Merry Christmas!

I hope that this post finds all of you in high Holiday spirits and ready for Christmas! Here in the frozen tundra we call Minnesota, we're pretty much ready. The tree is up, lit and decorated, packages wrapped (though they do lack ribbons and bows at this point: more on that later), and we've shipped anything that needed shipping. I finished our cards early this morning and Rich mailed them for me a little bit ago, so...gosh I think we've got this holiday thing pretty well in hand!

The aforementioned tree went up a couple of weeks ago with nearly all of the breakables nearest the top, and the non-breakables at the bottom, where I was reasonably sure they would become kitty toys. I was praying that neither kitten would climb the tree, but as they are both a couple of little monkeys, I wasn't holding my breath. The first week went really well and they both seemed content with batting at the lower branches and ornaments: I was even bold enough to announce that they were leaving it alone... Well, you know that old saying about "speaking too soon"? Yeah. You guessed it; no sooner had I said it than one of them had to make a liar out of me. Last Saturday I caught Lois mid-way up the tree, broken ornament on the floor and a look of terror on her face as I came tearing out of the kitchen. I'm not sure if the commotion was enough to deter her from ever doing it again, but at this point they've both been content to admire it from the floor though they persist in walking about amidst the packages underneath and given their mutual love of ribbons we've left off all of the usual ribbon and bows until a little closer to the date. I'm pretty sure they would shred anything we put on them so, for now, they look a little bare. I did remember to put tags on everything this year however!

Josh is now enjoying his Christmas break from school, and trying to pick up a few more hours at Pancheros at the same time. He's managed to earn and save a fair chunk of money for his trip to DC next month but every little bit helps. He leaves on January 18th and returns on the 21st, so the trip is coming up fast. Despite the outcome of the election, I think he's still looking forward to the trip. I told him to keep his political opinions to himself while he was there lest he come home in a body bag for -God forbid- voicing his opinion. It's bound to be a momentus occasion regardless, and I know that he'll enjoy seeing the sights of the Capital.

I will be off work beginning the afternoon of the 23rd and won't be going back until the 5th of January. Ahhh, bliss! Almost 2 full weeks of rest and relaxation. I can't hardly wait. Josh has his license now too, so I won't necessarily be required to shuttle him about unless I need my car for something of my own. Mom will be here Tuesday night to spend the holiday with us, so we're all looking forward to that. I see a stack of jigsaw puzzles with Mom on the horizon! Rich will be working much of the time I am off which is a bummer, but he didn't stockpile his vacation like I did. I tend to do that every year just because I love having the Christmas / New Year time period off. Rich prefers to take days here and there throughout the year I think.

On a final note, before I post this and get my sorry arse moving...

Many of you will note that my cards this year are missing a couple of elements. Namely a photo and letter. I admit it seemed odd sending the cards off without them, but since I try to keep things updated here pertaining to what we are doing, putting it all in a letter again seemed redundant. I realize that not everyone has access to this blog, so I tried to write a little in the cards for those folks. You know... like in the olden days?!?! As for a photo- getting one of Rich, Josh and I (without Dan) seemed a little sad, but pinning our eldest down for a photo was impossible, so... the photo above of Josh, Lois and Lana seemed like a fair substitute. At least it's recent!

With that said, We wish all of you a Very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Blessings to everyone!

Christmas Lights

Or lack thereof...

Well, it doesn't look like we're going to get our lights up this year. Not sure what happened there other than a general sort of lazy... However, a friend of mine sent me this nifty video that puts anything we might come up with to shame. Enjoy! If the link below doesn't work, just copy and paste it into your browser. I'll see if I can find another spot within the blog to post it as well.

http://www.break.com/index/amazing-christmas-light-display1.html

Happy, Happy, Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, we've done about all the gobble-gobbling we can do for one day. Well, all of us except Josh, who is of course a bottomless pit. I don't plan on eating tomorrow at all.

We hope that all of you had a very enjoyable Thanksgiving. We had the pleasure of entertaining Brenda, Greg, and our other kid... Dan. Remember him? We haven't seen his face in a while so it was nice to get a refresher. As an added treat, we had the chance to talk to my brother Bruce too. Anyway, Greg helped to remind me that my blogging skills are getting rusty because I still had Bruce and Beckie's old website listed in our links for favorite places. I have now fixed that little error, and you can now zip on over to their space on the Southern coast of NC.

Tomorrow is, of course, the biggest shopping day of the year, and if all goes well, I'll be firmly ensconced on my sofa with a cup of joe about the time the rest of the world is fighting the mobs of idiots who think it's necessary to shop at 5 am. Honestly- there just isn't a deal good enough to drag me out of bed on my day off at that ridiculous hour. Besides, there's that online thing that doesn't require that I leave home at all to shop!

Well the clock is inching toward my bedtime, so I'm going to quit here and see if I can chase a few sugarplums... toodles!

The First Snap of Winter

Well shucks, I guess we had to get it sometime, but I have to say it was nice to have Fall lingering about for so long. Last week we woke up to our first real snow of the year which of course made the morning commute a challenge because nobody can remember from one year to the next how to drive when the roads are "Winter wet" as opposed to "Summer rain wet" though in this particular instance there was no real difference. In any case, the bare inch of snow we had was melted before noon when the temperature creeped its way toward 40 again. Now we appear to be in that state of limbo where there's enough wind to require a jacket and we get rain practically every day. We’re also enjoying the semi-annual clock change so the chance of seeing daylight is almost nil except for an hour at lunch and the 30 minutes between arriving home and fixing dinner.

On the up-side - lest you think I've nothing uplifting to report, Thanksgiving is coming up soon and with it a couple of days of vacation/holiday time. Nothing wrong with that picture!

Josh is doing pretty well in all his classes, and has now started 2nd quarter. His counselor went over his schedule for 3rd and 4th quarters and managed to get his Algebra 2 class moved to his Senior year which lightens his load a bit. In place of the Algebra class he how has one quarter of Drawing II and possibly an advanced drawing class in 4th quarter.

The kittens, Lois and Lana, are both growing and doing well. They're wonderfully snuggly and fun to have around though we've given up letting them sleep with us at night because sleeping is rarely their priority after 9:00 pm. Clearly they get ample rest during the day when we are all gone.

Other than that, there's not a lot new going on. We're starting to look toward the holidays and our plans there. Work and school are going as well as we can expect - better for some of us than others- but as we're all employed we're not complaining. Hope all is well with all of you!

Take Care everyone!

The Windy City

Okay so we don't get out much, as most of you are well aware, but we did make a trek to Chicago at the end of August just before school started up again. Not sure if I mentioned that previously or not, but if I did consider this the follow up. Duane and Giselle, our hosts for the weekend were wonderfully accomodating and it was nice to see a little of Chicago again too. We spent most of Saturday wandering around Millenium park which is probably the coolest inner-city park we've ever seen. Chicago is wonderfully "artsy" so seeing sculptures and statues, fountains and floral gardens all jumbled together with cafes isn't the least bit unusual. Sadly, I forgot our camera back at the house so the only photos I have of this part of the trip are on my cell phone.

Sunday we shopped and wandered around home improvement stores. Duane and Giselle are remodeling an old house so we tossed in our opinions on various countertops, appliances and cabinet styles. I'll be curious to see what they end up choosing, but that's for another trip! Monday we threw ourselves at the Museum of Science and Industry in a 3 hour whirlwind tour just before we loaded our stuff in the car and headed for home. The MSI was high on my list of stuff to do while we were there, and I have to say it was worth it. Hopefully we can go again another time but we did manage to hit most of the high spots. One of the exhibits is an actual German U Boat that the US captured in WWII. It was towed back to the US via rivers and lakes, and finally "planted" underground at the museum. We skipped the inside tour more due to time than anything, but it was still fascinating. I highly recommend it if you're in Chicago anytime. I doubt the sub will be going anywhere soon! Other than the sub, there's a full size airplane and locomotive that you can walk through and an interactive model train display that, all by itself, is a delight to see. In short, it's a great museum, full of stuff for all ages.

Travel going forward will probably be pretty limited given the economy and price of gas, though the latter seems to be dipping of late. No complaints there! Josh will be flying off to Washington DC on a school trip in January for the Presidential Inauguration and a REALLY fast tour of the capital. He's been fundraising all summer for it and most of his paycheck is feeding the kitty for the trip. I have to give the kid credit - he's working hard to pay his way.

Well, I'd better hit the post button and get going on the dishes. Funny how they pile up when you're not looking...

The Pitter Patter of Little Feet

Welcome Lois & Lana! After 4 whole months, we collectively caved in and adopted two 10- 1/2 week old kittens. They are quite possibly, the friskiest pair of kittens we've ever had, so we're all (dog included) getting used to having two little fur balls flying around the house at mach speed. Buster is actually accepting them pretty well, and aside from a little initial hissing the girls are getting more comfortable with him. I'm doing my best to make sure Buster doesn't feel left out but he seems like he's perfectly fine with having them around. I think he's still waiting to see when he gets the green light to actually PLAY with them!

The names are courtesy of Rich. He and Josh watch a LOT of Smallville which, for those of you who don't know, is a weekly series about Superman before he became Superman. Lois, as in Lois Lane, finally made an appearance in Season 4. Lana, was Clark's "first love" apparently, according to the writers of this particular series. I was more or less booted out of the naming process this go around, but since they didn't come up with anything I couldn't live with, I'm going along with their choices. Besides, they fit somehow.

So far, the most often asked question seems to be "How do you tell them apart?". Well... Lana is the smaller of the two, her fur is silkier and pure black. Lois is fuzzier looking and she has very faint tabby stripes that make her look slightly less black. Personality-wise, Lois is a little more cuddly right off the bat and a little more timid. Lana is more daring and has already decided Buster is nothing she can't handle. We'll see what they have in store for us!

Change is good...right?

Well, here we are mid-way through September already. Josh is well entrenched in the whole school routine and we're all enjoying these last fleeting days of summer. Fall peeked around the corner last week and I gave thought to putting the summer clothes away and pulling out the down comforter. (sigh) This week we're back to 80s again. Maybe I'll just hold off a bit on that comforter...
For those who have not heard yet, last week we took the plunge and dropped our land line here at home. It still seems odd not to have a home phone and while I do spend a fair bit of time on my cell phone (yes, I admit it!), having it on me at all times is an adjustment. Anyway, if you don't already have our individual cell phone numbers, send me an email and I'll give them to you.

Freshly Sharpened Pencils

Well, we've dented the pocket book once again with the annual school shopping expedition and Josh is now ready to roll into another year of school. His schedule came in the mail today (See the torturous schedule below), and while he seems to be taking it all in stried, I am trying to control my shudders. Here's his lineup for the year unless something get's juggled around. Brace yourself. It's not pretty.
Quarter 1:
P1: Gym
P2: Honors Band
P3: AP Language & Composition (aka AP English)
P4: Honors Chemistry 1

Quarter 2:
P1: AP European History
P2: Honors Band
P3: AP Language & Composition (aka AP English)
P4: Honors Chemistry 1

Quarter 3 & 4
P1: Algebra 2
P2: Honors Band
P3: Statistics & Probability
P4: AP European History

In addition to this, Josh is hoping to continue working at Panchero's on Friday nights and weekends so he can save for his trip to DC in January and a car. Apparently any social life he is planning on having will have to occur between shifts at Panchero's. I feel sorry for the kid, but he (at this point anyway) assures me that it will all be fine. Me, I'd be crying in the counselor's office.

Dan seems to be happily settled into his new digs and pops his head in periodically to appease his mother who misses him like crazy. Delilah, his cat, has apparently established herself as the "cat with attitude" in their house and has repeatedly been seen slapping cousin Bryon's cat upside the head. She's no sissy, that's for sure.

Rich and I are plugging along doing our thing. I'm plotting out our Christmas cards, and stamping whenever I get a chance. Work is going well, and things are picking up so I am a little busier these days. Rich is in the process of interviewing for a new position within GE but it's early days yet so we'll have to let you know of his progress there.

Hope everything is going well for all of you!

Till next time...

Empty Nest...

Josh took off for the Boundary Waters last Sunday morning, and left Rich and I to our own devices for a week. Not that there's anything wrong with this, but it is now Friday night, he's supposed to be home in another half an hour or so, and I am not the least bit ashamed to admit I can't wait to see him. It's probably a really good thing that it will be another few years before Josh moves out because at this point in time I think the whole "empty nest" thing is the pitts!

Summer is quickly winding its way toward a new school year (yes, I hear both the groans and the cheers when I say that), but like it or not we'll be shopping for pencils and notebooks again before we know it. I'm sure Josh is thrilled about that idea! Of course, he's probably just as annoyed as I am that there are Thanksgiving decorations coming out in the stores already. I mean really! Is that absolutely necessary?!

Well, I'm off to get the kid. Hooray!

Our Own Extreme Home Makeover

May turned out to be home-improvement month with the departure of Dan from our midst early in the month, and an anxious 16 year old waiting in the wings for his new bedroom makeover. I can now say I have had my fill of repairing drywall, taping, priming, painting and re-carpeting for a little while. Thank heaven for Josh and his help with his portion of the transformation process, because by the time we finished his room I was completely shot. I was duly rewarded with a nasty cold/flu virus that laid me out flat for 3 days. There's no justice...

Our projects started with the transformation- and yes, it IS quite the transformation - of the guest room. Formerly known as Dan's room. This is where I re-learned the joys of reparing drywall as my darling son had managed to put not one, but two, substantial holes in the wall during his time there. Don't you just love boys? Anyway, I devoted all of Mother's Day weekend to repairing the damage, taping, priming and painting. The result, I will proudly say, was worth the effort, and we now have a place for overnight guests to stay! See photo. Dan was a little surprised when he saw it, but he did admit that he thought it looked nice. Anyway, for those of you who have been making up excuses not to come HERE to visit, I'm not listening......

On to Josh's room and the demolition of Memorial Day weekend:

Our youngest, bless his heart, has been steadily outgrowing the furniture we bought back when we moved into this house. While the bright red bunkbed and matching red-white and-blue dresser set was great for two small boys, Mr. long legs has rapidly outgrown them both in height and years. To correct this, we decided to make his room a little more adult looking with the addition of new carpet, new furniture, and we finally ditched the chair rail that divided his walls in half horizontally. He liked the colors that I picked for the guest room so to save a few pennies I mixed the two colors I used there together (two shades of a soft country yellow-gold). We pulled the carpet that the cat managed to shred and replaced that too. We did the installation ourselves, and I can say with certainty we won't do that again. All Hail to Carpet Installers Everywhere!!! What a hideous job. Anyway... three coats of primer later to cover the navy blue that some idiot thought would be a good idea for the bottom half of the wall (me), I was ready to paint.

This is the point at which Josh dived into the project to help. I think he was getting a little antsy about having to sleep in the "girly" guest room. Tired mom? Too bad.. let's keep going and get this done. Ah, the energy of youth... Anyway, to bring you up to date, I started the priming on Saturday morning. Early. This took all of Saturday to accomplish and part of Sunday. Two coats of paint hit the walls on Sunday, and somewhere around 11:00 pm I finally gave up and went, aching, to bed. Rich incidentally is, at this point, sick as a dog so I'm trying to accomplish all of this as quietly as possible so he can rest. Monday morning, Josh was raring to go and happily pulled staples from the old carpet pad, and hammered nails to even out the floor. By Noon we had the floor prepped and ready for the new pad. I begged a reprieve for lunch before I fell over. By 1:30 we were laying down new pad -a really noisy project I might add - and by dinner time we were done. Now by this time, everything aches and I am ready to quit and pick it up tomorrow. No such luck. "Let's do the carpet tonight Mom!" " Oh gee son, can we???" After a quick trip to Home Depot to rent a carpet kicker and another break to eat, we hauled the carpet in and started that project. Rich, who isn't getting any sleep anyway, and who was feeling marginally human, helped with this task. Good thing too. I understand how the carpet kicker is supposed to work, but I don't have the necessary OOMPH to make it a success. Unfortunately, we were a little too successful, because by 8:30 we were ready to re-install the baseboard, and "since we were on a roll" someone decided he wanted to sleep in his new bed too. I think I crawled into bed (literally!) around 11:00, and oh joy, crawled out again at 4:30am.

The rest of Josh's furniture was assembled in good time, though not by me. By Wednesday, I was battling whatever bug Rich had and spent the rest of the week in and out of bed. Now I ask you, what sort of reward is that?!?!? I guess the reward is in how nice Josh's room looks now. No photo at this point but I'll see if I can get one soon. For now, I'm going to grab my cup of rapidly cooling coffee and see if I can find a sunny spot on my deck to enjoy it.

One Chick out of the Nest

Well, folks, we now have one less chick in the nest. Dan moved out at the beginning of May into a house in Bloomington with his cousins. He took the snotty cat with him, so Buster is in doggie "I now have everyone's full attention" heaven. So far, from what we have been told, things are going well, and he seems to like both the proximity to work and the independence our little "shove" has given him. I admit it; I am guilty of giving him more than one nudge toward the door, but only because I love him. Sometimes you have to help them grow up so that they appreciate where they came from. In any case, he calls fairly frequently and visits from time to time, (without the expectation of dinner!) so I think he's made the transition fairly well. We'll see how long it takes him to invite us down there for dinner...

Guess who's 48???

Rich celebrated another birthday on Thursday and we did what we could to help him have a good one. We went out with some friends last night to a place in Maple Grove called Dave & Buster's. It's essentially a Chuck E Cheese for adults and for those of you, who through the joy of procreation, have "enjoyed" the limp pizza and warm soda delights of Chuck E Cheese on more than one occasion, this is a welcome change. Half the place is a fairly classy restaurant and the other half is an arcade minus all the little kiddie games and rides. They even serve "adult" beverages and have an under 18 must be accompanied by an adult rule. So... the number of screaming children running around is minimal! yay! Perfect for crabby old women like me.

Josh is next up on the birthday parade. He turns 16 in May and Dan will be 21 (gasp!) in June. Somebody else has a birthday in August but I think we're skipping that one this year. ha!

Something other than the weather...

Okay, so I posted my weather lament already, so now I'll move onto what most of you might consider "news".
First off, the kids are both doing well. Josh just finished his 3rd quarter of 10th grade, and promises us he passed everything. As I have not yet seen a report card, I cannot comment. I do know that he is really glad to have his AP History class out of the way even though he really likes that stuff. At any rate, he's rapidly finishing up another year.

Dan is getting ready to move at the end of the month here (we think?) The exact date tends to vary depending on who you ask, but in any case he's started packing up his stuff. I think he's a little surprised at how much he's accumulated over the years! The good news is, we uncovered his carpet! The bad news: It's just as ugly as it ever was! Delilah, our cat, will be making the move with Dan which means we will be catless for the first time in 23 years! We'll see how long that lasts. The cat-lover in me predicts it won't be too terribly long before we have another furball to fill in the gap.

Rich and I really don't have a lot of new info to report. We're both pretty busy at work, but that's nothing new. If we ever get warmer weather I have a couple painting projects to tackle, and we'll probably replace some carpet this year. Oh, and that fence I keep hoping for to keep Buster from wandering about the neighborhood.

Well, it's been a REALLY busy week, and I'm pretty well worn out, so I'm going to fold for now and come back later when my othewise brilliant wit isn't quite so dull...
Take care everybody!

We're skipping Spring this year...

Honestly, can you believe this weather? Spring, as I recall, is supposed to have started by now, and instead all we seem to be doing is wobbling back and forth between Winter and, well... more Winter. Sigh... I hope those two days in the high 50s and low 60s we had last week aren't all we're going to get this year. For those of you who are basking in sunshine, soaking your toes in the ocean, or generally walking around barefoot... well, you just hush. We're not listening. Deep down, we know you are all green with envy that we are enjoying such a lovely Minnesota Spring and you are missing out.

No news is good news...

Just a little update to a previous post. I've not heard anything from the previous employer and don't expect I will at this point. Drat. I pretty much had my response all worked out too... : )

Phoenix for the Weekend

Hello again! We just returned from our too short vacation to Arizona, where it was a balmy 72 degrees, sunny and generally speaking, a nice break from the frozen tundra and sub-zero temperatures.

We had a nice visit with Rob and Gloria, puttered around a flea market looking for treasures we couldn't live without and took a quick tour of Luke Air Force Base. For me, the most exciting part of the trip (relative reunions excluded of course) was our jaunt out to see the Grand Canyon. If you've never been there, it really is amazing. I snapped as many photos as I could while we were there but, as is often true of photos, they hardly capture the grandure of the place or the beauty. Anyway, I've included a couple here. For those who might be planning on going there, plan for a FULL day. Our visit was only about 3 or 4 hours because we had a 4 hour drive to get there and back from were we were staying. Also, we went in at the South entrance at the South Rim, so we only saw two of the lookout points. There are about 7 others if you begin at the East entrance of the South Rim. Weather is generally cooler there this time of year too. It was 54 the day we went but sunny and gorgeous so despite the snow on the ground we went wearing light jackets or sweatshirts. That in itself was a treat! Anyway, we missed a lot because of our abbreviated trip, but it was still awesome to see.

Oh, the irony...

So, last week I had a phone call from a friend at my old job. Actually, I had SEVERAL calls from people I used to work with. The topic: My boss who quit. QUIT, after 6 1/2 months on the job, and just 3 days prior to the annual sales meeting. How's that for a twist? The most popular question seems to be "Would you consider going back?" It's an interesting question, I'll grant you. I'll be interested to see if the next call I get is from someone who thinks the answer might be "yes." Stay tuned....

Oh, my God, he'll be driving soon!

Joshua started Driver's Ed last week and through the wonders of youthful exhuberance for a topic of great interest, Rich and I are now "complete failures" as drivers, and "Really need to pay closer attention to what we are doing behind the wheel.". Whose brat is this anyway? So, here's the recap of day 2 Drivers Ed.: I picked Josh up at school because his class ends at 5:00 so there's no bus. Considering our temperatures were hovering in the single digits or lower last week, I thought this was pretty darn nice of me... Anyway, once he got in the car, he informs me that he's not going to talk to me the rest of the way home. Hmmm. This is odd. This kid NEVER keeps silent for that long. I figured he'd never last. So we pull into the driveway, and I stop so he can get out of the car but instead of opening the door, he turns to me and informs me that "I failed". "Failed what?" I ask. "The test", he says, and proceeds to tell me everything I neglected to do on the drive home. "Get Out! I said. Who made you the expert driver all of a sudden?".. " No really mom, we just reviewed this stuff in class today, and you failed." " No", I said, "Get out of my car!" Honestly. Of all the nerve.

I have to admit though... I am paying closer attention to what I am doing. It's clearly all part of an evil plan... We'll see who he tries to shmooze out of the car keys when he needs to take the test...

Piano Man

So, we bought an electronic keyboard just after Christmas. I have to interject here that this was actually Rich's idea because he had decided that maybe we should be doing something a little more diverse with our time than sitting in front of the boob tube. He thought it would be fun to learn a musical instrument and suggested a keyboard. So... we pooled a couple gift cards and bought one. So far, neither of us is Liberace, and probably won't be anytime soon, but it's fun to play around with and I, at least, am finding that I haven't forgotten all those piano lessons entirely! For now we're both starting back at the beginning with single-hand songs and a rudimentary review of how to read music. I think the refrain to insert here is, "practice, practice, practice..."

Happy New Year!

Yes, I know I said I was going to be better about updating this... Stuff happens people... stuff happens.

Any Whoo...
We had a wonderful Christmas. As earlier reported, Mom was here with us and we had a very nice visit with her. Our weather was a little dicey but we just huddled up indoors and amused ourselves with movies, crosswords and YES!!!! jigsaw puzzles. I can now say I've had my fill of jigsaw puzzles for a little while. Especially after we assembled a new on one Christmas Day only to have a piece missing. How frustrating is that?!?!?

Thanks to everyone who sent cards and letters and photos. What a treat it is to hear what you're all doing and see what you look like this year! My apologies to anyone who was hit with a "postage due" on our card. Honestly, I did try to make them as flat as possible. Darn it, I guess I have to skip the ribbon next year.

After this week, we will all be back to work full time. Rich took some vacation time over Christmas as did Dan. Josh was off school for two weeks and of course, relished every minute. I, being the new kid on the block at work, had to work a couple odd days between holidays which made nearly every day I was there seem like Monday. It's nice to know that tomorrow when I go back, it really will be Monday! Funny how getting back to a five day week can seem like a blessing sometimes!

Well, I really need to get dressed and hop on those resolutions I made... As it's 10:00 am and already 36 degrees outside,(pretty nice for January in Minnesota) I am thinking I will take the chubby dog out for a walk. That ought to take care of one of those resolutions, or at least whittle away at it.

More later. I still have to tell you about the electronic keyboard we bought to amuse ourselves, and Rich's suggestion that we get one in the first place! Yes, there's a story there... Stay tuned.