Carpet is Here!

Our carpet is finally in town and will be installed Thursday, so I've spent the last two days packing up all the small stuff and moving the boxes downstairs or upstairs as the case may be. Tonight Mike and his friend Kasey moved much of the furniture into either the garage or the living room. We'll have a little more to move that we still need to use for a day or two.

Tomorrow, we are finishing the bathroom, so I'll post pictures of that soon.

Sunday morning, I'm going to visit my friend Rolayne who's due to have a baby in about two weeks.

It's a Jungle Out There!

We’ve had even more rain while we were gone, so when we got home, the yard was a jungle. My pumpkin plants exploded out of their pen and went trailing 4 feet across the lawn. We had to use clippers to cut the fence away since the plants had grown through the fence, and then once we removed the fence, I could redirect all the plants in a different direction and off the lawn. We also had to chop down yards of vine that was growing on the deck, over the windows, and into the garden, as well as mowing the grass and weeding. Aspen loved all the extra green because it offered cool places to lay down. She crawled right into the thicket.

Nevada 2009

Our second stop was a visit to Nevada to hang out with my family. I have officially learned to wake board after two summers of trying, although I still fall down pretty quickly. We all enjoyed the water sports, tubing, jet skis, boating, and getting a chance to see everyone. Aspen liked riding in the boat, but she would get very nervous when I went off the back of the boat to ski or tube. Then she’d pace and crowd the back of the boat. She also liked the chance to play with all the other dogs and her first introduction to beef rib bones!
We also got the chance to meet Lesa’s boyfriend Colin and spend some time with them at the lake, which was great. Then, we headed back to Winnemucca for a few days, where we enjoyed riding the ATV’s in the mountains and several family dinners. Aspen ran about 8 miles round trip behind the four wheelers. She could have ridden in the back, but she wouldn’t stay put. She loved running with the other dogs, but she’s had sore feet for the last couple days as a result. She’s never run that far, or that long! Here are some pictures from the trip:

Shaver Lake 2009

Our vacation started with a week at Shaver Lake with the Harper and Mandell families. We had a great time hanging out by the lake, riding the jet ski and pontoon boat, doing crafts, eating, and exploring. We got Jason and the girls hooked on fishing and went on an adventure to Dinkey creek. The weather was hot, but with lots of water to cool off, it wasn't bad. I think my favorite day was renting the boat to tour the lake. It's a goregous lake with many little coves and islands to play in and on. Aspen especially loved the small island because she could go without her leash for a little while. I highly recommend tour by boat.

Marie, as always thoughtfull and generous, had prepared with water bottles and fun beach bags filled with goodies for all of us to use. And, a special treat to me, she brought craft projects and scrapbooking matierals for the girls. I even got to try out the Circut and confirm that I do want one some time.

The week went by amazingly quickly and soon we were packing up for our next leg of the journey. I have lots of fun pictures, but here are just a few:

Everyone enjoyed watching Aspen repeatedly bury her bone around camp, and you will all be happy to hear that as soon as we got home she took the same bone and "buried" it in our closet! She looks like a little pig, rooting around in the dirt with her nose.

On the road...

I'm typing this from mike's iPhone, so  I'll have to keep it short. The keys are one finger touch and I'm not a texter, so this is weird. We are in a hotel room in Mesquite NV. We were going to go camping until we stepped out of the truck into 109F heat, and started melting. We quickly decided we didn't want to pitch a tent in that heat so we found a hotel room. We did stop long enough to wade in the Virgin river for a few minutes, but it wasn't as refreshing as it sounds since the water was about 90 degrees. It was fun to visit arizona for a few minutes along I-15. Tomorrow we will head to Fresno to meet up with my friend Kim for a visit. I need to get out the camera tomorrow too. Aspen did great today. She rode really well in the car, and was very patient. we stopped for an hour in Grand Junction at a dog park and Aspen went for a swim in their pond. She had a great time.

It's been one of those days!

Thank goodness for honest people! I accidentally left my purse in a cart at Home Depot today, but some nice person turned it in right away (Meanwhile, I got all the way home before noticing and freaked out.). I went right back to get it, of course. I blame it on loading a big bag of thinset, which I had to go get because we thought we were going to run out, but we didn't. Makes it even better that it happened for something we now don't need!

I spent most of the day today interviewing potential teachers for an open English position we have, which is always interesting. I'm always surprised that some people really don't know how they come across in public, and they don't speak well or anticipate questions. Lesson #1--Do not write your cover letter so that it sounds like an infomercial. Lesson #2--Do not speak incredibly slowly, which makes you sound hesitant. Lesson #3--A surprising number of English teachers do not know what the word lexicon means! Lesson #4--Answer the question, all parts of the question, so help me god! It's shocking how many people don't elaborate to explain their answers without insane amounts of prompting. Of course, we had several good interviews too, and I think we've found a good candidate. Hopefully, he accepts the job.

The tiling is finished, except for grout. I have to grout tomorrow and touch up paint in places and then we can start putting in vanity, fixtures, etc...I've included a sneak peek at the tile here. I will take many more pictures when the room is done. However, everything has taken so much more time than I anticipated. I've been forced to conclude that the bathroom won't be finished before vacation. Since we are leaving in two days, I really need to turn my attention to getting ready to go.

Who Knew Screwdrivers had Clutches and other revelations!

The giant mud puddle is still going strong at the dog park, and today we met Lars, a Saint Bernard puppy who likes to lay down in the water and roll over. He looks like an elephant cooling off in the water, and comes up dripping gallons. He's quite amusing, and already 80 pounds at only 5 months! Of course, I had to run like crazy when he came out of the pond since his shake covered a half mile radius! Aspen and Lars had a great time splashing in the puddle. Aspen won't lay down in the water; she just runs through and splashes. The pictures are from my cell phone, so they aren't brillant.

Mike's wrist is officially broken, and he has the worst (or most spectacular, depending on how you look at it) bruise I have ever seen. The good news in the orthopedic surgeon said there are no shards floating around in there and he doesn't have to get a cast--just a brace for the next 6-8 weeks.

The bathroom remodel continues to come along slowly. Today, I finished laying the subfloor of cement board and tomorrow I will start to tile. I'm learning all kinds of handy skills. Today, I learned how to use a jigsaw and a tile saw, and I learned that power screwdrivers have a clutch. Who knew. I thought clutches were only for cars! I had to call my husband because I couldn't get the screws to go in all the way no matter how hard I tried. Still, the job got done in the end.

I visited the salon today for a haircut, which is always unique. My hair dresser is so un-me that it makes me nervous sometimes, but I like how she cuts my hair. It's just that I usually feel a little like I'm in the twilight zone. She has no boundaries, first of all, and asks me personal questions like "How's the family planning going?" as soon as she sees me. Now, this might be okay if in response to my telling her that we wanted kids or something to that effect, but I never have mentioned anything of the sort to her. Then, she's maybe 23 years old, she dies her hair different colors each month, she has a tattoo of which she is inordinately proud and prominantly displays, she's an unapologetic unwed mother who will happily tell you about how she got pregnant "by accident," and she has very interesting views on politics and most social situations. Perhaps most obnoxious to me is that fact that she frequently uses double superlatives like "most funnest" until I really want to adopt a teacher voice and lecture her. Ha! I try not to, but she does do a nice job with my hair.