Insomnia

Today was kind of a weird day due to the fact that I did not fall asleep until 5 AM this morning. After writing last night's post, I got to thinking of my to-do list in preparation for the school year. A combination of this, as well as several classes of ice tea, caused me to get very little sleep last night. I read Conviction for a little while, then TRIED to go to sleep, but my mind kept wandering. The odd thing was, I wasn't nervous or worried about any of this. It was more like excitement and anticipation. I hope this bodes well for this school year. After trying to get comfortable till about 2, I decided I could not stay in bed any longer. I ended up getting my laptop out, sitting on the couch, and revising the Band Handbook for next year. I finally started feeling a little sleepy around 5, and then went to bed.

Meg woke me up around 11:30; it felt like the middle of the night to me. But I forced myself out of bed, because if I slept past noon, then my sleep schedule would be even more off.

That being said, today did not feel like a very long day. I pretty much farted around for most of the afternoon, and ended up doing money stuff. Eventually, we went for a swim to cool off, and then I stopped at the bank to deposit some checks, and picked up some things at the grocery store. We had dinner, and then I worked on my idea for a practice log book for my students next year.

About 8 or so, I took a Tylenol PM, so hopefully I can fall asleep at a reasonable hour. It's 11:30 now, and I am going to try to sleep now. Wish me luck!

The Sunday of Summer

Over my last three years of teaching, I've come to view the summer as one giant weekend. Allow me to illustrate...

June is the Friday of summer. You start out with school, but the whole time, anticipating the arrival of summer. Once school is out, you do your "Friday night party type things," go on vacations, relax, forget about the school year, etc.

July is the Saturday of summer. For me anyway, Saturdays are housework days. So, you concentrate on all of the projects you have planned to do for the weekend/summer. You still have fun of course, it is Saturday.

August is the Sunday of summer. It's your last full day of the weekend/season. You've gotta start thinking about Monday/September, and the work that will need to be done. It is still also you last full day/month, so you gotta take advantage of the day/month.

September is of course Monday, although the analogy stops here. Mondays pretty much suck, no matter how you look at them. September is usually pretty exciting. It was when I was a student... looking forward to new classes/teachers, getting settled in to a new routine, a fresh start and a clean slate, and my favorite part, school supply shopping! As a teacher, it hasn't changed a whole lot. The whole clean slate/fresh start thing is the most appealing to me.

So here it is, late on a "Saturday" night. How did my Saturday go? Did I get everything done I wanted to get done? Let's see...

I planned two major projects. To build a deck, and to finish the nursery. Those are both done! There was other stuff I had planned, such as landscaping the front yard and building a workshop in the shed, that I did not get to. The reason for this being $$$, so I am not even considering those. Looking at all of this, I had a pretty awesome "Saturday."

So now, I need to look towards tomorrow, the "Sunday" of summer. My perfect weekend Sunday during the school year works like this (unless handbells are performing, of course)...

I get up early, and try to get as much school work done as possible. I usually have a list or a pile of work that I plan on doing. My goal is generally to finish it up by lunchtime. This way, I don't spend the rest of the day worrying about school. After lunch, I get the housework done that I didn't get finished on Saturday, or relax, do something fun for myself or with Meg. Sunday nights we go to my parents for dinner. This is a very relaxing time for me. There's always good food at my parent's house, along with joking, laughing, and catching up on a week's-worth of stories. We usually reluctantly leave my folks, to come home, make lunches, pack-up our laptops, and go to bed a little early for Monday morning.

I am going to follow a similar model for my Sunday of summer, with the exception of going to my parents. I don't think they would appreciate us squatting at their place for the last week in August, but here's the basic idea:

The first half of August, say, before the 15th, try to get all of the school work that I planned to do finished. Here's what I've got planned:

• Curriculum maps for all grades
• Updated band handbook and policies
• Updated classroom management policies
• Tentative band schedule for the year
• Lesson plans for the beginning of school.
• Worksheets and materials prepared for the 1st marking period
• Halloween Parade music prepared and arranged.
  
• Create band portfolio system (an idea for tracking student progress I am ripping off of a product I saw at the NJMEA convention)
• Take an NJEA PD course.
• Purchase and read a book on classroom management to fulfill my PIP

This seems like a lot, but I want to get a good head start into the school year, and stay ahead of the game, because, come November, we are going to be a 'little' busy! Also included in this schoolwork is preparing for the upcoming Handbell season:

• Ordering and picking the music
• Work out performance schedule with Jane
• Work out a rehearsal schedule based on that performance schedule
• File last year's music
• Stuff folders with this year's music.

A lot on my plate here, but the sooner it is done, the sooner I don't have to worry about it anymore.

After the 15th, I can relax, take care of low cost home improvement projects, go on cheap day trips with Meg, etc. That gives me a half a month of relaxation, and NOT worrying about school.
Then on to Sunday night, which, in my model, is actually that part of September before school officially starts. That's when I'll really get ready to implement all of this stuff I planned. I plan to spend at least one day before the in-services in my classroom, getting things set-up, stuffing band folders, making copies, etc. I will be adjusting my sleep schedule to get me back to getting up at 6 AM. I will be mentally preparing (and not "worrying") about the school year. Then, September 7, a.k.a, Monday morning, rolls around, and its another school year/workweek. Only this time, with a new member of the family coming around Period 3 :-).

This summer has been/will be pretty awesome. Last summer was all about moving. That was cool, because I love this house. But there was no relaxation. It was packing the old house up to July 15... after that, it was painting and unpacking, pretty much up to the start of the school year. The other thing is marching band. I will not be doing it in the fall due to our little girl coming, as well as a recent refocus of my future career goals. Though I always enjoyed doing marching band, the fact that it starts in the beginning of July and involves a week away at band camp puts a big damper on the end of summer. As soon as you get to that first band practice, it feels like September.

So here's to the Sunday of Summer, I am ready!

Whoops, this blog is about what I did everyday. Kinda forgot to talk about Sunday, TODAY! Here is a bulleted list version of what I did:

• Got up at 9 - breakfast
• Moved tools and paint out of guest room, and put everything away
• Cleaned and organized shed
• Pulled up all of the grass for good in Max's "Poop Pit"
• Weeded the garden in front of the pool
• Sprayed "Round Up" on all of the weeds growing up from the cracks in the pavement on our property
• Mowed, weekwhacked, and blew the back yard
• Took a swim to cool off
• Cleared off my desk (again!)
• Moved boxes in the family room to the attic
• Nick, my parents, and Laura and Sean came over for dinner
• Dad lent me edger to clean up front yard. Family loved deck and nursery.
  
• Made grilled chicken with rub for dinner for family
• Played Encore game with family
• Mom brought water ice for dessert, yum!
• Blogged for a LONG time.

Sunday, here I come!

Nursery's Done! (for now)

If you've been reading my posts, you know this already, but since I had trouble uploading pictures last night, I am posting them now.


Left corner of the room with the crib


Window with valance and blinds installed


Right corner with rocker chair


New closet door installed.

We are actually not finished yet. The room stills needs a dresser/changing table, diaper pail, bookshelf, hamper, and other stuff I just can't seem to think of right now. Some of the stuff we hopefully will get from a baby shower. My parents are also going to buy us a dresser and a bookshelf. But, for all intensive purposes, the nursery project is done! 

The Chair

Woke up what felt like was early this morning, but was really 9:30 or so. It is going to take forever to get me back to a normal sleeping schedule. I am going to have to start in the middle of August or something.

Well anyway, we had to go to Babies-R-Us to pick up the rocker chair. We went there, got the chair, came home and set it up no problems. It looks great! I WOULD post pictures, but it won't seem to work for me tonight for some reason.

After that, I made the shopping list and straightened up the kitchen. Nick came over to borrow a music stand for his gig tonight, and we ended up offering lunch, so he hung out here for a while. After Nick left, Meggie took a nap, and a fooled around with StumbleUpon for a while. Found this neat website called Nutrition Data, which gives you the nutrition facts on pretty much everything. You can even put in custom recipies, and it gives you a nutrition facts label for it. I made one for my spaghetti sauce. Pretty healthy, actually.

We went shopping. It was an expensive shopping trip as usual, but I have come to realize that eating healthy=expensive food, and that our health should be more important than money. Don't know how that will go once we are paying for daycare, diapers, and everything else. I also went to Home Depot to get another bi-fold door. Our pantry door has been falling of the track for months now. Since I had such an easy time with the nursery door, I figured I'd pick up another one, and replace the pantry door.

We got home, and I vacuumed the pool. As usual, something went wrong, and I had to end up taking the suction line hose out and unclogging it. It is always something with this pool. At least this problem was easy to fix. When I got done vacuuming, Meg and Max came out to swim.

We had dinner, a new experiement - crab stir-fry, with that imitation crab meat. I LOVE imitation crab meat believe it or not. I can eat a whole package of that stuff cold and in one sitting. I am not a big fan of stir-fry, but it is cheap, healthy, and Meg loves it. So, I just picked out the veggies I don't like and enjoyed. I thought I would be hungry later on, but here it is, 12:30, and I feel fine.

After dinner, I installed the new pantry door, then we had what I call "Bobby-Meggie-Maxie Time" in the nursery. This concluded with getting Max over his fear of hampers. We put a hamper on it's side on the ground, and put Max's Kong all the way in the back. After 10 minutes, and a lot of barking at it, he finally got up the courage to climb in there and get the Kong.

Spent the rest of the evening messing around with the computer. Found a new program called SyncToy, which lets you keep folders between computers syncronized and up-to-date. I think I am going to try it for our music and picture collection.

I should really get to bed now. Lots of work to be done tomorrow, because the family is coming for dinner, and the house, inside-and-out, needs a lot of TLC!

Max in the Nursery

Max is enjoying the new nursery just as much as we are...




Here are three pictures of him hiding underneat the crib during a thunder storm.


This is because we have nothing better to do on a Saturday night than torture the dog. We got him over his fear of hampers by putting his Kong all the way in the back. It took him 10 minutes and lots of barking at it to finally figure it out. Genius! 

Carpet!

Got up VERY early this morning (7:30) because Empire gave us a window of 8:00 - 6:00 to come and install the carpet. We got up, had breakfast, and did our normal morning computer routine (reading news feeds, other people's blogs, posting, etc.). I was feeling VERY sleepy, and suggested to Meg that we take naps in shifts until Empire got here. So, I went into the family room and fell asleep on the recliner. They arrived a little after nine, when my nap ended, because carpet installation is very noisy. They finished pretty quickly, and the new carpet looks great. It is so nice to have that old stinky carpet out of the house. Below, you can see the room with the new carpet.



Meg and I got started right away with finishing the room. Meg did a few paint touch ups. I reinstalled the shelving in the closet and assembled the crib. Meg set up all of the bedding, and began to move all of the other baby stuff in there. It looks adorable, and matches greatly with our paint. Check it out below.



Later on, I took a trip to Home Depot to buy closet doors, a curtain rod, and blinds. I came home, and installed all of that stuff. I thought I would have trouble with the closet doors, because all of the other closet doors in our house are falling off the track. Apparently the previous owner of this house was a complete moron when it came to installing stuff, because I had it up in like 15 minutes. I ended up taking it down again so I could paint it.

Meg talked to my mom this afternoon to find out if we could borrow the van so we can pick up the chair for the nursery tomorrow. My mom invited us out to dinner at Applebee's. Woo-hoo, free dinner! I offered to pay, and then to leave a tip, but, as usual, my dad insisted he pay. Mom and Meg got dessert at Applebee's, but nothing really looked good there for Dad and I. I have a nut allergy, and almost everything had nuts in it in some way. So, my dad suggested we stop at Baskin' Robbins on the way home, so the two of us could get dessert. I had two scoops of Cookies-n-Cream icecream, and it was delicious! I have been eating so healthy lately, and I really missed yummy things like icecream. It was nice to have a treat.

After dinner, we went back to my parents, and Mom and Meg and I went over the registry, and Mom made a few more suggestions. She also hinted about the baby shower and other things, and then eventually went through my baby book, and all of the gifts I got for Christmas when I was little (boy, was I spoiled). Meg and I left with the van and came home. I put another coat of paint on the closet door, blogged, and now, I am off to bed. Good night! 

Registering

There was a pretty amazing electrical storm last night, so I was not able to blog. I have gotten in the habit of unplugging all of the electronics in our house (except for the crappy TV in the living room, I hope it gets zapped so we can get a new one) after what happened to my Grandpop's modem. After a lightning storm a few months ago, his modem got fried. Luckily, he just called Verizon, and they gave him a new one.

I can't remember what I did yesterday morning, which probably means it was a whole lot of nothing. But after lunch, we went to Baby Depot to go baby registering. I was a little overwhelmed with the process, since I had really no idea how much stuff you needed. It wasn't the basic stuff that bothered me. It was more that as the baby gets older, you need to keep getting new stuff. Besides being tired (I am not a good shopper), I had fun. I just hope someone throws us a shower so we get a lot of this stuff. You can check out our registry here.

When we got home, we took a swim, because it was really hot out. Then we had teriyaki pork chops for dinner. This time, a dinner experiment that went well. Meg and I did some touch-ups in the nursery. We are gonna wait to touch up the walls and trim until after the carpet is put in, since the process usually scuffs up the walls. But I touched up the ceiling, and Meg filled in the yellow stars and moons a little better. After that we got the room cleared out, and spent the rest of the evening watching lightning.

Stars and Moons

Whoa, lots of pictures in those last two posts. Love having a digital camera. Now I am move on to today...

Woke up EARLY because the man from Empire was coming at 9. He got here, we looked at samples and stuff. The were more than Home Depot, but competitive with everyone else Meg had called. Home Depot wouldn't be able to install the carpet until three weeks. Empire will be installing the carpet on Friday, so we went with them.

Right after he left, we began taping areas for the darker blue squares. Meggie helped me with this, and we got it done quickly. I then went through and painted all of the dark blue squares. Below, I am painting the dark blue squares.


We chilled for a while, basically waiting for the paint to dry so we could do a 2nd coat. During this time, I also finally got around to fixing the back door screen that Max walked through a few months ago. This would be the 2nd time I've fixed the screen for the same reason. You'd think he'd (I mean we'd) learn!

Before starting the 2nd coat, we discovered a problem. After pulling back some of the tape, we realized that the darker blue paint had bled under the lighter, leaving a very jagged edge when we removed the tape. Meg came up with the idea of moving the tape over a little bit and then repainting the squares. So, we moved each piece of tape over, about a 1/16 an inch, then repainted the squares, very promptly removing the tape before any more seepage could occur. We also removed the long horizontal tape, and it looked really nice.

Next, I made some pasta salad for dinner, and then we took a swim for a while to cool off. Had burgers for dinner, and then moved on to stenciling the stars and moons. Meg and I thought that it would be too busy to do a moon/star on every block, so we ended up only doing it on the dark blocks. The stenciling was a big pain in the neck, and basically created very sloppy looking stars and moons. Meg took little paint brushes, and touched everything up to reshape it. It looks really nice now. You can see the whole room in this post, as well as the step by step progress in this post. Here is a close-up of the completed border.



Meg and I are both dead tired, having gotten up early, and accomplishing a lot today, so off to bed I go (hey, it's only 10:30!) 

More Pictures

Here's a tour around the whole room.




 

Today's progress...

Lots done today, as you can see...


Veritcal tape has bee placed to mark off dark squares.


Dark squares are painted. This was a bit of a problem, as the darker paint blended underneath the tape. We had to move each piece of tape over about 1/16 of an inch in order to cover the bleeding in the 2nd coat. We were also much more careful when doing the second coat to keep this from happening again.


Right after finishing the 2nd coat, we removed all of the tape.


Later on, we stenciled on the stars and the moons. This was also not easy, but Meg's handywork with little paintbrushes fixed any mistakes made during stenciling. 

New Neighbors and Money Woes

Woke up this morning and had breakfast, then actually cleared off my desk. I am going to try to get in the habit of going through the mail every day. I tend to let it pile up. The most frustrating thing is that it is mostly student loan and credit card offers, so you spend time going through it, and it is pretty much useless.

After going through the mail, Meg and I talked about going out for lunch, but I wasn't sure if we had the money for it. So, I took all of our recent receipts (this I do about once a week), and put them all into Microsoft Money. Another part of my weekly "money stuff" as I call it is printing up a report of our spending by category (gas, food, bills, etc.) and plugging them into a spreadsheet budget. After doing this, I found out that we were already pretty much over in expenses for the month, and that had us both kind of bummed...

We have always tried sticking to a budget, and we do it for the most part. But, it definitely is not fun. I feel like I am constantly making a big deal about little things. For example, I was upset to see that we had already spent $550 on groceries this month. And we still have one shopping trip left. Our budget was $500 for the month. I don't really know how to cut back much more. We do all of our shopping at the Wal-Mart Super Center, which has really good grocery prices. We make a meal plan, and a list, and stick to it. We don't impulse buy. Besides groceries, we do a lot of other things well. We hardly eat out. Maybe once a week, if we are lucky. We have recently given up on those extra Wawa runs for a snack. We $0 budgeted for entertainment, and very little for travel. If we do something fun, it is because we have a gift card, or it is free. We worry about whether to have people over for a get-together, because it will blow our grocery budget.

So for a while, Meg and I were quite bummed, but then I started to thing about some GOOD things that we do, that other people don't. First off, we have never not paid a bill, ever. I always make sure there is money to pay the bills before anything else. We do have a lot of debt, between student loans, my car, the mortgage, and the ONE credit card we occasionally use, but I make sure to always make payments on those too. I know of people who can't do this. They skip bills, or don't even bother to open them. They pay credit card bills with other credit cards. And you don't see it, but I wonder if these are the same people who eat out every day for lunch, stop at Wawa or Dunkin Donuts, or Starbucks or wherever on their way home from work, and go on vacations, and the movies, and concerts and other stuff. Of course there's no way to prove it, but we must be doing something right if all the bills get paid, even if it means having less fun. Meg pointed out further that we are very lucky, here it is that we get two months of the year off, essentially paid (if you divert some of your income during the other 10 months). So all of these things made me feel a little better. We found some burgers for lunch, which were yummy, and then moved on to our entertainment for the day... getting haircuts.

Actually, this is one of my least favorite things to do. I tend to put it off, but Meg really wanted to get hers done, and I said I would go with her. I feel awkward having a stranger cut my hair. You either get a stylist who doesn't say all but two words, or you get the ones that feel pressured to talk, and then you get in the same old conversations as usual. "Where do you work?" "Do you have any kids?" "What do you teach?" "When's the baby due?" etc. Not that I have a problem revealing these things to complete strangers (I do blog, don't I?), but it just seems weird.

Anyway, we both got our hairs cut, and we both look good (Meg especially!). We went to Wal-Mart and picked up a prescription, then went to Home Depot to buy a ceiling fan and inquire about their carpet installation service, and then came home.

Meg and Max went for a swim, I started my sauce. Was a little nervous about the meat for the meatballs. It just didn't smell right to me, but I figured I was imagining things and used it anyway. The meatballs did turn out okay. While cooking the sauce (once you get it started, you have to stir it every 15 minutes for two hours), I installed the ceiling fan. After Meg got out of the pool, she baked some cookies to take to our new neighbors...

They seem pretty nice, or "he" in this case, as we only met the husband. It's a husband and wife, and they have a 3 year old girl, and a newborn boy. When I first saw the guy moving in (hey, I'm nosy), I was a little scared. He was very big and muscular, and looked like the kind of guy not to cross. But, we haven't had neighbors yet that we got along well with, so we decided to be friendly and bold and make an approach. He was actually very nice, though was busy painting. He told us about his wife and two kids, and thanked us for the cookies. They haven't officially moved in yet, as they are still painting and stuff. Hopefully they will remain good neighbors, as we were happy to see the last ones go. I know I will come off sounding like an old man here, but they were very noisy. Between the car stereo and their two dogs, it was rarely quiet. Plus, our bedroom window is right by their driveway, making the noise problem worse. The wife there was usually friendly, but her husband was basically a freeloader who rarely helped with anything, and was unfriendly as anything. When we moved in last year, I introduced myself to him, and he pretty much blew me off for some reason. Whatever, they're gone now. I have a good feeling about the new neighbors.

After dinner, I removed the tape from around the trim in the nursery. I didn't take any pictures tonight, as not much as changed. We hope to do more with the border tomorrow, so I will have pictures in my next post. Meg and I laid on the floor, and stared up at the "starry sky" for a while and talked baby stuff. I am actually going to try to get to bed early tonight, as Empire Carpet is coming at 9 tomorrow to give us a quote. Good night!

Stars and Stripes

Lots of progress on the room, as you can see from my last post. I did not post yesterday because I was up till 2 AM taping the lines for the border and the trim.

So here's yesterday...

Kind of a blah day. I've felt like I am in a funk lately. Unless I've done something productive at the end of the day, I feel a little depressed. The only bad thing is, sometimes I never get motivated to do something productive, and then I end up blaming myself for wasting the day. For example, my desk is a mess; it's been that way for days now. Why haven't I bothered to clear it off. Now, I have been painting, but not the entire day. I've been way busier before. I can't even complain about being busy. I can't complain at all (except here), because I am not working right now, and still have money. So yes, I will stop complaining, and make the most of my days for the rest of the summer! (I heart being a teacher).

So anyway, didn't do much during the day, but at night, we had dinner at my parents. That was kind of a blah visit too. My dad wasn't feeling good at all, my sister wasn't there (she tends to be the life of the party), and my brother was only there for part of the night, and he wasn't feeling good either. So, it was mainly Meg, myself, and my parents. Not that this is a bad thing. We ended up staying till past 11. My brother and I were showing each other stuff on our laptops when I looked at the taskbar, and saw it was like 11:15! So we headed home, and I got started with taping...

Earlier in the day, I tried it with just a regular level. It didn't really work. When I had finished one wall, the tape was noticeably sloping upwards. So, I borrowed by dad's laser level, which really helped. I finally finished all of the taping, and then went to bed...

Got up a little earlier today, since Laura was coming at noon to help paint. She got here, and I had her paint the stripe in between the two tape lines. While she worked on that, I painted the trip. The stripe was easy, so I had her paint the large moon in the corner of the room. She is very good with art, and it had to be done freehand for the most part, but she did a really great job with it.

After we finished, Meg and I treated Laura to lunch by ordering sandwiches and stuff. This was a nice change, as Meg and I usually eat leftovers for lunch. It is more budget-conscious. I would love to eat out every day for lunch, but that would get very expensive. My sister brought her suit over, so we all took a dip in the pool to cool off and relax.

After that, my sister left, Meg went to the grocery store, and I went to start dinner... my famous sauce (tomato) with meatballs and sausage... only to discover that I never defrosted the meat. So I took a look at our meal plan for the week (yes, we make weekly meal plans, have been every since we got married... we are organized freaks), and saw "Sour Cream Chicken," a recipe I got from this cookbook Meg recently received. The recipe sounded good. Chicken breasts with sour cream, onion soup mix, and a little bit of milk, baked. Well, it was disgusting. I took one bite and managed to swallow it. I tried another bite and had to spit it out! I ended up just boiling up some cappellini and mixed with garlic, butter, and cheese. Needless to say, I am hungry; I'll probably have a little snack before bed.

So after dinner, it was back to painting. I put 2nd coats on the stripe and the trim, and then started putting the stars on the ceiling. I had made a the stencil, and wasn't sure how it was going to work. I am bad with spatial stuff, so I had Meg mark where the stars should go with a marker taped to a stick. Then, I moved around the room, stenciling a star over each dot. It took some time, but it looks great. Check out the picture below of the moon with some stars.



Here you can see a good summary of the day's progress, and more stars.



Well I am tired, hungry, and covered with paint. So off to snack, shower, and sleep, in that order!

Progress...

I had six pictures, but Picasa will only let me post 4 for some reason... check out This Post for earlier pictures of the progress. I will give you more of an update on my next post.


At this point, ceiling and walls have been painted.


Masking tape was put around trim, and border was outlined with tape.


Border and trim are painted, Laura painted the moon.


Border and trim got a 2nd coat. Stars were added to the ceiling.

Rainy Day

Yesterday, weather-wise, was a yucky day. It was pretty much cloudy all day, with a few hints of the sun. It also threatened to storm all day, but it never really did. However, I took advantage of a good rainy day, and got some miscellaneous things done inside the house.

I finally got around to organizing our laundry room. It had never really been done. When we moved in last summer, we kinda just unpacked things and stuck them places. I threw out a lot of stuff, and condensed things so now we have room to put future junk (from what I hear, having kids accumulates a lot of junk). While I was organizing the laundry room, I was also doing the laundry.

I also finally fixed our leaky shower faucet. For months now, it has been dripping constantly (I guess that explains the last water bill). I have a Do-It-Yourself Plumbing book from Home Depot, and used that to figure out what was wrong. I replaced the worn-out part, and it works great now. I also added a ceiling light to the laundry area. We had this dark hallway that served as the entrance to the laundry room. I took the light that used to be in the nursery (since we are going to put in a ceiling fan), and installed it in the hallway.

At night, Meggie and I played the Encore game. I was winning for most of it, but she won in the end. She actually remembers words to songs. I am terrible at remembering words. There's this Comcast commercial where this guy is singing "Born to Be Wild" in the shower and keeps messing up the words, and Mr. T bursts through the wall and yells at him. Well, that is pretty much me, the guy in the shower. Remembering words to songs is a really important skill when it comes to playing Encore, therefore, I lose...

I spent the rest of the evening StumbleUpon-ing. What a cool extension for Firefox, a bit addicting though, as I sat in front of the computer for two hours just looking at all of the different websites it has. Eventually, I went to bed, and read some more of Conviction.

Slow Day...

I've been so productive the past few days that I feel like I got very little done today. It isn't like I sat around all day or something, but I certainly didn't get a room painted...

Woke up this morning with a phone call from the oilheat company. They were coming in an hour for the annual furnace tune-up. So we had to get up and dressed, and I had to straighten up the laundry room a little, since that is where the heater is. Everything works fine. He did have to run the heat for about 10 minutes, which was loads of fun in July weather.

I sat around for most of the morning, and then decided to go to the pool store to get new hose connectors since the hoses on the filter kept popping off. I also needed to get a new backwash hose, since the old one exploded last time I backwashed the filter. I got what I needed, came home, attached the new hose connectors, cutting my finger in the process. They work great, and hopefully the hoses won't pop off anymore. Then, I decided to backwash the filter. I hooked up the new hose, made very sure that there were no kinks this time. Turned on the pump, and after 30 seconds are so, the hose popped off. Unfortunately, I was standing right in front of the connection, and I got soaked (with dirty filter water, mind you). Hooked it up tighter, checked for kinks again (no kinks), and turned it back on. Another 30 seconds, and boom, the NEW HOSE BURST! That was a waste of $20. I don't know what this is happening, but I ended up using a shorter hose which didn't reach all the way to the street. I flooded our and our neighbors back yards. I came in frustrated, then Meg and I decided to go for a swim (I was halfway there, anyway). Of course, the minute we got out there, we heard thunder. No storm actually ever came...

We eventually proceeded with our normal Friday night ritual... Peter's Diner for dinner, and then Wal-Mart for grocery shopping.

After shopping, I spent the rest of the evening in front of the computer looking at Optical Illusions, and solving riddles, on websites I 'StumbledUpon.' Click the links and challenge yourself!

3 Day Progression

Just to give you an idea of the progress with another corner of the room...

Here's the 'almost' original room. There was originally two holes that had to be patched.

Here's the end of Day 1, after primering and painting the ceiling.

Here's the end of Day 2. Ceiling and walls are finished.

More Painting

A big day for painting, but it was fun. I really do enjoy painting, only to Meg's surprise. I find the process relaxing... it gives you time to reflect.

I started the morning by putting the 2nd coat on the ceiling. I had lunch, then got started on the walls. The green looks great! It will look even better in softer light, I have a feeling. I was about to start the first coat when my Mom surprised us by sneaking in. Actually, she just walked in the front door, and neither of us noticed. She dropped by a baby book that she bought for us. While I painted, Meg and Mom went through old pictures of me (how cute ;-) and put them in chronological order. Meg is working on photo albums, and needed more info to finish mine. Moms are good for that kind of stuff.

I finished the 1st coat with BARELY enough green. I was a little nervous about buying a new can, because sometimes the colors don't match. We learned this in our old house. We had picked a beige color for the hallways and spare bedrooms, so we needed a lot of paint. Our original estimate of 3 gallons was not enough. I went to Home Depot and got one more gallon, began to put it on, and noticed it looked different. I figured it would dry the same color. Well, I ended up doing a 2nd coat on the entire hallway and painting an entire bedroom before I realized that the paint had been mixed wrong. I went back to Home Depot with a paint chip, and had them verify that the color was correct. Then, stayed up all night, repainting everything I had just done. So, you can see why I was a little nervous about this...

But it all worked out well. I went to Home Depot, got another gallon of green, and finished the 2nd coat. Below is a picture, same corner of the room as the last post.


"Now we play the waiting game... oh, the waiting game sucks! Let's play Hungry Hungry Hippos!" (Homer Simpson). Now DOES begin the waiting game, because the next step is to tape off an outline to a giant stripe that will be our border. You aren't supposed to put tape on this paint until it cures. According to the can, it requires a week, but I've done this after two days, and it has been okay. So, that puts us at Sunday. Meg's friend Stacey, who is an art teacher, may be coming on Sunday to help us lay out the tape and create sun and moon stencils. Then, it will be back to painting.

Well, I am physically exhausted. I may enjoy painting, but it is a major strain on the body. I've had a nice, long shower, and am about ready to bed. I think the picture of Max below sums up y feelings. Good night!

Major start on the Nursery

I got a major start on the nursery today. First, here is the picture I took last night--the "before," just one corner of the room.

All of the walls are different colors (green, yellow, and tan--very tacky), and the carpet is disgusting!

So, I managed to roll out of bed at almost 11! It was actually cool for a change in our room, which helped me sleep in. We got up, and quickly had breakfast, because I THOUGHT a rep from Prudential was coming at 11 to drop off my life insurance policy. Turns out I was wrong, and the meeting was scheduled at 1... no big deal, it got me out of bed.

After our meeting, Meg went shopping, and I got started in the Nursery. Cleaned it really good, dusting and vacuuming and all. Then I rough sanded all of the walls, got what I needed from the shed, and began to primer. By the time Meg got back from shopping, the walls and ceilings were primered. She was very impressed at how quickly I work. Painting is one of my favorite things to do, and I work best at it by myself. I just have a system, and get it done quickly!

Meg had several errands to run, the most notable being that she ordered the rocker for the nursery. Blue gingham. I'm sure she'll put a picture on her blog soon. We had dinner, and then went out to Home Depot to buy more painting supplies, and all of the paints.

When we got home, I got started right away by painting the ceiling. It is a very light blue called "rain water." It looks good, but probably will need a 2nd coat. Meg and I really weren't sure about the color we chose for the walls, called "water sprout," which is green. We had a bad experience at our old house. We painted the kitchen green, with a color that looked great on the card and in the can. It even looked okay going on the walls. The next morning when we got to the house (we were still living out of our apartment at this time), we saw that the color was this hideous neon green!! We picked a new color, and I ended up taking a sick day at school and repainting the entire kitchen! So as you can imagine, we were a little nervous about going with green again. So, rather than waste a lot of time, I painted a small section of the wall. It looks great now. Hopefully it will still look good in the morning. Here is a picture of what I accomplished tonight (same view as before)...


Ceiling blue, walls primered. You can see a square of the green there. It is really hard to make out colors in these pictures, because of the harsh light of the bare bulb.

I am STARVING, and am going to have a midnight snack, read more of Conviction, then go to bed.

It's a Girl!

So, we had our big ultrasound today, and the results are in... it's a girl! The proof is in the picture below. The arrow is pointing to the female 'parts.'


It was a surprise for me, because I did really think it was a boy. I am happy, of course, since it really doesn't matter, although a little bit nervous, because I am not quite sure what to do with a a girl. Everyone has told me what to do... spoil her, which I am sure I will! :-) So, now we can stop calling her "it." The name is still secret though. You'll have to wait until November to find that out! Below is another picture of her, on her side, facing up, head to the left.


She's healthy and growing at the correct rate. We have to have some more pictures taken next time, because she did not cooperate and wouldn't show her spine, umbilical chord, or heart. I also got to meet the doctor that delivered me, since he is who we saw after the u/s. I bet I made him feel old.

After the Ultrasound, we stopped at my parents to deliver the good news to my mom and Laura who were home. We hung out there for a while, came back home, and began to clean the house top-to-bottom. About 6 or so, my Mommom and Poppop got here. We had chicken for dinner (more McCormick rub stuff), and pie for dessert, and sat around and talked. They were very impressed with dinner and our house. Max wasn't too bad, we just had to keep him busy with a stuffed Kong and other treats.

Well, I am very tired, and I still have to do another coat of joint compound on those holes I had to patch.

Party and Today

Okay, so it was really late last night when I got home, so I did not blog. I posted some pictures, but this wasn't nearly enough... so here I go.

Sunday was awesome, the party was great. Lots of people showed up, the food was really good, the yard looked great, people really had fun, and my brother and sister were much more helpful.

We went over to my parents house around 2 or so to continue helping them get ready. My brother and I blew up a bunch of floatie toys for the pool my mom had bought. I shucked some corn, set up tables and decorations, and Meg helped my mom get food ready inside.

About 4, guests started showing up. I kept myself very busy in the beginning of the party. I cooked about 30 burgers on the grill, and basically made sure all of the food was stocked and ready to go. Meg was busy as well, helping my mom out inside, and making sure all of the guests knew where the food and drinks were. She also helped out in an interesting way, as my mom put it, "Meg is making sure that all of the guests are getting 'lai'-ed." My mom bought lais for all of the party guests, flowery ones for the girls, sea-shelly ones for the guys. My dad got this big gaudy bead thing, and the party hosts (My mom, me, Meg, Nick (my brother), Laura (my sister), and Shawn (her boyfriend), all got special lais. It was a really cool touch.

Most of the day there was a huge volleyball game in progress on the side yard. I would have played, but was so busy, I never even got the chance to get out there. This wasn't a big deal, as I am not all that good at volleyball, or any other sport for that matter. A few people swam, and most everybody else sat in the back yard and ate and talked, and pretty much enjoyed themselves.

Mid party, Meg and I had to come back to our house to feed Max. Feeling a little guity, we let him go for a swim, since he would be stuck in the crate the rest of the night.

After getting back, we sang "Happy Birthday" to my dad, and he got all kinds of old-fart type gifts. If you check out the pictures, you'll see the "old-fart" had, the BBQ apron, and various badges. He was also given a cane with a horn, rear-view mirror, and change purse, thick novelty classes, rubber gloves and KY jelly (I don't think I had ever seen my dad blush so much), and the list goes on.

Afterwards, I took a dip in the pool, and spent the rest of the evening in the Tiki hut with Meg, Laura, Nick, Pat (one of Nick's friends), and Shawn. We all basically reminisced on childhood, and told stories about high school and such. It was also nice to get to know Shawn more. He's been around for a few months now, and we are all hoping he sticks around. None of Laura's past boyfriends would ever give us the time of day. I can tell that he and I probably have very different interests (coincidentally, so do my sister and I), but it doesn't bother him, and he talk anyway. It is the mark of a geniune person.

Soon, everyone left, and thanked us for a great time. Then the clean-up process... It didn't take that long, but afterwards, more talking and reflecting on the day. The evening ended with an amusing argument about fonts... Comis Sans MS is "played out" to quote my brother. Which is better, Arial size 12 or 10?? Times New Roman is boring, etc...

We got home around 1 and went to sleep.

And on to today...

Got up, had breakfast, then went out to the garage. Got the whole thing cleaned out, and I mean cleaned out! I don't think I have ever seen the garage cleaner. Now, we can start putting on of the cars in the garage again.

Had lunch, then we went for Max's annual checkup at the Vet. He is in perfect health, and we were both impressed with his behavior. Taking him to the vet used to be a nightmare, but he is getting much better about it. We got smart and brought a Kong stuffed with peanut butter, dog food, and pieces of hot dog. Max was too distracted to bother people or other dogs. He was very cooperative when getting his shots and while the vet looked him over. The vet also told us that labs make great family dogs, since we told him we were expecting.

After bringing Max home, we took a trip to Deptford for shopping. I stopped at Home Depot, and got some things I needed to start on the nursery. We then went to the Deptford Mall. Meg dropped her new medic alert bracelet to be engraved, then we went to Motherhood Maternity to get some more blouses for her. Unfortunately, they didn't really have anything that she didn't already have. Hopefully she can get some more stuff when their fall lineup comes out.

After shopping, I started work on the baby's room. I had to patch these two big holes left by the previous owner. Of course, I discovered that the bucket of joint compound I bought last year was no good anymore, so I made a 2nd trip to Home Depot today. After that, I patched the holes, and re-did some wiring stuff. I had dinner, cleaned up in the baby's room, and then did money stuff.

Tomorrow's a big day. We have our anatomy scan in the morning, so we may find out the sex tomorrow, and then my Mommom and Poppop are coming over for dinner, so we have a lot of cleaning to do.

Pictures from the Party

We got home very late last night, but here are some pictures from the big event. I will definitely blog more about the party, but since it is going to be 100 today, I want to get outside and clean up the garage and shed before it really gets hot.


A view of the Tiki hut from the back deck.


A view of the pool deck, complete with a tropical landscape.


My dad, having received several 'old man' gifts


Grill-master Bob with mom helping