26th Birthday/Thanksgiving/BlackFriday

(I include Black Friday in this time frame because it all blended into one long day)

My birthday/Thanksgiving was pretty awesome. We woke up and Jordan got us Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. I opened my presents, which was the movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall and the promise of bunny slippers (once he found some). After that I took a nap and prepared for a long night.

We went to Emily's house for Thanksgiving dinner. She's a great cook and had SO MUCH FOOD. It was really nice. Then we came home and spent a couple hours with my brother. At 10:30 we met my friend, Stephanie, at the movies to see Australia. Steph is down from Atlanta, so it was REALLY good seeing her! It was an OK movie. It didn't do a lot for the viewer. It kind of just seemed to keep going and going with no real point to it still going.

We got out of the movies at 1:30am and went to the Altamonte Mall. It opened at midnight for Black Friday. Stephanie bought enough clothes from Banana Republic to own a portion of the store. I bought a purse and ring. Let me just tell you there were SO many people at the mall. It was more busy than a Saturday morning.

We finally got home about 4ish and to bed at 4:30. Stephanie spent the night instead of driving an hour and a half back to her parent's house. We woke up at 10:30 and started the shopping all over again. Jennifer, Steph's sister, met us at Target. Pollo Tropical for lunch, yum! And off to the outlet mall on I-drive. It's completely redone, has great stores and is HUGE. Stephanie bought me a sweater for my birthday. I also found this line of products from Bath and Body Works that I bought for my birthday. Instead of getting bunny slippers, I got Lambie slippers, blanket, and pillow. They are made from the softest material I've ever felt.

We spent about 5 hours at the outlet mall. We spent another 30 minutes in the parking lot trying to get out of it. Traffic was pretty awful everywhere, but it was expected considering what day it was.

Black Friday was a lot of fun. It's been a while since I've seriously shopped, especially since Steph moved to Atlanta, she was my shopping buddy. And after all that walking I was pretty tired once I got home. I got my Lambie collection, snuggled up on the sofa with Jordan, and watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It was the perfect way to end the day.

My Movie List

Upcoming movies I want to see

My Ducks

Since life has slowed down a little now that the party is over, I've taken up walking again. I just started this week, but it feels good to get back into the habit. This neighborhood is great for walking in. Lots of trees, pretty yards to look at, a couple lakes. After I get done walking I go sit by the lake. It's surrounded by houses and is private. It's more of a retention pond I guess. But none the less, it's really pretty and peaceful. Good for meditating and just relaxing by. The ducks that live there are clearly used to getting fed. They fly and swim as fast as possible to get to me. Then they come within about 3 feet. The closest duck apparently thinks he gets the biggest reward so they keep trying to out do each other. I've never actually fed them, but eventually I'll remember to take them bread. The white one is my favorite.

Fever

We went to see my grandfather tonight. He's still in ICU. Still only opens his eyes. He developed a fever today. They did blood and urine cultures. That will take 72 hours for the results. The fever is making him more lethargic than he was yesterday. His breath sounds are very coarse, with a cough that makes him turn purple. I think he said "ya" once to a question. He moves his left side, but not as well as his right. He held my hand pretty tight. We have lots of family visiting him.

Australia....!!

I have a whole week off. I don't go back to work until Monday night. What to do with myself? Oh yes, decorate for Christmas. Fix my curtains. Write Christmas cards. Clean out the garage, cause the garage door opener works now and I can actually put my car in it! Then there is Thanksgiving, aka my birthday, Crash O Rama, Stephanie visiting on Friday, pedicures with Jaime, possibly dinner with friends to celebrate the big 26, and I think that's enough. Oh yes, and we will be going to see Australia.



I can't wait for this movie! Nicole Kidman is my favorite actress ever. I'm probably looking forward to that the most for this week. Just kidding. Spending time with friends and family during this time of Thanksgiving is what I look forward to the most....

Perky People Go to Hell

Love it

Papaw

My grandfather had a stroke this morning. He had brain surgery and is now in ICU. We went to see him today. He's heavily sedated still and only manages to open his eyes. We will know more tomorrow when he isn't drowsy.

Christmas Card Time

I'm not sure how I feel about Christmas cards that include photos. On one hand it's nice to get a yearly picture of people you don't get to see regularly. But on the other hand, it's a Christmas card not a photo album. So I figured I'd let whoever reads this decide for me.

AWAKE!!!

Ya... I messed up my sleeping schedule again. I woke up at 7 this morning, went back to bed at 9 and slept til 2 (with the help of benadryl). So I'm still awake. Tomorrow I will not be sleeping late....!

Jordan and I went to see Madagascar 2 tonight. The first one was soooo funny. I think it's my favorite kids movie. But the second one was B-A-D. It still had it's funny one liners, but the story line was a mix between Nemo and Lion King. And they added humans to the story line. It was really bad. Go here, watch all the clips, and you will have seen everything the movie has to offer.

I put our dining room on Rate My Space. I knew it was dangerous, and I've learned a lot from it, about myself and other people. 3 hours ago I would have had a lot of awful things to say, but I've grown since then. I probably shouldn't have done the dining room though. It's my favorite room, I'm not going to change anything about it in the near future, so people critiquing it isn't what I want to hear. I'll try one of the other rooms that I actually want advice on.

Tomorrow we're having some family in town. Sunday we are having Thanksgiving early and celebrating my birthday with my family. This holiday season won't be like any others. My parents are gone for Thanksgiving and we're out of town for Christmas. So much for family time. We won't even spend our first Christmas in our new house. Actually, I don't even know WHEN we will do our Christmas. Not any real point in decorating even. None of the extended family is getting together like we always do on Christmas Eve, too many of us are out of town. Christmas Eve was even better than Christmas day when we were growing up! I guess we'll be breaking tradition left and right this year. Let the holiday joy begin....

Making Fire

It's chilly outside!! Perfect for using our fireplace for the first time. We just so happened to have some starter logs left over from the previous owners. Jordan isn't home, but I'm cold so I decided to have at it by myself.

Kindling, check. Candle lighter, check. Starter logs in place and flue is open. Ready for take off.

The junk mail - kindling - created a nice big fire. I grabbed my camera. Yay! I did it! I made my very first fire in my very first house.

And... the fire was gone before I could even click. The smoke alarm went off. Jelly is running around scared to death. Big ears and big noises don't go well together.

I closed the fireplace doors, opened the sliding glass doors. The smoke alarm eventually stopped.

I started messing around with the flue. It wasn't open very much and didn't seem right. So slung it back and forth. Some soot fell out. Then a lizard fell out! He ran for the sliding glass doors. Peanut snatched him up and he was dead before I could pull Peanut off of him. Sadly, the first use of my fireplace tools were to scoop up a dead lizard and toss him in the back yard.

I call trusty Dad and ask him how much a flue is supposed to be open. All the way, completely vertical. This one isn't. There is a weird latch that is holding the flue handle in place and not allowing it to open all the way. I unscrew it, remove it and, TA-DA, the flue opens all the way!

Now my fire is roaring and the starter logs have taken. I'm too scared to open the fireplace doors, so I'm not getting much warmth out of the deal. But it sure does add a nice cozy feeling to the living room.

Isn't it pretty?



It only cost one lizard his life and Jelly some minor distress.

It's Over!

And I'm already bored! We did so much working up to the housewarming party and now it's over. It was a fabulous party. We had about 35 people show up. We had a steady flow of people from 3:30 until about midnight. The guys from Jordan's work pitched in and got us a grill. Jordan spent most of the night putting it together with 3 other guys. Apparently those things are hard to put together. But we did eventually get hamburgers and hot dogs cooked on it, and they were really good. Our friends Frannie and Cole are excellent cooks, Frannie's actually a chef, and they brought great food. We got lots of gift cards including this cute little gift card holder:





Jaime and Brian gave us beautiful mother of pearl picture frames from Restoration Hardware. Josh and Alison got us a bottle of Crown Royal, that we went through pretty fast (talk about breathing fire!). Shannon and Fred got us a bottle of Oops Chardonnay. And my parents got us flowers, a food basket and these pumpkins:




If I forgot anyone, I'm really sorry (it's been a rough day, read on). I forgot to take pictures until the last group of people showed up - UGH! So these are the couple pics we did get.

Jordan's signature picture


Me and Jordan with our housewarming bottle half empty


Me and Aleen looking very photogenic


Maribel and Covah throwing up some fake gang signs



It was a great party and I thank everyone SO much! Our home is thoroughly warmed. And I got the greatest compliments of all time, from multiple friends, saying our home looks like a model home. THANK YOU!


Today we got some really bad news about my Aunt Franny. She was diagnosed with cancer this past week. They did further tests on her and she has lung, brain, and bone cancer. Stage 4 (the most advanced stage). They are giving her 6-8 months to live. This is the worst possible news we could have gotten. Our family is shedding many tears over this. She is going to be set up with palliative care and move in with her grown daughter. She will get chemo and radiation treatment for comfort. She is in shock and sad she will not get to watch her grandchildren grow up. But she knows she's going to be with Jesus. She's going to see her husband and father-in-law and we will all be together one day. Her pain is still really bad. She has a hard time getting to the bathroom, answering the phone, feeding herself, things we take for granted. Please pray that she will be able to enjoy the rest of her time as much as possible. I just want her to be comfortable.

On a much lighter note, Jordan and I spent most of the day stranded on the side of 429. My car had a squeaky belt for a couple days. It decided to break right after we started on our way to our friend's housewarming party. I was REALLY looking forward to seeing Jamie and Jen's new house. God had other plans for us though. We had my car towed to our trusty body shop. My dad met us on 429, I think mainly for moral support. He was going to try to fix the belt, but it looks like something else is broken too. So we will find out tomorrow what's wrong with it. I just hope it's not expensive. Christmas is always so expensive, especially with flying out of state and missing a weeks worth of work. I just have to remind myself this is exactly what our savings account is for....

Today Is The Big Day!

Yay! It's finally here. Our housewarming party!

Housewarming!

Tomorrow is the big revealing! One of our friends sent us some flowers, which was just so so sweet!



And I got the last decal on the ceiling. I absolutely love it.

Still Awake

I worked last night. It was a busy night because I had a patient I had to assess every hour. Do you know how fast an hour goes by when you have other things to do? It would have been fine if I didn't have 5 other patients to adequately care for.

So 7:30 rolls around and we are all on our way home. I get a call from my good friend Maribel, and her car has a flat tire in the company parking garage. She's really upset cause we are all supposed to be asleep, especially her since she has to go back to work in 11 hours. We decided we're going to fix the tire. I just saw Jordan do it a month ago. We get out the donut tire, we get out the jack and those metal things people get hit over the head with in movies. Jack in place, now to loosen the lug nuts (that's what they are called right?). They don't move. Some nice dude comes by and loosens all of them for us. We should have asked him if we had the jack in the right place. So then we start twisting and turning that stupid jack. It's really hard. It moves the car up a lot, but then seems to not be moving any more. Then the car tilts slightly forward and falls. The jack is bent in half. I'm not going to say it was our fault, but other people jumped to that conclusion pretty fast. I called my dad and he said it was too dangerous for us to change it. I'm thinking he was right. Being the nice friend that I am, I drive my dear Maribel all the way to Waterford Lakes (east Orlando), I live in Apopka (north west Orlando). By the time she is dropped off it's already 8:35. I get home around 9:10. I'm so tired, but I have to wind down. Oh, and changing a tire, if you want to call it that, is a really dirty job. With the little bit we did, I got dirt under my nails.

Just a story that Maribel and I are adding to our collection.

And I found this while winding down



Now I will sleep and dream of miniature Boston Terriers.

All I Want For Christmas

Energizer Bunny

Is amazing how much you can shove into one weekend.

Saturday morning I co-hosted a baby shower for Jaime. I cleaned the house Saturday afternoon. Saturday night we went to a birthday party. Sunday morning we went to the dreaded Walmart to pick up some supplies. Jordan transplanted a tree thing that was in the front yard to the back. I planted some flowers in it's place. He mowed the lawn, I pulled weeds. I washed the screens on the patio, plus the screens in all the windows (which were all put on backwards and that is why lizards were always in between the window and screen). I painted the dining room ceiling to match the wall. And then we painted the guest bath and office together. Unfortunately we have to do some touch ups in both rooms, that's what we get for painting at the END of a long day.

The housewarming party is this Saturday. My plan is to touch up the paint, do another decal in the dining room, hang the stuff in the bathroom, hang the mirror in the living room, and hang the curtains in the bedroom. If I post it I'll feel like I'm going to be held accountable. Then I have to plan the food for the party and clean the house (I hate tile floor, they always look dirty).

On a super awesome note, my mom and dad bought me the vanity I wanted for the guest bathroom. It's this one:




It's my birthday and Christmas present combined, but worth it! Once the holidays are done we'll start remodeling the bathroom.

Today I had to wake up at the un-Godly hour of 6 am! We had a seminar at work that started at 8. It wasn't so bad. I've been in more boring situations. I sat with some of my snarky co-workers so they helped ease the pain. We got to see lots of cool pictures of Head and Neck Surgeries. Since we get the patients after surgery, they are already sutured and stapled back together. Nasty, disgusting pictures BTW.

Then I came home and organized the kitchen pantry and our closets. Now all of Jordan's stuff is in one and all my stuff is in the other. I trimmed our crape myrtle bush. I don't know if there is hope for that thing. Someone trimmed it back to the ground at one point so it's growing skinny little limbs out of it's base all weird.

I think we're going to treat ourselves to a restaurant tonight, and then head to Northland. We're eager to hear what else Pastor Joel has to say about the election.

Much Improvement

I finally got the bathroom painted!! I did that yesterday, Friday, and Jordan finished up the trim today that I couldn't reach. It looks a hundred million times better now that the ugly, poopy color is gone.

Before!



After!



We bought a new light for Jordan's office. These shade chandeliers are really popular right now, and really over priced. We found it at American Signature and it was such a good price.



I bought this rug at Home Goods. I ab-so-lute-ly LOVE it. It's super soft, but not very cushy, but that's ok because it was cheap! And those are the ottomans we just bought. The ones Jordan wasn't so happy with, you know, cause of the price.



And my pride and joy. I put my decals on the wall today. I really like the way they turned out. Exactly what I wanted. I had to figure out the pattern and the measuring. I'm completely satisfied. Once I get the ceiling painted, a large decal will go around the chandelier... eventually.... once I can look at a paint brush again without wanting to throw up.



Oh, and we got the drapes re-hung in the living room. They match the rug really well.



We bought this painting last week from Pier 1. It was 75% off. And it fits in the niche like a glove.

God Answers Prayers

I just read an article Time magazine did on Pastor Joel Hunter, Who Is Joel Hunter, and Why Is Obama Praying With Him. Apparently, Pastor Joel got to have a pretty intimate prayer with Obama on election day. Pastor Joel is doing amazing things trying to bring Christians and non-Christians together on important issues. I love how he focuses on the resolution, not the differences of getting to the resolution. Such as, not focusing on if abortion is legal or not, but preventing women from ever needing the abortion in the first place and giving them alternative choices when the situation arises. I think each side can agree on that.

I really hope Obama is smart enough to include Pastor Joel on his religious counsel. This weekend Pastor Joel will be giving a sermon on Tuesdays election. This is his summary:

“‘God answered your prayers. If you pray, ‘God, put who you want in the White House;’ and you believe that God answers our prayers, then it is logical to assume that Barack Obama is God’s answer to our prayers.”

I'll have to admit, I was convicted on reading that.

Oops

What Taxes Bought

We might be seeing a lot of this in the future


more fail, owned and pwned pics and videos

Complete!

And 2 hours later we have completion.

Just a Little More!

Today was frustrating. I bought paint from the sexist man a couple days ago. Today I put it on the dining room wall. It was completely and totally wrong, I hated it. It was a pretty color, just not what I was going for. So I went back to the paint store and bought (the original) paint choice. It's perfect. I'm letting it dry a little right now so I can do a second coat. Hopefully, I'll get started on the bathroom tomorrow. After this dining room paint is done, the dining room is complete!

Jordan is hanging the living room curtains (again) and once we get the mirror hung and buy a rug, it will be complete.

The ceiling fan in the bedroom is broken, it only has a high speed, none other, so Jordan has to take it down and get another. Or maybe we'll go with a chandelier....!!!

I WILL TACKLE THE BATHROOM TOMORROW! And curtains. And organizing. Oh ya, and I'm hosting a baby shower Saturday, lets not forget about that.

Post #100

This is post number 100. Which is kind of ironic. I started the blog to keep friends and family up to date on the house buying news. And on #100 I'm here to tell you our house made it in the news paper. There is a picture of it and some information in the real estate section of "What's Selling". I don't know how it was chosen or why, but it did and Jaime was really excited about it (maybe because her name was in the paper ;)

Did You?

Pictures

We like to keep the kids outside and the dogs inside.




As far as I'm concerned, the kitchen is complete.

Men ::Rolling my eyes::

Now men are great, and we wouldn't get too far with out them. You know, the whole takes two to create thing. But sometimes I just can't believe what comes out of their little stupid mouths.

I was at the paint store buying my 100th gallon of paint, or so it seems. The man helping me was not very friendly, but whatever, just get my paint right. So he mixed my paint and they always ask if I need help out. If it's more than 2 gallons, then yes, but I only had 2 so I could manage. But this man just said "I got it" and grabbed the cans. Whatever.

When we get to the car he says "You don't look like you'd know how to paint." Which completely threw me off. What the heck kind of statement is that?!?! Clearly stereotypical, sexist, and just plain rude to say out loud. And as I comment back about painting over 15 gallons myself, he says something about getting my nails dirty. WTF old man?? Want to throw a "sweetie" or "honey" in there and really make me livid? Honestly, it just gave me a little extra pep in my step. Yep, I paint on my own, put furniture together, hang curtains, what else you want cause I'll get it done? That's what I felt like saying. Unfortunately, I'm nice and just wished him a good day.

A friend asked if I pounded him with my paint cans. I enjoyed that mental picture a little too much: grown man on the ground in the fetal position begging for mercy as my 2 paint cans fly at him. Ok, maybe I'm not nice.

And on that note, I'm going to paint!
Thanks mom for raising me to be independent. (You all should have heard mom when I told her what happened! She was more riled up than me!)

No Work Surprise

Last night I was supposed to work, but I got canceled, which means I didn't have to go, nor did I get paid. Oh well, it was a nice surprise. Instead I painted for 3 hours. I got one coat on all of the kitchen. Jordan and my dad got the microwave installed. So the kitchen is almost complete. After getting the walls painted though I decided the windows need valances. That will come eventually though.

Today I hope to buy a rug for the living room. I just have to decide which one I want and what I'm willing to pay. We'll see.

Saturday

What an eventful day... just like every other day here recently....

We got our appliances today. They look really good. The kitchen looks so much better with matching stainless steal instead of the old stuff. The wall where the microwave goes is block, so we have to have some kind of special drill bit to hang it. So that didn't happen today. Once that's done, we just have to finish painting, find a new light fixture, and put some hardware on the doors and we'll be done, for a while at least.



We also got our buffet today. It's such a nice piece. Not quite the right color for our table and chairs, it's honestly too nice for them. But we might need a whole new dining room set when we put down the wood floors anyway (the wood colors might clash big time). I really think the buffet is a nice piece though. It'll be even better once I get the wall behind it painted green.




We had my parents over for dinner tonight. It was the first time we used the dining room. It was mom's birthday on Thursday, so I made her gumbo and bought her some presents. Dad of course comes over to do work... kind of feel bad about that, but I swear up and down he enjoys it. He almost got my car's gasoline door fixed, but not quite, so he's moved on to plan B. I swear he can fix anything.

And now we rest and see what Sunday brings.