Revelations

You ever have a moment or event in your life that clearly delineates a "before" and "after"? My earliest of those moments that I can remember is when I spent the summer with my brother when I was 16. Before I went, I was painfully shy, backward, and the very opposite of self-sufficient. Then I went to stay for the summer away from my parents with my brother. I learned to do my own laundry, I had my first serious boyfriend; it was a summer of change. I came home not a grown up for sure, but on my way to being a young woman.

I've had other such moments in my life: getting married, becoming a mom, the three years in Vermont. This past Tuesday was another such day. It was another before and after event. If you think I'm being dramatic, even Bailey, my dog, has noticed a change. Hannah, my other dog, is too oblivious, lol. What the hell is my point? This week has truly been a week full of craptasticness. Crappy, craptastic, crap. And to top it off, there was a pretty big shake up with one of my clients. Everything is different and not in a good way. Actually, there were two craptastic revelations that occured on Tuesday. It will be forever in my mind The Day of Craptasticness.

I wish I could go back to Monday and try to live Tuesday differently. I wish e-mail and cell phones didn't exist. That's really saying something coming from me, lol. If I could really have any wish at all, it would be to go back to 2003 and avoid Vermont altogether. Why did those three years have to be so freaking pivotal? My sister's husband went to culinary school in Vermont a while back. He had such a terrible time there that he still believes Vermont is evil and they wouldn't come and visit us while we were there. Aside from the good friends I made while we were living there, I believe Vermont is evil too. And considering what happened on Tuesday, I would give those friends up, as much as I love them, to have not ever had to live there.

I'm sure things with my work will work themselves out. I'm in need of more clients should you know of anyone that could make use of my talents. I feel terrible for the other people that were involved in this work shakeup more than I feel for myself though. My pay doesn't support my family but rather it cushions it a bit I guess. I can afford to lose a client and wait for another to come along.

As for the other thing that happened on Tuesday, it's not going to kill me and I'm not dying so I guess I'll survive it too. Don't ask cuz I'm not telling. Anyone. At all. Oh. And I have no plans on killing anyone else either. ;) Sometimes life sucks and that's the price to pay for being. More often than not, it doesn't though, right?

It’s a Blustery Day in the Neighborhood

Nobody in my household got very much sleep last night. The wind is blowing so hard that the house is creaking loudly. The Mister and I have been up off and on since 4 this morning. The funny/bad thing about it is that today is trash day. The girls put out our trash and recycling last night before it started raining. We got up this morning and all THREE paper grocery bags of recycling are GONE! I feel really bad that all that stuff is blowing around the neighborhood but we had no idea the weather was supposed to get so bad. Cleanup is going to be a bitch.

The wind also blew over our grill and our patio chairs. The grill is way to heavy for me to lift by myself and the Mister is at work so I’m hoping the propane tank is ok. Ugh!

In other news…

We have worked out a semi-solid moving plan.

• 3/8 – The movers come to pack the house.
• 3/9 – The movers come and load the truck.
• 3/10 – I have cleaners come to clean the house.
• 3/10-3/11 – We do any repairs and/or painting that needs to be done.
• 3/10-3/11 – We have carpet cleaners come.
• 3/12 – We hit the road. Our first overnight will be in Atlanta.
• 3/13 – We drive to Pensacola, Fl for a bit of sight seeing then onward to stay overnight in Gulfport, MS.
• 3/14 – We drive from Gulfport to San Antonio to visit with Dana and her family.
• 3/15 – Visiting in San Antonio.
• 3/16 – Drive from San Antonio to El Paso, TX for the night.
• 3/17 – Drive to Tucson, AZ to visit with another friend of ours.
• 3/18 – Arrive in San Diego.

Of course, this is just a preliminary plan and I’m sure things will change, but this is my ideal idea. ;) This means that we have to have everything completely ready to go by March 7th. That means that including today, we have 58 days to get ready for the movers. Big UGH!! But really exciting at the same time.

We’ve started looking at houses for rent out west. Base housing isn’t off the table and is probably where we’ll end up, but we’re still looking. While reading listings, it occurred to me that people are pretty stupid. I can understand why people don’t want pets in their rental properties. However, some people’s reasoning isn’t reasonable at all. One listing said cats ok and small dogs will be considered. In my experience as a pet owner, small dogs do just as much damage if not more than large dogs when it comes to chewing and not being house broken. To say that this is the domain of large dogs is preposterous at best. As for cats, cat pee is way worse than dog pee and cats scratch walls and carpet and stuff. Chances are because we have two 55 pound dogs, we’re not going to have much of a choice but to move into base housing. Why? Because most people are uninformed twits.

Two Left Feet

We had a rather eventful long weekend.

Saturday, it was very spring-like here. Temps got into the 70’s which was a really nice change from the freezing temperatures we had been experiencing for a few weeks. We decided to turn off the heat and open the windows for the day. The Mister and I also tackled the task of cleaning out the garage. We had a ton of boxes that were broken down and needed to be recycled and a few packing boxes that were filled with packing paper that also needed to be recycled. Something that we had been putting off for a year and a half took only a couple hours to do and two trip to the recycling center. :/ Now the garage is 90% finished with only needing a little bit of organizing and a few totes of old toys going to charity.

We also got the girls’ hair cut on Saturday. Their hair was long enough, and they got it cut short enough, that they are both able to make a donation to Locks of Love. They are so very excited about being able to do this. And they got really cute haircuts.

Sunday evening, the girls were outside playing and the Mister and I were up in the office. Next thing I know, I hear loud crying and wailing through the open window and then I see the youngest running into the house. She comes upstairs and says, “You need to hurry!! My sister is on the ground!” She’s so funny. So we go outside and the oldest is all hunched over on the side of the street crying. Once I manage to get her to straighten out, I see she’s scraped and bleeding but at first glance, it doesn’t look that bad. So I tell her to get a grip and come inside so I can clean her up. I’m such a sympathetic mother, huh? After getting a good look at her, the child is scraped literally from head to toe. I’m all like, “What in the world were you doing??” I guess she had been walking along when one of the kids kicked a ball to her and she didn’t notice and tripped over it. I dunno. But her face is scraped in a couple places, both her palms, her elbows, her knees look like someone took a cheese grater to them, the tops of her feet, and we’re pretty sure she broke one of her toes. FROM TRIPPING OVER A BALL!! She honestly looks like she’s been in a car accident. Sometimes I just don’t know about her.

Yesterday was pretty quiet. The Mister and the girls had the day off due to MLK Jr Day. I, however, had to work. I had to get up early for a phone call with a potential new client. I’m pretty sure he’s going to hire me too. Then, I had work for my other two clients. It sucked being the only one that had to work.

Remember how I said we turned off the heat the other day? Well, it’s not Spring yet and we forgot to turn the heat back on. I woke up to a freezing cold house this morning. BRRRRR!!! Now I have to take the oldest to school. The Mister is still in bed snoozing because he has today off of work too. That’s right. He worked until noon on Friday and had Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday off of work for MLK Jr Day. Doesn’t he suck?

Moving Progress

I was recently called out for not updating my blog regularly. Yeah well. I have very little of interest to say. So :P

We found out yesterday that the Mister will be checking out of his current command 15 days earlier than we thought. Our move date has moved up. Again. He checks out on March 10th now, not March 15th. In actuality, we have 26 days from March 10th until he has to check into his new command out in San Diego. We won’t be leaving NC exactly on the 10th because we’ll have movers and then the cleaning of this house.

::Side note::

I had to stop typing to take the oldest to school. On the way there, I got behind a school bus. After picking up a bunch of kids at a stop, it took off down the road going 45 in a 35 and in a school zone. What’s up with that?!?!

Anyway, essentially, we have 1 month and 27 days or so before we move. Yikes! I have so much to do and with our move date constantly being adjusted closer, I have less and less time to do it in, lol. We’ve opted to have the military pay for movers rather than moving ourselves so that takes a big load off but I still have organizing, cleaning, arranging to have my car shipped (we decided not to drive two cars cross country), getting the dogs to the vet for one last check up, finding somewhere to live in San Diego, taxes, and every day life in the midst of all that.

Did you know…

When you’re making a military move, you have two options. 1.) You can choose to have them pay to have a moving company come in, pack your stuff, and ship it to your destination. You get travel pay for mileage to drive your POV and for food and hotels depending on how many days they estimate it takes to drive to your new duty station. In our case, 8 days times 4 people. They always pay you way more than you need. We also get paid for the weight of our luggage that we have in our car. What that means is that we have to have our car weighed empty, pack it up, then have it weighed full. We get paid for that weight. 2.) You can choose to pack your own stuff and arrange to have it moved to your destination and have the military reimburse you for your expenses. This 2nd option is called a DITY move or Do It Yourself Move, pronounced, ditty. In all of our moves, we have done one DITY move and that was from Ohio to California. I packed up our very meager belongings which were at my dad’s house. We really had nothing. A bed with a plain metal frame, baby stuff (crib, changing table, etc.) a dinette set, sofa, 19 in. TV, a couple dressers and a few other odds and ends. I flew out to California with the girls and our families loaded a moving truck and drove it out to California for us. We reimbursed them with the money we got from the military and had some left over that we pocketed. I’m not sure if they have increased the money you get for doing a DITY move or if it’s just inflation, but nowadays, people get A LOT more than we did in 1999 for doing a DITY move.

A Marine that the Mister works with is moving out to Cali with his wife and some household belongings. They don’t have kids. They are getting $20,000 to move themselves!!! You may be asking yourselves why we don’t take advantage of such a deal. Well, I’m telling you that IMO, the money isn’t worth it. I would rather NOT have to pack up a 4 bedroom  house, all of our furniture and appliances, and the rest of our crap, and move it across the country. I’m not even sure they make a rental truck big enough to fit all of our stuff in. Professional movers come with a semi-truck. Plus, if stuff gets broken, you get reimbursed for the damages whereas if you break your own stuff, you’re out of luck. We moved ourselves across town a year and a half ago and that was such a major PITA that I think the peace of mind is worth $20,000. Maybe I’m just lazy. Yep. Movers are a wonderful thing.

Did you know::

This is how professional movers work:

1. They come in one day to visually assess how much stuff you have and what kind of boxes and moving supplies they will need to pack your crap.
2. On another day shortly thereafter, they come in and pack up your crap. Yes. It only takes them ONE day to pack EVERYTHING.
3. On the next day, they come  in and load your crap up on a truck. It only takes a few hours to load.
4. They make arrangements with you to have your crap delivered; a date and a destination address.
5. At your destination, they arrive on the prearranged date and unload your crap, putting together furniture and placing boxes where you tell them to. They will even unpack your boxes if you tell them to. We don’t because at this point, we just want them gone.
6. That’s it. You unpack your crap and settle in to your new home.

There. Now I’ve updated my blog. :P

Snow in the South Part 2

It didn’t snow. It didn’t get cold enough. It rained. They delayed school for two hours for rain. Sadly, even though MCB Camp Lejeune and MCAS New River had two hour delays this morning, MCAS Cherry Point, the Mister’s base, did not. He wasn’t happy.

I’m not bothering with pictures. Rain is rain.

Have a great weekend!

Snow in the South

As I sit here composing this post, I can’t help the shaking of my head or the feeling of silliness. I’ve had the luck to live in several different parts of the United States and in living in different parts of the U.S., I have experienced several different climates.

Having spent the first 20 years of my life in mid-Ohio, this is what I consider “normal”. I compare everything from neighborhood layouts, architecture, and traditions to how I first experienced them in Ohio. Ohio has very distinctive seasons:  cold winters with bare trees and snow, mild springs with lots of rain, summers that are hot and humid with strong thunderstorms, and mild autumns with changing leaves and cooling temperatures. I would guess that out of all the United States, the midwest has four seasons that you can actually tell when they are happening.

I only lived in Florida for six months, April until September. Spring until very early fall basically and it was a long time ago. All I really remember of it is HOT HOT HOT! Very humid with kickass summer storms and a few hurricanes thrown in to make things interesting. You could practically set your clock by the afternoon thunderstorm that rolled in from 1-2 in the afternoon almost every day.

Then we had California. San Diego county is unique in that you can experience almost every climate in the one county. It’s very temperate along the coast, hot and dry inland and in the deserts, cooler with occasion winter snow in the mountains. They say that you can snow ski and surf all in the same day in San Diego county. We lived inland and the summers were very hot and very dry. Winters were mild. That was it. I loved it though. I remember one time during the Santa Anas that it was so hot that when you walked outside your skin would tingle with it.

Next, we had Vermont. They basically have 2 1/2 seasons:  Winter, Mud Season/Spring/Summer, and Autumn. You had cold winters that started as early as September. Cold barely even describes it. In the dead of winter with wind chills, you could get frostbite by being outside less than fifteen minutes. And because it was so cold, the snow never melted until spring so it just accumulated all winter long. They make such a thing as roof rakes so that you can rake the snow off your roof so that it doesn’t cave in from the weight. It is the bitterest cold I have ever experience in my life. There were times when it was warmer in Alaska than it was in Vermont. No kidding. Vermonters know how to clear a road better than anyone else I have ever seen. School was rarely cancelled or delayed due to snow but more often because of the bitterly cold temps. Winters would very reluctantly give way to spring sometime in April or May. Then it was time for Mud Season. The snow melts until everything in sight is a muddy, mushy mess. Mud Season was terrible. If you are a neat freak, you can forget about living in Vermont because mud being tracked in was just something that you had to learn to live with. Sometime in June, things would begin to dry out. It didn’t rain all that often during the “summer” months. In the three years that we lived there, I can only remember two days where I wished that we had had air conditioning. The rest of the time, open windows and fans during the day were enough and those had to be shut at night because it would get too cold for them. Then, of course, you had Leaf Season. This lasts for 2-4 weeks before it starts snowing again. Vermonters pretty much hate Leaf Peepers if you’ve ever a mind to drive there to view the autumn colors. They clog the roads and pull over to the side of the road whenever they see a particular scene worthy of a picture. It’s annoying but I did the same thing, lol.

Now we live in North Carolina. This is again, a state with basically three of the four seasons: Hot, hot summers, and coolish autumns and winters, and mild springs. Neither spring nor autumn last very long at all. It seems like one day it’s in the 70’s, next it’s in the 90’s, then it’s back in the 70’s for a few days before that gives way to chilly winters. Summer is, by far, the main attraction. We have very hot and humid summers where the nights only get as cool as the mid 70’s. I like the weather here although the cool months get cooler than I prefer.

The entire country is experiencing a cold snap, North Carolina is no exception. We’ve had overnight lows in the teens and tonight, we’re bracing for snow. Now’s when I have to shake my head at the silliness. They’re forcasting a trace to an inch at the most and they’ve already posted 2 hour delays for the schools tomorrow. Even Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base is on a 2 hour delay tomorrow. They’ve even salted the roads already too.This is when Vermonters would laugh and call us “low landers”. It is so funny to think that less than an inch of snow is going to shut the state down. Still, in a land where people never see snow, the thought of being on the road with these people is scary indeed. I, for one, am grateful that I won’t have to venture out with people that consider an inch of snow to be a lot. In Vermont, people would still be wearing shorts, t-shirts, and sandals with only an inch of snow on the ground.

All in all, I am GREATLY looking forward to being able to sleep in for two hours tomorrow. What a way to start the weekend! I’ll do my best to post some pictures tomorrow, heheh.

Inauspicious Start to the Year

My first post of 2010. I really don’t have anything to say.

Christmas was good. New Years was fine. It’s cold. We’re moving in just over two months. The spring semester doesn’t start until 2/14 so I still have lots of free time on my hands which is nice. Very nice.

I’m reading, playing games, and getting ready to move. That’s it. That’s my life. It’s very boring but very busy.

I got into the bad habit of staying up very late (3-4 am) and sleeping in very late (11-12ish) while on Christmas break. I guess I was channeling my inner teenager, heheh. Monday, the kids’ first day back to school, was painful. I overslept through my alarm and fell asleep on the couch around 9 pm. I’m feeling better this morning though.

Now, after this very lousy blog update, I have to go and take the oldest to school. I need to find socks. Did I mention it’s very cold?

Ten Things I Like About Christmas

1. Christmas carols
2. Movies
3. The smell of a real tree
4. The decorations
5. Driving around looking at the lights
6. My kids opening their presents
7. Baking cookies
8. The ham
9. Ham gravy
10. Christmas vacation

Hectic = Forgetful

When I’m in a rush, I forget things. I think that’s something that happens to everyone occasionally.

Last night, the oldest child had what is for her, the final band performance at her school. Since we’re moving, she won’t have any more performances at this school. One of her very good friends wanted to go so I agreed to pick her up at the last minute. While I was out picking up said friend, (luckily, we live in a small town) and running red lights doing it, the oldest was home taking a shower. Why she waited until the eleventh hour to get in the shower is beyond me. Also, the Mister was doing his best to rush home so he would make it too. It was madness. I get home with the friend long enough to run in the house to pee and then we all ran out and piled in the car to go to the school. Her band instructor is a beast and very strict. We got the oldest to the school one minute late, heheh, but she didn’t get into trouble.

In all my rushing, I forgot the camera. Big :( I had it sitting on the mantel and  had even charged up some batteries for it but walked out the door without it. I’m totally bummed. Her last performance at this school and I don’t have any pictures or video. Again :(

Afterwards, we took the lot of us out for some Arby’s. We had dinner at 8:30 last night, heheh. Even without the camera, it was a good night. All three classes, 6th, 7th, and 8th grade bands, played Christmas songs so it was a good way to get in the Christmas spirit.

I Guess This Is Something Else I Shouldn’t Have Said

We had a bit of a thing happen today. I’ll explain.

Last year when we took our OBX vacation, I wrote a letter of explanation to the oldest child’s school two weeks beforehand to let them know she would be absent and to request that her work be sent home with her so she could do it while we were gone. They didn’t give her her homework but let her do it when we got back. Whatever. But when we did get back, I fielded a couple calls from the school explaining to me the importance of students attending school. I was miffed but I let it go. I take my kids’ educations very seriously and don’t just arbitrarily let them miss school. Besides, we visited a lot of historic places which provided a hands on learning experience AND the kids only missed 4 days of school because of Veteran’s Day.

This year, I was better informed having read the student handbook that the kids get from the school district. Turns out that if you take your kids on an trip which has “educational opportunities” that the absence is excused as long as you send in your letter five days prior to the absence. I did so this year and even quoted the paragraph out of the handbook to cover my butt, not wanting a repeat of last year’s phone calls. Again. They did not send the oldest child’s school work with her but I didn’t receive any phone calls this year. I figured everything was good.

Yesterday, the oldest brought home her 4 1/2 week grades. NOT GOOD! She was missing a lot of assignments. She is now grounded. GROUNDED. She tried blaming our vacation on the missed work but I wasn’t buying it. One of her progress reports (they are sent separately from each of her teachers) had a hand written note at the bottom that said that it’s necessary for her to attend school in order to maintain her grades. That was it. The final straw that broke the camel’s back. I’m sick and tired of them riding their high horse and judging me because I choose to take my child on a family vacation. This year, she only missed 3 1/2 days because of the weather and Veteran’s Day. If they had sent her work with us, I can guarantee you it would have been completed and turned in when we got back. So, I write this teacher a letter explaining how I followed procedure according to the handbook, blah, blah, blah. My tone was a bit snarky but not overtly disrespectful. I was careful. I signed it with both my phone number and e-mail address at the bottom. She replied by e-mail, cleared things up, and the oldest is still VERY GROUNDED.

However, we find out that her teacher, upon reading my letter, yelled at her in front of the entire class. Maybe I was snarkier than I remember being. I am not happy about it though. She shouldn’t have taken out whatever feelings she had about my letter on the oldest let alone in front of the entire class. It’s immature and unprofessional. Sometimes I just really don’t get people.

Oh well. Only three months to go and I’ll get to deal with a whole new school, new teachers, and new snarkiness.

Random Floating Thoughts

I have all this stuff floating around in my head so I’m gonna write about it and get it all out.

The other night, the Mister and I were going to bed and we were locking up the house for the night. We turned  out all the lights in the living room and were walking to our bedroom in the dark. Weird thing about is that while I was walking in complete, pitch black dark, the Mister said he could see well enough from the light coming in the windows to make out shadows of where stuff was. It wasn’t until that moment that I realized how very bad my night vision is. I knew it wasn’t 100% but I didn’t know it was that bad. I guess it’s no wonder why I hate driving at  night.

The oldest child had a dance performance at her school last night. She did really great!! I am, of course, the proud parent. I’m going to put up video on my other blog which is private. I’m not comfortable putting video of my kids and other people’s kids on the Internet for all to see. If you’d like to view the video, leave a comment and let me know. I will need your e-mail address to send you an invite.

Something else I just realized is that we will be moving, actually on the road moving, in just over three months. The movers will be here around the 1st of March. I’m not sleeping again and since I’m not worried about anything else, I can only guess that I’m worrying about moving. I’ve also had the worst indigestion. Yes, yes. I know I’ve moved before and will make it through this one, but moving cross country with such little time to get ready is, I think, a perfectly legitimate reason to be stressed out. I’ve also never moved when I was both working and going to school. I’m also concerned about where we will live in California. I think it’s the thought of having to move back into base housing after living like regular people for six years that has me worried the most.

Another realization…I’m getting burned out on social networking. Maybe it’s just a phase and I’ll get back into it.

I’m tired of hearing about Tiger Woods. Move on. Next subject.

Yesterday, it was in the 50’s, today it’s in the 70’s (as I type it’s 72 with a heat index of 77) and tomorrow’s highs will only be in the 50’s again. Totally weird weather.

I’m still rereading the In Death books. Not counting the novellas, I’m on book 20 of 28. The last book, Kindred in Death just came out last month and I haven’t read it yet. I’m excited to get to it. I annoy myself though. Having reread the series as many times as I have, I can pick out a lot of mistakes that Robb made in the story line. Why do I have to be so nitpicky?

Finals on Monday were a nightmare. I took 17th and 18th Century British Literature and Concepts in Marketing this semester. I enjoyed both classes and learned a lot. I don’t know why my exams kicked me this year. I don’t have my grades yet. I probably won’t be posting about them either, lol.

I feel much better now. Don’t forget to let me know if you want to see the dance video and click on through to see my new blog template if you haven’t already!

New Layout/Theme/Template

Whatever you want to call it. Not sure what I think yet. I always need to give new templates a few days before I decide whether or not I like them. And besides. Let’s face it and be honest…How many people actually visit blogs rather than read them in a feed reader these days? Still, if you’re curious to see the changes that I’ve made, feel free to click over and check it out and leave me a comment with your opinion.

The whole reason that I changed was that I wanted to find something more Christmas-y or at least find a template where I could make the header more Christmas-y. I missed the mark there, lol, but I like that this template is brighter than my old one. I was seriously getting tired of the dark brown.

Anywho, dinner is in the oven and I’m cramming for finals tomorrow. Gotta run.

Good Moods vs. Bad Moods

My blog has certainly evolved, or de-evolved depending on your point of view, since I first started it back in 2003. What started out as a simple and easy way of updating family on our move to Vermont turned out to be the only thing that kept me sane during our time in Vermont. A theme has never been seen around here either. I’m not a mom blogger even though I’m a mom who blogs. I’m not a book blogger even though I love to read and occasionally talk about what I’ve read or am reading. I’m currently rereading J.D. Robb’s In Death series in case you were wondering. I’m not a thinly disguised money-making blog. I’ve never earned one red cent by blogging. I’m not even sure how you’d categorize my blog other than to call it a personal, not professional, blog. Blah blah.

What I have learned through the years of blogging is that it is much easier to find things to write about when I am in a bad mood. Ranting, raving, complaining, and just plain bitching are things at which I excel. Idiot drivers, lousy neighbors, family, the Mister’s job, money or the lack thereof, cleaning house, my kids, other people’s kids, and I could go on and on. These are just some of my favorite subjects that I like to blather on about.

Lately, I’ve been in a really good mood. I seriously can’t figure out what’s gotten into me. I’m usually an up and down kinda person. Holidays usually make my moods worse. This year, I just can’t get enough of Christmas. Maybe it’s because I don’t have sucky renters trying to make me go insane this year like I did last year. Or maybe it’s because the Marine Corps isn’t being a major PITA!! like they were in 2006 at Christmastime. Who knows? All I know is that I’ve been in an exceptionally good mood lately which makes it so that I don’t have anything much to say. At least nothing new to say anyway.

I seem to be alone in my joyfulness. I’ve been reading around Facebook and blogs how people aren’t in the Christmas spirit this year. Stop it!! Put out your decorations, bake some cookies, put on some Christmas music or a movie, adopt a reindeer, burn a pine scented candle, whatever it takes!! And hurry it up! My good mood surely won’t last for much longer. ;)

Our Last Thanksgiving in NC

We had a pretty decent Thanksgiving this year. For the first time ever, we  had a fresh turkey instead of a frozen bird. I didn’t think there would be very much difference between the two but I was way wrong. A fresh turkey is juicier and tastier. Honestly. Fresh birds only from now on. The only thing was that we got a 12 pound bird which was big enough for dinner but didn’t leave enough leftovers. Part of our Thanksgiving tradition is to make a turkey potpie with the leftovers. We had to go out and buy a turkey breast in order to have our potpie! And it did NOT taste like turkey at all. I heard on  some Thanksgiving Day special on TV that it’s the dark meat that gives turkey its flavor. I’m guessing that explains why the turkey breast didn’t taste like a normal turkey. Still, the potpie was good and it made leftovers in and of itself!

This year, the Mister and I did some Black Friday shopping. I do believe this is the first time we’ve gone shopping like that since 1995 or 1996. It was fun and other than a few odds and ends, I’m pretty much done with my Christmas shopping. Woohoo!!!!! I’m pretty proud of myself being done so early. Basically, I just have to figure out what I’m getting the Mister for Christmas. He is absolutely the hardest person in the world to shop for. If I was only going to get  him PS3 games, I’d be set but I like variety and PS3 games are pretty much expected. Too bad I don’t have the money to buy him the airplane he’s always wanted.

We have most of our indoor Christmas decorations up. Kinda. We buy fresh trees so we’re waiting a week or two before we get one so it’ll last until New Years. We have two smaller artificial trees up though. One we bought this year that’s pre-lit and the other is older than dirt but still looks nice on my grandmother’s table. My mantle is done up real nice too. I bought a cranberry garland to go across the front and we also bought some really nice stocking hangers. Today, we’re starting on the outside decorations. It’s about 70 degrees here today so it’s perfect weather to put up outside stuff. I just need the stuff, lol. I tried out my lights and all but one long and two short strands are broken. I have no idea what happened to them. They worked last year. I’m too impatient to figure out what’s wrong with them so I trashed them and I’m going out later today to buy new. I can’t wait. I also need to buy my Christmas cards. Yep. I’m sending them out this year. I hope I have everyone’s correct mailing address!!

Still loving the holiday season!!!!!! We bought Andrea Bocelli’s new Christmas CD on iTunes (It’s really good!) and I’ve watched The Santa Clause about 3 or 4 times already, hehehe.

Odd Behavior

I don’t know what’s gotten into me this year, but I’m so excited about the holidays. Usually, I’m a real bah humbugger about holidays. I don’t know what’s gotten into me!

We have all of our Turkey Day food ready to go. We’re not having anyone over this year but that’s okay. Not to be inhospitable, but I enjoy the time with just my family. Maybe next year will be different though. ;)

I’m also totally into Christmas already. I’m itching to put out my decorations. I saw someone yesterday with their yard already done up and it was nice to see. I also stop to listen to commercials with Christmas music in them. Hmm.

Maybe I’m in a good mood about the holidays because things are so good for us right now. With San Diego on the horizon, I’ve been taking things in stride a lot more than I usually do. There was a freakazoid in the carpool lane at the oldest’s school last week and instead of flipping my lid, I laughed at them instead. I only have to deal with that craziness for 4 1/2 more months. Yep, yep!

Well, I gotta meeting in five minutes, so I’ll stop my blathering now. I hope all of you are in the holiday spirit this year too!!

I Don’t Work Weekends

It was another slow weekend at our house. Friday the Mister and I did a bit of Christmas shopping. We also bought snack food for the Ohio State v. Michigan game on Saturday. We picked up pizza for dinner that night too. Real exciting, right?

Saturday we watched Ohio State beat Michigan for the sixth year in a row. Michigan fans want their coach fired, hehehe. The Mister wore his fuzzy buckeye hat and weirded out the neighborhood kids, lol. I think I’ve posted a picture of it before, but just in case, this is his hat:

I bought it for him for Christmas forever ago. He wore it to the grocery store one year in California. I did not go with him, lol.

Saturday night, the oldest child was invited to a birthday party. We didn’t let her go. It was for our neighbor who turned 14. She had a party that started at 8 and ended at midnight. The Mister and I don’t feel she’s mature enough (even though she’ll be 14 herself in July) to attend such a party. Funnily enough, she wasn’t even mad or upset. I don’t think she wanted to go anyway. This girl doesn’t go to the oldest’s school so she wouldn’t have known any of the kids there anyway.

Sunday, the Mister and I went to the commissary for the first time in about two months, maybe longer. We had been doing our grocery shopping out in town, but with all the Thanksgiving food we needed, we decided to hit the commissary, save some money, and stock up. It was a freaking madhouse. They didn’t have any eggs, chicken broth, allspice, and a couple other things. It’s annoying having to go two places for stuff. Add that to the crowds, the drive, and having to tip the baggers, is it really any wonder why we opt to shop out in town??

We also did some more Christmas shopping on Sunday. This is the earliest head start I’ve ever gotten on Christmas shopping. We are always very last minute usually. We’re also doing a red and silver theme on our Christmas tree this year and picked up these really neat LED lights for our tree. I can’t wait to try them out. I’m totally excited about Christmas this year. I’m really in the Christmas spirit and I’m looking forward to getting out my Christmas decorations and putting away my harvest decorations on Friday. Yay!!

Kitchen Gadgetry

The Mister and I made a run to the grocery store last night for a few groceries. Our cupboards are really bare. We haven’t gone grocery shopping since before we went to the Outer Banks, lol. I wish I could figure out why I hate grocery shopping so much.

While we were in the store, we walked past the refrigerator section of coffee creamers. All the pretty bottles!! Outside of a caramel frappacino from Starbucks, I’m not a big coffee drinker. I prefer green or white teas. I’ve tried regular brewed flavored coffees and find them too bitter. For some reason though, I had gotten it into my head that I wanted to try the flavored coffee creamers. We bought a caramel apple flavor and a cinnamon bun flavor and a bag of Green Mountain coffee. Side note:

My Favorite Things From Vermont:

1. Cabot Cheese
2. Vermont Teddy Bears
3. Green Mountain Coffee

We have a coffee maker for guests but the vacation house had this really neat coffee maker that we wanted to get. Considering that our coffee maker gets used about once a year, this is really just indulging our love of kitchen gadgets. This is what we were after:

This is what we got:

I love it!!! It’s so cute sitting on my counter. It brews a cup of coffee in three minutes. We also got one of these to go with it:

When you register your brewer online, Keurig gives you two free boxes of K-Cups when you buy two boxes plus 10% off your total purchase and free shipping. So, we ordered a variety box of Green Mountain flavored coffees, a box of the Doughnut House Collection by Green Mountain in the Chocolate Glazed Doughnut flavor, a box of hot chocolate for the girls, and a variety box of Gloria Jean’s teas. It was a really good deal and I’ll be able to fill up my carousel. We also bought a reusable filter so that we can use other coffee that doesn’t come in a K-Cup and for loose teas. I love oolong tea thanks to Jennifer.

It’s silly how much I like this thing, lol. I also can’t wait to organize our K-Cups on the carousel. I think I need a life, hehehe.

Beginning Our Newest Journey

Now that we are home from vacation, leisure time is a thing of the past. At least until after we move and settle in in San Diego.

Yesterday I began cleaning out our garage. I suppose compared to other people’s garages, it’s not too terrible. At least I can fit my tiny little car into it, lol. However, it’s getting to the point where I can fit my car in, but getting in and out of the car is starting to be a challenge. We have empty boxes, some broken down and some not, stacked almost to the ceiling on one side. They tend to topple over from time to time. On the other side, we have boxes and Rubber Maid totes full of things we didn’t unpack from when we moved into this house. That is where I began cleaning yesterday.

I turned four totes of the girls’ toys into one tote of trash, two totes that are full of toys going to charity, and one tote of toys that I allowed to come back into the house. The kids whined a bit but I explained to them that these toys had been in the garage for a year. If they hadn’t been played with in all that time, they couldn’t be that important and I didn’t want to hear arguments about it!!

I also found water in the garage and a big pile of sand next to the side door. I can only assume that it rained so much here from Nor’Ida that the side yard flooded and came into the garage. I have no other guesses as to where the water and sand could have some from. Only one box got wet (a box full of my books, CRY!!) and our rolled up area rug. Now the rug smells and I think I’m just going to throw it away. The box of books, I’m too scared to look and will take care of it in California.

Today, my legs and back are sore from all the lifting. It’s a good sore though because I did a lot of work and it was necessary work. I feel good about it.

OBX Vaca 2009: The Pictures

Cotton field on the way to the OBX.

The living room/kitchen at the house. This is the 3rd floor.

Living room/nook. 3rd floor.

View off of the 3rd floor balcony.

1st floor rec room with the pool table, Captain Hook, and the foos ball table is behind me.

Bridge out to Cape Hatteras

Cape Hatteras Lighthouse

The original site of the lighthouse before it was moved in 1999.

A crab that came up to our front door.

 

Currituck Beach Lighthouse

A Great Blue Heron that I caught on film fishing. Cool!

Nor’Ida

After one of the most quiet hurricane seasons that I can remember, we manage to vacation in the worst storm of the year. You might think that being in the middle of a Nor’Easter would ruin a vacation, but you’d be wrong.

This was the beach before the storm;

If you’ll notice in the above pictures, the ocean is relatively calm, and you can see how far back the waves are from the dunes. The top pic was taken the day we arrived and the second one was taken Tuesday. It was overcast but not windy yet.

Conditions Wednesday to Friday were pretty bad. The wind and rain were so constant that it made it hard to remember what quiet was like. The wind gusts were strong enough that they shook our house. We could hear the roar of the ocean over the wind and rain and inside the house with all the windows and doors shut. It was eerie to say the least.

This was the beach on Thursday when we walked over to see what was what:

The waves were clear up, and sometimes over, the dunes at this point. The sea foam would fly up and over the dunes clear to our house and it looked like clumps of snow at times. I had never seen anything like it before.

This was our walkway down to the beach. If you’ll notice, there are no stairs anymore. We actually saw several sets of stairs be swept by as we stood there. Lots of walkways were lost to the storm.

Here you can see more foam and get an idea of how high up the wave were beating on the dunes. You can also see where the dunes were already being eroded. At this point in the storm, we hadn’t even reached the worst of the series of high tides that were expected.

Here’s a video:

I think it was Wednesday night that the main road into town was flooded cutting off our way out. Thankfully, the little area where our house was located was almost directly across the street from a Harris Teeter so we had food and supplies the entire time we were stranded. Two of the streets that were in our neighborhood flooded too but were still passable. I’m pretty sure this is the only time I’ve ever been truly stranded anywhere. The road that our house was off of, NC 12 ended at the beach when you drive north on it. Literally. The pavement ends in sand. You can keep driving if you have 4WD or an ORV but I’m sure it’s not recommended during a storm. So the only way out was to drive south on NC 12 back to US 158, or the Bypass as it’s known, but NC 12 was flooded and closed between Corolla and Duck. You can Google Map it if you want.

Another video:

Anyway, we passed the time by playing Apples to Apples, doing crafts, and playing pool and foos ball. It was nice actually. We were all cozied up in the house with plenty of food, lots of things to do, and each other. Here are some more pictures:

Stairs and other debris floating by.

What was left of the stairs to the beach. Also, about half of the bulk of the dunes were gone. We estimated about 5 feet of the width was washed away. You can also see that the ocean had receded back away from the dunes.

This was the road next to our house. Our side yards flooded but that was it. Our house was actually ideally situated because we had very little standing water whereas most of the neighboring houses had much more.

On the drive home Saturday, we saw lots of flooded yards and roads still had standing water on them. Nags Head seemed to be the hardest hit in the Outer Banks. Many roads off of US 158 to the beach were still flooded and blocked off by the city. Some people also lost their homes in Nags Head. I saw footage of Rodanthe on the news and The Serendipity House, which was the house in the movie, was in the ocean. It was still standing at that point and I haven’t heard if it made it through the storm.

I hear so many people say how they don’t understand how people can live so close to the ocean. But you know what? I also hear people say how they don’t understand how people can live in California with earthquakes and fires or in the north with all the cold and snow. Is there any place on earth that is completely untouched by Mother Nature’s rage? When you take into account all the places that have oceanic storms, earthquakes, forest fires, landslides, avalanches, tornadoes, flooding, and droughts, there really isn’t anywhere that is 100% safe. You take the good with the bad. That’s life. The Outer Banks is gorgeous most of the year and rich in history. I guess it’s the bad that sticks out most in people’s minds though.