New House

We were supposed to close on our house Friday October 28th. Due to issues with our sellers and our lender not having their act together, it did not happen until Tuesday November 1st. We didn't get the key until Thursday the 3rd.

Saturday we met with a general contractor to discuss some things we'd like to have done before moving in. We are waiting to get an estimate from him. We were hoping we'd be able to have everything complete and move in before December 1st...hoping that would give us time to unpack and decorate a bit before Baby Boy arrives (due December 18th).

In the listing, the sellers said they would be painting the exterior of the house. It was a very neutral gray color. The painter contacted us to see if we would like to pick the colors before he painted. It was not easy, but we picked a blue color. Every house in the neighborhood is very neutral and with the dreary weather we wanted something that would pop a bit. I really like how it turned out.

One of my favorite things about the house is the deck in the back and the slide coming off the deck. Canaan has already been enjoying this when we've been over at the house. The slide needs a bit of wax to make sliding down it a little easier.

Most recent big news

Our biggest news as of late is this.



Our house is officially on the market! Matthew has done an incredible amount of work to get our house ready to sell. And he daily does a lot of work to keep it clean and picked up.

We have no idea what is to come, but we know that the financial obligation is just too much for us right now while Matthew is without a job. We hope it will sell quickly. Then the plan is to rent until we figure out what is next.

Neighborhood Kids

This evening I walked over to a neighbor's house to give her some coupons I had received in the mail for the formula she uses. I was crossing the cul-de-sac when a young girl said something like, "Ooh, a baby. Do you live around here?" I told her I did and pointed to my house. She then replied, "Oh, I remember. You have Max." So she didn't remember me, but she remembered that I belonged to Max. If Max is outside when this girl walks by our fence, she will call him over and pet him through the fence.

I also have a quick story about a little boy that lives across the cul-de-sac. His father was deployed to Iraq for about a year. While he was gone, Matthew threw a football for him one day. Ever since then, he will come ring our doorbell every once in a while to ask if Matthew will come out to play with him. It is the cutest thing, but Matthew feels a little weird about it now that his dad is home.

What a view!

The view from our driveway has changed a bit. Do you see the change?


Unfortunately after a year and a half in our house, the lot directly across the street from us has sold. Soon we will not have this view of Pikes Peak. We don't sit out front and look at this view so it shouldn't be a big deal, but it is still nice to see any time we go out the front door. We'll miss this view for sure. I think Max will even miss the view.

Customer Service

We've had some interesting dealings with customer service recently. My employer is very big on good customer service. My office is attached to a conference room and more than anything else I have overheard trainings and conversations on customer service.

A couple of months ago Matthew took a stereo/receiver that we purchased around Christmas to the store we bought it from for repair. The store sent it to the manufacturer and we were supposed to get it in 6 to 8 weeks. We called the store a couple of times without an update on our stereo/receiver. Finally a week or so ago Matthew went to the store to find out what was going on. It turns out somewhere along the way our stereo/receiver went missing. They told him to come back the next day because they would replace it with a new model. The next day, they gave him the floor model because they didn't have any new ones. He had to go back the next day because they hadn't given him everything he needed to set it up. Everything works which is good, but it was a little disappointing because they had promised a new one.

Last week, for the second time this year, someone stole our trash can from in front of our house. The last time this happened we were using a different trash company. That company had identifying numbers on the trash can itself. I called the company and they told me they would keep an eye out for it. I didn't really think anything would happen, but they actually found our trash can. I was so glad we didn't have to shell out $70 for that trash can. Needless to say, we really appreciated this trash company. Then our HOA made us switch to one trash service for the community. Last week our trash can disappeared once again. So I called the trash company to make sure they would still pick up our trash if it wasn't in the trash container. The only advice she offered was to steal one of our neighbor's containers. What kind of customer service is that?? And why is someone stealing our trash container???

Much excitement

The weather is changing. It seems as if it changed as of September 1st. We have already had several nights where the temperature dropped below 40 degrees. The days have still been warming up to the 70s, but fall is coming quickly. I noticed while playing with Max yesterday evening that the leaves on one of our trees in the backyard has already changed to gold. It is pretty, but doesn't it seem too soon for this kind of color? I actually wore a hooded sweatshirt one evening this week while playing outside with Max.

I also thought I would show you how much of the wood Matthew cut down has been used so far. I know it's hard to tell from this picture so I will just tell you how much we've used. Ready? I think we've used 5 pieces at the most. When we tried to use it, it wouldn't burn well because it was still too green. We really haven't tried any since that time. Maybe we'll try again during this fall weather we're having.

I opened the door from the garage into the house upon arriving home from work on Tuesday and smelled the most horrible smell. Once inside, I very quickly discovered that Max had the runs in the house. This happened once before - the day the Olympics began on 8/8/08. That time Matthew got home first and discovered Max had the runs on the carpet in the basement. Poor Matthew. That must have been AWFUL to clean up which was done before I even got home from work. Thankfully, this time the incident occurred upstairs on the hard wood floor for the most part. I am telling you...that was DISGUSTING! I felt bad that he was obviously sick at some point during the day. He seemed completely normal when I got home and was ready to get outside and play. I count it a small miracle that I did not lose my lunch while cleaning that up. Whew! I hope that doesn't happen again any time soon. What's weird is that we have no idea what caused that to happen either time. I couldn't finish this post without adding a couple of pictures of Max. Isn't he a cutie? The longer we play fetch, the longer his tongue gets. Where is that thing attached? Matthew swears it is attached at his tail.

Decorating Woes

Have I mentioned that Matthew and I have completely different ideas about decorating. This is one of the factors that contributed to hanging something on the wall almost a year and a half after moving into our house. Does that mean we're slow to compromise? I hope neither of us is that stubborn.

Anyway, we have had no idea what to do with our sliding door into the backyard. The only thing I was sure of was that I did not want vertical blinds. I've only had them in apartments and I don't remember them being that bad, but it seems that everyone recommended we not buy vertical blinds. So we didn't. For a year and a half, we had nothing covering the sliding door. We have always wanted something but either didn't know what or just couldn't decide. Recently when I finally got some inspiration to do a little decorating, I decided to just buy a sheer curtain until we could decide on something else. It is amazing how something so simple has made such a difference to the look of the room, the sunlight hitting the hardwood floor, and the temperature upstairs.

I would like to hang some kind of curtain either around or over the sheer curtain, but that could take another year and a half at the rate we're going. I want something that will tie the dining room into the living room since they are right there together. I also want to add some color to a currently very neutral room. There is nothing wrong with khaki and varying shades of brown (in fact, khaki is one of my favorite colors), but we need at least a splash of color in this room. I would like to hang a curtain with some kind of pattern and a couple of colors while Matthew would like a solid color. We haven't been to look at anything yet, but while my mom was here last month we went to look at fabric samples. I ended up finding something I really like from a Smith+Noble catalog. I don't think it's too matchy-matchy, but Matthew doesn't like it at all. He thinks it matches too closely and is too busy. I've never thought that stripes could be too busy.

Please excuse the darkness in these photos. They were all taken at night so the room looks pretty dark. What do you think? (Not that your opinion is going to change mine or Matthew's taste, but at least I will know if I'm completely off my rocker or not.)

No more excuses

I have no more excuses for avoiding a regular workout (I didn't really have any good ones before, and I'm very good at making up excuses). We had the opportunity through a guy at Matthew's work to purchase this equipment back in February for a very good price. It is in good condition and appears that it was not used much by the previous owner. Three guys from Matthew's office helped him disassemble the equipment, carry it upstairs from someone's basement, haul it over to our house, and move it into our garage where it sat for several months. At the beginning of July, I finally decided where I wanted it to be set up and Matthew and a friend moved it into our basement. Carrying anything that heavy and awkward shaped is quite an ordeal, but they did it without creating any holes in the walls or flooring. I call that a successful venture. Yesterday, Matthew finally put it together for me which also proved to be a lot of frustrating work.

After all that time and work, it is now ready to be used. In fact, we both used it this evening. My hope is that I will begin to work out more regularly and maybe even be disciplined enough to do this before work each day. I have the hardest time getting out of bed in the morning, but I know it would give me a great start to the day to get my exercise in first thing. Something about starting the day out that way helps me to make better food choices during the day. I know that it's completely mental, but that is just the way it is with me. We'll see how it goes. Isn't it nice?


This weekend we also finally painted the frame that Matthew made for the basement. We hung it yesterday, but while Matthew was putting the exercise equipment together it fell off the wall and came apart. Hopefully, he'll fix it this weekend and we'll have it back up on the wall. He isn't thrilled with this style of letters, but I think this looks very nice.

One slow step at a time

We are finally getting around to doing a little bit of decoration. We certainly are not rushing into anything. I would have to say that I am challenged in the area of home decor. I have done a few things recently though that I am going to share. We both like simple and clean lines and don't like clutter. Even though this isn't much, this is what we have at the moment.

I added several items above the cabinets in our kitchen.

Yesterday Matthew hung these doilies in our front hallway. One is a doily my grandmother made for me when I was a kid. I wanted to preserve it when I was in college and framed it very cheaply. I recently had it re-framed for our house. After I got it framed, I remembered the doily my mother had made for our wedding gift. Thankfully they both had blue mats (which match the bathroom they are outside), but I had to get a different frame for the gift from my mom this week. I ended up finding one at Michaels that was on sale. I was thrilled! It was hard to get a good picture of both because I had to stand in a tiny corner to be able to see them both. I think it looks nice and am glad to have something else on the walls. These were the first nails that we have put in our walls. (We used sticky stuff for the black MERRITT letters downstairs.)

Productive Weekend

I would say we had a fun and productive weekend. Friday after work, our neighbors came over to eat blue cheese burgers and watch Firefly. If you haven't seen Firefly, I would recommend it. It is a science fiction tv series that only ran for one season. I am not the biggest sci-fi fan, but this show is hilarious to me. I would describe it as something between science fiction and western. It is quite entertaining.

Saturday Matthew worked on staining the fence. You should have seen Max while this was going on. Matthew put him in the backyard while Matthew was on the outside of the fence. Max generally wants to be as close to a person as possible. So he laid against the fence which meant that he got stain on him. I wanted to take a picture of this, but I knew as soon as I opened the door Max would come running. So I didn't even attempt the picture of Max laying next to the fence. It was funny though! While Matthew stained the fence, I ran some errands and played with Max. I went to PetSmart while I was out. A rescue organization was there for pet adoptions. I saw THE CUTEST puppies there (of course, I say that pretty much any time I see puppies). They were a mix of sharpei and rotweiller. I seriously considered bringing one home. You should have seen them. We then cleaned out the window wells. A couple of them were filled with tumble weeds and trash. While Matthew was in one of the wells, he found a tiny frog. I have no idea where it came from, but we freed him into the yard. Hopefully, he hopped away to a new home. We spent the afternoon with our neighbors at the movie theater watching "Hancock." I really enjoyed the movie, but Matthew wanted more background on the main character. We all wanted to go see The Dark Knight but knew it would be crazy to do so over the weekend. We'll have to go another time. Saturday evening some Merritt family friends stopped by on their way through town. The couple and their daughter (who now lives in Boulder) took us to dinner and then stayed the night at our house. The couple is going on a motorcycle trip and will be staying the week in Pagosa Springs. They left their truck and trailer here and took their motorcycle to Pagosa Springs. They will come back through next Saturday and stay the night again. It was nice to see them (I met them a little over a year ago when they came for a ski trip) and here funny stories about Matthew's growing up years in Tennessee.

Sunday morning our friends took us to breakfast before they left town. Afterward, Matthew and I had a semi-lazy day. We were both exhausted for most of the day. Matthew finished staining the fence while I hung curtains on our sliding door. I can't believe it took me a year and a half to get anything hung over that door. It is completely silly. I would still like to hang other curtains over or around the door as well, but that may never happen. It is seriously amazing that we have chosen anything for our house as Matthew and I have polar opposite taste in most things. We may never find a compromise for the curtains. I'll let you know if/when we do make that compromise though. After hanging the curtains and playing with Max in the backyard (during which I had to get the ladder to retrieve the Flying Squirrel that I threw onto the roof), I dislocated my knee (for the 4th time) while heading into the house. I have no idea what happened because it happened so fast. So I've had a sore knee this week. We took Max up to the pond to let him swim (and to clean him off a bit). That is definitely the easiest and most fun way to "give him a bath." Even though no soap is involved, he always smells nicer and is so soft after swimming. He had a great time as usual and this time Matthew got in the water with him. He didn't know what to do about that. He would retrieve the ball but didn't want to get out of the water while Matthew was still in there. When we got home, I watched "The Memoires of a Geisha." I thought it was an interesting movie. I'm not sure if I would recommend it or not. I did enjoy it though and thought the main characters eyes were beautiful.

All in all, it was a fun, relaxing, and productive weekend; however, Matthew is responsible for most of the productive-ness. I think the things he took care of have really made an impact on how the place looks...and that makes me feel nice and at home.

Walking Washer

I am pleased to report that we had an uninterrupted night of sleep last night. I seriously do not think Max even moved all night. When the alarm woke me this morning, he was in the same spot as when I turned off the lights last night. It was wonderful to have a good night's sleep! In fact, after the alarm went off Max wasn't sure he wanted to get off the bed. He was really slow and tired this morning. On a normal day, he tries to get us to play fetch with him as soon as he's awake. It was nice to see that he got so much exercise yesterday and was still worn out this morning. Once I got home from work, he was a recharged Max.

It turns out it was even better than I thought that I got a good night's sleep. I have so much work to do this week. Our quarter ends this Sunday. Normally, that does not mean a bunch of additional work, but this quarter I have a lot going on. I take care of the fixed assets for my region of the company. Each year every store and facility has to go through the fixed asset list to make sure they still have everything on the list. This causes a lot of work for me mostly because people wait til the last minute to take care of everything. I thought last year was a lot of work when I had to make all the changes for 13 stores/facilities...HA! This year I have to do it for 34 stores/facilities. It is challenging to find the time to take care of this on top of all my other work...but even more challenging to figure out what people's notes mean. I sent a list of specifically what I needed on each list. Half of the lists I got back were not complete so then I have to follow up with everyone. Apparently, these folks did not learn to follow directions completely in kindergarten. Fun, fun, fun. I seriously feel like I could work from now until Sunday non-stop in order to finish my work. Talk about stress. Today I realized that I feel like I am in quick sand and my head is just barely above ground. Each time I thought I was pulling myself out just a bit, something else would come my way that was equally important. Man am I ready for a vacation!

We had a Mr. Mom episode at our house this evening. I had a load of laundry in the dryer and another in the washer. When I went to check on the status of both loads, I found that the washer had moved. I've never had this happen. At first I assumed Matthew had moved the washer to get something from behind it. But when I asked him, he had no idea what I was talking about. Has this ever happened to you? I am not sure if you can tell much from these pictures. Just look at the lines on the tile. You will see that the dryer is straight and the washer is not...though it was just an hour ago. Strange... (Please ignore the mess and dirt in my laundry room.)

Washing machine on the fritz

Monday evening after returning from taking our friends to the airport, I started on my gynormous pile of laundry. I discovered during my first load that something was amiss with the washer. The washer filled up and then would not drain or spin. So I made an appointment to have someone take a look at it. M and I talked about what we would be willing to pay for a repair.

I have had this washing machine for quite a while. I think I've had it either 7 or 8 years. I bought my washer and dryer the weekend I graduated from college. It was seriously my most proud and practical purchase at the time. I was so happy to have my own washer and dryer in my own little apartment. I felt quite grown up.

• While still under warranty, the motor went out in my washer two different times. After the second time, they decided to replace my washer rather than replace the motor. Of course, the model was no longer available so I had to pay $80 or something like that for the closest model.
• When we lived in the trailer in Austin, I had to call for a repair. I was so embarrassed to find out the washer wasn't working because the dial was between settings.
• After moving into our house about a year and a half ago, I had to call for a repair again. Our washer and dryer had been sitting in a garage for a year and a half while we rented a townhouse. Once we moved it into the house, the washer did not work. The washer would fill up but would not spin. The problem was the little doo-dad on the lid was broken and the washer did not think the lid was closed. That repair cost a little more than $300.

So I had no idea what to expect today. The guy showed up around 1 pm today (after giving me a time frame of 8 am to 5 pm) to check out the washer. He asked me a few questions because he couldn't get it to do anything at all. After checking out all the usual stuff, he found that the GFI outlet just needed to be reset.

Embarrassing? It was not as embarrassing as the situation above when it was my own error that caused the problem. Frustrating? Definitely. Neither M nor I had even considered checking the outlet. That will be my first course of defense next time around. That cost me $118 today. Yikes. While I am upset about spending $118 for something so silly, I am thankful that the washer lives on for now.

So here's my free advice to you...check the outlet before calling for service on any appliance.

How does your garden grow?

I spent most of Saturday outside planting in the front and back flower beds. This was really my first time to plant like this so I am anxious to see what happens in the next couple of months. We have a really short growing season here - I just planted this weekend and we could have snow as early as October.

I took before and after pictures of both flower beds. It is hard to see all the flowers in the after shot, but I expect (or am hoping) they will grow a lot and fill in the empty spaces.

In the front, I planted carnations and jethro tull coreopsis in pots near the front door and on both sides of the driveway. In the bed, I planted the following.

• spenger asparagus
• pincushion flowers
• foxgloves
• African daisies
• regal geraniums

In the back bed, I planted the following.

• salvia
• dahlias
• petunias

Almost everything in the front ended up being a shade of purple. I really like all the colors, but I saw so many purple flowers that I liked. Since I have never had a flower bed before, I was afraid of having too much color and it all looking chaotic.

While I was working in the flower beds, M worked on our fence. Unfortunately for us, the guy who built our fence did not do a good job or use good materials. So M spent just as long as I did in the flower beds working on the fence. He did a great job fixing it, but thinks other parts of it need to be replaced as well. So we may be working outside quite a bit this summer.

Max behaved very well while I was working in the flower beds. I played with him some, but mostly he just sat near the flower beds holding his Chuck-it toy. He did a great job of staying in the front yard. I tried to get his picture with the flowers, but that didn't work out like I hoped.

Saturday evening we had our neighbors over for burgers and to watch "The Prestige." All day I was thinking about grilling out since the weather was so nice. It was delicious!!

Here's to Spring/Summer!!

Hardwood Floor

We recently had some work done on our hardwood floor while it was still under warranty. After talking to the company that installed our floor, M decided we should go ahead and have some more work done on it to get rid of lines that have formed since we have a couple of rugs on the floor. It didn't cost anything near what we thought it would so it seemed like a good idea. They came yesterday for the first of three days to work on it. They told us we wouldn't be able to walk on it, but they didn't have any other warnings for us. When we got home last night, we couldn't believe how powerful the polyurethane smell was. We went to bed but got up around midnight to go to bed downstairs because we felt like our noses were burning. This can't be good for us. M says that he can still smell it even though he left home 2 1/2 hours ago. He also hasn't been able to taste anything today which is connected to his sense of smell. I hope we aren't permanently damaged. We would have loved to leave some windows open overnight or during the day yesterday, but as I mentioned in my post below it is really cold today and supposed to snow. M is going to rescue Max from there and we hope to stay somewhere else for the next few days so we don't have to subject ourselves to the chemicals.