Day 334 - November 30

I started making pieces of our Christmas cards over the weekend.  I've been so frustrated that I can't make a square peg fit in a round hole that the pieces continue to sit, sit, and sit on the coffee table while I steam.  I'm also waiting for one thing to come in from my November club order so I can assemble what I have, but I'm unhappy with how they're turning out.  I can't decide whether to cut my losses and start over, or to make do.  Grr....

Day 333 - November 29

I had a doctors appointment today, so I got to leave work early and commute while the sun was still up.  What a treat! :)  When I got home, I looked down and was so excited at what I saw!  Please ignore the giant green weed at the bottom and the dead brown weed towards the top.  Instead, blur your eyes a little to adjust for the lousy phone picture, and look at the beautiful blades of grass that are growing through the fertilizer/mulchy substance.  FINALLY!  We're hoping it continues to spread as quickly as it has for the past 2 days!

Day 332 - November 28

The living room is decorated for Christmas now.  A very full tree, our stockings, snowmen on the mantle, and my lighted houses on the shelves.  A working fireplace will be a nice addition, but we're waiting for the extra inspection in a couple weeks before we make a fire.

Day 331 - November 27

Today is my husband's birthday.  We headed to Duclaw for his free lunch with friends, and then home for birthday cake and football and house decorating.  (Well, the guys did a little more football watching and the girls did a little more house decorating, but you know.)  I always mock the watching of college football because we're watching kids up to 14 years younger than us who go to completely random schools - but both games they watched this afternoon at least featured the alma mater of the two boys watching.

The local ice cream place made an out of season "key lime pie" ice cream cake for him which came out really tasty.  I didn't realize they made ice cream pies until a recent facebook posting, so I was glad to find out at the right time of year!  :)

I dug into the bag of video games we've accumulated through recent sales and gave him one of those with his Ravens tickets for January.

It seems as though he enjoyed his day.  I think tomorrow is going to be more of the same.

Day 330 - November 26

Last night on the way home from dinner, we stopped for our 3rd annual Thanksgiving Day Michael's shopping fun.  Then, the car wouldn't start.  The anti theft system locked us out for some reason.  The computer needs to be reset.  Joy!  So we left the car there late last night with all the people who were sleeping out for black Friday.  This morning, we went back to wait for the Tow truck.  What an experience...I'm glad it's (almost) over. :) 

Day 329 - November 25

My pies ... our contribution to Thanksgiving.

Day 328 - November 24

The carnage from today's baking feast.  I made a regular pumpkin pie with a ginger snap crust and then a pumpkin swirl cheesecake too.  It took every mixing bowl we own. :)

Day 327 - November 23

About once a year, I get the premium channels to catch up on the most recent seasons of TV shows.  Really, I wanted to see Dexter so that I don't get spoiled this year.  But once I pulled up the Sho On Demand listings, I remembered how many awesome shows there are!  Weeds is up first, then U.S. of Tara and then Dexter ... but then there's also Nurse Jackie and Californication  ... and I got HBO free with Showtime, so there's Boardwalk Empire and then soon Big Love.  No wonder all the cable channels win at the Emmy's - they can go so much further and do so much more.

Day 326 - November 22

Behold - the organized and ready to go "December baking cabinet!"  Let's eat some sugar! :)

Day 325 - November 21

The downside of having really cheap stuff stockpiled is that when you get a washer that needs special detergent, you have a years supply of regular stuff sitting in the laundry room.  We tried to gift them to Sarah but she forgot to take them. :)  So on Thursday when we show up with our pumpkin swirl cheesecake for Turkey Day, we will also have a big box of Tide to pass out as party favors.  :)

Day 324 - November 20

They're here!  And they work! We were going to wait out the year because our home warranty would cover any problems until March.  However - with the leaks of the Black Friday ads and then the competitive sales earlier in the month to beat Black Friday, we decided to go for it.  We called my parents and had them give us the Consumer Report best buys, did some online research, and compared prices and models at 3 stores.
Best Buy - Their sales were all on pairs only.  A lot of the pairs had one highly rated machine and one that didn't perform so well.  We don't care if our set matches in that way - we just want them both to work.  It was going to be expensive to mix and match.

Sears - Do their appliance people work on commission?  They asked if they could help us and we said we were just browsing.  One guy stalked us the whole time and kept interjecting into our conversations.  Then when a woman talked to us, that guy was making under his breath comments at her until she snapped "I get it - they're yours."  We left shortly thereafter.  If their prices had been a zillion times better than the other options, we would have sucked it up and bought them there, but other stores were competitive so we didn't feel the need to put up with the crap.


Home Depot - They had a good set (sold seperately, but we did wind up getting the set) for a good price.  The salespeople asked us if they could help and when we told them we were still researching, they left us alone.  That did happen with 3 different people, however, they all left us alone after asking.  (There were big "We don't work on commission" signs up too.)  Eventually, we narrowed it down to 2 sets and decided to ask some questions.  We were also simultaneously searching for information online.  What did the world do before smartphones?

Eventually we wound up with these.  The LG steam washer and dryer.  Their reviews are very good, so hopefully they live up to the hype.  We got them at a great, great price. They are going to be $50 cheaper on Black Friday, but we didn't have to stand in line to get them. :)

Day 323 - November 19

I'm currently washing my last thing in our old washer and dryer.  The washer is at least a decade newer than the dryer (if not more than that), but it has issues with filling and then not running.  It doesn't happen on a regular enough basis to call a repair guy (or use our home warranty) and we can' figure out what triggers the problem.  The dryer is just awful.*

*Even though the machines aren't great - the whole reason I'm using them tonight is to shrink a new sweatshirt before we get the good ones.  Sometimes it's good to have the ability to shrink stuff! ;)

Day 322 - November 18

This is the view under my coffee table.  It's where my shoes go every day, and every day I choose a pair to wear.  Currently I'm rotating between the dark blue Nikes with my orthotics and my slip on silver and light blue Dr. Scholls with the occasional brown New Balances thrown in as I break them in.  What's it like to have a job that doesn't make your feet hurt?  I love my job, but I couldn't do it if my shoes were cute instead of uncomfortable.  It's hard enough in sneakers!

Day 321 - November 17

We had a serious storm last night.  It woke us both up with a start just after 1am.  We were comparing it to a hurricane, but when we woke up and saw the paper it sounds like perhaps there were tornadoes locally.  The power outage map had a line going straight down Route 1 from Bel Air to the city.  Luckily, we didn't lose power (yay for hot showers in the morning and alarm clocks going off!) but several neighborhoods in our area did.  Our old grill went flying into our new grill - the picture is after I unstacked them.  I didn't go any further than this at 6:40 this morning because I had work clothes on and there was water and grease all over the covers.  You'll also notice that the tree finally gave up the death grip it had on the leaves.  80mph winds will do that. :)

Day 320 - November 16

For months, we've had a drainage problem with our dish rack.

My mother pointed out last weekend that we didn't have a drainage problem but rather a directional problem because the bottom piece was upside down.  After feeling stupid for not noticing and then not thinking about it for a week, it's fixed now.

Not exciting, I know...but it's been that kind of day.  Just plodding along.

Day 319 - November 15

At first glance you might think - wow, it's dark when she gets to the park'n'ride in the afternoon now!  But then, you might look closer - above the center gray piece of the building.

It's an ultra light!  Someone in the area owns one and flies around fairly regularly ... but I've never been in a parking lot to get a shot with my camera at the right time.  Of course if I rode around with my regular camera it'd be a better shot...

Day 318 - November 14

And now for a different type of book club.  We're reading this for a book study in our school this year.  I spent some time this morning getting through chapter 1.  It's actually really good, and I wanted to read it anyway, but it's hard to get the professional books I want through the library sometimes.  (And REALLY hard to read them in 3 weeks!)

Day 317 - November 13

Tonight was stamping club for November.  We made a cool luminary as well as a pop up card.  The details don't show too well in this cell phone picture, but I like both of them.  I think I might make some luminaries in this way for my mantle for Christmas. 

In all my spare time? :)

Day 316 - November 12

This is the previously mentioned mum bush in the front yard.  When all the other mums were cooperating and growing in a nice globe shape, this one started breaking apart.  About a week ago, it had one tiny branch sticking straight up, and the others had all sunk to the ground in a circle.

Then, I watered the grass.  I didn't turn around when I pulled the hose, and it broke this bush into about 10 pieces. 

Oops.

Guess we have to really get rid of it now.  (Darn?) :)

Day 315 - November 11

This month's book club book is due back to the library this week, but book club isn't until next week.  That means I'm done a whole week early!  This is a civil war era historical fiction book about a woman (Mary) who wants to be a doctor.  Parts of it were interesting, but parts were too far fetched for me.  I enjoyed the medical parts more than the girl meets boy who wants to meet her sister part.

Day 314 - November 10

Monthly Duclaw night was today.  The November beer is always Devil's Milk.  It's some super strong type that comes in a tiny glass.  I, as usual, got my free glass and my brisket sandwich while Mike enjoyed the flavor of the month.

I had the weirdest fibro attack while we were waiting for a table.  I was fine one second, and the next second both of my legs were complete painful knots and cramps.  In addition to the severe and sudden pain onset, every one of my senses went haywire.  The clinking of dishes and glasses was super loud, the lights were flickering weird, and my clothes hurt just touching my body.  When I came home I tried to relax with a hot bath/shower, but it still isn't working.  I can't figure out what caused it - other than the fact that my body is just weird...

Day 313 - November 9

Finally had a chance to snap a picture - I'm never riding in a car on the correct side of the vehicle when we pass it. 

It's been up for more than 2 weeks.  I can't believe nobody has caught it and changed it yet!

Day 312 - November 8

Now that we have "fallen back," there is once again a little light for my morning drive to work.  Even though it's depressing to have the darkness come early in the evening, I almost felt like there was extra time.  We ate when it got dark - but then it wasn't bedtime or tv time yet! 

Day 311 - November 7

Grow, grass, grow!  We have a ton of these blueish green seed/fertilizer spots all over the yard which we are taking great care of.  Now we just need some grass sprouts to make us feel like we're doing a good job! :)

Day 310 - November 6

One of my best friends from high school got married tonight.  The ceremony was at a chapel in the bride's high school (which was also my sister in law's high school, which my husband had actually never been inside) and the reception was at a country club.  It was fun!  We have one more 2010 wedding - the wedding happened last week on a cruise, but there's a reception next month.  What a busy wedding year!

Day 309 - November 5

It's here!  It does fit because the piano & desk are kind of the size of a china cabinet or buffet, however, after looking at an empty room for 6 months, it seems like there is SO MUCH in there!  We christened it with 3 of the 4 parents tonight and a couple pizzas. :)

Day 308 - November 4

The good thing about this rainy day is that it's helping our new grass grow and I don't have to water when I get home!

I hope there is no truth to the old wives tale about trees getting lots of berries when it's going to be a hard winter, because this year, this tree outside my classroom windows has more berries than I have ever seen it get - and I've been watching it grow since the fall of 2001. 

Day 307 - November 3

Our trick or treat bowl has been sitting in the foyer since Sunday ... but I didn't finish eating the candy until right now. :)

Day 306 - November 2

Election Day...We spent the day seeding the lawn.  Woohoo? :)

Day 305 - November 1

Target's having a buy 2 get 1 free video game sale this week so we got Mike's bday and Christmas present and my Christmas present in one swoop. 

I bet you think mine is the yarn game, don't you?  Wrong! That was his choice, apparently it is a some Mario style game that got good reviews.  I'm all about Rock Band 3 - it has a keyboard option!!  Finally, piano lessons are helping me out in my grown up life!  Now they're tucked in a bag awaiting the holidays.