Amidala

too long?

2012-01-27T09:42:00.000-05:00

is there some statute of limitations on Christmas decorations? is it a bad thing that we are the last house on our street that still turns their lights on at night? at what point does it go from being fun and festive to being stubborn and just kind of crazy? am i in danger of becoming one of those people who leaves their lights up all year? and would that really be such a bad thing?

well if i am beginning the descent into the realm of year-round-christmas-light redneckery, just know that it's not because i was too lazy to take the lights down, but i decided to leave them up (and keep plugging them in) because they are just so gorgeous and they make me happy. and that goes for the ornaments in the front window too. they're just plain happy.

the hubs thinks i'm kind of crazy. what do you think?

things i have ordered.

2012-01-26T13:11:00.002-05:00

after procrastinating on most of my Christmas shopping right up to the point that i was forced to shop in real stores if i wanted to have any gifts to give, i have rediscovered online shopping. and i am in love. its just so easy! and it's practically like instant gratification! and i get mail! it's a win-win-win situation up in here y'all!

AND THEN there's PayPal, making it even easier to spend my money quickly. i'm so glad i remembered my password! best. thing. evar!

but seriously, who doesn't love getting mail? it's definately near the top of my list of favorite things. and getting fun things in the mail?? even better!!! and since i'm uber generous and thoughtful and WAY over-excited about sharing all this, let me just show you the things i have purchased so far this year:

a smart cover for my iPad. because its smart. and because i am not, and the cover that i actually originally ordered right after Christmas was a different style and when it came it didn't fit right. it was all my fault. also, this one is green.

a clear snap-on iPad cover. because i dont want my pretty new iPad to get all scratched up.

protective screen covers for the iPad. because i managed to mess up all three of the first set that i ordered in December. fifth times a charm!

this cow creamer. because why not?

a 2012 calendar. because i can only live in denial for so long. and because its cute.

a little photo album. and some note cards. because i had a $15 credit at OneKingsLane that my sister was urging me to use. i think somehow she got money out of the deal. i dont really mind though, cuz aren't they cute and fun?

new bite caps for my camelbak water bottle. because instead of cleaning out my old bite cap again, i just chucked it, rendering my water bottle completely useless. and man, i miss my water bottle.

you guys, we're only 26 days into the year. someone please change my PayPal password back to something i can't remember before i spend all of my Europe money on little things that i kinda sorta really need but mostly i just kinda sorta really want.

PS i am going shopping for real on Saturday with Deenie and my BFITW. because i love them and i dont see them enough and they are fun to shop with, and because i need new pants. and if there is one thing that you can't buy online with any amount of certainty, it is pants. wish me luck!

a-door-able.

2012-01-24T12:19:00.000-05:00

have you ever had one of those experiences where something that initially seems like the opposite of normal slowly integrates itself into your life over time to the point that you no longer notice it as being abnormal but rather it's become the new normal? how about then when things go back to the original normal and all of a sudden what is normal seems like it is wierd and out of the ordinary? anyone have a clue what i'm talking about? just me?

ok, i'll give you a real life example to clarify. so we've been living without doors on the basement stairs or our two hall closets for a couple months. we took them down when we started painting in the front room and the hallway back in November because we were going to give them a quick coat of paint and some new hardware, and then throw them right back up all quick and easy-peasy-like. except for it wasn't quite as quick as we originally thought (is it ever?) and so we were just a little doorless for a while.

and you know what? it wasn't so bad. i mean sure, anyone who's come over in the past 2 months now knows exactly how many coats we own and what brand of toilet paper we prefer (7 of mine, 2 of Marks, and Charmin Basic in case you were curious) but it was actually kind of nice to be able to go up and down the basement stairs without having to worry about the extra step of dealing with a door. and since we don't have any lil kiddos running around we didn't have to worry about them getting into things or falling down the stairs. in short, we got used to our semi-doorless way of living.

until last week. when the doors went back up. i had kind of forgotten what the space looked like without the dark, gaping, empty doorways showing off all our clutter. it looks... clean. bright. and just a little wierd. but i'm sure i'll get used to it again soon enough.

so now we only have two doors left in the main level of the house that still need some sprucing - the guest bathroom door, and the front door. (and i guess technically the sliding glass door too, but that's gonna take more than just some paint so i count it more like a window) all in good time though. slow and steady is the name of the game around our house - one room, and one project at a time.

weekly plan: Jan 23.

2012-01-23T12:00:00.001-05:00

well, we made it through another week of meal planning. granted, i only tried one new recipe last week, and that one recipe managed to turn my kitchen into a disaster zone for a full day and a half, and it didnt turn out as well as it should have because i managed to overcook the noodles, and i made about twice as much as we needed, (we're finally finishing the last of it for lunch today) but overall i would definately have to call last week a success for meal planning!

as far as how we did on the other stuff we had planned, i might have been a tad bit ambitious. yes, we got the doors painted and re-hardwared and re-hung. yes, we cleaned out the fireplace. and as a bonus, we even finally took Harold down and out to the backyard.

but that stuff about the kitchen? yeah no. after a little discussion, our plans for the kitchen have expanded a little beyond what i had originally thought. instead of just painting the walls in there (which would take zero time because our kitchen is super-tiny) we are also going to fix a spot in the ceiling, paint the ceiling, paint the cabinets to match the trim, and hang a shelf. still relatively minor stuff to be sure, but it's not the kind of thing thats going to get done in a couple hours on a Monday night.

but since i'm on a roll with this whole having-a-plan thing, here's our plan for this week:

To Eat:
Monday: taco night! (carried over from last Friday)
Tuesday: squash stew - recipe from Dana (i'mma try it in the crockpot)
Wednesday: whatever Victoria brings over for dinner
Thursday: shrimp, rice, and a vegetable
Friday: orange citrus chicken (from this book), Mark's roasted potatoes
Saturday: leftovers, whatever i find at the mall food court
Sunday: eggplant parmesan, salad.

To Paint:
- coffee table.
- my toenails.

To Do:
- catch up on laundry.
- buy better scissors.
- shop with my BFITW on Saturday!

and as always, the plan is subject to change. and if it does, it's no big deal. after all, this is the year of non-resolutions and vague goals and no pressure to do anything perfectly, or really to do anything at all.

maryland pickers.

2012-01-20T10:14:00.000-05:00

so apparently i've been on a real furniture kick this week. allow me to introduce to you our other furniture-find of the week:

i have no idea where this particular gal is going to live for realsies, but i just love her little round feet so much that she just had to come home with us! at the moment she is fitting very nicely into that corner of our fireplace room. and even if we don't like her or we can't find the perfect place for her, we haven't really lost anything, because we picked her up for free on the side of the road.

yeah, you heard me right. i totally trash-picked that computer desk.

she was left sitting all alone and forlorn at the bottom of our neighbor's driveway. out with the trash. except that the trash guys had already come and gone for the day, and she was still there. passed over by even the trash guys. i don't know that it gets much lower than that. so on my way to work, i enlisted the hubs to help me load her into the back of my car and off we went! i think the neighbors might have actually watched us take her. we are officially those neighbors.

and yes, she's not the most high quality piece of furniture (hello, particleboard!) and she does need a little bit o' lovin' but i dont think its anything that some wood filler and a fresh coat of paint and maybe some new hinges can't fix. so here's to turning trash into treasure - we'll be sure to let you know how (and if) she turns out!

table hunting.

2012-01-19T19:52:00.000-05:00

now that the dining room is all painted, i've restarted my search for the perfect dining room table. i've come close to finding 'the one' in the past, but after a while i always end up falling out of love with whichever one i pick. i'd like it to be wood. but it has to compliment our wood floors without being all matchy-match, but it also can't clash with the chocolate brown on the walls. AND i'd like to have a rug to go under it, which adds a whole new thing to search for at the same time. honestly, it's kind of stressful.

so while i was trolling around the interwebs the other day, i decided to check out a place that is right up the road from our house called Belle Patri. i have literally driven right past this place several times a day for the past year, and i cannot believe i have never gone in before this week. they are a consignment store of sorts that has all sorts of wonderful furniture and accessories - some new, some second hand, and all awesome. they carry a lot of shabby-chic-type of stuff, and everything i saw in the store looked really nice, even if it didn't match the style of our house. they keep their inventory pretty up to date on their website, which is nice if you are looking for something specific, like i was.

i didn't find a dining room table there, but what i did find was a matched set of end tables and a coffee table that caught my eye. they had good lines and were a nice clean white, which i liked since i don't want all my furniture to be as eye-catching as the not-a-credenza. as a bonus, i could get all 3 pieces for half what i would have paid for something similar from IKEA.

so i was understandably bummed when i got there after work and discovered that the end tables had already sold. but the hubs met me there on his way home and assured me that he thinks he can make me some similar end tables if i really really like them. so with a generous 10% discount that the nice lady working there gave us because of some scratches on the top, we bought ourselves a coffee table!

if i had photoshop i might have thought about editing out all that crap on the loveseat. but thats what it looks like. just keepin' it real.

the plan for now is to give it a coat of paint with the same shade of white that we have been using on all the trim throughout the house, since we aren't quite ready to do a full-on makeover of the front room. but Mark has already commented about how much more lived-in the house feels with the new table sitting in the middle of the front room. and it really does help to visualize what that space might eventually look like with the addition of a rug, and a couple chairs, and a fabulous built-in bench/bookcase. it's gonna be awesome! but first we have a pretty long list of other projects to tackle...

how does your garden grow?

2012-01-18T06:33:00.003-05:00

yes, I know it's January. Seems like it should be a weird time to be talking about gardening, right? And yet, we have not had any snow yet this season, and it was 55 degrees and rainy today, which makes it seem like spring, which would make it the perfect time to be talking about our garden.

back in November, Mark spent an afternoon clearing out some of the plants around the back deck that we managed to kill this year while we kept busy with all our inside projects.

and now, thanks to this insane warm spell also known as the winter without snow, possibly known as the year without winter, Mark has been able to build himself a raised bed along the back of the house. It is 3'x~~18'~~ 12' and fits perfectly between the basement door and the dryer vent. He planned it that way because he's just that good.

on top of all that (literally) he also built a support system for the mesh/cage/trellis that will keep the birds and critters away and give the climbing plants something to climb on. He made it a little shorter than the full length of the bed so that it would not overlap in front of our bedroom window, and just the right height to sit just under the bathroom window.

last weekend he finished gathering all the ingredients for the special dirt he needed to mix up and put in the bed. I don't pay a whole lot of attention to the details of the garden, because this is really Mark's project. I know there is vermiculite involved, that he got from the garden supply store. And the peat moss came from Walmart. And then he borrowed his dad's truck and picked up some compost for free from the landfill. (we're working on our own compost, but it's not ready yet) I wish I could tell you all the deets about how much of each thing goes into the special dirt, but the best thing I can do would be to direct you to the square foot gardening book.

we still need to fine tune the mesh, and get some sort of trellis for the side that is up against the house, and make our square foot delineations, but those are all things that can be done in the spring. apparently the important thing was to get the dirt ready so it could sit over the winter. if winter ever comes that is. i mean we appreciate the extra nice weather that allowed us to get the garden all ready, but it might be nice to get just a little bit of winter before its time to put seeds in the ground.

rain, rain, go away.

come on back in spring someday.

we'd like some snow in which to play.

rain, rain, go away.

PS. today is SOPA strike day. i'm not blacking out my blog because i get a whopping 12 page views a day and it wouldn't really make that much of a statement. but i did sign Google's petition. (i think) i'm still learning what i can about this censorship proposition and what it would mean for the internet, but censorship of any kind doesn't sit quite right in my head so that's where i stand on this one.

a plan.(ish)

2012-01-16T12:58:00.000-05:00

last week's meal plan went surprisingly well. we only had to switch meals around once, and just skipped one meal. (we ate at the in-laws) we had plenty of leftovers for lunches, and the food was all delicious.

recipe for this found here on Pinterest

the only problem is that now i am having trouble coming up with a plan for this week. it's like i tapped out all my ideas last week. and as good as the food was, i don't know that i want to eat the same meals over and over every week. but every time i try to pick meals for the week, they wind up looking almost identical to what we ate last week. soup, pasta, chicken, fish, beef...

is that a bad thing? am i overthinking this? eh. so what if i am. we need to eat something and i need to come up with a grocery list. so here's what's on the menu for this week.

To Eat
Monday: soup from a can (because i'm a procrastinator. also: lazy)
Tuesday: frozen raviolis, salad
Wednesday: chicken, pasta, corn (maybe this recipe?)
Thursday: fish, rice, broccoli
Friday: taco night

**edit: swap Monday and Thursday. even though i'm lazy today, i have more time tonight to make dinner than i will on Thursday.

To Paint
- closet and basement doors.
- kitchen?

To Do
- replace hardware and re-hang doors.
- organize kitchen.
- clean out the fireplace.

on the plus side, at least we've stayed away from the frozen pizza so far! but seriously, if you have any suggestions for what we should eat next week, please send them my way!

friggatriskaidekaphobia.

2012-01-13T14:11:00.000-05:00

my car needed an oil change, so i took her to the garage.

an oil change turned into new wiper blades, a new air filter, and a patch for a leaky tire.

a patch for a leaky tire turned into a corroded tire pressure monitor so come back tomorrow.

a corroded tire pressure monitor turned into needing to reset all four monitors turned into a trip to the dealership.

the trip to the dealership turned into having three recalls on my vehicle. one was for the screws that hold my rearview mirror onto my car. the other two sounded much more involved and i would tell you what they were for except i didn't understand a word that nice woman said to me.

it started as an oil change, and ended 5.5 hrs and $300 later.

all because a little bug went KA-CHOO!

perhaps i should think about developing a healthy fear of Friday the 13th.

why not? bears do it.

2012-01-12T15:01:00.000-05:00

hibernation seemed like a viable option this morning.

i realized after i got out of bed at 6:10am and into the shower that today was actually one of the few workdays that i could have legitimately slept in without any negative repurcussions, as i had scheduled Sophie an oil change at 8. since the garage is only 2 minutes from my house, i was officially awake way too early. so i did what any self-respecting, responsible adult-type person would do in this situation, and i finished my shower and i crawled back into bed.

i stayed in that nice warm bed through several more alarms. when the hubs woke up and got out of bed, i stayed put. i tried to coax myself out from under the covers, but the world outside of my protective layer of sheets and blankets was just so cold.

finally i reasoned with myself that if i was not out of bed before the hubs left the house, then i would no longer have any motivation to wake up, and it was all too likely that i would just stay in bed all day. looking back, i don't know why i thought that would be a bad thing.

about an hour after i began my hibernation, i slowly made my way out of bed. i got dressed. i brushed my teeth. i pulled my hair back into a pony tail and put on a little bit of makeup. i packed myself a lunch and was at the garage 4 whole minutes early.

i read a book while Ronnie changed Sophie's oil, replaced her wiper blades, discovered that her air filter was clogged, and found out that she had a leaky tire. he's ordering some parts, so i get to go back again tomorrow morning.

and thanks to a moment of complete randomosity, i am now the owner of a 1943 steel penny.

i get to hibernate again tomorrow. i guess today's not so bad after all.

an idea for food network's newest show.

2012-01-10T12:05:00.000-05:00

i have discovered something. a revelation of sorts. a realization that there is a sizeable hole in the repertoire of cooking shows. or at least i think there's a hole, whatever size it may be. and i guess the filler for such a hole could exist somewhere out there and i just don't watch enough Food Network to know about it, but it's a novel idea to me and so i'm going to just throw it out there because i heard it here first, even if you didn't.

Cooking with Men Who Don't Know How to Cook.

i'm thinking it would be a big hit, and i'm going to go ahead and tell you why.

1. you've already got plenty of cooking shows hosted by women because a woman's place is obviously in the kitchen and thats why we dont wear watches because there's a clock on the stove and i feel like the whole 'woman in the kitchen' thing is already way overdone.

2. while men cooking on tv is nothing new, all those men have some sort of a background in the culinary arts. whether they're a chef or a baker or a foodie, they are masters of their craft and they know their way around their kitchen stuffs way better than i ever will.

3. it would be exciting. there would be knives and fire and the never-ending suspense of whether or not all of the sweat and tears and hard work would ever yield anything edible. and really, the tears enough should be all it takes to get people to tune in.

4. it would be hilarious. i know that sometimes when i read a recipe i just have to laugh because i don't understand a word of what they're trying to tell me to do. so it only follows that it would be even funnier to watch someone else try to figure it out from the comfort of my own couch.

5. it would be educational. men and women alike would learn new things about food, cooking, kitchen gadgets, and recipes, and maybe even get a glimpse into how very different the inner workings of men and womens' brains are.

6. men have a certain tendency to be creative in their problem-solving methods and the tools they choose to use. anything goes. don't know what an immersion blender is? use your drill and grout stirrer instead. bring on the power tools, boys. the bigger the better.

so where did i get this fabulous idea? the hubs decided to help out with tonight's dinner. in fact, he did most of the work for our rice-beef-vegetable-soup concoction. and then when i told him that we should probably leave a little more room in the crock pot because we didn't know how much water would cook out of the meat and the veggies, he got a little concerned. and then he came up with a plan.

so one cutting board, one sink, and one 50 ft extension cord later, our soup setup was prepared for any overflow-type-mishaps that may or may not happen while we are at work today.

perhaps 'reasonably sized extension cord' should move up to the top of our shopping list.

hey Food Network! call me!

do you have a plan?

2012-01-09T16:03:00.000-05:00

so. about this time last year, i decided that i needed to find a meal plan to use. something that would allow me to make new things, eat real food, and feel grown up. i found one that came with recipes AND a shopping list. it seemed perfect. it also required me to make at least three brand new recipes every day. most stuff was delicious. a few things were complete disasters.

i lasted about a week. and then i got overwhelmed at the thought of having to go through all that again the next week and i gave up and ran whimpering back to my frozen pizza every Tuesday night.

and yet, here i am again, with the first of my non-proritized un-resolutions for 2012 being to come up with a reasonable meal plan. so here's what i have for this week:

Monday: quesadillas.
Tuesday: homemade beef-rice-vegetable soup.
Wednesday: grilled chicken penne pesto pasta with roasted asparagus.
Thursday: fish, rice, and broccoli.
Friday: broccoli mac n cheese.
Saturday: leftover soup?
Sunday: chicken and potatoes.

the asparagus was one of our favorite things that i learned how to make during last year's meal planning extravaganza. other than that, none of these things have an actual recipe per-se. but they all sound good to me. they all seem simple enough to pull off on a weeknight without having to spend the whole evening in the kitchen. and best of all, none of them require me to wander my grocery store searching for the ever-elusive barley, gouda cheese, or green chiles. (i never managed to find any of them last year. i'm not entirely sure they actually exist. kind of like The Princess Bride.)

maybe in the weeks to come i'll get more adventurous with my meals. i might even blog about the new stuff that i try. or maybe i'll continue to stick with what i know. but either way, hopefully our Tuesday frozen pizza nights will no longer be a weekly ritual.

and if you let me know when to expect you for dinner, i'll have something special planned just for you!

(that last line sounded creepy and evil and stabby. that's not how i meant it. honest.)

things i would like to do in 2012.

2012-01-06T10:59:00.002-05:00

in no particular order.

make a reasonable meal plan. paint the front door. run a 5K. go to Europe. enjoy that trip thoroughly. bring home at least one good souvenir. feel good about myself in a bathing suit. sit-ups. clean the front porch. have pretty flower beds. shower with the door closed. read the Lord of the Rings trilogy. then watch the movies. paint and organize my kitchen. invite more people to our house. smile. make curtains for all my naked windows. clean regularly. use my crockpot. read through my bible. run. dismantle the mountain-o-junk in the basement. decorate for seasons other than Christmas. yard sale. read a book by Jane ~~Austin~~ Austen. hang things on the walls. build something. laugh. organize the office. carve a jack-o-lantern. buy pants that fit and make me feel fantastic. clean out my closet. put new music on my iPod. be a good friend. quilt our old t-shirts. close my other bank account. hit 'play all' on abs and buns of steel and not want to die. go to the dentist. give more homemade gifts. play outside. ride my bike. the big book of everything. go to a baseball game. swim. paint something little. have fun.

these are not resolutions, as they are not necessarily stamped with an expiration date of Dec. 31st and therefore cannot make me feel bad if i dont actually follow through with all of them in the next 365 days. rather, these are goals. things that i would like to accomplish. maybe this year, maybe not. some things involve major lifestyle changes and paradigm shifts. others are much simpler. there are things on the list that are one-shot kind of things, and once they are done that's all there is to it. but there are things in there that are longer-term kind of things, and they will hopefully stick around for a while. its not a comprehensive list, and it might grow as the year goes on. i might keep track of what i accomplish, or i might not. no biggie.

*****

the beginning of this year has been hard for me, and i'm not really sure why that is. i came home from my sister's house and i was just... sad. kind of deflated with a sprinkling of apathy to take away any and all flavor from my life. i've kept going, but it feels like i'm just barely scraping by. i don't want to get out of bed in the morning, i get mad at everything, i swear under my breath when i drop my keys under the front seat of my car. when i get home in the evenings, all i want to do is nothing.

the hubs has been super awesome about it. he's gone grocery shopping, done dishes, and laundry, and cleaned toilets, and made me laugh, and let me watch What Not To Wear and buy the green smart cover that i want for my iPad even though he thinks its overpriced. and while i really appreciate the help, i know that it's not fair for me to zone out and let him take over. i can imagine that it's stressful for him, and knowing that i'm stressing him out really doesn't help to put me in a better mood.

but i'm trying. and i'm starting with this list. the things on it are positive and attainable. it's not overwhelmingly long. i am not pressuring myself to do one specific thing every day for the next year, (i've tried that, and it just doesn't work for me) or setting myself an impossibly small goal weight, or even really resolving to do anything. i'm just identifying the things that i think i might like to do in the near future. and i'm putting it in writing so that i can come back to it for ideas when i have a free afternoon and can't think of anything to do. its a little bit of accountability, and i think it will be fun to go back to this post a year from now and see how i did.

i'm starting this weekend. we invited a couple of friends over tonight for dinner and a movie. it has all the makings of a really great evening. and even if it turns out to be a total flop, at least it's a good start on my goals to "invite more people to our house," "be a good friend," and "have fun." see how this goes? no pressure. just fun.

what would you like to do in twenty-twelve?

let's do the time warp again.

2012-01-03T13:01:00.065-05:00

time warp - (n) a hypothetical eccentricity in the progress of time that would allow movement back and forth between eras or that would permit the passage of time to be suspended.

we spent last weekend in the most delightful time warp at my sister Stasi's house in WPA.

when we woke up on Saturday morning, it was Christmas all over again! there was a beautiful tree, an abundance of presents, and the best sisters, brothers-in-law, and niece and nephew who were all VERY excited to be all together in one place.

presents were opened in an unorganized flurry of wrapping paper and boxes and shouts of joy and excitement. the spoils included all sorts of happy things: tailgating stuff, bike stuff, sewing stuff, sleeping bags, a new camera, games, toys, and enough chocolate to keep us all nice and hyper for at least a week.

and if that weren't awesome enough, we also got to celebrate New Years all on the same day! we spent the afternoon preparing for the big party full of family and friends and food and drink and games and even a fancy cake. because a party just isn't a fancy party without a cake. a fancy cake.

Claire designed it. Aunt Stasi baked it. Nick helped with the icing.

it was one of the fanciest cakes i've ever seen. just check out those delicate piping details and the way the flowers just pop right out at you. and it was delicious too. really, what more could you ask for in a cake?

it was a very great, very fancy party with fabulous people. we played fun games and ate good food and laughed til our stomachs hurt and almost lost track of time. but we managed to squeeze everyone into the same room just in time to watch the ball drop at midnight.

it was a fantastic way to end 2011. it was a fantastic way to kick off 2012. it was hard to come back home to my quiet house with its piles of laundry and dishes. it was sad to look at my Christmas decorations and know that i will have to take them down soon. i miss my sisters. i miss my BFITW.

let's do the time warp again. soon.

a quick look back.

2012-01-03T12:24:00.001-05:00

i don't know that i've ever done one of these Year In Review type of posts before, so i'm not really sure how to start it. probably with some sentimental mumbo-jumbo about how the past year has flown by and how much i will miss it and how long it is going to take me to get used to writing 2012 at the end of the date. oh wait. that's pretty much exactly how i feel about the end of this year. it was a good year, full of new things and adventures, and i guess i could manage to scrape together one measly blog post to celebrate it before i throw myself into 2012 with wreckless abandon.

i apparently spent the entire month of January in the kitchen. wow that was a long time ago.

February brought us our first married valentines day, a new nose-piercing for Sophie, a ski trip with friends in New York, and some imaginary drama with an old friend that i apparently made up in my own little head.

in March i did some super-sale-shopping, and celebrated my 24th birthday with my BFITW, while the hubs did a little basement make-over.

April showers brought us some flowers, an impromptu visit to visit my sister in NYC, a fabulous easter dress, and the return of my seasonal allergies.

in May i discovered the joys of my mobile online photo albums, i found a polyester picnic blanket at Goodwill, we took a weekend trip to Virginia for an old-world wedding, and a memorial-day-weekend trip to visit my sister in WPA.

we stuck close to home in June. we ventured as far as the local carnival, but spent most of our time in the fireplace room working on that drywall project.

July was awesome. and busy. while Mark continued to slave away in the fireplace room whenever he wasn't busy playing softball, i worked on some other little projects and took a trip to the beach with some of the greatest girls in the world. we also made time to celebrate the 4th with family and friends, go to the movies, and spend a day helping out on a friend's horse farm.

the highlight of our August was family vacation in Williamsburg, which included my first real (unofficial) 5K. we also started painting the fireplace room, and managed to survive both an earthquake and a hurricane.

in September we mostly kept working on the fireplace room. wow, that was a long project and a lot of work. i also did some good yard-sailing, and we took another trip to NYC to celebrate my niece's birthday with apple picking and an amazing cake.

October was an eventful month, as it not only marked the end of our first full year of marriage, but also the end of the fireplace room project! we also survived our first not-quite-a-pregnancy-scare, and celebrated Mark's 24th birthday. i made progress on refinishing the not-a-credenza, and transferred offices at my job. this month also holds claim to the saddest event of our year, which was when we found out about the death of Mark's college roommate's young wife Kortney and their unborn daughter Sophy.

we were very thankful in November. we spent our time doing some yardwork, spending time with friends, and painting all the things. we rounded out the month with a Thanksgiving trip to visit my parents and brother in Wyoming, and i sent my hubs out to hunt elk (and lose his phone) in the wilderness.

December was a happy mix of finished projects and Christmas. we finished painting all the things and hung curtain rods. we got our first real tree and named him Harold. we decorated at work and at home. we finished the dining room and the not-a-credenza. we celebrated Christmas for three days straight. we got Mark a new phone. and then we wrapped up the year with one more Christmas and New Years in WPA.

Dear 2011 -

you were good to us this year. your days and weeks flew by so fast, and yet january still feels like it happened ages ago. you brought us tons of laughter, good times, and good friends, but you were not without the overwhelming sadness of friends lost way too soon. you were our first full calendar year of being married, and owning a house. you witnessed the start and finish of several large projects, as well as the slow demise of all our flower beds. you tried our patience, made us stronger, and blessed us immensely, and we praise God for His prescence and guidance throughout. we will miss you, and remember you fondly as we move on into a new year and all the adventures that it will bring us.

Love Always,
Mando

happy accidents are happy.

2011-12-29T13:18:00.000-05:00

Part The First:
when we bought our house over a year and a half ago, the first room that i had a plan for was the dining room. it was the chair rail that did it for me - i knew that space had potential, and i could see it in spite of the horrid pink floral wallpaper that the room was sporting when we had our first walk-through.

this picture is from about a year ago, after we had taken down the wallpaper (revealing that the rest of the room had once been pepto bismol pink... yikes!) but before we had done anything else.

i had the colors picked out for this space before we even moved in - it was going to be celery green on top, chocolate brown on the bottom, with chunky vertical stripes under the chair rail done in a high-gloss paint in the same shade of brown to keep them nice and subtle. as i mentioned a couple weeks ago, we just recently finally got around to painting the front room, dining room, and hallway. it took a little bit longer to get the details of the stripes together, which is why i didnt share the dining room at that time.

but now, after a couple late evenings of work by the hubs, the dining room is all striped and done! but can you spot the whoops on this one? yeah. that whole 'different finishes of the exact same color' thing? not so much.

the high-gloss paint wound up being a slight shade lighter than the original color. and i think it's even more awesome this way than how i originally planned it. the stripes are just a teeny bit more pronounced, but still very much subtle. so now our dining room is finally back in working order, and looking even better than i could have imagined!

Part The Second:
not long after we got married, i yardsaled a table with four legs which would come to be known as the not-a-credenza. it had suffered from a number of bad paint jobs and at least a little bit of neglect, so although it had plenty of potential it was not looking so hot.

the inside was even worse. i mean, i'm sure at some point these geese were a good idea, but their scuzz was just not going to cut it anymore.

over the 4th of July i started the process of sanding, paint-stripper-ing, and sanding it again. this part took a couple months because i only worked on it a little bit at a time.

then on Halloween i primed it,

and then just before Christmas I PAINTED IT BLUE!

but seriously, we spent part of our Christmas Eve morning putting all the new hardware on this bad boy when i probably should have been doing things like cooking, cleaning, or showering. i do not regret my prioritization on this one.

i originally picked out a paint swatch from Home Depot, but when i decided to go ahead and buy the paint we were shopping at Lowes, so i had them color match it for me. like the stripes in the dining room, the color was a little lighter and more muted than i had originally hoped for. and its perfect.

but the accidentally-amazing shade of blue isnt even the best part... using some leftover paint from another project, i also gave the inside an awesome little bit of happy surprisedness for anyone who ever has to get something out of the not-a-credenza (which will probably most often be me, which is why i decided it was totally worth the extra time and effort to refinish the inside too).

sometimes i'm a little bit sad that i couldnt find hardware that was more similar to what was originally on the not-a-credenza, but then i look at it again and i can't help but squeal with happy and jump up and down a little bit. ok a lot.

this thing took me FOR-EV-ER to finish, (ok so Mark was actually the one to apply the last coat of clear coat because i had to do all the Christmas shopping but i did the bulk of the work so i'm totally claiming this project) and i think it looks awesome so i dont even care if you think my color selection is crazy or if you feel the need to point out all the stray brush-marks and drips because i know that its perfect and i can't wait until i can start storing things in it and decorating the top of it and i'm so glad that that the color turned out different than what i asked for.

come on over anytime. our house looks awesome and i would love to show it to you. but just please to be ignoring the several doors that we are missing on our basement stairs and various closets.

we're working on it.

maybe i'll get the camera for my birthday.

2011-12-28T15:58:00.000-05:00

so i guess right about now would be the logical time to post something about our Christmas. except that it doesn't quite feel like Christmas is over yet at our house. our tree and all our decorations are still up, the Christmas music is still on the radio, and there is still a fairly substantial stack of presents for Harold to look after. don't get me wrong - we've done a lot of Christmassing over here, but we're really only about 66% of the way done with Christmas.

and i love Christmas, so that is quite alright with me. but if it's quite alright with you, i'll go ahead and share a little bit of our Christmas so far.

we started celebrating on Christmas Eve, when we invited Mark's family over to our house after church to eat some food and to just hang out for a little bit. we need to start inviting people over more often, because it was really a good time. although i didnt actually take any pictures of them being here, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

after they left, Mark and I opened our first present of the year, which was (of course) our ornaments! i had almost forgot that we bought these guys on vacation in Williamsburg over the summer. i'm glad i found them before i stressed myself out about trying to find ornaments the week before Christmas!

on Christmas morning, Mark and I opened our stockings, ate breakfast, and exchanged presents. and just like last year, i didn't take any pictures of us, or of our presents. i guess i was too busy playing with my new iPad to bother with my camera.

but since i didn't want this Christmas to go by completely undocumented, i made sure i took some pictures of people and presents later in the day at his parents house. i think i got at least one picture of everyone who was there. (except for me and Mark) they are all rather unflattering, but hey, they're better than nothing, right?

and since i do like my in-laws and i feel a little bit bad about posting these pictures of them on the internet, i will also share the one picture that i have on my camera of me and the hubs, taken the day after Christmas at his aunt's house.

i didn't even try to get a better picture of the two of us. i also didn't get any pictures of his grandparents, or his aunt's family. and yes, there are MUCH better pictures of everyone who was at each of these parties, but they are not on my camera.

maybe my new years resolution should be to improve my photo documentation skillz before next Christmas. and i can get a head start with the two more Christmas celebrations we still have to go this year!

home for the holidays.

2011-12-22T11:27:00.000-05:00

i know i've already shown you all of my Christmas decorations here and here, but i was struck the other day by this particular view of them from the front door - looking through the front room into the fireplace room.

its pretty much everything Christmassey about my house all wrapped up in one frame... almost like a scene out of a Norman Rockwell painting. if you move in a little bit closer, you can see some of the details more clearly: Harold; decked out with colored (non-blinking) lights and an assortment of ornaments ranging from angels, cows, and penguins to wolverine and a half-eaten icecream cone. he stands guard over a giant pile of presents, most of them to be given away in the next few days. there's a rocking chair that used to belong to Mark's grandmother sitting in front of our fireplace, which is home to our handmade stockings with our names lovingly stitched onto them. and what's that up on the mantle?

oh, its just our super-awesome nativity scene. seriously, i'm in love. it was an early Christmas present from my mom and dad and i could hardly wait until December to display it. it can be rearranged in any number of ways, and on the back of each piece is a section of scripture that relates the part of the Christmas story that each character played. it reminds me of the type of nativity that Mrs. Repp would love to have as part of her collection, and i think its perfect for our little family.

its a little bit funny to me that this is my house. it just looks so very house-like. no not even that... it looks like home. it was only a year and a half ago that we bought this house and i wondered if and when it would ever feel like home, and now here we are... celebrating our second Christmas together in a home already filling with memories and traditions.

and i love it.

why i celebrate Christmas.

2011-12-20T13:24:00.001-05:00

it's no real secret that i love Christmas. everything about it, really.

i love the lights and the way they make everything sparkle. i love knowing the reaction that racing lights evoke from my mother, which kind of makes me love them just a little bit more.
i love Christmas trees. i love the way they smell, how they transform a room, and the memories that are tied up in all the decorations that go on them.
i love the music. i love the silly songs as much as i love the classic carols. i listen to it non-stop from Thanksgiving until they stop playing it on the radio, and sometimes even a little bit longer. its really only acceptable to listen to it this one time of year, so i make sure i make the most of it.
i love the treats: the cookies, the chocolate, the cinnamon rolls, the cookies, the hot chocolate, the cookies, the popcorn, the cookies...
i love the traditions. an orange and a toothbrush in your stocking. a penguin on the christmas tree. a certain movie and opening one present on Christmas Eve. candlelight church services. a santa tray to leave out cookies and milk. and i love that sometimes the specifics of these traditions can change over time, but they are always always what makes each year memorable.
i love the presents: i love getting presents from people who love me, and i love searching for the perfect presents to give to the people i love. and i love the anticipation that comes along with it - wondering both how well you'll make out this year, and looking forward to seeing whether or not you actually found the perfect presents for everyone else.
i love the magic that surrounds the whole month of December. it is a mix of Santa and goodwill and cheer and joy and love and excitement and vacation and snow and i love that even as i get older the magic is still there.

those are some of the reasons that i love Christmas, and some of the ways i celebrate, but they are not the reason why i celebrate.

Christmas is so much bigger than trees and presents and tradition and sparkle. it is essentially a birthday party for the greatest human being who ever set foot on earth. it is the celebration of a baby whose primary purpose in this world was to point to the one and only God who is the main character in all of history. he came to be a perfect sacrifice for a world full of people that in and of themselves are full of sin and incapable of the perfection that God requires. he came to die in our place, to cover all our sins with his perfection so that we might one day be restored in heaven with God. and he came to then rise from the dead - to conquer death, sin, and satan to prove once and for all that God is more powerful than satan, and that the outcome of the battle is already written. and all of that power was wrapped up as a tiny baby.

this year, i'm really being remided that Jesus' birth - revealing the glory of God in a form that we can comprehend, living to die as a sacrifice for the sin that we ourselves could never overcome, and fulfilling the work of the Father to defeat death and crush satan - is the "reason for the season," and it all kind of changes how i look at it. Jesus' birth, life, death, and resurrection gives me a hope and a freedom that nothing else can.

and so i celebrate. i celebrate with friends and family, with joy and laughter, with lights and decorations, with presents and treats, in the happiest way i know how. because i love that baby and all he stands for. he is why i celebrate Christmas.

source

virtual christmas card.

2011-12-15T13:40:00.000-05:00

just like last year, i got our christmas cards this year from Shutterfly.

unlike last year, we did not really have a reason this year to have anyone take nice, professional quality pictures of us to put on our cards. in fact, since i was most often the one behind the camera, pictures of both of us together were few and far between this year. and as far as finding one good enough to use, it didnt really help that the ones we did have mostly looked like this:

attractive, no? don't get me wrong - i love each and every one of those pictures. because this is pretty much exactly what our year looked like. and that last one was actually a pretty serious contender to be the one defining picture of our year.

but instead of trying to find just one picture that made us look mostly decent to send out to our friends and family, we ended up with a few pictures that made us look just kind of ok, especially since having more of them meant that they could each be smaller!

also, instead of writing out a christmas letter this year, we found a card that let us just share the highlights of our year in list form. and more words on the card meant even smaller pictures. winning!

so just in case you didn't make the short list* of people who got one of these in the mail, allow me to introduce you to this year's Christmas card!

*and that does not mean i dont love you but more likely that i might have lost your address and was too lazy to hunt for it so if you want to get on the mailing list for next year you should probably send that to me so i have plenty of time to either add it to my address list or more likely to forget to do that and wind up losing it again at some point over the next 12 months. wow. its kind of amazing that i ever accomplish anything.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

curtains are overrated.

2011-12-13T12:16:00.002-05:00

internets, i have a confession to make. we still do not have curtains on 60% of the windows in our house. all the curtain rods are bought and hung on the walls, and we have the fabric that will one day turn into the most fabulous curtains you have ever seen for the fireplace room, front room, and dining room. i promise, there will be curtains and there will be pictures, just as soon as my busy schedule manages to line up with the even busier schedule of my most wonderful friend who has a sewing machine and who also offered to help me make my curtains. and that's obviously not going to happen until after the holidays.

but until then, i am refusing to let our curtain-less windows get me down. in fact, i am using them to my advantage as i decorate for Christmas. because could there be an easier way to hang 48 Christmas balls in your front window than with fishing line and a curtain-less curtain rod? i highly doubt it.

i found these gems being sold all together in one big box at Target. they're the perfect mix of colors, shiny, and sparkle, which means they immediately and a little bit impulsively jumped straight into my cart. and they're mostly unbreakable too, which is handy for a klutz like me who managed to send several of them flying across the room after accidentally 'trimming' the wrong invisible string. they actually have a pretty nice bounce to them, as long as you don't drop them on their heads.

i'm in love. i mean really. who needs curtains when you could have this little bit of lovely in your life instead?

* i got this idea from pinterest, the great internet timesuck where productivity goes to die.

meet Harold.

2011-12-12T12:12:00.001-05:00

we had a beautiful weekend here. it was sunny, it was warm enough to be outside during the day in just a sweatshirt or sweater, but there was enough of a chill in the air to make you remember that it is December and Christmas is coming. it seemend like a perfect day to get our Christmas tree!

last year, we used the artificial tree that i had in my apartment. it was tall and skinny and came complete with fake snow. i thought it was adorable, and it had plenty of room underneath it for presents, but my sisters made fun of it when they came to visit.

this year i convinced the hubs that a real live tree was the way to go. we weren't quite ambitious enough to go cut down our own at a tree farm, but we felt pretty qualified to pick one off a lot.

we looked around for a short time to find a tree that was the right height and nicely shaped. it was a relatively painless decision, and the nice guys who were working there whisked the tree away to wrap it up before i could even take a picture of it where it stood.

the hubs loaded the tree onto Sophie's roof, being careful to put down some old towels to protect her from scratches.

then i helped him tie it down nice and securely for the ride home.

on our way home, we took turns checking to make sure the tree was still attached to the roof. and then this conversation happened:

A: i think he looks like a Harold.
M: who?
A: the tree.
M: you cannot name our Christmas tree.
A: ...
M: it's too late, isnt it?

so our tree this year is named Harold. (it's safe because neither of us were planning on naming one of our kids Harold someday) we're not sure yet if ALL subsequent trees will also be named Harold. i guess we'll have to wait and see what next year's tree looks like.

as for this year's Harold, i have taken a lot of pictures of him. you could probably make a flip-book and see the progress. or you could just scroll down through the rest of this post and see the progression too.

i got the tree stand all ready for him while the hubs took him off the roof of the car.

we put him in the stand and made him stand up straight.

i let him "settle" for as long as i could stand to wait, and then i added lights...

...the bow on top and a tree skirt around the bottom... (which is actually a twin-sized flat sheet from target!)

... and all our ornaments!

his decorations are admittedly a little bit sparse. i can't help thinking that we could use something like hand-made snowflakes to fill in the gaps, with a matching angel for the top if anyone out there would like to get a head start on an idea for us for next years Christmas... (hint,hint,wink,wink)

the final touch for now was putting some presents under the tree! i finally unpacked the gifts that were sent home with us from Thanksgiving and was happy to see that the presents had all survived the trip. a few needed some minor wrapping paper repairs, but only one needed a major duct-tape wrapping overhaul.

doesn't he look great? dont you just want to come over and visit him? and of course us too... but i might totally understand if you just stopped by to say hi to Harold. he is really quite charming.

it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in our house... how about yours?

never stop improving.

2011-12-09T12:14:00.001-05:00

yeah, i stole that from Lowes. this post has nothing at all to do with Lowes.

but it does have something to do with home improvement.

wanna see what we've been up to? what we've been so busy doing that we havent quite yet fully gotten into Christmas and why we're on the brink of being hopelessly behind on Christmas and considering just giving up and buying all of our presents this year at Home Depot?

painting. thats what.

the front room is done! the plastic is up off the floor! we no longer have to re-live the scenario of Trip-Shriek-Hubs Comes Running-Hubs Collapses With Laughter at the fact that the plastic tripped me AGAIN! we moved the monstrosity of a china cabinet back into the room to make room for a tree in the fireplace room! we discovered that the outlet by the monstrosity is controlled by the switch by the door that we thought did nothing!

the hallway is done! i only changed my mind about the paint color once! there are still no doors on the closet or the basement stairs! i'm not really sure why i'm using so! many! exclamation! points!!!!1! but they make this all more exciting!

the dining room is mostly done. i still have a little bit of detail-painting to do in there under the chair rail, so it is still sporting its platic-covered floors and painters tape. i'll hopefully get to that soon.

but wait, thats not all! we also moved straight from painting and started hanging curtain rods! because you know, eventually we're really going to have curtains to hang, and they are going to be FANTASTIC!

we had one minor snafu with one of the special heavy-duty wall anchors pulling right out of the wall that it was supposed to be anchored into, but other than that nice fresh hole in the wall, the process has gone fairly smoothly. this is the first one we hung. whaddaya think? beautiful, right?

we didn't quite make our goal of having the entire upstairs finished this year, (and by finished i mostly mean painted) we still have to do the kitchen and the bathroom, but we came pretty close and i'm pretty happy with where we are. and we still have a few weeks to try and tackle the few things still on our list of
Things-We-Want-To-Finish-Before-The-End-Of-This-Year:

- hang the rest of the curtain rods.
(one came out of the box corroded :( so we have to return it )
- replace the outlets and light switches.
- finish the not-a-credenza. (i'm so close!)
- paint the stripes in the dining room.
- paint and re-hang the basement and two closet doors.

think we can make it and still survive Christmas? fingers crossed...

i dont think my coworkers know what to do with me.

2011-12-07T13:47:00.001-05:00

in my office, there are these hanging plants that i suppose are strategically placed to make the cubicle world feel less cubicle-ish. they are green and leafy and they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

that is, until i did this to the one that hangs by my desk:

this is by far the best use of $4 and the second half of my lunch hour that i have ever found. so freakin festive! and yes, pink sparkles are in fact the epitome of Christmas festive-ness and are keeping me from slipping into a Christmas funk fueled by a lack of decorations at home coupled with the current weather, which is 60 degrees and rainy.

chance of snow overnight though... fingers crossed.

woohoo!

2011-12-06T08:04:00.000-05:00

sometimes, the Google people know just what to say to make me smile

.

battle of the christmas carols.

2011-12-05T12:48:00.000-05:00

five days into december and i already feel close to hopelessly behind on Christmas. i have zero presents bought, zero decorations in my house, we're still not sure if we're going real or fake for our tree this year, and our free time between now and Christmas is rapidly decreasing.

but nevertheless, i have been doing as much as i can to get into the Christmas spirit this past week, which basically means that i have been listening to Christmas music exclusively since we got back from WY. its really the least i can do, but at least its helping me cope with the fact that the holiday might actually be coming up a lot quicker than i would like to believe.

but what i never really realized about Christmas music is that its not all entirely universal. yes, there are the classic carols and rudolph the red nosed reindeer who are no doubt listened to and loved by the masses, but there are some Christmas songs that only exist in certain areas of the country, because they wouldn't really make a lot of sense to anyone outside those areas. what i'm trying to say is that there are such things as colloquial Christmas-isms.

i don't know if they exist everywhere, but i do know that both the Steel City (where i grew up) and Charm City (where i currently live) both have their own. here, let me show you them.

Pittsburgh:

Baltimore:

whaddaya think? they're both catchy, get-stuck-in-your-head-for-days kinds of songs. they both pretty well capture the essence of their respective cities - both the Yinzers and the crab-obsessed people of the bay. one will leave you craving pierogies and a sandwich topped with fries and slaw, with a peppy tune and a cheery "i'm tellin' yinz hows come" popping into your head throughout the day. the other will have you anxioiusly awaiting the return of crab season and make you belt out randomly and borderline-obnoxiously "NO NOT SCROD!"

if you're exclusively from da Burgh or B-more, maybe you're perfectly ok with that because you never have to listen to both in the same season. but if you're a transplant like me, then you might find yourself humming a tuneless mash-up along the lines of "jeet jet? then dontcha kno yinz come on dahntahn picksburgh hon and get some steamed crabs and a beer n'at for Christmas!"

and i'm just not sure how i feel about that.

so, good people of the internets: if you had to choose, who do you say has the better Christmas song?

ps. i still have no idea what scrod is, but i dont think i would want it for Christmas either.

no elk here.

2011-12-01T08:31:00.000-05:00

over Thanksgiving vacation, the hubs went hunting.*

rereading that sentence, i am struck by the feeling that this sort of thing probably isnt newsworthy in much of the country, and definitely should not be for a girl who grew up having the first day of hunting season as a day off of school. and yet, there it is. big news in my little family.

but this wasn't just any hunting trip - this was Mark's first time ever hunting, and he wasn't just hunting deer - he was hunting ELK. go big or go home, amirite? he borrowed all the appropriate hunting clothes from my brother and a guy from my parents church, and spent two days in the wilderness with my dad and a couple other guys. i sent him with my prayers that he would come back in one piece and not full of holes, and also with my camera. because elk hunting seemed to be a little more photo-worthy than what i was doing for those two days, which was mostly laying on the couch, reading books, and watching my brother play zelda while we each ate our own box of cheezits.

but you should just know - this is what you get when you trust the photo-documentation to someone else:

a picture of the butts of the guys you trusted with your hubs' life:

a picture of the hubs with the butts of the guys you trusted with your hubs' life in the background:

and a picture of... a deer. because it felt wrong to come home without any pictures of wildlife, and the HUNDREDS of elk that they saw were apparently too far away to get a picture of.

too far away to shoot a camera at, but not too far away to shoot a gun at. men and their priorities. i just don't get it.

*ok, so technically he wasn't the one hunting, because he didn't have a tag. but he did get to carry a gun, just in case he happened to be attacked by a bear. not even kidding. big game hunting is dangerous y'all!

thankful 2011: sleep-deprived edition.

2011-11-29T15:54:00.000-05:00

so our Thanksgiving celebrations officially ended yesterday when we left Wyoming after lunch in Montana with Mom and Dad. when we got to the airport and had finished all our teary goodbyes, i realized that i hadn't really said goodbye to my brother the night before, and he had already left for school by the time i finally woke up that morning, so just real quick right now i need to say i love you Goob and i miss you and thank you for letting me lounge around on the couches in the big room with you this weekend reading my books and watching you play zelda. it was awesome.

after a long day of car rides and airplanes and layovers and more airplanes and a shuttle bus and another car ride, we were welcomed home in the twee hours of this morning rather unceremoniously by our dark little house, complete with its plastic-covered floors and the smell of paint still lingering in the air. the good news is that all the people who might have been thinking about burglaring our house while we were out must have taken my disclaimer the other day to heart and the house was just as we left it, which is good because i had a little moment of silent anxiety on the drive home from the airport just thinking about what a mess it would be if our travel-weary selves all of a sudden had to deal with police and insurance and all those other things we would have to do ifwe had been burgled and i'm just so glad that we were able to just brush our teeth and fall into bed before having to wake up WAY too early to head back to those pesky 9-5 jobs of ours.

but before i am forced to fall headlong into the Christmas season, (which i am REEEEEELY excited about in case you were wondering, and YAY for all the time Christmas music stations on the radio!) i still have a few more thankful things to share.

86. that the only thing that Mark lost while elk hunting was his phone, instead of something important like his toes.
87. that Mark was going to get a new phone in December anyway, and that he can make due without a phone until then.
88. cell phone alarms in the morning.
89. moms who will act as an alarm and wake you up in time to catch your flight home when you forget your phone in the kitchen and sleep through your alarm, even though she would rather you just stay at her house forever.
90. only having to take one day to travel across the country, instead of driving for three.
91. bathrooms that are not on an airplane.
92. being able to save time in the morning by picking out an outfit the night before.
93. being awake enough this morning to NOT drink the ladybug that found its way into my waterbottle.
94. perfectly hemmed pants to wear to work today.
95. knowing my route to work well enough by now to not have to think about it too much.
96. free coffee. twice as much as usual this morning.
97. having a suitcase full of wrapped Christmas presents to jumpstart my Christmas mood (they are not all for me, and none of them are from me either, but they are at my house so if you are my sisters and would like your presents, then you better plan on coming to my house!)
98. short weeks.
99. finishing the list.
100. home. and being able to leave home and come home all in the same day.

black friday thanks.

2011-11-25T15:47:00.000-05:00

so officially the holiday is over and i'm supposed to be moving on into Christmas mode, but it is still November, and i still have so so so so much to be thankful for, including:

81. a whole day to spend on the couch with nothing to do but watch tv in front of the pellet stove.
82. knowing for sure that i get my love of paint from my mom.
83. not fighting through crowds and lines in stores today.
84. snuggly little rat-dogs. or maybe just one in particular.
85. really really delicious gluten-free cookies.

i'm a little bit determined to finish out my list, and also to do my best to keep up this thankful attitude through the upcoming Christmas season too, so stayed tuned for at least a couple more thankful-posts in the next week or so.

happy thanksgiving!

2011-11-24T11:52:00.000-05:00

we made it 'home' safely. and i could not be more thankful to be able to be here and spend Thanksgiving being thankful with the fam!

76. singing with my mom.
77. shooting guns with my dad.
78. being able to watch the Macy's parade.
79. just relaxing and enjoying the holiday.
80. Thanksgiving dinner like my Momma always makes :)

self-explanatory thanks.

2011-11-22T10:04:00.000-05:00

i know it's bad internet manners to announce when you're going to be away from home, but i am literally shaking with excitement in my desk chair and cannot not share that I GET TO SEE MY MOM AND DAD AND BROTHER TODAY!!!! so today, i am thankful for travel and vacation related things such as:

71. paid holidays.
72. vacation time.
73. half-days.
74. airplanes.
75. a new book series to read on the plane.

and just an aside to all you people out there who might be thinking of "visiting" our house while we're gone, just know that our house is already half empty, and what is in it isnt worth much, AND we have a cop-neighbor who we're on good terms with... so don't waste your time on our place, or you might end up in jail over what would have been a complete bust anyway. no seriously, i'm really looking out for your best interests here.

thanks for the weekend.

2011-11-20T17:24:00.000-05:00

61. Saturdays.
62. waking up at 9, but feeling like you slept until 11.
63. leafless gutters.
64. having an area prepped for the garden in the spring.
65. shoe shopping.
66. friends to shoe shop with.
67. old school preachers.
68. laundry detergent.
69. tire pressure gauges.
70. spell-check.

title of the post.

2011-11-16T13:04:00.000-05:00

as these lists go on, i feel like they're getting more cryptic, and less informative about whats going on in my actual day to day life. and i think i'm ok with that. and honestly, you should be too. because if it werent for these lists then you would be subjected to literally endless posts about how we are STILL painting and we are STILL only about half-done, because we STILL dont enjoy painting trim so we are STILL putting it off. and if we're being honest with ourselves, we all know that we don't need a play by play style documentation of something that boring and stretched out.

so in the interest of keeping all my ~~millions~~ dozens of lovely readers around for a while longer, here have a thankful list instead of a real update.

51. vaccuum cleaners.
52. love.
53. a blanket of crunchy leaves on the ground.
54. recognizing irony and just going with it.
55. my parents.
56. friends with sewing machines.
57. sisters. and having two of them.
58. leftovers.
59. showers.
60. that i found my passport. too bad its still in my maiden name.

still (re)counting.

2011-11-14T14:59:00.000-05:00

40. (again) cousins who read my blog and keep me accountable for my thankful count.
41. sunshine.
42. weekends.
43. that i figured out after only one coat that i picked the wrong color paint for the hallway. (the hubs wishes i would have just picked the right color in the first place)
44. i have never been followed/chased by paparazzi.
45. birthdays.
46. crockpots.
47. band-aids.
48. the Seattle Seahawks.
49. coffee.
50. the opportunity (and means) to go to Europe in the spring! eeeekkk!!!

going on 40: surprisingly thankful.

2011-11-11T12:39:00.000-05:00

i did not want to wake up today. my bed was warm, my pillow deep, and i could have just stayed snuggled in my bed all day. so when i finally forced myself to get out of bed i was running late, hated my outfit, was scared by a spider, i fought with my hair, was upset with the hubs for no real reason, decided i hated every single wall color i picked for the house, and i was pretty well convinced that my whole day was going to be terrible, horrible, no-good, and very bad.

but instead of having to move to Australia, my day turned around. and i ended up finding plenty of things to be thankful for:

31. pillows.
32. hugs.
33. hot chocolate.
34. pumpkin muffins.
35. getting to work on time.
36. bohemian rhapsody.
37. veterans.
38. pumpkin muffins.
39. mini blueberry muffins.
40. spoons.

thirty percent.

2011-11-09T15:46:00.000-05:00

i am thankful...

26. that we remembered to take out the trash this morning.
27. for friends that pray for me.
28. for oatmeal in the morning.
29. for jazzercise.
30. for my mom, who taught me everything i know, and who also makes me laugh.

the pictoral edition.

2011-11-07T08:57:00.001-05:00

this weekend, i had a lot of reasons to be thankful.
and i took pictures of pretty much all of them.

18. friends.

19. paint.

20. leaf blowers.

21. shoeboxes.

22. weed whackers.

23. machetes.

24. ice cream with sprinkles for Sunday Night Football.

now if only my Steelers would have been able to finish the game... sigh.

but at least i have

25. a hubs who masked his estatic joy enough to console me in my loss.

tgif.

2011-11-04T13:27:00.000-04:00

on this friday, i am thankful for...

12. breathtaking sunrises.

13. getting to work the right way the first time.
14. bagels with cream cheese in the morning.
15. my BFITW, who knows how to make me laugh.

(here is where i thought about putting the picture she sent me this morning of her crazy hair, complete with crazy eyes, but i want her to still be my friend tomorrow and the day after that, so i'm sorry but her ongoing friendship is more important to me than your brief entertainment)

16. Chick-Fil-A.

17. the abundant blessings in my life, in spite of the fact that i am woefully undeserving.

all the thanks i can manage.

2011-11-03T14:47:00.000-04:00

over the past two Novembers, i have noticed a little bit of a pattern, and it goes something like this: i make a concerted effort to have an attitude of gratitude, and then the Universe dishes up a bunch of annoying things to thwart said attitude. last year it was the grocery store, this year it was my commute this morning.

allow me to explain. (and look! i even brought visual aids! bonus points for me!)

for the past few weeks, i have been taking the most straight-forward route to work at the new office. the one with the least amount of turns or backroads or chances for me to get lost, which is also the one with the most traffic. and stop lights. and did i mention all the traffic? so let's call this route the-one-that-takes-longer-than-it-should.

so yesterday, i took a new way to work, thanks to a combination of Google Maps, Gordon, and following the truck in front of me. there was hardly any traffic, and i got to work in under 30 mins. let's call this route the-brand-new-favorite-cause-its-awesome.

so then this morning, i decided to attempt the-brand-new-favorite-cause-its-awesome route without the aid of Google Maps, Gordon, OR the truck in front of me. i was feeling really proud of myself, until i got a little bit lost. i made a wrong turn at some point, and then when i tried to resort to getting help from Gordon i missed a turn when he told me to continue straight when what he really meant to say is 'hey, the road turns here so make sure you turn here to stay on the same road don't just go straight onto that other road' and all of a sudden i was right back around the mid-point of the-route-that-takes-longer-than-it-should. you know, the route i was working really hard to avoid. so instead i just made the-route-that-takes-longer-than-it-should even longer. because i'm just that awesome.

AND THEN! as if that wasn't bad enough... as soon as i got back onto the-route-that-takes-longer-than-it-should, (which i didn't want to be on in the first place) a gray taurus pulled out in front of me. but this wasn't just any gray taurus. no, this one was being driven by one of the most incompetent people i have ever met on the road.

and that, my friends, is the story of how i wound up driving the rest of the way going 15mph UNDER the speed limit, tapping my brakes for EVERY car passing in the other direction and EVERY turn, and ended up being late to work, even though i left plenty early and planned to take the-brand-new-favorite-cause-its-awesome route and miss all the traffic.

11. i am thankful that i have a car to take me to work. because walking those 12 miles would take a heckuva lot longer than even the-route-that-takes-longer-than-it-should does.

thankful in 2011.

2011-11-01T14:19:00.000-04:00

Happy November! you know what that means? yup, its the return of the come-up-with-a-list-of-100-things-you're-thankful-for-in-November challenge! my mom started doing this way back in 2006, and my two sisters and i have each been making our own lists for the past two years. it's a pretty simple concept: you just make a list (in no particular order) of things that you are thankful for, to help you prepare for Thanksgiving and also to just keep yourself looking for things to be thankful for in all sorts of situations.

so here goes:

1. free evenings. for Halloween, we just set out a bowl of candy, and i used the free time it provided me to prime the credenza. we had some tinted primer left over from when i painted the tv stand, which is why it is brown.

2. clean(ish) painting projects. i was pretty impressed with how un-painted i stayed during the priming-the-not-a-credenza process. usually i wind up absolutely covered in paint, but this time i made it until the second to last leg before i dipped my hair directly into the paint can and then immediately painted the majority of my left hand. oh well, we can't all be perfect all the time i guess.

3. the hubs. even though he came home from work yesterday feeling sick, he carried some heavy things for me and helped with the laundry. he also laughed with me and told me i was special when i painted my hair.

4. strobe lights. i used the two strobe lights that my friend bought for me for the rave party as last minute decorations for our Halloweenie front porch. they pretty much made it look like i actually tried a little bit.

5. corn mazes. not to mention having good friends to navigate them with.

6. IT guys. they're probably sick of dealing with me, as we're still trying to get me and my computer completely transferred to the MD office. but i'm glad i'm not trying to figure it out by myself!

7. sweater-weather. although they turned the heat on in the office today, making sweaters almost unbearable.

8. meeting new people at lunchtime. because its nice to get away from my computer for a little bit each day.

9. jobs. yeah, i'll whine sometimes about having to spend all my best hours of the day at work instead of doing more-fun things, but the truth is that i am so thankful that the hubs and i both have good jobs that we enjoy.

10. anticipation. i am so so so so looking forward to our Thanksgiving trip in 21 days!!!!

what are you thankful for this year?

some things i never shared. oh, and halloween.

2011-10-31T10:13:00.002-04:00

i think my last post might have been #400 for me, which would kindasorta be a milestone number, but i'm not completely sure. i mean yeah, blogger thoughtfully keeps a running count of how many posts i have written, which is nice, but it also counts in there all the posts that i have hanging around in 'draft' form, which throws off my total post count.

so in an effort to clean up my blog and get a better handle on my real post-count, i present to you:

Cleaning Out My Drafts Folder

2011 Edition.

*note* this bunch of posts was what was left after i went through and deleted any drafts that i eventually posted as a separate post, or any that were just a title with nothing actually written in them, of which there were more than i realized.

Jan. 19, 2009. amazing grace
how sweet the sound...
i was thinkin the other day about all my fave worship songs, and i was struck by the fact that nearly all of them focus on my God's absolutely amazing grace and mercy.

Oct. 7, 2009. my momma told me there'd be days like these.
i woke up in the middle of the night after having a horrifying dream about a giant spider and a dog the size of a horse (the dog was one of 101 and he was the most giant dalmation you could ever imagine) so i was a little on the tired side when i woke up. and then i yawned and discovered a horrible pain in my left ear. no idea where it came from or why its there, but it chooses to remind me of its prescence everytime i yawn, cough, or hiccup (which everyone knows is fairly often)

July 14, 2010. running very low.
You are running very low on virtual memory.

so there you have it. everything i've been holding out on you for the past two years. exciting stuff. please try to contain your excitement.

and now i can say with certainty that this is now my 402nd post, which means that my applesauce post was actually #400. at least it was a good one. maybe i'll do something special for #500. or maybe i'll just completely forget again by then.

on a completely unrelated note, i hope you all have a Happy Halloween! we will be celebrating by leaving a bowl of already-picked-over-by-us-candy on our undecorated front porch and painting things this evening that we didn't quite get around to this weekend.
we're all about the holiday cheer up in here.

not exactly a party animal.

2011-10-28T12:52:00.001-04:00

i am officially the most socially-awkward person i have ever met.

no seriously. you should meet me, and then you would know. when i first meet a person, or am in an unfamiliar situation, or in a large group, my default setting is quiet, shy, and just painfully awkward.

case in point: yesterday's monthly party at work. it was the perfect storm of all three of the situations i just mentioned that make me clam up: since i just switched offices a week ago, i'm perpetually meeting new people, the party was on the first floor of the building (i work on the third, and lets face it the entire building is still new to me), and it was a pretty good sized crowd (even though i'm told the parties drew a much bigger crowd before they stopped providing beer) which means that i was the epitome of awkward.

i knew a grand total of 5 people there (the people from my department) and even when i ran into a guy i knew from college, our conversation went something like this:
me: hey, you work here?
him: yeah, you work here too? cool. where do you live?
me: in maryland.
him: i live in york.
me: cool.
us: *awkward silence, smiles, and head nodding*
and then we walked away from each other and didnt talk any more.

i ate a piece of pizza and a brownie. i stood silently as people around me chatted. i listened to people i dont know (and couldnt really see over the cubicle walls, or really hear over the music on the intercom system) announce some company business, read the suggestions from the suggestion box, and give out the employee of the month award. (surprise! not me.) and then i somehow found my way back to my desk to get my stuff and go home. and that was it. i didn't meet any new people. i didnt hold any conversations that lasted more than 2 minutes. i kept my head down and hightailed it out of there at my first opportunity.

i have a feeling its going to take me awhile to make friends around here.

criss-cross applesauce.

2011-10-26T12:11:00.001-04:00

about a month ago, i told you that we went apple picking with my sister and her family, and we brought home a half-bushel of apples. just in case you are not well-versed in the measurement of volumes by bushel, let me put that into layman's terms: we had a crap-ton of apples. especially for just the two of us. we ate them in our lunches, and i baked a couple into cookies once. but mostly, we just glared at them every time we walked past them in the kitchen, using them as target practice for our jedi-mind-tricks, willing them to just disappear.

we are not very good jedis.

we got to the point where there were fourteen apples left, and they were starting to go bad, so i knew it was time to either start throwing the apples out, make a triple-quadruple batch of apple cookies, or cook them into applesauce. i went with the least-wasteful and seemingly easiest option of the applesauce, expecially since the internets told me i could use my crock-pot.

luckily for me, i discovered that one of my apples was rotten to the core when i went to dice it up, leaving me with thirteen chopped up apples, which justbarely fit into my crock-pot.

then just for fun, and because i was following an amalgamation of several online recipes, i added a little water, and some brown sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

i cooked the apples overnight on the low setting, because i was so excited to be making applesauce that i couldn't wait until the morning to start, so when i woke up, i was greeted by a crock-pot full of delicious smelling cooked apples.

and then i mashed them with a potato masher, and left them sit for the rest of the day on the warm setting, because it was time to go to work. (this is the part where being less impatient the night before and waiting to let them cook during the workday would have made a lot more sense... oh well.)

after work, i allowed the applesauce to cool, and also wisked it to try and get rid of some of the larger chunks of apple. definately not the most hi-tech system of applesauce making, but hey it worked.

at this point, i realized that instead of having a crap-ton of apples, i now had a crap-ton of applesauce to deal with, and not a very good idea of what to do next. i briefly considered some sort of a quick-and-dirty pseudo-canning process, but after talking to my sister we decided that it was longer than a 2-hour process. (tanning with a t on the other hand may have been added to my list of things-to-do-at-some-point-in-my-life)

freezing the applesauce was also an option, but since i kind of had canning on the brain, i decided that i would rather just put the applesauce into jars, and either eat it all within the next few weeks before it goes bad, or give it away to people who might appreciate the sentiment of a jar of home-made applesauce.

lucky for me, the spaghetti sauce that i like to buy is packaged in 24 oz. mason jars, (i like to buy it because of the jars) and i have been saving them for any number of potential projects. so i washed up as many would fit in my sink, peeled off the labels, and scrubbed off all the glue residue and even the stamped-on expiration dates.

to get the applesauce into the jars, i made the fortuitous discovery that i own a gravy ladle! smaller than a soup ladle, bigger than a spoon, and the perfect substitute for a funnel of any sort, which i do not own. and just in case you're planning on doing this yourself, you should know that 13 apples = 84 oz. of applesauce, so make sure you have enough jars. which i did. yes sir, yes sir, three (and a half) jars full.

i still can't quite decide if i should be selfish and keep all the applesauce for myself, freeze it in the jars, and pull it out for Christmas or sometime that i want to seem really impressive when i show up at a dinner party with my homemade applesauce, or if i should stick to the nursery rhyme and go with "one for the master, one for the dame, and one for the little boy who lives down the lane." to me, that means i'd keep one for myself, give one to my mother-in-law, and give one to our next-door neighbors.

what do you think? are you as impressed by my most recent kitchen adventure as i am? what do you think i should do with my three jars of homemade applesauce? (i'm not counting the half because i've already eaten half of it) do you think that frozen jars of applesauce would be ok to put in my carry-on to take to Thanksgiving in Wyoming? or do you think that would land me in airport-jail? what if i split it out into a bunch of 4 oz containers? hmmm...

birthday weekend.

2011-10-24T18:13:00.000-04:00

this weekend was a prime weekend for celebrating for several reasons:
1. i successfully transferred jobs mid-week despite the most evil sore-throat head-congestion combo known to man
2. Mark worked reallyreally hard this week and just made the deadline for his project submission on Friday (and when i say 'just made' i mean he probably chased the poor UPS woman down the street so she wouldn't leave without his delivery) and
3. the hubs turned 24 on Sunday!

so celebrate we did.

we celebrated the end of our crazy workweeks by going out to dinner on Friday night, and then just chilling out, watching some tv, and working a little bit on our Halloween costumes.

for the rest of the weekend, we celebrated Mark's birthday. We started out with a bang, with a birthday surprise on Saturday morning, in which i took some initiative and kinda sorta forced the man, who since the last tour du bridge (two summers ago!) has been saying he really wants to get a road bike, to finally get a road bike by surprising him with a trip to the bike shop! Mark is in love.

Saturday night, i managed to pull together a pretty sweet birthday party with some of our friends, including decorations and food and dessert and glow sticks and strobe lights and costumes! i couldnt really pick one theme and stick with it, so the party ended up being a Halloween-Birthday-Dance-Rave kind of a hybrid, and i think it went over pretty well with everyone in attendance.

since my real costume for this year (Goldilocks) isnt quite finalized yet, i dressed up as a cowgirl. but Mark got to wear his real costume and spent the evening as Robin Hood - man in tights!

it was a great party. trust me, you're really sad you missed it.

then on Sunday, since we love this guy SO much, he got another birthday party with the fam. more good food, more presents, and more time just generally enjoying the company of the people around us. it was basically the perfect weekend of relaxation and partying and just general celebration.

now if you'll excuse me, i have a mountain of dishes and laundry that needs my attention...

last day.

2011-10-19T07:49:00.001-04:00

today is my last day at my current job.

surprise!

i havent said anything about it before now, not just because i think that writing about and sharing stories from work for the whole internets to see can open up some proverbial cans of worms that would be best left alone, but also because i'm still not entirely sure just how i feel about it all.

don't worry Mom and Dad and various other family members who keep tabs on me here, i didn't get fired and I am still employed. i just decided to take advantage of an opportunity to transfer to a different department within the same company in a different office that is closer to home. i think i will enjoy the work, and i know i will enjoy the shorter commute that will allow me to sleep in a little longer every morning, but i am still emotionally conflicted here.

as much as i am excited to be able to move on to something new, i am still apprehensive at the same time. because no matter how many times i am told that the people in the new office are nice, i still have a feeling they won't hold a candle to how awesome my coworkers are right now. i have spent the past two years getting to know these people, building relationships, going out to friday lunches, and celebrating birthdays and babies and weddings. i really really like them, as coworkers and just as generally good people, and it is hard to say goodbye to them.

i guess you could say my feelings about the transfer are kind of like a crazy mashup of "Oh, The Places You'll Go" and "Annie Bananie"...

Will you succeed? Yes, you will indeed (98 3/4% guaranteed!)

but you will never, never ever, find a ~~friend~~ group of coworkers that's half as clever, you will never ever find, ~~a friend~~ people who are as good and kind, no you will never, never ever, ever, find another ~~friend~~ job like me.

**updated to add:

Reason #174 that i love these guys - my going away card:

i'mma miss you guys.

i'm in love with a stripper.

2011-10-17T09:11:00.001-04:00

a paint stripper, that is.

maybe i should start at the beginning. about a year ago, i found a piece of furniture at a yardsale for $35 that i just couldn't pass up. i first described it to my mom as "a table with 4 legs." Mark prefers to call it the credenza, but i am of the opinion that since i am under the age of 50, i am too young to own something called a credenza, so i refer to it as the not-a-credenza. anywho, it was in need of some love, and i was in need of some furniture for my new house. it was a match made in heaven.

i decided that refinishing it was going to be my winter project. and then winter came and went and i decided that maybe it could be a spring project. and then spring went by so fast that it turned into a summer project.

so in July, in the midst of our massive drywall extravaganza, i finally made time to start it. after going over the entire thing once with a 60 grit sandpaper, i not only discovered how many layers of paint were on this thing, (at LEAST 4 in colors including but not limited to white, gray, tan, green, orange, teal, and red) but also that sanding them all off was going to take a ton of time and sandpaper. i mean, all those curvy edges and the turned legs look really pretty, but i was not looking forward to trying to sand four layers of paint off of them by hand.

it wasn't pretty. so it sat again for a few more months until last weekend, when in the middle of a frustrated crying sanding-induced hissy fit, the hubs suggested trying out the paint stripper that we had used to get rid of the stray paint splatters on the fireplace brick. and i have to say that for as messy as it was, (the majority of the paint came off with the color and consistency of snot), and as much as i didnt like having to wait 15 minutes between each application and removal, it was way faster and way less of a pain that trying to sand it all.

overall, it took a few hours of paint stripping last sunday and this past saturday, and then a relatively quick once over with 220 grit sandpaper, and this beauty is ready for paint! (i know it still doesn't look extremely fantastic, but trust me its a huge improvement)

i bought the paint yesterday, along with all new hardware, and i am excited to get painting and get this thing back into usuable form. our dining room table has been suffering as the only horizontal surface on which we can dump stuff when we come in the house, which means we have been eating a lot of meals off our laps on the couch, so it will be nice to have the not-a-credenza back in action.

**UPDATED**
since you all (and by you all i mean you, Mom) asked so nicely, here's the color: it's called Blue Agave (by Behr) and i think it's going to be gorgeous, don't you think?

and if you disagree with me you can just go ahead and keep your opinion to yourself. its not like i asked for it or anything...

simple pleasures.

2011-10-13T08:45:00.001-04:00

this morning, at my house, it is dark and foggy and rainy. and what i am really in need of is a good reason to smile and be happy. on the radio station that i listen to for the first half of my commute, Thursdays are the day they share their 'simple pleasures' that they are enjoying that week. things like re-discovering an old TV show, or actually enjoying a movie in the theater. those things sounded nice, so i decided to come up with a few of my own. let me show you them.

1. hats for everyone at tea time.

2. nephews who know how to share. even with those who are a little piggish sometimes.

3. access to a fantastic dress-up box.

4. the fact that the hubs is letting me post these pictures on the internet.

anyone else out there finding joy in the simple things lately?

please to be sharing!

beyond comprehension.

2011-10-10T12:04:00.000-04:00

if ever asked, i would say without a doubt that my wedding day, a year and a week ago, was the best day of my life. i don't think i stopped smiling all day. i felt as though nothing could go wrong. i never felt the chill in the air. my immense joy made me untouchable, and my feeling of joy-fueled invincibility lasted for at least a week.

conversely, if ever asked, i would probably say that the day my Gramma Rita passed away, almost two years ago, was the worst. despite the fact that i knew she was no longer in pain and that i would see her again in heaven, the pain of my loss overshadowed the joy that was brought by that knowledge. i was not ready to lose her. i wanted her to be at my wedding, and get to meet my babies, and keep being my Gramma. but the cancer made her a shadow of herself, and then she was just gone. it was so final, and the intense grief hung around for a long while.

mountains and valleys.

on Saturday evening, the hubs and I had the pleasure of witnessing the joy of a couple who shared an obvious love for one another and also for God be joined in marriage. we shared their joy, celebrated their union, and sang and danced the night away. toasts were given. cake was smashed in faces. laughter was plentiful. and at one point, a slow motion chicken dance happened, Zooey Deschanel style. (anyone else out there watching The New Girl?) it was a great evening, and we felt blessed to be a part of it.

this morning, i learned that on Saturday evening, the wife and preborn daughter of one of the hub's college roommates were killed in a head-on collision in Georgia. i didn't want to believe it. i still haven't quite let it sink in. we had celebrated their wedding with them just a few short months ago. we wished them the very best and looked forward to all that God would do in them and through them, and we prayed that they would share many years together. but it is painfully real. the brevity of their marriage, and of hers and their child's lives. and it absolutely breaks my heart.

i guess the mountains and valleys have to meet somewhere.

the juxtaposition of the mountaintop joy and deepest valley of loss, both simultaneous and yet separated by time and space, is difficult to swallow. as one family is created and celebrated, another young family is devastated, torn apart, and mourned. i cannot begin to comprehend the meaning behind it all, or the divine plans and purposes that are served. instead, i pray for peace. for healing. for daily reminders of the inherent goodness of our God. i pray for love and joy to be continued, and also restored.

because the valley won't go on forever. Psalm 23:4

functionally complete.

2011-10-09T20:24:00.001-04:00

Our Final Fireplace Room To-Do List:

- ~~fill all the nail holes with wood filler and sand smooth.~~

- ~~put a thin layer of touch up paint over the nail holes and fingerprints.~~

- ~~clean a few paint splatters off the brick.~~

- ~~clean, paint, and re-install the air return vent covers.~~

we actually bought new ones

- ~~put up all the light switch and outlet covers.~~

- ~~re-hang the light fixture in the nook.~~

- figure out what to do about window treatments.

and so, without further ado, it is my great honor and esteemed privilege to proclaim our fireplace room (finally!) FUNCTIONALLY COMPLETE!!!

just as a reminder, here is a picture of the two-toned look this room was sporting from WAY back when, before any of this madness got underway:

and here is the room as she stands this very moment:

NOTE: the china cabinet is not going to live there forever, it just moved there temporarily to be out of the way in the front room.

A Comprehensive List of Things We Did:
- replaced the 1/8" wood paneling with 1/4" drywall.
- covered the textured ceiling with 3/8" drywall.
- spackled holes and fixed some nail pops in the walls.
- primed and painted all the walls and trim.
- painted the fireplace doors.
- fixed the doorways to accommodate the drywall wall.
- put bigger crown molding around the fireplace.
- replaced all the switches, outlets, and all their covers.

and even though we're still curtain-less in there, Mark moved all the furniture from the rest of the house back into the fireplace room, serving the double purpose of making it look oh so cozy in there and also being the first step in prepping for paint in the front room and dining room.

no rest for the weary here folks, we plan on having the whole upstairs functionally complete by the end of the year... fingers crossed guys, (and your toes too if you can manage it) it's probably gonna be close, but we'll definately keep you posted.

our first scare.

2011-10-06T08:02:00.000-04:00

my blog is about to go to a place where my blog has never gone before. its kind of personal, but i think we can all handle it. if you dont think you can, then just skip this post and come back later. i'll probably have something to say about grilled bananas or painting furniture thats a little more in line with what we're all used to getting around here.

a couple months ago, i screwed up my birth control system when i forgot to pack my pills before we left for vacation. no wait, thats kind of a lie, because i actually did pack them, but then in a fit of organizational awesomeness i unpacked them to take one the morning we left, and then forgot to repack them before we actually left. i guess thats what i get for trying to be prepared and pack three days ahead of time.

so i was off the pill for a while and yadda yadda yadda all of a sudden there's a chance i might be preggers. (i am not going to elaborate any further on that point because i trust that all my readers are old enough to know where babies come from. you're welcome. go ask your mother.) anywho, this all led to a two-and-a-half week period in September during which i overthought every thing i did or felt and tried desperately to figure out if i was indeed going to grow a little person inside of me. and since you weren't hanging out in my head at that time, i've provided a symptom-by-symptom account of those weeks purely for your enjoyment and a little bit of understanding of why and how i came to be a little ball of silent stress and anxiety.

Symptom: eating a lot of food. a lot of junk food. specifically ice cream.
What I Was Thinking: i am so hungry! its like i'm eating enough for myself and a whole 'nother person... i kind of hope i actually turn out to be preggo so i can justify this junk food binge.
What I Probably Should Have Thought: i do not really need this ice cream. didn't i say i was going to start eating healthy and working out so i wouldnt feel so fat?

Symptom: "i feel so faaaaattttt."
What I Was Thinking: bloating! thats totally an early sign of pregnancy!
What I Probably Should Have Thought: hur dur dumbbutt its probably cause of all that ice cream. and i should probably actually start working out more. and maybe eat a little less cheese.

Symptom: headaches in the morning and a sore back all day.
What I Was Thinking: (google google google) oh man. more signs of early pregnancy. i dont think i'm ready for this. i need to go hyperventilate somewhere.
What I Probably Should Have Thought: i should stop sleeping in my contacts, because i know they give me headaches. and what a good jazzercise workout! i love that sore all over feeling the next day.

Symptom: gosh, i am really tired. i do not feel like doing anything but laying right here on this couch.
What I Was Thinking: that crazy little maybe-baby is sucking all my energy!
What I Probably Should Have Thought: i need more sleep. maybe staying up late to catch the end of America's Got Talent and then getting sucked into the show after that too wasn't really the best plan ever.

Symptom: massive acne breakout. not like "oh look a few zits on my chin" but more like "my face resembles that of a 16-year old boy who refuses to wash their face and/or their sheets and by the way is that a zit inside my right ear?"
What I Was Thinking: (google google google) oh man i didnt even know that acne leads to babies! PANIC!
What I Probably Should Have Thought: um hello? remember how your face kinda sorta does this EVERY month? probably just PMS. chill out and wash your face a bit more.

Symptom: getting up to go to the bathroom like 6 times in 4 hours.
What I Was Thinking: OMG TEENY TINY HUMAN MAKING ME HAVE TO PEEEEE
What I Probably Should Have Thought: well, note to self: drinking approx. 96 oz of water in one day might be just a tad bit excessive. chill.

**SPOILER ALERT** i'm not pregnant. just a little stressed and out of shape and making less-than-stellar dietary choices. sorry to disappoint.

and no, i'm not really disappointed at the lack of babyness in mah bellay. we're honestly not ready for that yet, as evidenced by the fact that one of my main concerns had to do with fitting into the fabulous bridesmaid dress i just bought for Vic's wedding 9 months from now, and that one of the only positive things i could really think about having a baby right now would be having an excuse to get fat.

so yeah. no babies here yet. just thought you might like to know.

One, Part Two.

2011-10-04T15:07:00.000-04:00

and/or How To Freeze Your Cake and Eat It Too.

so i told you all yesterday about our ~~super-special~~ low-key anniversary plans. dinner at home, watch our wedding video, open our wedding jar, and eat the top tier of our cake. out of all these pretty standard anniversary events, one of the most anticipated was definately the cake. did it survive an entire year in the creepy downstairs freezer? would it be edible, or moldy, or frozen solid like a big cakey icecube? what did it taste like in the first place? (turns out neither of us ate any of the cake when it was fresh) did we ever actually take it out of the box and wrap it up? which one of us did that anyway?

only one way to find out.

we trekked downstairs to the far corner of the basement where the creepy old refridgerator resides. we opened the freezer door, and lo and behold - there was something wrapped in aluminum foil. a good sign.

we figured that whatever was in that package would thaw better if it were unwrapped, so thats what we did. after removing three pieces of clear packing tape (yeah i don't know why either) and the first layer of aluminum foil, we found ANOTHER layer of aluminum foil covering what we were assuming to be the top tier of our cake.

peeling back the second layer revealed a layer of plastic wrap...

...followed by a layer of wax paper. apparently whoever wrapped this thing up meant serious business.

and it turns out that inside all that wrapping was indeed the top tier of our wedding cake, just like we remembered it. and take a look at how good this thing looks after an entire year in that getup!

I transferred the cake from its plethora of protective layers onto a plate for mostly aesthetic purposes, and let it sit for a bit.

while we waited for dinner to finish, and the cake to thaw, we listened to our wedding music and opened our first wedding jar.

inside the jar was a plethora of good advice, a copy of the BFOTB's speech, a few reminders about the outcome of the football game that day, and not one but TWO warnings about the cake. specifically, not to even bother with it.

well that only made us more curious to see how ours survived its year in the freezer, so after dinner we decided to chance it and cut ourselves a piece. (and i would just like to say that i was pleasantly surprised to find that my cake-cutting skillz have greatly improved over the past year)

time for the moment of truth...

the verdict: it tasted like cake. not particularly good cake, but the kind of cake you would expect to get from a grocery store bakery. which incidentally is exactly where our cake was from. we each ate a whole piece, and since we're not puking our guts out today, i would have to call this adventure in cake-freezing a great success!

additionally, i would like to take this opportunity to apologize to everyone who did eat cake at our wedding and then spent the rest of the evening with green teeth. my bad.

our only dilemma now that the cake turned out to be edible and reasonably tasty is that we're having a hard time justifying just throwing it out, which is what we were planning on doing. so you tell us: what should we do with the rest of our cake? feed it to my coworkers? have a second wedding reception? wrap it up and leave it on a strangers front porch? the possibilities are almost endless...

One.

2011-10-03T11:11:00.002-04:00

so this is what a first anniversary feels like...

its a little bit...

well...

is 'normal' too harsh a word for such a supposedly special day?

i feel a little bad because i don't have anything really deep or insightful to say here.

maybe its because my mind has been focused on other things lately and i haven't taken time to really reflect on the past 12 months. i mean, we've done a lot. we've travelled to some different places. we've had a lot of fun. there has been laughter and movies and snuggles and fights and reconciliations and surprises and projects and celebrations. and i loved all those things. i honestly wouldn't change anything about our first year of marriage. but on some level, it was just another year. another span of 365 days, just like the last one, just with different memories.

maybe its because we didn't make any huge plans. it is a Monday after all. and i was out of town all weekend. we plan to make dinner together tonight. we plan to watch our wedding video for the first time. we plan to eat the top layer of our cake. we plan to open our first wedding jar. and then on Friday, we plan to dress up fancy and go out to dinner somewhere nice. somewhere new. there may or may not be presents. i had lofty ambitions for an awesomely crafty gift for the hubs that would be heartfelt and let him know just how much i love him. and then i ran out of time. so instead i picked up a neat little something while i was out this weekend. i didn't ask for anything. i didn't really even hint about anything a lot. and is it too corny to say that i might not even mind all that much not getting something because i'll be happy to just spend time together?

maybe its because i've always just built it up in my head to be more than it really is. i mean, yes, its a big deal. its our first real anniversary after all. but i have celebrated a lot of anniversaries prior to this one. every month that we dated, every month that we were engaged, and every month that we've been married up to this point have all been major milestones for me and for us, and i celebrated accordingly, even if only in my head. so maybe i thought that when they all were added up into one big, full year that somehow it would feel bigger? but really it just feels like every other milestone.

but i know that its not. i know that this day is the one that matters. i know that February 15th, and March 20th don't even hold a candle to October 3rd. i guess there's just something about promising to love another person for "always and forever, no doubt whatsoever" and really meaning it that makes a day extra special. and i wouldn't have it any other way.

Happy FIRST Anniversary Mark! One down, hopefully at least 49 to go...

how to make the most amazing birthday cake ever.

2011-09-27T08:44:00.002-04:00

a little while back, i mentioned my pinterest-inspired art project and how it turned out. this weekend, it was my sister's turn to attempt something that she had pinned for my niece's 4th birthday: the cake. it was quite an adventure, and we think it is only fair to everybody else who has pinned this cake that we share our experience of attempting it.

8:00 pm - put the kids to bed. it's time to get your bake on! you have inspiration and a recipe and are ready to knock this thing out!

8:35 pm - realize that your organic from-scratch cake batter is looking more like cookie dough. this may not have been the best time to try a new recipe.

8:37 pm - consult with sister as to the best course of action.

8:38 pm - shrug, add some more milk, and carry on.

8:43 pm - gather every large vessel you own. split batter into 6 equal parts to dye all the colors of the rainbow with food coloring gel (except for indigo, because is that really even a color anymore?)

8:54 pm - abandon all now-dirtied large pots in favor of dirtying all the cereal bowls instead.

9:15 pm - put first four layers into parchment lined pans. cross your fingers and close the oven.

9:21 pm - ignore hubs inquiry as to whether or not he smells fire.

9:30 pm - confirm that something was indeed burning. but at least it wasn't the cake! make a mental note to trim the parchment paper to fit the pans next time...

9:32 pm - express disbelief that this is really how your awesome cake is turning out.

9:45 pm - try to determine how to proceed from this point. does a birthday party really NEED a cake?

10:05 pm - do not even bother to attempt to bake the final two layers. just trash it all. curse pinterest for putting this idea in your head.

10:14 pm - head to the grocery store.

10:22 pm - semi-seriously consider just buying a generic grocery store birthday cake.

10:23 pm - pick up boxed cake mixes and two cans of white buttercream icing. ready for round two.

10:45 pm - mix up cake batter in no time flat.

10:58 pm - use two cake mixes to make six layers of multi-colored cake. bake in oiled-and-floured pans in lieu of messing with parchment. they all turn out great.

11:45 pm - use both cans of icing to stack and dirty ice the cake. make a mental note to get more icing before the party.

12: 10 am - put cake in fridge for the night. vow to clean up the kitchen in the morning.

12:13 am - go to bed.

1:12 am - wake up, confused to hear a soothing woman's voice crooning something about BEEP BEEP BEEP CARBON MONOXIDE BEEP BEEP BEEP

1:13 am - turn off the detector. contemplate just going back to sleep.

1:14 am - figure it's probably in your best interest to call the fire department instead.

1:17 am - two firetrucks bearing some of New York's finest arrive. they inspect the house, and take readings to determine the source of the elevated CO levels.

1:23 am - the source is determined to be the oven. apparently extended baking with all the windows shut will elevate levels just enough to trip the alarm. stupid cake.

1:24 am - realize the disastrous state of your kitchen while the firemen wander about your house. kind of regret decision to clean up in the morning.

1:25 am - open all the windows and wait for CO levels to normalize.

2:03 am - firefighters leave, looking a little disappointed that they didn't get to rip down any walls or anything.

2:05 am - go back to bed.

6:28 am - the kids wake up, because they somehow managed to sleep through all the midnight excitement.

11:45 am - husbands return from their morning excursions (on which they took the car with the carseats and ALL THE KEYS) with two more cans of icing, among other things.

12:03 pm - use another can and a half of icing to cover the cake. (that's three and a half total, if you're counting.) decorate with skittles, a detail you added yourself to give the cake more flair.

2:32 pm - light the candles. sing happy birthday.

2:33 pm - the birthday girl makes a wish, and blows out the candles.

2:35 pm - cut the cake. jumping up and down while shrieking "ohmygosh it looks so great!" is entirely optional and might get you some wierd looks from other partygoers, but it's also completely appropriate behavior. honest.

2:37 pm - serve to the birthday girl with pride and ENJOY!

so the moral of this cake story is that it can be done, but you might want to have a backup plan. and plenty of icing. and a few hours to kill. and some firefighters on speed dial, just in case.

so now that you know just how exciting a pinterest project can be, who's next?

apple picking.

2011-09-26T08:49:00.000-04:00

the weather man said it was supposed to pour down rain all weekend.

i am so glad he was wrong.

Happy Birthday Claire Marie!

thanks for inviting us to share your birthday weekend.

craving.

2011-09-22T15:20:00.001-04:00

you know what i could go for right now? some M&Ms.

I had this same feeling yesterday afternoon. Yesterday, i put a dollar into the vending machine and hit E5 an watched the M&Ms slowly inch their way forward as quickly as their twirly spiraled cage allowed them to because some kind soul had posted their $0.75 bail.

But apparently the vending machine was feeling vindictive, as though the M&Ms did not deserve to go free, and just as the M&Ms were about to escape, the machine grabbed them and held on.

I left a note on the vending machine that it was holding my M&Ms hostage, but no one returned them to me. and they're not holding on in there anymore.

somebody done stole my M&Ms.

Oh well, they probably were really doing me a favor. I guess i'll just eat my baby carrots instead.

hey, i put some new shoes on.

2011-09-21T13:14:00.000-04:00

so i mentioned that as part of my weekend shopping spree that i picked up a pair of shoes for myself. now, you have to promise not to laugh at me before i tell you anything else about them. promise? pinky swear? ok.
well, they're those toning kind of shoes - you know, the ones that will give you better legs and a nicer butt just by lacing them up. stop laughing right now or i'll break your pinkies! 'cause they're not like the ones with the giant rocker on the bottom or even the balance ball inspired ones. in fact, if the box hadn't told me they were the special toning shoes i might not have known it because they're actually pretty cute and normal-looking.

i wore them for the first time to jazzercise last night. ok seriously, enough with the giggles its a really good and fun workout! i could feel a difference in my legs, but i wasnt entirely sure if that was a good or a bad thing. i guess the good news is that i could still walk when i woke up this morning, but it kind of felt sometimes that the shoes just didn't fit quite right and i was a little off-balance trying to make up for the extra bounce in the sole. but maybe that's just how the shoes are supposed to work. i guess i'll have to wear them a few more times to know for sure. i suspect that these shoes will either give me really nice legs, or make them fall off, and i'm wierdly excited to find out which it will be!

shopping spree.

2011-09-19T19:33:00.000-04:00

this weekend, i did a little shopping. well actually, i did kind of a lot of shopping. i hit up yardsales, and craft stores, and hardware stores, and department stores. i got some things that i needed, some things that i wanted, and a bunch of pretty sweet deals. so let me share with you some of my spoils.

Saturday morning i got up pretty early to check out some of the end-of-the-season yardsales. most of what i saw was either a bunch of leftover junk or a lot of baby stuff, neither of which i had any need for. i was on my way home when i spotted one last sale. it was there that i found the best stuff of the day - an all-wooden futon, and a fun ikea mirror. she wanted $25 for both, but agreed to take my $23, since i'm such a convincing barterer. and/or that's all the cash i had on me. we think the futon will eventually live in the basement and give us extra room for guests, once we get a mattress for it. we have no idea yet where the mirror will end up.

after helping me unload the futon, Mark spent the rest of the day catching up on some work stuff, so i got to do some more solo shopping. i was supposed to be looking for curtains for the fireplace room. because our windows in there have been nekkid for far too long. but i didnt find any that i liked in any of the three stores i visited, so i did not buy any curtains. or curtain rods. but i picked up some swatches of fabric in case i decide to make curtains. and i did find some finials for the curtain rods at BBnB that i really like and that i could get 20% off of, so now all i need are the rods. (i'm not really sure why i didn't just go ahead and buy the rods at the same time. just not ready to fully commit yet?)

i also found this awesome little wheely-garlic-cutter that has been on my "i really wish i had one of those" list ever since my sister-with-the-babies told me about hers, but i wasn't willing to buy one for myself. until i found this one that was 1/2 off. score!

another little thing that brought me great joy was the bedskirt that i found on clearance for $4 at Target. i ironed it and put it on the bed in the guest bedroom, and now i can stop feeling self-conscious about the no-longer-exposed frame because it is all covered up and looking fine. doesn't it just make you want to come visit? what? you say you would also like a headboard and some bedside tables? be patient y'all... all in good time.

i made one last stop on Saturday at Home Depot to pick up a small lattice for our thornless raspberry plants. they were about to out-grow the pot we had them in, and needed something to support themselves so they would stop growing along the ground. Mark transplanted them into a bigger pot, the one my Mom got me for my bridal shower, and i think they're really going to like it there.

on Sunday morning, i made the unsettling discovery that i did not like any of my pants. so since i had 30% off at Kohl's to use (and because if you get the 30% you can't NOT go shopping) i spent the afternoon figuring out what size pants* i wear in grown-up sizes** and making the most out of my extra discount. i ended up with 2 pairs of pants, 3 pairs of capris, 2 shirts, and a pair of shoes for me; and 2 pairs of shorts, 1 pair of swim trunks, and 2 shirts for Mark. i shopped mostly from the clearance racks, except for my 2 pairs of pants, and i ended up saving around 4x what i spent. i think it was a good day.

did anyone else do any shopping this weekend? anyone know where i can find a futon mattress? who wants to help me pick out curtain fabric? anyone have a sewing machine i could maybe borrow? and when are you coming to visit and sleep in my guest bedroom?

*definitely NOT a size 4. what was i thinking? also, neither is Kirstie Alley. sorry hon.

** a rant-y aside to the Womens Pants Sizing Makers of America (WPSMOA: presumably pronounced whip-some-mo'): may i seriously suggest that you get your act together and start standardizing your wacked-out system for sizing women's pants? just because i might be classified as 'petite' does not mean that i am also extra skinny. i'm just a little shorter than average. but according to you and your crazypants, i'm about 6 inches too short for 'average' pants, and yet somehow still about an inch too tall for 'short' pants. and why can i fit into a size 6avg but need a size 8short? YOU MAKE NO SENSE! thanks for making me feel fat and short all at the same time, all while not making any pants that actually fit me..
what's wrong with the way men size their pants? i know that i can pick up any pair of pants that say 32/32 and be guaranteed that they'll look great on the hubs. why can't we do that? because i would LOVELOVELOVE to find a pair of pants that fits me around my hips and butt and are also a comfortable length - you know, somewhere between needs-to-be-rolled-three-times and hey-where's-the-flood? to be able to pick up a pair of pants in my size and be guaranteed that they'll fit me without having to take three pairs of the same pants in different sizes into the dressing room only to find that NONE OF THEM FIT?
save us some time. save us from dressing room meltdowns. save us from wearing the same pants we've had since highschool because we dread having to shop for new ones. and FIX THE WAY YOU SIZE OUR PANTS.***

*** ok, i'm done now. i feel a little better.

happy independence day!

2011-09-16T19:15:00.000-04:00

...in Mexico, that is.

to celebrate, i made chicken fajitas for dinner. i was kind of excited to try a recipe for fajita seasoning that a friend of mine had given me last winter, but it wasn't until i got home from work that i realized i did not have all the spices i needed. so, time to improvise!

i sauteed some onion and an orange bell pepper in a little bit of olive oil, until they started to get soft and a little brown around the edges.

then i cooked up some strips of chicken in a little more olive oil, until they were cooked through and a nice golden brown color on the outside.

then instead of the fajita seasoning i was planning on making, i added part of a package of taco seasoning - i just added some water and kind of sprinkled the seasoning on until the meat looked seasoned enough. then i added the onion and peppers back in to heat it all up again together and viola! fajitas.

it only took me about 20 minutes to make this whole dinner. and Mark said it was really good, so i'll just go ahead and call this quick, easy meal a definite win!

hope you all had a happy Mexican Independence Day, and have a great weekend!

almost there.

2011-09-12T12:22:00.000-04:00

since i'm in a state of denial about all things football related this weekend (my likely fantasy win doesn't really make up for that embarrasment on sunday) let's just focus on some other happenings of the past few days. what? things exist outside of the NFL? the world revolves around something other than football season? why apparently, it sure does. and just in case you've forgotten, in our little world everything revolves around the neverending fireplace room project.

thanks to all the rain this week, Mark's softball game was cancelled on Tuesday night. he made the most of his evening by starting to fix the doorways into the room. he managed to remove the old too-small door casings without having to remove the existing trim on the other side of the door. this apparently saved us a lot of time and frustration. i was duely impressed.

by the end of the evening, the lengths of all the pieces had been calculated and double-checked, all measurements had been measured at least twice, and everything was cut to length and fitted into the doorways before it was taken to the basement for the first coat of primer.

over the next few weeknights, the pieces all got two coats of primer and two coats of paint. i would be lying if i said i helped with that at all. not that i didn't offer, just that i was not needed at this stage of the game.

when the weekend finally came, we knew that before we did anything else with the doorways, something had to be done about the floor in the fireplace room. because not only was it getting kind of hard to work with all the stuff to step around and avoid stepping on, but all that junk was also covered in a nice thin black dusty film of spraypaint gunk. it was almost entirely imperceptible until it was transferred onto your feet or hands and then left black painty fingerprints and footprints all over everything that did not need to be covered with black painty fingerprints and footprints.

we meticulously wiped down absolutely everything in the room with a damp rag, and rolled up the plastic as we went. we put away tools that we were done with, but kept close the ones we might still need. then i vacuumed the floor, and swiffered the floor, and wiped the whole thing down with a wet rag on my hands and knees, and swiffered the floor again, and then swiffered it all with a wet cloth too. and for about a half an hour, the whole room was spotless.

oh, and i took advantage of the freshly clean environment to take another pic of the fireplace in all her trimmed-out spraypainted awesomeness without the clutter on the floor or tape on the ceiling to take away from how good she looks.

anywho, then it was back to the business of the doorways. Mark started with the kitchen doorway. he nailed the frame together lying down, then stood it up to fit them into the doorway. and thanks to his careful calculations and measurements, it fit perfectly!

then Mark used his studfinder so he would know where the studs were in the wall when it came time to put up the trim and make sure everything was all secured and in place. i didn't help with this part either, because i don't need a studfinder to find my stud. (ba-dum-bum-chissshhh) (i told mark when i took this picture that i was going to make a really funny studfinder joke that he wouldnt think was funny at all. he mostly ignored me.)

since Mark was doing most of the work at this point, and doing SUCH a good job of it, i took it upon myself to simultaneously enjoy my super clean floors and the first time we've seen the sun all week by sprawling out in the middle of the room and staring out the window at the gorgeous blue sky. a major contribution on my part, honestly. i am so helpful.

my cloud-gazing break had to end when Mark had moved onto the front room doorway and needed my floorspace. so i kept blue glove buddy company in the kitchen for a while.

fitting the second doorway into place had a few more bumps than the first did. turns out the opening was just a hair too narrow, so Mark had to cut back about a quarter inch of drywall on each side of the door. this made sure the doorframe would fit, and also made a mess on my freshly-clean floor.

since my help was only needed sparingly, i transitioned into a role not unlike a supervisor who watches the workers, offers encouragement or a helping hand when needed or requested, but who mostly sits around and does nothing. see how helpful i am?

i am happy to say that thanks to my diligent oversight and surveillance of the process, this was our only nail gun casualty of the day. no fingers or toes or animals were victimized, just the hub's patience. bonus points to anyone who does not mention this or point this out to him when they come to visit, as it is kind of a sore spot for him. extra bonus points to whoever finds out where in the world that nail went.

wow, this is getting long. i guess you should just be glad i'm not sharing all almost-80 pictures i took of the whole process. but to make a long-ish story short-er, the doorways are officially fixed! i am so thrilled. i had almost forgotten what the room looked like with real finished doorways and trim and baseboard.

oh, you'd like to see what it looks like too? no problem, i'm happy to share. we ended up having to borrow a smaller nail gun from Mark's dad to put up the quarterround at the bottom of the baseboard on sunday, but everything was in place and cleaned up in time for the Sunday night football game.

i'm never quite sure that the to-do list ever gets any shorter for this room, but the things on the list are of a much smaller scale than they used to be. we are definately in the home stretch here, and it feels good.

Still To Do:

- fill all the nail holes with wood filler and sand smooth.

- put a thin layer of touch up paint over the nail holes and fingerprints.

- clean a few paint splatters off the brick.

- clean, paint, and re-install the air return vent covers.

- put up all the light switch and outlet covers.

- re-hang the light fixture in the nook.

- figure out what to do about window treatments.

insert interesting post title here.

2011-09-09T12:40:00.000-04:00

it's been almost a full week since i've updated at all, so i feel like i should say something here. but the thing is, i don't feel like i have anything to really say. at least, not anything that anyone else would find extremely interesting, or funny, or worth writing and/or reading about.

i could default to the weather, and gripe and complain about the non-stop rain we've been having here on the east coast thanks to a crazy confluence of hurricanes and tropical storms. but the rain hasn't really affected us personally. yet. (knock on wood, grab a lucky rabbit's foot, and search frantically for a four leaf clover) our basement is dry. we don't live near a creek. our road isn't closed. we can still get to work. school closings dont affect us. we haven't been evacuated. all the trees are still standing in our yard. the only inconvenience we've suffered was Mark's cancelled softball game on Tuesday and the knowledge that we'll probably have to mow our grass twice next week once this all dries up and the sun comes back out. so yeah, not so much to say about the weather.

i guess i could talk about work a little, and how an unexpected power outage on Tuesday led to me having most of a day off, which led me to working 9-hr days the rest of this pay period to make up the glorious extra hours i spent at home, except that i know a few people at work who read this so i wouldnt want to do any sort of complaining or whining that might in any way endanger my job. because i like it. so yeah, no discussions of work here.

i guess i could tell you about the progress we're making in the fireplace-room-door-fixing process, (and by we i mean Mark) but i kind of want to save that so it can have its own post once they're done. you know, to try and keep the total number of posts about the work we're doing in that room down below 30 or so. so yeah, forget that i mentioned the fireplace room.

of course, i could always lament my lack of general housekeeping abilities and regale you with anecdotes about how i spent all day Tuesday cleaning my house, all day Wednesday messing it up again, and the rest of the week not doing a single lick of housework. but then you would all know that my kitchen sink is full of dishes, i didn't wash the ravioli pot from last night, my bathrooms are a disgrace, and you don't even want to know how many hours i spent just sitting on the couch watching bad tv this week. but i can't mention any of that because then my mom will worry about me. so yeah, not so much interesting happening in my day to day life.

but wait, this just in! i just got back from a quick Sheetz run for Friday lunch and i would just not be a good blogger if i didn't share with you the fact that i totally got hit on by a stranger at the traffic light. he was sitting in a green subaru at the red light in front of me, waiting to turn left, when i noticed he was looking at me in his rearview mirror. and then he waggled his eyebrows at me! i'm not really sure what he was expecting from me, so i shot him a "seriously?" look. he responded with a look of his own that i interpreted to mean "yeeahhh, you know it" and he waggled his eyebrows again! this silent exchange continued for way too long, partly because i didn't want to just take the easy way out and wave my ring in his face, and partly because i was having a lot of fun giggling at his desperation. the icing on the cake was when he stalled out when the light finally changed because he was so engrossed in our "conversation," and then sped away to escape the uncontrollable laughter that exploded out of me at his expense. i was just really glad that he was not also on his way to Sheetz. that could have been awkward.

Dear Dark-Haired Stranger at the Red Light -
thank you for making my day, and for giving me something interesting to blog about. sorry to disappoint you, but i'm happily married. and even if i wasn't, you still would not have gotten my number. your choice of location for picking up women makes you seem desperate and awkward. you might want to rethink that for the future.

Good Luck with That,

Mando.

the day for laboring.

2011-09-06T13:13:00.000-04:00

another long weekend made for the perfect time to knock out some more of the fireplace room to-do list. this weekend, the fireplace itself was due for some lovin'. we had decided a while ago that the gold finish on the fireplace was just not quite our style, and figured that since we were doing so much in this room already, we might as well try to modernize it just a little bit to make it look more like it belonged in our house and less like your grandmother's fireplace.

our weapon of choice was a can of heat-resistant black spray paint. we taped over everything that we wanted to stay its original color, or anything that was going to be exposed to open flame at some point, to lessen the chances of lighting the house on fire.

after the first (very thin) coat of paint, it was still looking rather shiny, and more than a little splotchy, but it wasn't drippy so i was feeling pretty confident that our investment in that one can of spray paint was going to be worth it.

since it was raining, we couldn't paint outside, so we set up a secondary spray station in the basement to spray the doors so we wouldnt have to wait for a nice day. because we're nothing if not determined to get this project done in a timely fashion. and also kind of stupid for putting that many fumes into a not-very-well ventilated area. (don't worry Mom, we took plenty of fresh air breaks on the front porch)

four (very thin!) coats of paint later, and the doors looked like this:

and the fireplace surround looked like this:

so then we put it all together and whaddaya get? a brand-spankin'- new fireplace thats what! i'm still kind of amazed that it's the same fireplace, just a different color. i'm a little bit in love. (i would be even more in love if the spray paint hadnt also left a coating of black paint/dust all over every horizontal surface in the room, but i'm just going to take a big breath and not get into that rant right now)

while i was busy painting the fireplace and watching paint dry, Mark tackled the crown molding and trim that went around the fireplace. first, he used some paint stripper to remove some of the paint that the previous owners had so kindly left on the brick when they had painted their old trim. this was the most time consuming part of the process, and the results were subtle but i think it made a big enough difference to be worth the effort.

then, because there were no joists in the ceiling right along the fireplace and because you can't shoot a nail gun into brick, Mark made some backer pieces out of an old 2x4 and super glued them to the ceiling to make sure the nails would have something to grab into and keep the crown molding from falling down over time. oh, and those blocks on the corners were necessary because of there will be trim running vertically around the fireplace as well as the crown around the top, and there is no other way to make them look nice where they all run into each other. there are similar blocks at the bottom to tie into the baseboard and quarter round too.

because i got to be a helper in the actual putting-up-the-trim process, there are no pictures of that. so thanks to the wonder that is the internet, viola! here's the fireplace as she looks right now - all painted, doors on, crown molding up, and cove trim along the sides.

sorry the picture's not the greatest, and please ignore the tape on the ceiling and the giant mess that is the whole floor in that room. but honestly, that's what the room looks like at this very moment. we didnt have time to clean it up and stage a good shot, heck we just barely got all the pieces up before we had to rush out the door because we were late for a labor day picnic.

Mark and his blue-glove buddy that i made him on a fresh-air break outside are proud of what we accomplished with our weekend. Mark is already itching to get to work on the last big part of this room: fix the doors.

pins and buttons.

2011-09-03T17:54:00.001-04:00

i've had a pinterest account for a few weeks, or maybe it's been months, i dont really know. i've pinned 132 things that i like, or think are cool, or funny, or that i would like my house to look like, or look like something i could do. up until this week, i had done none of them. and then when i was hunting for ideas for Mark's cousin's birthday, i pinned this:

and a couple days later, i got excited and i made this:

i'm pretty happy with how it turned out. actually, if i could get over the fact that the fabric has a couple little wrinkles in it and there is that one button that i probably should have moved over a half an inch, it might just be my favorite thing i've ever made. maybe i should start thinking about some of those other potential projects i have pinned...

...or maybe i should focus a little more on that fireplace room project first...

stay-at-home hubs.

2011-08-29T19:57:00.001-04:00

Things that Mark did today while he was home because his office didn't have power:

- cleaned up the leaves and twigs in the yard.
- mowed the lawn.
- swept the deck.
- checked the mail.
- did the dishes. and put them away.
- did the laundry.*
- made the bed.
- cleaned up the kitchen.
- vaccuumed all the floors.

the only thing that would have surprised me more would have been if he had cleaned the bathrooms too. well, there's always the chance that he might have off again tomorrow...
man, i love my hubs.

*well, kinda. it would have been extra awesome if he wouldnt have folded and put away two loads of dirty laundry along with the two clean loads...

hurricane weekend.

2011-08-29T08:52:00.000-04:00

I Really Meant To...
stock up on bottled water and non-perishable food.
But Instead I...
stayed FAR away from the grocery store. did not feel like getting trampled!

I Really Meant To...
stay home and hunker down through the storm.
But Instead I...
drove to a friend's house to watch the UFC fight. and then drove home again after.

I Really Meant To...
find the flashlights and make sure they had batteries before the storm.
But Instead I...
searched for a flashlight for 20 minutes the day AFTER the storm. (for something non-hurricane related. we were fortunate to have power through pretty much all of the storm.)

I Really Meant To...
clean up all the leaves and twigs that fell in our yard.
But Instead I...
played catch with the hubs in our yard.

I Really Meant To...
make dinner and have a quiet night in.
But Instead I...
went out to eat and to the movies. (Our Idiot Brother = pretty good for a laugh. not recommended for young kids.)

probably not some of my best and/or brightest ideas ever, but i dont really regret any of them. we had a good stormy weekend, and we were extremely blessed and fortunate that the only thing we lost was our cable. (although according to my brother, that might qualify as a major loss)

my thoughts and prayers are with those who are still without power, those who sustained major damages, and with the families of those who lost loved ones to Hurricane Irene.

earthquakepocolypse 2011.

2011-08-24T08:24:00.001-04:00

hey guys, what's shakin'?

**dissolves into a fit of giggles cuz i am so dang clever! and funny!**

but seriously, an earthquake? on the east coast? on a tuesday? whoah. that's crazy! apparently it was the first earthquake we've had of that magnitude since WWII. apparently it could be felt from ohio to south carolina to canada. apparently office buildings all over the place were evacuated and people got to go home for the afternoon. (in our office, once we were all sure that the shaking wasn't going to trigger another flood, we just went back to work) apparently the shaking even cracked the Washington Monument.

facebook immediately exploded with a slew of updates along the lines of

ZOMGEARTHQUAKE!!!1!!!!!!11

you know, a reaction that was completely proportional to the severity of the event. major phone companies shut down because they couldnt handle the volume of people calling home to make sure their house was all in one piece. i didnt have anyone at home, so i had to wait til the end of the day to find out how our little house and our new drywall did in its very first major-moderate earthquake. and good news: it was fine and un-cracked!

our house: better than the Washington Monument since 2011.

recent reading.

2011-08-23T08:09:00.001-04:00

i first heard of Wicked when my high-school art club was planning a trip to NYC and we were voting on which Broadway shows we wanted to see while we were there. i had no idea what it was, but it got a lot of votes so i figured it had to be something good, and i was among the disappointed when we weren't able to secure tickets for our group. we wound up going to see Hairspray and The Producers instead, and i forgot all about the other shows on the original ballot.

i next encountered Wicked in my college marching band. one of our closing numbers my freshman year was a mash-up of two songs from the score: Dancing Through Life, and Defying Gravity. i liked the songs, but it was kind of difficult to fully appreciate them while also trying to play them and keep up with the drill too. lucky for me, my BFITW was kind enough to introduce me to the full soundtrack. and then i promptly fell in love with the parallel story of the Wizard of Oz.

and THEN, i found out that the musical was based on a BOOK, and of course had to read it. i put all three* books from the Wicked Years on my Christmas list, and i read through the first book before Christmas break was over. (i only got the first one that year, because apparently the fact that i asked for anything called Son of a Witch was just too shocking!) if it was possible, i fell even more in love with Wicked. i even went to see the musical in Pittsburgh with my BFITW, and it is the inspiration for our hopefully-sometime-in-the-nearish-future matching tattoos.

all that to say, i took a trip to the library before family vacation, and over the past few weeks i finally read the second and third books in the Wicked Years: Son of a Witch, and A Lion Among Men. and i highly recommend them to all of you. start at the beginning of course, with Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, and go from there. i dare you to not get sucked into the story, and the characters, and the whole world of Oz. they're like fairy tales for adults!

speaking of fairy tales for adults, when we were on vacation, my sister loaned me another book by Gregory Maguire called Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, which is a parallel Cinderella story. i read the whole thing while we were at the beach with the inlaws over the weekend. you should read it. it will give you a whole different perspective on the classic story. and i bet you'll love it.

i've read some really good stuff in the past month or so, but i'm not quite sure what i'm going to read next. have you read anything good lately?

* i hear from the very reliable source that is wikipedia that a fourth and possibly final book in the series is supposed to come out later this year! anyone else wicked excited?!

sluggish.

2011-08-19T09:28:00.000-04:00

as part of my post-vacation funkitude of re-acclimating myself to real life, i have had two weeks worth of sluggish mornings.

which is better than i can say for this guy, who has had a lifetime of them:

(haha see what i did there? ya know, cause i don't like to wake up in the mornings, and that's a GIANT slug on my porch? get it? i'm so funny.)

painting together: a short history.

2011-08-17T12:23:00.001-04:00

about two years ago, back when the hubs and i were still dating in the summer of 2009, we got our first taste of what it is like to do DIY-style home improvements together. his parents were finishing up a patio room addition on the back of the house, and since i was unemployed and spending a good chunk of my time as a vagabond there, i offered to help out. the task: painting the one wall in the room that isn't floor-to-ceiling windows. and the closet.

i had painted a lot of things in the 22 years of my life up to that point: bedrooms, youth rooms, furniture, VBS backdrops, canvases, buildings at service projects and on missions trips, and i was excited to show Mark just how handy i was with a paint brush and a roller. you know, show myself off a little. well, in a nutshell, let's just say that he was not too impressed with my painting style and suggested that my skills were probably better suited to painting the closet while he took care of the wall in the room.

there you have it folks, the man i love and married, at his finest.

fast forward a year to the late summer of 2010, and we've just bought our house together and are painting the two bedrooms before we move in: the giant guest room and the smaller master bedroom. this time, rather than attempt painting in the same room at the same time, we split up the job. he took care of the master bedroom on his own, while i took on the guest room with the help of a friend from work and Mark's dad. both rooms (and their closets!) turned out spectacularly.

(at this point i would just like to interject the fact that even though Mark doesn't really trust my ability to cut-in the edges or roll the walls of a room, he is more than happy to let me take care of ALL the trim painting. this is progress people. for serious.)

fast forward one more time to last weekend, late summer 2011. we have come to a point in the fireplace room at which we are both beginning to be weary with the project. the trim has been painted (by me of course) and the edges have been cut in (by the hubs). we have one day to get two coats of color onto the walls. i suggest that this will only be possible if we work together. after a moment of slight hesitation, the hubs agrees. (did you catch that? he agreed to let me paint with him! in the same room!!!)

he only questioned my method once at the very beginning of the day, and was pleased to hear that i had (mostly) conformed to his preference for a slightly thicker first coat followed by a thinner second coat. after the first coat dried, we had a good time pointing out to each other all the little spots we had missed, and i may or may not have said to him, "HA! you're just as bad as i am!"

we tackled the second coat after a Home Depot/Lowes/Chick-Fil-A run, and he only went back ONCE to touch up an area i had already painted (which was, admittedly, just a tad bit streaky).

this is huge. the walls in this room are now all the same color for the first time since we've owned the house. and i love it, dont you? (sorry these pics arent the greatest of the overall room, my camera was in the process of dying) the bonus is that the hubs and i painted the room together without any arguments or issues. what a good day!

still on the to-do list for this room:
- molding around the fireplace.
- fix the doorways.
- put all the baseboard and doorway casings back up.
- paint the fireplace doors.
- do something about the warped mantle. (replace? paint? replace and paint?)
- re-hang the light fixture in the nook.
- move the furniture back in.

is it just me or is this list not getting any shorter?

Day Eight: Play Ball!

2011-08-16T15:21:00.000-04:00

so, the real reason that the sister with the babies came to my house after vacation wasn't just to make me feel better about the end of vacation, or to play at my playground, or to eat a sno-ball. they actually came to see Baltimore and go to a baseball game with us at Camden Yards. and we were more than happy to oblige and to spend more time together! we drove down into the Inner Harbor and walked around a bit to see the sights and find a place to eat. and then just when we were getting ready to head over to the stadium, it started pouring down rain.

even though we had two umbrellas between the six of us, we ALL managed to get completely soaked as we made our way through the streets of B-more. but it was a pretty comfortable summer rain, we finally did make it to the ballpark, AND it was bobblehead night. success!

the tarp was on the field, and there was a rain delay, and no one else (including the MASN guy that Mark talked to) seemed too optimistic that the weather would clear up, but we were actually very optimistic the whole time because we had seats that were under cover, we were on vacation, and we were there to have fun!

the rain delay lasted just over an hour total, and yes, we were among those obnoxious people who cheered when the rain stopped and they came out to take the tarp off the field!

i was pretty excited that they were actually going to play, since this was my first Orioles game too! i have been watching them a lot on tv since the hubs is a fan (and they dont show many Pirates games in B-more) so i guess you could say that i am kind of an O's fan too.

even though the rain came back again just before gametime, they played anyway! it turned out to be a pretty quick game, with a lot of innings where the batters went down in order. (which was good since it started an hour late) the rain kept coming back off and on, but since our seats were covered we hardly noticed.

we thought we were going to leave early, but since the game was going so well, and we were winning, we ended up staying til the end of the game to see if the O's could hold onto their lead. which they did! although not everybody in our party can say that they actually saw the end of the game, just that they were there.

and just like that, vacation was over.

thanks for letting me extend my vacation by an extra week and a half. i hope you enjoyed the recaps even half as much as i enjoyed the actual vacation, because it was awesome. and i can't wait until we are all together again.

Day Seven: parting ways.

2011-08-15T08:03:00.001-04:00

what? you really thought just because i took the weekend off from posting that i was ready to admit that vacation is over? hardly. i still haven't even unpacked my suitcase. or caught up with all my laundry. although while i've been re-living vacation we have been busy doing other blog-worthy things, but i'll get to those eventually. after all, there are still a couple more days of vacation left!

our time all-together was all too short. so we eased the end-of-vacation blues by having the sister with the babies come and spend the weekend with us. after a long drive home (made even longer by traffic) what the kids really wanted was more car-time, so we headed to the park.

it was a good way to blow off some steam at the end of a traveling day.

and a great way to get really dizzy on this spinny-seat thing.

after dinner, we went out for authentic Maryland sno-balls from the sno-ball stand up the road. spoiler alert: they're just like sno-cones. just not in a cone. but they do taste very much like vacation.

Day Six: the last full day.

2011-08-12T13:11:00.000-04:00

the end came oh so fast. and since the majority vote wanted to go back to Busch Gardens again, thats where we went too because we wanted to spend as much time together with everybody as we could. we rode all the big coasters again, since the lines were only slightly longer than the day before, and we also made time for a few other rides, like the teacups!

we ended up meeting up with Mom, Dad, Stasia, and the Goob for lunch in New France and to ride the Griffon (a coaster that hangs you over the edge for a few seconds before dropping you down the completely vertical hill!) we rode in the front row, and i managed to keep my eyes open the whole time and my hands up for some of it. Mom had her eyes closed for the first drop, but she said it was her favorite coaster.

the Goob says this is his 'dancing to banjo music' face.

we split up again on our way out of the park. Mark and I couldnt convince the Goob to ride the Alpengeist, but since he waited so patiently for us at the exit, we stopped to let him check out the Sesame Street Forest of Fun. unfortunately, he was just a little too tall for any of the rides.

ok, so maybe we just stopped long enough to quickly snap this off-center pic.

we had to leave the park a little early-ish because we were in charge of picking up dinner: steamed crabs! everybody sat and picked crabs and worked on finishing up all the other leftovers we had accumulated throughout the week.

check out that pile of shells: i think this is my best showing to date at crab picking. i didnt count how many i ate, or how long i sat for, but i had a good time. i mostly ate claws, because there is still something that is just not right in my head about ripping apart and eating something that is looking at me. ugh. i just can't bring myself to do it.

but pretty much everyone else could, and we made quick work of those crabs. and of course, Mark was the last one sitting to finish them all up.

the Goob tried to kick us all out so that he could go to bed, but we were having way too much fun being all together in the same place, so we stayed up way too late doing nothing but being together.

PS is this really the only sibling picture we took the entire week? gosh i love you guys.

Day Five: a bushel and a peck.

2011-08-11T11:56:00.000-04:00

Mark and I celebrated our 10-month anniversary on Wednesday. (cue collective 'aaaaawwww' for the adorable newlyweds here) we were tired after beach day, so we slept in a little before filling another day with Williamsburg, lunch at the Olive Garden, and an afternoon of fun at Busch Gardens.

the palace green was full of people playing ball and attempting to master rolling a hoop with a stick. apparently its not as easy at they make it look in movies. i was half tempted to try, but my less-fun more-grown-up scared-to-look-like-a-goofus-in-front-of-a-bunch-of-strangers side of me won out and we just walked past.

since we remembered this time to get a map at the visitors center, we were able to pick out the places that we wanted to see but had missed the last time in our wanderings. one of the first places we stopped was in the church yard to look at some of the graves that were there.

the inside of the church was really neat. there is so much history in the building and it was fun to think about all the differences between churches then and now. it actually has an active congregation, which is pretty impressive seeing as it sits right on the main street of the Colonial part of Williamsburg and not out in the modern part. i think it would be way cool to get to worship there every week.

the colonial gardens were probably Mark's favorite part. i think he would have wandered around in there for a few hours, and might have even liked to sit for a while under the grape arbor with a good book. we would have liked to come home with a few plants, but since our garden and other outside space is less than planned (and more like overgrown and out of control) at this point, we just bought a few packs of seeds for when we do have more of a plan.

the shoemaker was one of the most in-character people we talked to, which mostly made us feel as though he wished we would stop asking him questions and just let him work. so we didn't visit with him for very long.

i convinced Mark to get a little bit into character by trying on this 3-cornered hat. i was not quite convincing enough for him to pose for a picture with me in the stocks.

but i did take this nice picture of a barrel.

we hung around just long enough to hear that the redcoats were coming with that traitor Benedict Arnold, and might burn the town like they had just done to Richmond. but we were too hot and sweaty to stick around for the fire. (Mom and Dad stayed and they said that the town escaped un-charred)

the afternoon was a leisurely day of coaster-riding at Busch Gardens. since there was a threat of rain, the park was not very full and the lines were very short, so we were able to ride all the big rides in about three hours. we didn't take many pictures since most of our time was spent on roller coasters, but i did stop to take advantage of the carousel photo-op. (and i just feel the need to clarify that it was a tiny little horse which is why i look like a freaking giant!)

at the end of the day i realized that there was only one full day of vacation left with the whole fam. and then i promptly stopped thinking about it because it was just too sad.

Day Four: Just Beachy.

2011-08-10T08:01:00.000-04:00

because Tuesday wasn't a weekend and it wasn't supposed to rain, we headed to the beach for the day!

we dug in the sand, and let the tide bury our feet.

we took advantage of the nice breeze and gave our honeymoon kite another go-round.

Claire Marie held the handle with two hands. and Daddy held onto the string. just in case.

we jumped waves and boogie-boarded the day away. there was no time for just lounging and reading a book, because we were way too busy having a great time playing together.

there were a lot of jellyfish (not the stinging kind) and fish and crabs in the ocean that day, and Claire decided that there were just "too many creatures in this ocean" for her to enjoy any more time in the water.

but Nick, on the other hand, couldnt get enough of the water and the waves and was just bummed that he wasnt allowed to get down and swim on his own.

despite the fact that we slathered and reapplied several times throughout the day, i think we all ended up getting burnt. some worse than others. i think the Goob got it the worst; he didn't want to move very much for the rest of the week. me and the hubs did alright, he had some peeling on his shoulders and i ended up with a lovely chunk right at my hairline that makes me look all dandruffy and my shoulders just started peeling a little yesterday, but mostly i think i just wound up with a pretty nice tan!

note to self:

try a higher SPF. spend more time with the fam. preferably at the beach.

Day Three: a great day for the water park.

2011-08-09T12:04:00.000-04:00

ten whole years after the first Williamsburg vacation that went so horribly wrong, we found ourselves right back ~~at the scene of the crime~~ there. and not surprisingly, not a whole lot about the place had changed. i guess that's kind of the whole point, after all. but we as a family definately have. most notably this kid, who is easily 3 times as big as he was on the last trip.

speaking of things that were different, there was actually shade this time... and cold drinks and ice cream...

...and tours of air-conditioned buildings that didn't require waiting hours in the blazing sun...

... and interesting shops other than the blacksmith's that were actually open...

... and we had a great time!

although i think if i actually lived back in Colonial times, i would advise the army to actually use their lightsaber technology (as captured in this rare photo) because i kind of think that it would greatly speed up the whole war process. or at least make it more fun to learn about in 9th grade social studies class...

after a whole morning in the hot hot sun, we decided (just like we did 10 years ago) that it was indeed a great day for the water park, so (unlike 10 years ago) that's where we spent our evening. but since my camera is not water-proof, i have no pictures of that. but real quick before you stop reading due to lack of pictures: there's this one slide, where you start out standing up, and then they DROP THE FLOOR RIGHT OUT FROM UNDER YOU and i totally rode it. awesome.

Day Two: Lazy Sunday.

2011-08-08T12:19:00.000-04:00

after a morning kerfuffle over a bit of bacon, a few red lights, and some less-than-stellar directions on the way to church, we were more than ready to pack a lunch and spend the afternoon doing nothing and being lazy at the park where we ran the 5K the day before.

while we were happy to eat our lunch and play with bubbles, Dad and the brothers-in-law wandered off to see what all there was to actually do at the park.

they came back with a plan: boats! a jon-boat, (not to be confused with a dinghy because for some reason they are apparently different) a paddleboat, and a two-person kayak were just right to keep us all entertained and gave us plenty of chances to try out all the different options.

although some of us were skeptical at first, once we were on the water it was obvious that this was a great plan.

there was plenty of wildlife to see, including dragonflies and turtles and this little frog-guy who jumped right out of the lake and onto Dad's arm, beginning a trend of us seeing at least one frog every day for the rest of the week.

we spent the whole afternoon just paddling lazily around the little lake. it was fun, and relaxing, and mostly cloudy so we didnt have to worry (too much) about overheating or sunburn.

also, we need to start looking more seriously into getting ourselves some kayaks and finding a place to use them, because i had almost forgotten how much i like being on a lake in a kayak.

near the end of the afternoon, there may or may not have been a mini naval battle, with the jon-boat attempting to forcefully enlist the "athletic couple" in the kayak (hey thats us!) to pull their lazy butts back to dock.

however, due to a miscalculation on their part, they ended up towing us instead!

it was a great day to be together. and don't we all just look so very good in our life vests? i might just have to start wearing one all the time. think anyone else would join in on the trend?

the only downfall of the day was that the hubs had a minor run in with chiggers. i didnt bother to take any pictures of the tiny creepy little bugs that were all over his feet and ankles, because um, ew gross! but have no fear they were spotted quickly and swiftly eradicated with a combination of a towel, some hand sanitizer, a can of Raid (for his shoes), some hydrogen peroxide, and a good scrub in the shower. in fact, if i hadnt just mentioned them right now, they would probably be one of those long-forgotten vacation memories because they were just that much of a non-event in the grand scheme of a great vacation.

Day One: Vaca 5K.

2011-08-07T18:35:00.000-04:00

i know. i know. i should have been blogging every day of vacation this past week like my Mom did so as not to have to bore you all with things that happened a week ago. (or more, depending on how good of a recapper i actually end up being) but i was having too much fun actually enjoying vacation to take any time at all for blogging. sorry about that. so just sit back, relax, and enjoy as i extend my vacation (at least mentally) for as long as possible.

note: since Friday was a travel day and all we really did was show up, eat dinner, and chill at the pool, i'm not counting it as a full day.

we woke up bright and early Saturday morning to run the First Ever Family Vaca 5K Fun Run/Walk. the hubs ran with me to keep me motivated, which is a good thing, otherwise i would probably have quit at least three times. the route ended up being just a little longer than an official 5K (3.6 miles according to my sisters GPS) but we were all able to finish!!! Mark and I crossed the finish line at just over 44 mins, with the rest of the fam not far behind. everyone was finished in under an hour. and everyone came in first in their division!

ps how great are those shirts?!?

it was a really good thing that we decided to do the 5K first thing, because it gave us all a great sense of accomplishment and allowed us to fully enjoy the rest of the week without having anything big like a 3+ mile run looming over our heads the whole time.

we spent the rest of the (very hot and humid!) day checking out a local farmers market, which came complete with a bluegrass band!

and in the evening we headed over to Busch Gardens for a few late-night rides and to watch their evening fireworks display.

and to think all that was just the first day...