Christmas

So we had a fun Christmas. We went back to Brookings to spend the holiday with Eric's family. It was another year of seeing the magic of Christmas through a 5-year old's eyes. Santa even showed up and walked through the front yard waving to Anthony. The look on his face was absolutely priceless. The picture below sums up his expression through the whole night. Actually, this scene really sums it up. I'm not sure who the little kid really was. Whenever Anthony opened a gift and it needed some sort of assembly (which they all do), Eric took it and started putting it together. But Eric seemed to hang onto them a little longer than necessary..."testing" the toy. Anthony was amazingly patient and didn't get grabby at all when Uncle Eric started playing with the cool toys first. He got a light saber, remote controlled cars, fire truck playset, etc. Whew! Eric, er, Anthony had a good Christmas!
The only picture of me that exists from Christmas. I used to love being in pictures, but not these days. I have to at least document, however, that I do exist. We got these great SDSU shirts from Janel, a family friend. We don't have any with the new Jackrabbit logo on it. I love the new logo! He's a really badass Jackrabbit, instead of the Disney rabbit from before.


These were the score of the night for the two big boys. Anthony pretty squarely sides with Eric as a Packers fan. He's often heard saying "Packers fans do this..." That is much to the dismay of his grandpa, a diehard Bears fan. There is much rivalry between the two.
Eric didn't think I'd post this picture...but if you pull stunts like this they get posted. So yeah, I hope our boss is reading this. Anyway, his contempt for Da Bears speaks for itself.

Bathroom update

We've long wanted to do some updating to the bathroom (read: scrap and start new). But we don't want to spend our money on that right now. So, I've been thinking about painting and over these last few weeks decided to go for it. A fresh coat of paint, new shower curtain, new window treatments should dress it up enough to make it look a little more updated, right?


Yeah. In theory. Try 3 coats of paint and 3 window treatments later. The only thing that actually worked right the first time was the shower curtain. And that just hangs there!

So I picked out two colors of paint because they matched the shower curtain. It's kind of an off-red and a mustardy yellow (you can see a little sliver of that on the left by the door. That color goes around the top of the shower). They were kind of fall, earthy colors that I liked together. It was specifically bathroom paint because we have some issues with humidity and venting in that room. The previous paint got round mildew spots on it every now and again. So I wanted to make sure we got some top-quality paint for this project.

First, I primed it. So far, so good. Next, the first coat. Doing fine; this is still the first day. Feeling pretty good. That feeling ended real quick when we did the first coat of red. We ended up with a second coat of each. No biggie; a lot of paint jobs need two coats. A little bummed because I want to see the end result, but still hanging in there. By this point, we've had to let each coat dry for a while. My enthusiasm toward this project is thinning. Who the hell thought of painting the @#@!$# bathroom?!?!?! I'm tired of this. I want my bathroom back and I want the walls to stop being sticky. We put coat 3 on. Looks better....nice, even. I give it another day to dry.

Day 4, 5,6 -- who knows anymore. We decide to put up the shower curtain and put the cabinet doors back on. Shower curtain, check. Doors....BLEEP!!! Eric lined up the hinges with the old holes and wouldn't you know it, they aren't seated right. The bottom pair doesn't fit the same way (despite using the same holes!) and they ripped huge chunks of paint off when we closed and opened them. ARGHH!H! Forget it, that's another project for another day.

It's now time to take the painter's tape off the ceiling and corners. Yeah. This paint is so good that it's like one giant piece of rubber. I pull off a corner and it catches the paint and peels it off the wall about an inch. I'm steaming now. So (calmly) get an box cutter and have to score the wall as I'm peeling off the tape. Twice the effort, half the happiness.

That's finally done. Wow, it kind of looks nice. Sure, there are a few spots that are messy...and cat hair embedded into one wall (by the window Bingo jumped into while it was still wet. I walked by mid-jump and screamed at him. Well, that startled him and one leg dropped below the window sill and made a cat-size smear. I would have been furious if it wasn't so hilarious giving him a little bath after that).

Ok. Fine. Are you still with me? Feeling the frustration? The final straw came when we put up the roman shades I purchased. I thought Roman shades would look cool in here; kind of completing that "earthy" look. Whatever. The damn things were semi-private! But of course Kathy missed that detail in the store. We drill 8 holes into our wall, install the shades, and then realize that at night you can see right through them. I go back to the store and purchase another one that does not say anything about being fully or semi-private. They are see-through, too! I can't even see straight I'm so fed- up with this thing. The worst part is that we threw away all the stuff for the first set of shades. But I was so damn determined to get my money back that I went dumpster diving and found the packaging. I literally taped the instructions back together (I have a bad habit of ripping paper before it goes in the garbage). I painstakingly packed it all up and returned both. Thank goodness that worked. The next best thing we found was this green pair. I really don't give a rat's ass what's in my bathroom anymore. I kind of miss the plain old white.

Election Night Party 2008

I wanted a reason to decorate the house, so I threw a little impromptu election night party for Eric and I. I had some fun decorating -- balloons, streamers, and a homemade electoral college map. I knew Eric would have fun coloring it in. He did until they called Ohio and then we went to bed. Boo. Such high hopes for the evening. Oh well. It was a fun night to eat pizza and cheer our nation on!

Kitty Ying and Yang

This scene cracked me up the other day. These two don't often cuddle together -- there's usually a smack-down concerning the couch real estate. Bingo is a lover and not a fighter so he often walks away, letting Yoda win, only increasing her false sense of power. But this time they must have needed the warmth because here's how I found them. Bingo must not have been too concerned over where his face was at.

Boston!

So let me warn you that there are a lot of pictures I included in this post. I took a ton of pictures while in Boston...yet I hardly have any with people in them. Cardinal sin! I'll have to remember that next year when my conference takes us to San Francisco. But until then, here are the adventures of Boston 2008.

As you can tell from the top picture...I walked A LOT. One day I walked 25,000 steps. That's about 11 miles! I was so shocked and proud of my ability to do that I had to take a picture of the pedometer to prove it. Walking around really made me feel a part of the culture as I did most of those steps on my own (some of them were with a group later in the afternoon). I liked blending in while all the people were trying to get to work. I'm not sure I blended in much because I have light hair and was wearing a bright green jacket. Everyone in this town had dark hair and wore dark clothing. But still, I got used to crossing against the light just like the locals. Take that tourists!

This picture is at the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill. There's really not a whole lot there other than the monument (which is quite similar to the Washington Monument) and the the statue. The monument was so big I couldn't get it all in the photo. But I hiked to the top of it (did that for you, Eric!)...all 291 steps. This was the part in the day where I had already walked about 18,000 steps, but wasn't too tired. The group I was with wasn't interested in climbing the monument so I said, "I'll be right back!" I bounded up the first 100 steps (they had the steps marked at intervals), and then it hit me. I slowed down quite considerably after that! But I dragged myself up to the top and had an incredible view as a reward! I'm not sure what the round thing is (I first thought it could be a gun sight or something...then it occurred to me the monument wasn't there during the Battle of Bunker Hill. Duh). There were 4 small windows at the top with a 360-degree view and on the ledge of all the windows people had dropped all kinds of change. I'm not sure how they did it since there was a piece of plexiglass on it. But I thought it made a cool picture.
Below: This is the view from the front of the monument looking back towards Boston Harbor. This monument is actually in the city of Charlestown and the homes that circled the monument were picture-book perfect.
Below: This is the duck boat that we took a city/harbor tour on. We drove around the city for about an hour on this (way up high and loud!) and then it splashed down into Boston Harbor. I have no idea where the tea party took place; no one ever mentioned it and it wasn't a place that you could walk to on the walking path. It must not be much of a tourist destination.
Below: This is the Cheers location. My coworker went into the bar one night, but I didn't. It actually wasn't very far from our hotel. It was on the farthest side of Boston Common from us.
Below: This was shortly after we got into the water and were going towards the harbor.
Below: This is the Old State House. I went back on my own and took a tour of this place and it was pretty cool. It's right in the middle of downtown, but a lot of historic things happened here. Right out front is where the Boston Massacre happened.
Below: I walked down the street a little ways to see what it looked like that way. I had a hard time getting a sense of history in Boston because of how modern everything is. I'm sure in it's day the State House was the biggest, grandest building around. It's positively dwarfed by modern structures now.
Below: This is Fanueil Hall. It's a historic place itself, but it's more commonly known for its shopping now. I could not freaking figure out how to get into this place to get up to the top floor for a tour. In its day it used to be a place of market and trading, but on the second floor of the hall it was a place for political forums, etc. I walked all around and could not figure out how to get upstairs. If I had only walked to the back of the place I would have seen the stairs. I thought stairs on the inside would take me up there...but nooooo, they had to be on the outside. I'm so bummed I didn't see it because I saw pictures from my coworker and it looked so grand. Damn.
Below: This is a view from the top of the Old State House. This is also the exact place that the Declaration of Independence was read for the first time in Massachusetts. Ok, but this picture I took is where the Boston Massacre occured. Of all the sights I saw, this one struck the biggest chord with me. I'm not sure why. I think becuase it was such a pivotal moment in our nation's journey toward independence and how it looks today. In the middle of a busy city street covered in concrete. Just amazing to me. The street on the right is the one I walked down to get that long street shot of the state house.
Below: Inside the Old State House museum. This is some of John Hancock's stuff. He was the first signer of the Declaration and the first governer of Mass. He was also a pretty rich guy who worked closely with Samuel Adams. See? I was paying attention.
Below: We also walked around to Beacon Hill. The thing I remember about Beacon Hill is this is where all the rich people live. Like Sen John Kerry. On our duck tour, we drove by the legal address of JFK's until the time he was assassinated and it was right in this area. Narrow streets with homes that all look the same. But they were awful pretty. We were only a few blocks off the busiest streets near Boston Common, but it was amazingly quiet on the streets of Beacon Hill. We saw a lot of fancy cars behind gates here: BMW's, Jag's, what are other rich cars? We saw them.

Below: We walked to the Old North Church (also known as Christ Church) where Paul Revere hung the lanterns.
Inside the North Church. The thing I found interesting was that the pews were all separated off. And they had walls that were about chest high. The pews had names on the door (all that date back to the 1700s) and I guess the parishoners had assigned seats? That would surely be a way to tell if your neighbors were attending church regularly!
Below: Can't remember where this was, but I thought it was kind of quaint. It's so hard to get a sense for what the city is like through pictures. But I thought it was neat that the lady in the foreground was doing a painting of this scene. I must have figured if it was worth painting, then I should get a picture and figure it out later!
Below: This is the marker for the victims of the Boston Massacre. It is located in the Granary Burying Ground, which is in the middle of the city. I suppose back then it was the edge of town. Someone asked our tour guide what the stones on top of the grave are and he said it's a Jewish tradition. Family members who couldn't afford a headstone would visit the grave site and leave rocks. Eventually, enough family members would visit and enough rocks would be left to form a monument. These rocks were on the graves of Samuel Adams, John Hancock, and Paul Revere, who are also buried here.

Below: This is a view from Paul Revere's grave site. It's toward the back of the burying ground. This whole site kind of reminded me of a courtyard of a hotel or something. It was surrounded by buildings. You can kind of see across the street are buildings. It's a busy city street outside this cemetary. Something interesting about this place: when people were buried here, they were just laid down haphazardly and a flat stone put as a marker. This was all good until push lawnmowers were invented and the caretaker had a hard time going around all these stones that were not laid out in rows. So he rounded up a bunch of men to remove the stones, mow down the grass, and voila! The only problem is that they took the markers off the graves completely, so instead of figuring out where they belonged, the markers were just lined back up. So I guess no one really knows where anyone is buried in this place.
Below: This is a picture from inside the Boston Public Gardens. We thought it was so interesting that there were trees and green on top of these fancy condos/penthouses.
Below: The building on the left is the Boston Public Library. I went inside and discovered...a lot of books. I think they have a catalog of something like 5 million books. The church on the corner is the South Church.
Below: This is another angle of the Library. This is taken standing in front of Trinity Church. This whole area is called Copley Square and it was one block from the front door of our hotel. It took 2 minutes to walk here.
Below: This is the front corner of Trinity Church. I didn't really find out much about the church itself, but I want to watch the movie "National Treasure" because I think they came to Boston for a part of their puzzle. I can't remember where they went, though. Anyway, the glass building is the John Hancock Tower. It's like 76 stories high and was directly across from our hotel. It was the largest building around so whenever we felt turned around we would try to locate that and know where we were.
Below: From the corner of the John Hancock Tower. The Library would be off to the left.

Dang...I guess that's all I have! Well, it's a small taste of what this town is like. It's so hard to describe a city from pictures. The first thing I noticed about Boston is that it smells like food! Delicious fair food. There's a restaurant on every block. Plus, there are 92 Dunkin' Donuts in downtown Boston. Literally, they are on every corner.

Hanging with Grandma and Grandpa

Here are some pictures my mom sent to me after I left from my visit. My folks were getting ready to go on the next leg of their trip to the west coast before they have to arrive in Yuma in November. They pull their little Miata around on the back of the 'bus' (that's what Liv calls it). It gets pretty dusty back there, so my dad was washing it before they left. Olivia loves to be outside so I'm sure any chance she can get to help and she does.






Noah has the most precious grin when he's really laughing. He's such a doll.

Wiiiiiii!

Eric and I got a Nintendo Wii a few weeks ago and, boy, have we been having fun. We've taken it to both family's houses and played it. These are some recent pictures of my trip to RC for work when we were playing the Wii.




Olivia was watching all the adults exercising on the Wii Fit , so pretty soon she stood on her little plastic chair and kept saying how "I have to exercise now." She was trying to balance on one leg and move back and forth like we were doing. She must have pretty good balance because she didn't even fall once!

Into the Wild

Ok, so it wasn't quite like the book/movie, "Into the Wild"...because we don't die in the end. But we did go up into some desolate country in Northern MN this weekend. It was my folks' last weekend as the Chippewa National Forest, Norway Beach Loop resident Campground Hosts, Firewood Sellers, and Skull-Crackers. They had been up there since Memorial Day weekend. The weather finally cooled off and the mosquitoes dwindled enough for us to have an enjoyable visit. So we packed up and headed off on Thursday night, stopping in Brookings to drop off Lily with the best dog-sitter available -- Anthony! He took such good care of Lily that we didn't even have to think about her once while we were gone. Here are some pictures from the visit:


On the way home (Sun night) we stopped in Fargo and stayed overnight with Grandma Fran. It has been a few years since we last visited, so it was nice to be able to do so again. She cooked supper for us (local smoked sausage and luscious, delicious vegetables from my aunt Arlene's farm). Those vegetables were amazing. She had pulled together some pictures and we spent the entire evening and part of the next morning going through photographs and learning more about my family's history. I was surprised how much I didn't know about my extended family. She had 11 brothers and sisters (she's right in the middle). Plus, each of those had a handful (literally) or more so my mom has a bunch of cousins -- and they all look alike! It was a good thing for us to do.
We spent a lot of time sitting around the campfire. My dad had a pile of wood he wanted to burn through before they left, so we were really racing against the clock! We made good use of the fire by roasting traditional camp food -- S'mores and Hotdogs!! Delicious.


Randy, the backwoods Ax-Man. Jan, the friendly gift-shop lady.
Going-away picture in front of the "Bagel." They lived in this all summer long -- it's pretty darn spacious when you get inside of it. There's a pop-out thing on the other side that makes the living room area (well, living room, kitchen, and driving area) bigger. I can see downsizing and living out of that. It's not really that bad.
On Saturday we did our little touristing loop. The campground they "hosted" was about 15 miles south of Bemidji, MN so we had to stop and see Paul Bunyan and Babe. Apparently, there are more of these statues around the state..this one was just the closest (and they're not the talking ones). Dorky tourist pics (though I LOVE Babe's color).
This is inside the visitor's center -- I thought the props on the floor were awesome. Those are his moccassins, dice, and a mallet. All of the stuff inside the visitor's center were oversized. They even had his fingernail clippings...which were awful. Yuck. For as "themey" as South Dakota gets with its Black Hills and Mt Rushmore stuff, the area of this state was pretty much "Paul Bunyan this, Paul Bunyan that." Do they really think he was real??

The camp site. We stayed in our tent, which was fun. I like tent camping and need to do it a few times a year just to stay grounded. I like getting really dirty for a few days and then going home to clean up. Mostly because I just need a good excuse for looking disheveled.
They had several duties as Campground Hosts. First, was to make sure everyone was paid or had a tag on their camping site. My dad would get up early and make his rounds. Second, was firewood sales. They had a little shed (in the foreground) that was stocked with firewood (by someone else who cut it). They would sell it for $3 a bundle and boy, did they sell it! It was a pretty constant flow on Fri & Sat night. A third duty was to keep the peace during quiet hours (10pm-6am). Apparently my dad had to get up once or twice while we were there to shine his mega-watt, police-cruiser flashlight on a rowdy campsite. This flashlight is so huge that he told us that one time he walked up to a loud group of campers one night, turned on the light, and heard someone say, "holy shit!" under his breath. Yeah...walk softly and carry a big stick!
Another highlight of the trip was to climb the death-defying fire tower in the middle of nowhere. As we were walking to the base of this tower, I was just convinced we were going to see a foot attached to a dead body sticking out. Or bigfoot. This was that kind of forest. Anyway, Dad and I went up to the top. But I was white-knuckling it and looking straight ahead the whole way.
Where's Waldo? We weren't even to the top and you can see how small Mom & Eric were at the bottom.


Just to get an idea of how massive this thing was!