and you can see the new wall paint color. I forgot to take a before picture, so this photo of the living room that we took the weekend we moved in will have to do:

As you can see it was plain white walls and windows. We wanted to warm up the room and so we had the living room and kitchen painted a 'honey' color, and we love it. The wall color looks a bit different depending on the time of day, much warmer than the white walls we started with. We'll eventually paint other rooms in the house, but this is a great start, especially since these are the rooms where we spend most of our waking hours at home. The crown molding is also new and really completes these two rooms, now I just need to find a large wall hanging for behind the kitchen table and a window treatment for the kitchen and we'll consider them complete! Houses are always a work in progress, and with this house I want to make that effort, I never really did with the other one.....

Well, I didn't take photos of the draperies yet..but will soon.

We had a great weekend. We stayed around the house most of the day Saturday...it was dreary and rainy, and a good day to just stay at home. It rarely works out for me to be able to stay home on the days that the weather is telling me to stay home, so it was a nice treat. We made spaghetti for dinner, and I even baked some muffins for breakfast for Sunday, and broke in the smoker with a brisket - smoked it for 6 hours, then cooked it overnight in the oven. We had friends over yesterday to help us eat it...tasted so good, and it was a great treat to have it work out that everyone we invited was able to come. That should be the first of many good meals cooked on that smoker.

Tonight the Texans are on Monday Night Football. Kevin will be there, I'll watch it on tv. We are VERY excited to see them on national tv, especially against the Titans....

Thanksgiving is only a few days away and I am so annoyed that all the stores are already cramming Christmas at us. I know, their objective is to sell, sell, sell, but would it really be so bad to take these days to stop to think of all that we have to be thankful for? Even in the economy we are in right now and with all the people laid off, we have a lot to be thankful for. I am guilt of getting caught up in the hub-bub of it all, but do want to stop and think of all that I have to be thankful for. Here are the tops on my list of what I'm thankful for: a wonderful family (including the family I gained from marrying Kevin), my sweet husband, good health, a job I enjoy, living in a country with all the freedoms that we have. I know my list is much longer but that is my top 5. I want to be better at telling those in my life I'm thankful for how much they mean to me....I know that they know it, but its good to hear, even a simple thank you to the person working a check-out can brighten their day...

Mr V's Journey to Recovery

I know that my blog has a very small readership. If you read this and know my college roommate and friend, Delena, I wanted to share with you a blog she created to track her dad's recovery. He was in a very bad car accident last Thursday and is in the ICU of a hospital in Houston. He is a fighter, and has a long road ahead of him.

I've known Mr. V for over 12 years, since Delena and I met our freshmen year of college. He is a wonderful man and a loving husband and father. Whether or not you know her and her dad, please keep them in your prayers as they embark on this long road to recovery.

New Smoker

Today we put together a new smoker for Kevin. The one we had before had rusted out and finally gotten to be unusable, so we got rid of it and decided to wait until after we moved to get a new one (one less heavy, awkward item to move). We'd been wanting to get a new one, but just hadn't made the time to do it...until last night, we went to HEB and found the one we wanted. We need to get it so we can break it in before smoking a turkey for the family Christmas gathering in early December.

Purchasing it was an ordeal - it always is for us. We found the item out front and were told we could just go to the checkout and they'd have the item number there. The checker looked through his booklet and didn't have it. He sent a bagger out to find it, no luck.... While we waited they checked other people out, we didn't want to hold up the line entirely. They finally had to have a manager help us - after shutting down our checkout line. At least they would sell it to us - when we got the grill, Home Depot wouldn't sell it to us at first because of some kind of recall.... It could be a joke, how many people does it take to sell us something? We were finally able to buy it, and even had a couple of guys who work there help us load it in the car. Its a big, heavy box.

We just left it in the truck last night (and treated ourselves to concrete mixers at Culver's - the pumpkin pecan one is so good, better than pumpkin pie!), and tackled assembly today. The gate in the back of the fence came in handy, Kevin was able to drive the truck behind the fence and we unloaded it (piece by piece) onto our back patio. Much easier than bringing it through the house. It took us quite a while, but we got it put together and it looks great! We are a good team, when one of us is frustrated the other one keeps us focused and plods through to get it done....so we now have a fully assembled smoker, ready to start using next weekend! cannot wait for the good food we can make with it. The smoker even has the Texas star on it in several places, goes well with our door and other decorations..

We also have a painted living room and kitchen!! We hired a local company to install crown molding and paint these two rooms, they look great! We chose a 'honey' color, gives the house a Tuscan look. We'll have pictures soon - after our curtains are installed.

Volunteering

I'm excited - I found a way to keep volunteering with CAP even though I can no longer work on Tuesday nights. I've "adopted" two CVS stores near my house and will check on them each week to tidy up the display if needed and take inventory to see if they need to be replenished. I did my first check-in last night.

At one store, the display was still in the box so I had to set it up.....can't sell them if they are still in the box! The assistant manager helped me and we got it set up, hoorah! I can follow directions, but sometimes have a hard time understanding what they mean....hopefully it'll still be standing when I check back in next week. At the second store the display was set up, and one design was sold out! So, I'll let my contact know they need to send them some more. The inventory all goes straight to the store, so its a pretty easy job for me, and one I can do in my part of town....I am so glad that I was able to find a way to keep working for this great cause....

Edit: Addition CAP stands for Children's Art Project (Thanks Emily!) I forget that not everyone knows my abbreviations :)

Happy Halloween

This weekend's weather was gorgeous! It made for a PERFECT day at the Texas Renaissance Festival. My sister went with us and we had a great time. Being Halloween, there were costumes of all kinds. She and I dressed up and Kevin was an anachronism :). Some of Laura's friends were also there, so she joined up with them to watch some shows and Kevin and I watched some entertainment but mostly just wandered around and enjoyed the weather outside - cool and sunny. The most entertaining show we saw was "drench a wench" where a girl sits in a dunking booth and heckles people while they try to throw bean bags at a target. often she gets spectators so mad that they pay to be able to try to dunk her. she's good at what she does!

We left early to be home in time for trick-or-treating, and had a LOT of kids come by! I should've had more candy, but wasn't sure if we'd have kids come to our door or not. We had LOTS of kids come by, love seeing them in their costumes - my favorites: the tiny boy in a lion outfit, the boy that just yelled "candy" when I opened the door, and the kids singing "trick-or-treat smell my feet.." as they walked away. Our favorite trick-or-treater: our nephew dressed as a Transformer.

enjoyed our extra hour of sleep last night, though really I just woke up extra early today...

Today we went to my in-laws to watch the game and have dinner, good meal and a Texans' win!!

Cannot believe its already November...

Birthday weekend

Its been a busy few weeks...

The wedding in Dallas was good, not much of a vacation for us (I forget how busy weddings are). We didn't get to go to Dealy plaza or the 6th floor museum because the UT/OU game was going on right near there and we didn't want to get stuck in traffic. We'll have to make another trip up there to see it. The bride was gorgeous and we did get to see lots of family over the weekend. Staying at the same hotel was great since we were able to see people at breakfast and even hung out in K's cousin's room after the reception.

Our nephew got upset right after the wedding - his dad was a groomsmen and the poor little guy saw his dad walking back up the aisle with the bridesmaid and thought he'd married another woman! They had explained weddings to him but guess it wasn't clear to him that only the bride and groom were getting married, not everyone up there....I'm sure it won't be the last misunderstanding, poor little guy for a few minutes his world turned upside down!

This past weekend was my birthday and I could not have asked for nicer weather for it!

I came home from work on Friday to find that my sweet husband had baked me a birthday cake, quite a nice surprise. We had a piece that night and another last night, very yummy! homemade icing is WONDERFUL, hard to believe we had everything he needed for the cake and icing at the house....guess we do have quite a collection of stuff in our pantry.

Saturday we cleaned house in the morning, went to a book sale (got a bunch of books for our nephew and a few for us too), and then we went to the Ballunar festival. We've been trying to go for several years but just never make it down there It is held at NASA. You can tour NASA, but we really went just to see the hot air balloons, and they were beautiful. They launch from all over, so you look around and suddenly see one (or more) come from behind the buildings. They are trying to hit a target on the field, and come right overhead....beautiful.....We also saw skydivers and people in what look like dune buggies with parachutes attached in the air. I do NOT want to be in the air in anything that I can then carry away on my back (they walked right by us afterwards), but it is fun to watch. We brought both cameras and took some wonderful pictures (haven't had time to download them yet). We stayed until after sunset to see the GLOW. All of the balloons are inflated on the field and they turn on their burners - lighting up the entire balloon...pictures won't do it justice, it is amazing to see. I'm pretty sure that is the first time I've ever seen a hot air balloon up close. We ended the night at a Halloween costume party hosted by friends, lots of fun! Kevin and I were both hippies - a costume he's wanted to do since our first Halloween together....

Sunday was my actual birthday, and my sister treated me to a movie (Couples Retreat) while Kevin went to the Texans game (they won!). I love going to the movies but mostly watch them at home. It was fun to go to the theatre to see a movie, and after the movie we went out to eat at Sharky's - thankfully they didn't tell the restaurant it was my birthday, I really didn't want to wear a shark hat. We sat outside to eat, such a beautiful day!

This week we're paying for the beautiful weather with lots of rain, but I'll take nice weekends and dreary weekdays....

Add: Ballunar Festival photos

Dog Movie Ratings

Maybe this is my million dollar idea and I'm missing out by not working on it (but I doubt it). We need to be able to look at movies we want to view with a scale on how much it will engage our dog. This includes notations of how many dogs will appear in the movie that will cause him to run at the tv because he wants to play with them, the front runners for that are:

I am Legend

Shooter - which has not 1, but 2 different dogs that each resulted in Smokey running at and jumping for the tv.

The rating system could also apply to songs, as I've indicated before Smokey bawls everytime the song "Let it Die" comes on the radio

Do other people's dogs do this, or is ours extra special bonkers (or both)?

We want to watch a movie to relax, not to have to grab our dog everytime we hear a bark or see a dog appearing on screen.....

Carpool

Starting tomorrow, I will officially be a Carpooler (what happened to that show? it was dumb, but HILARIOUS). My sis-in-law will ride with me into work, we both work downtown. I'll drive since I can park my car for $85 per year in my work garage vs her $200 a MONTH! I can't remember the last time I was in a carpool, oh wait I can - when my mom and another mom split the driving to take us to school - so it'll take some getting used to, but will be good. we'll get to talk a bit more and I can listen to something other than the mindless morning (and afternoon) radio shows.

I hope it'll also help me get out of work on time since I'll have someone waiting on me..

Its her first day back at work after a 3month maternity leave, I cannot even imagine going back after that long...the longest I've ever taken off was 3 weeks when I got married.

I hadn't realized how many people must make the trip to/from downtown until Sunday when we saw a truck driving home from the game (distinctive since it had FOUR decals for a local university on it), and we followed it nearly ALL THE WAY home. It turned off one street before us in the same neighborhood, poor guy probably thought he was being followed! We joked we should go to his door and see if he wants to carpool to the football games

Creativity

I had a great weekend...did a lot of creative things, which are fun but don't come naturally to me.

I was invited to something called Pinot and Picasso on Friday night, what a brilliant idea! You bring wine and get to spend time with your friends - visiting, eating (you also bring food), and drinking - while an artist takes you step-by-step through how to do a painting. At the end of the night you have a piece of art to take home. You see what you'll be painting when you choose your date and register. Here is my artwork:

On Saturday I went to a scrapbooking workshop, we made 6 greeting cards. I'm going to have a hard time sending them, I worked so hard on them but will send them eventually. I've never gotten into scrapbooking, but did find it (and the painting) relaxing, so I should look into doing something crafty on a regular basis.

Today was a less creative day - though I did put stuff up on the walls at our house, really starting to feel more like home as we make it ours. I had to run errands and finish my usual chores. The weekends just aren't long enough....

Electric windows rock

I did not realize how much I took for granted the power locks and power windows in my car. I took it to the shop today because I am an IDIOT and messed up the side of the car against one of the poles in the parking garage at work. Whose bright idea was it to have a pole every 3 spots?? I'm actually lucky it took almost 2 years for me to do it.

Worst part - its not the first time...I took a mirror off my old car at the parking lot in the apartment complex I used to live in - where there was a pole every OTHER SPOT. Seems like I'd learn to be more careful, and I usually am (see 'almost 2 years' to do it above), that's why they call it an accident. The rental car is a Chevy without power anything.....locks aren't a big deal, but cranking down the window was fun to flash my badge to get in and out of the parking garage. I rode in and drove cars without electric windows for years, but its tough to go back.....guess this will remind me to take care of my car so i don't have to have a rental.

Of course it was a Monday that I did it (last week), because Mondays aren't tough enough without being mad at yourself (and then getting to stew in it at a training all morning). This Monday was better, just crazy since we have a consultant doing work for us remotely, so had several meetings to give him what he needs and to follow up on pieces we need to work out before we can release the project to the community.

Fall

I love fall! It is my favorite time of year, the weather is finally cooling off* and its pleasant outside. So pleasant that Kevin and I went for a bike ride in our new neighborhood the other night. We'll be doing much more of that, our new neighborhood is larger and scenic. Some of the houses out here are HUGE!

I am excited about the festivals that we have this time of year -- we hope to finally make it to the Ballunar festival (hot air balloons) in October, and will definitely go to the Renaissance Festival when the weather is nice in October/November - already bought advance tickets! Another favorite festival, Greek Fest...oh the food (drool)....

Because of the work I do, fall is also my busiest time of year....we just hit our reporting day, so I am busy responding to all the requests from various groups wanting enrollment information, and the list goes on and on.

*cooling off is relative, we've had highs in the 80s and are loving it, while some areas would die with highs of 80s

SIGH of relief

that is a BIG sigh of relief.

We signed all the papers today to close on our old house, so once its funded we are once again the owners of only ONE house....

for extra fun, I followed the directions I'd found online and didn't see the title office...so I called them (thankfully I'd gotten their phone number just in case) and they actually say "its not that county road 94", because it is BRILLIANT to have two roads with the same name really close to each other....ughhh

Labor Day weekend

3-day weekend! I am so glad we moved LAST weekend and not Labor Day weekend like we'd originally planned. It gave us this 3 day weekend to get really settled in. We've re-arranged a few things in the kitchen to make it more usable, and spent this weekend finishing up with unpacking.

Kevin organized the garage today - we are now able to put our cars in the garage (yay!) and I concentrated on upstairs - the built-in desk and finishing up the guest bedroom. Most of the wall hangings are in the room but it is ready for guests! With all of the stuff unpacked we both feel more settled, and really feel like HOME.

We also completed the media room, taking advantage of Labor day sales to get a new tv and stand. It took most of the day to get the tv and stand, assemble the stand, and then troubleshoot the speaker wires...now it is ready for movie nights!! This is Kevin's favorite room in the house.

Today we grilled fajitas from a nearby carniceria, yum!

One year ago this week was Hurricane Ike...here is hoping for a calmer September!

Moved

We have moved! It was a long, hectic day on Friday. The movers came in the morning and moved all of our stuff from the house and the storage unit. My dad and I were at the old house directing stuff on that end – mostly staying out of the movers’ way and finishing up the projects requested by the buyers. Kevin and his parents were at the new house to be ready for the movers on that end. They spent the time before the movers got there getting the new house ready - assembling a storage unit in the garage, adding liners in the pantry and kitchen cabinets - and then directing where to put stuff once the movers got there.

Our cellphones came in very handy to give status updates to each other – movers are headed your way, etc. We added to the chaos by having a second mover take our weight equipment and having Comcast come to set up our tv/internet/phone on the same day.

It was a long day, especially for the movers. I have a lot of respect for what they do, and am thankful I can pay people to move my stuff for me. We really lucked out on the weather – it rained at the old house that morning, but stopped before the movers arrived, and it was a MONSOON that night at the new house after they’d finished. I hate to think how we would’ve moved in the rain.

We spent that night at our new house, but it wasn’t until Saturday night that I really got a good night’s sleep – too much going through my mind of what all we have to do.

ALL weekend was spent unpacking and today too. We both took today off work to give more time to get unpacked and settled. We have a garage full of empty boxes to show for it, and a very livable downstairs. We started with necessities – bed, bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, clothes, and got all of that done – thanks to some help from my in-laws and my sister. We also treated the living room as a priority to give us a comfortable place to sit at the end of a long day of unpacking. We were even able to make progress on the study. The guest bedroom and the garage are a mess, they’ll get there. For now, we'll head back to work and give ourselves a break, and pick up again this weekend.

We have even been able to make a few improvements on the house already: installed two additional ceiling fans (thanks Larry!), installed towel rings in our bathroom and the guest bathroom, and Kevin even drilled a hole through the built-in desk for the phone and computer wires. We found a plug to cover it, on clearance for 34 cents!

I love the new neighborhood, there are trees everywhere and nice paths to walk on, it already feels like home. Smokey is having a harder time adjusting, but he loves his big backyard and will soon consider it home. We’re here and so he’ll adjust.

Lessons learned:

• Do not pack breakable items the night before, you likely won’t pack them well enough and they will be broken – several boxes of dishes were all broken, thankfully it was the ‘everyday’ dishes, not the china
• Make sure to find out if the dryer connections are being run as gas, electric or both. We thought they were running gas since the stove and water heater are gas, and didn’t know it wasn’t until we tried to connect it and couldn’t. so, we are now the owners of a brand new dryer.
  

Here are photos of our new house.

Unpacking takes time, but is much better than the packing and moving part of the process. We'll get everything organized and out of boxes, we've already got a lot of it out, the first night the answer to where almost anything was located was, "in a box".....not a good feeling.

homeowners!

Its official, we own the new house!!!!! We closed yesterday morning and were able to get the keys that afternoon. We brought a few things over to the house...it was hard to leave...

I'll have pictures soon, for now its crazy with trying to pack and get everything done that we need to get done to move on FRIDAY!

Our move-in date got pushed back several times so it is coincides with the FIRST week of classes at the university where I work, not the ideal time for me to be in and out taking care of all of this stuff......we'll get it all done and decide on what can wait. We are already pretty good at divide and conquer to get it all done. It is crazy busy. I slept fine the night before closing, but didn't sleep well at all last night - the excitement and overwhelmed feeling of all we have to get done kept me tossing and turning.. I'm more excited then overwhelmed

Kevin even got his truck back yesterday. I know he's as excited about the house as I am and add to that getting his wheels back, great day!

Inspection Nightmare

Apparently it is too much to ask for a normal day. Yesterday was shaping up to be a normal day until I got a message from Kevin in the afternoon.

The buyer's inspector was at current house to do our inspection, and while he was on the ladder to get onto the roof it slipped and CRASHED THROUGH OUR WINDOW. Kevin ran downstairs to see him hanging from the gutter with one leg through the broken window. He was so lucky to have only a few scratches, Kevin was anticipating calling 911 and thinking he was going to see lots of cuts and bleeding. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I found out... I left work a little early to help clean up the glass, it is everywhere...

I think the rest of the inspection went well, Kevin said the guy said the worst he found was a broken window, caused by him. Our realtor had said not to break anything, well we didn't...the inspector did.

So now we have cardboard and duct tape covering that hole.....his insurance will replace the window and the blinds, I just cannot believe we have one more thing to deal with....when i told my boss so i could leave early he said "isn't buying a house fun?" you said it.....we've had mishaps with buying and sellling, knock on wood these are the last of them.....

Kevin and I went ahead and attended the Astros game that we had tickets for, we needed something fun and relaxing to do..and it was way better than staring at our cardboard-covered window.....we had fun once we got away from the teenage church group who was constantly up and down to the concession stand, I am pretty sure the 18 month old in front of us knew more about what was going on at the game than any of them did!

PS - I should never have made a label called "misadventure" I use it way too often.

thats one way to move

In a bizarre way, we've started our move to the new house

Today was the walkthrough at our house and my parents came up last night so they could see it. On the way there we got rear-ended! We had just stopped at a red light and heard screeching tires and then a jolt as the car behind rammed into us, pushing us into the car in front of us. ugh....thankfully no one was hurt. We had to pull over and call 911 -- I am pretty sure that's the first time I've ever called 911. We had to wait for the police to do a police report, and let our realtor know we were going to be late. Good thing she was there since I didn't know the builder's phone number. They were able to wait for us, so we didn't have to reschedule, and the house looks good! Our builder showed us everything at the house (shut-off valves, etc.) and we were able to put tape any place that touch-up paint is needed.

The truck was damaged in the back - the bumper is banged up, you have to move it to open/close the lift gate, and worst of all the exhaust pipe was smashed in, causing it to not have much power, and also make awful sounds any time we try to accelerate. Rather than getting on the highway in it (not safe), we thought it would be best to put it in the shop on that side of town and get a rental car until its fixed. so, we put it in the shop, got some food at Burger King since we were starving, and drove home in a pontiac vibe, quite a different ride. my poor parents, didn't quite know what sort of excitement they were in for when they decided to ride with us to see the new house.

The adrenaline was pumping when we got hit, I couldn't quit shaking for quite a while....

Is it asking too much to have a normal day sometime soon??

Craziest week ever

I am glad to see this week come to an end, it has been the CRAZIEST week – some good, some bad.

On Sunday, we went to a friend’s house to spend the afternoon while an open house was being held at our house. Smokey had a play date with their dog, Java, and loved playing with him and exploring their yard.

Not long after I’d eaten, my sister called – she had sharp pains in her abdomen and wanted to go to an ER but didn't want to drive herself. I went to get her and took her to an urgent care place - the first one we went to is only open Mon - Fri (what kind of urgent care is that?!?) We headed back towards another one she knew of, and thankfully they were open – she was in a lot of pain and so I just wanted to get her somewhere that could help her. We were there all afternoon and into the evening. They gave her fluids, and ran some test to determine what the problem was (we were guessing appendicitis), diagnosis: a kidney stone. They were able to prescribe pain killers and I took her home. I haven’t been so aggravated in quite a while as I was when we got to the first place and it was CLOSED, I go into ‘protection mode’ when I see someone I love in pain and was mad that we thought we were close to getting her where she could get help only to have it be a closed sign.

Her pain wasn’t getting any better during the week so she had an outpatient surgery on Thursday to have it removed. They weren’t able to remove it but did insert something to make it easier for her to pass it. She still has pain, but nowhere near the pain she had earlier.

The timing of when this happened was actually really good – any earlier and she’d have still been in school and had to work with her profs to make up the work, etc. tough to do when each class is only 6 weeks. If it had happened much later, we’d have moved and I would’ve had to recommend she get an ambulance to get her since it would get her to help much faster than I could, and it actually worked out being at our friend’s house since I was CLOSER to her then I was at home. A recommendation for everyone – make sure you know where your closest urgent care clinic is, it could come in handy when you least expect it. We call this week “the lost week” for my sis since she only left the house to go to doctor appointments

Now the good news from this week:

we got an offer on our house! We signed the paperwork to accept the offer on Wednesday night, and assuming all goes well we will be able to close in early September *fingers crossed*

We also got to see our new house on Friday, for the inspection. It is almost completely finished – the grass and landscaping are even done! There are still some things to be fixed – mostly found by the inspector, and we found where the missing towel rod and toilet paper holder are from our master bath. I noticed earlier that the finish doesn’t match the rest of the bathroom, and this time we saw that the ones in the guest bath have been installed. Turns out that is where they put them, so it should be an easy fix – just swap it. I forgot to take my camera, but will plan to bring it Tuesday for the walkthrough.

moving

I am so tired of cleaning my house for other people. We spent Saturday morning cleaning up the house for an open house on Sunday, good thing we did because we got a call (as we were beginning to make dinner) that someone wanted to come see the house between 3 and 4, so our cleaning did double duty - got the house looking nice for the open house and also for the unexpected showing on Saturday. The people spent about 25 minutes in the house, which we take as a good sign. ugh, I am just tired of having to constantly clean the house and put stuff away when I leave for the day......we'll keep the new house clean, but not to this point. I also miss some of the stuff I have in storage - our CDs, and I was going to put together some pictures for a friend who moved away, only to realize, nope they are in storage.

We move in just under 3 weeks and it'll be hectic and crazy, but once we're settled the house will be ours and only people we invite will be coming into it.

Professional development

Anyone who knows me well knows that I am shy around people I don't know – get to know me, I talk your head off, but I am an introvert. This is especially true when I go to conferences. I've had to make a conscious effort to talk to different people and not simply go to the presentations and then disappear into my room. Each time it has gotten a little bit easier. I like to think that as I've forced myself to step out of my comfort zone I've expanded the reaches of my comfort zone. I'll never be a natural public speaker, but I've come a long way and now actually ENJOY getting to talk to people who do similar work at different institutions and have to grapple with some of the same issues. Getting to know these people also gives me resources to bounce ideas or ask questions of since they are familiar with the work that I do, and in some cases have already done something similar to what I may be working on and have a question about.

This year, I decided to take a bigger step by getting involved with putting on the 2010 conference! I think it will be a good opportunity to get to know the people better and also to give back to an organization that has helped me so much in my 8 years (have I really been working 8 years?)

I drove to Waco this afternoon for our planning meeting tomorrow. So now I'm in my hotel room, because I'm tired from a day of work and driving from Houston-Waco.

Key Lime Pie

Our lime tree is finally producing limes (after about 2 years)! Soooo, we decided to make a Key Lime Pie. We used this recipe and it turned out wonderfully. We did have to add some store-bought lime juice to the fresh lime juice. We had a lot of limes but even after squeezing them all we had only about half the juice we needed. Squeezing them was a workout!

We made the pie, then had dinner and washed the dog. we made it early so it would have time to chill long enough before we ate it. It was so refreshing on a hot day, and something to look forward to while we washed our dog (always an adventure). Kevin is amazing at smashing graham crackers into crumbs...our blender wasn't doing it, so he just used a ziploc bag, a rolling pin, and his own strength....

I think this was my first attempt at a pie from scratch - except for maybe a pumpkin one as a kid when we'd carved pumpkins around Halloween. This was so much better! and the whole kitchen smelled of graham cracker crust all evening (drooling just thinking of it). We had enough crust makings leftover to make a second crust and will make another pie (maybe chocolate this time) after we finish this one.

We are seriously considering digging up the tree and taking it with us when we move. It took so long to produce limes and has such a great smell....we first noticed it when Kevin was cutting the grass and realized he smelled limes.

More evidence of how special our dog really is

This morning I let Smokey out, and noticed he was striping (fur on his back standing on end) and growling, I looked around and all I could see that it could possibly be was (scary music): two large mushrooms in our yard. My reaction to the mushrooms was - hoorah! our yard is wet enough to have mushrooms - it has been a hot and dry summer so far He was eyeing them and wouldn't leave the patio. After a while of this I had the thought that maybe there was something scarier in the yard, he can't really be leery of mushrooms. I go outside looking for something, anything (I have read reports of more snakes in yards trying to find water), but nope, its the mushrooms. They weren't there last night so they are new and not to be trusted. While I was out there, he finally got really brave and sniffed one of them (then finally did his business), but he was still not very happy about them being there.

I left him outside to finish getting ready for work, come back and he's laying down (at a safe distance) looking right at them......oh, so special..anything new or different, he is not a fan of....

Niece!

Our niece was born yesterday! Kendall Danielle Tucker was born just before 1pm. We are so happy she's finally here.

After work, Kevin and I went to the hospital to meet her. We passed Kevin's parents and Kaden who were heading out as we arrived, and they went back up with us to see Kendall. Kaden (the new big brother) had wanted to leave, but us arriving got him excited enough to go back to see her again, and he even helped to feed her, which made for some great photos.

She is so tiny. I got to hold her, and she is just so small, its amazing that we all begin that small. She was bundled up tight to get warmed up to the temperature the nurses want her to be, and poor little gal got hiccups on her very first day out in the world.

Here are pictures we took last night. Cannot wait to start spoiling our little niece!





If you're on twitter or facebook you've probably already seen my good news (how many different networking sites does one person need?)

Howl at the Foo

We have a very special dog. He is a good dog - very loyal to the point of clingy and, thanks to us, spoiled rotten. but he definitely has some odd quirks. Every time the song "Let It Die" by the Foo Fighters comes on the radio he bawls and yowls at the radio. I was able to witness it yesterday driving home from my in-laws. Kevin has heard it several times before, and said this was the most vocal he's been to the song - we think because he was also in the car (he already cries during car trips sometimes), he just keeps yowling and crying during the song - turns his head up and yowls, we tried (unsuccessfully) not to laugh. We think it must be some certain frequency in the song he doesn't like, that or he just likes to sing along with foo fighters song...it is a good song, so maybe we gave him good taste in music...

It is so strange what attracts his interest - last night on tv, polar bears on tv....he thinks they are literally in the TV, and doorbells on the tv set him off thinking they're at our door. The other funniest thing he would do was yowl and bark whenever he'd hear our voices on our answering machine - even when we were in the room! He doesn't have to worry about that anymore since we use voicemail as part of our phone service and got rid of the answering machine.

He is a neverending source of entertainment.

I've never had a dog so often I have to rely on Kevin's background with dogs to go, I've never seen a dog do this before....