Happy Candy Day!

I'm not big on Halloween.

I don't like ghosts, witches, monsters or evil looking things. Basically I just don't do scary, period, so that being the case I've been predisposed to avoiding halloween festivities in the past... this year I went so far as to get myself a friendly looking scarecrow that has a huge smile on his face and bounces around when you tap him on his head, but that's been about it.

I am however big on cute little kids... so tonight Kev and I are going to be handing out candy for the very first time together... to all the little trick or treaters that ring our doorbell and I can hardly wait to see the little munchkins, so happy candy day everyone, it's a lot less scary that halloween, at least in my world. ;)

If you didn't venture outside at all this weekend, you didn't miss much

If it weren't for Miriam's birthday party I'm pretty sure I would have been happy having just a cozy PJ weekend. As it is, I hold Miriam to be a dear friend and braved the silly rain and crazy winds to head out to her party, once there [and with the realization that it was warmer in her house than in mine anyway] I had a blast, as is usually the case when we hang out with that particular group of friends. To top the evening off on a high note, Laura and Andrew came out for the party and it was nice catching up with them on what's new, I even got to see pics of their furry new friends! :)

With Miriam's birthday came the thought process of me reflecting on my age. With most everyone having turned or is turning 29 this year, my pending 29th birthday looms in the near distance, I'm not quite sure how I feel about it. For the most part I think I've accomplished a lot and I know that I certainly do have a lot to be thankful for, within the coming year though the one item that I'm shooting for is to be that much closer to getting my designation and to at least have it by the time I turn 30 [in 2008]. Now that the house is coming together nicely on a personal level, once work/my job returns to "normal mode" I'd be able to give the pursuit of my designation full concentration and attempt to get it over with sooner rather than later.

Also making the news is that I've had a somewhat productive chat with my manager on where I see myself within the group over the next few months and was told that he'd be doing everything possible [within his power of course] to help me get there. This now initiates the waiting game, I've been asked to give it until March 2007 when these things are considered, and I will - if this goes according to plan it will align pretty well with some other plans I have in store for my personal life in the coming year... if this doesn't go according to plan, plan B is to start exploring various other options which will allow me to be where I want to be career wise.

Mission: Organization

Before



After












It seems I've been on a mission to organize lately, the most recent to fall victim to my quest has been the main floor hall closet.

I had been watching for a sale on a rubbermaid shoe shelf for the longest while - Canadian Tire finally answered my wish. Even with the sale though it was still stupidly expensive... but for my sanity's sake, it was worth it.

Here are some before and after pics of what I managed to accomplish. Looks like it might just do the trick afterall, given that most of our shorter jackets can still be hung above it.

I've now got a nice little shelf for my hat/scarf/glove box to sit on AND it means no more rummaging for shoes when we're in a hurry. Summer shoes will sit on the rack and winter shoes will sit at the front of the rack for easy access.

That's only the left side of the closet, I'm considering getting another unit like it for the right side but I want to see how this works out first and I've got to take a closer look at what other summer shoes haven't been "unpacked" as yet to determine if it will be necessary.

Next task, sorting out the shelves sitting above our coats to ensure that they are being used efficiently... but for now, I'm going to call it a night. :)

*yawn*

I'm tired, well beyond tired actually. I'm pretty close to falling asleep at my desk. I was feeling this way all day yesterday as well, so I went to bed around 10pm, got up around 5:45am. That's close to 8 hours but it didn't help.

Decided to plug in my MP3 player today, that's probably the only thing that will save me from falling asleep.

Loves the husband! :)

In the random tidbit dept --> I bounded up the stairs last week [from the basement] racing towards the kitchen to find Kevin to to tell him that a bird was peeking in through the glass in the basement window and that he should come take a look because it was cute.

I didn't find him but I found instead, flowers sitting on my kitchen counter. Turns out he was in the washroom and I'd found the flowers before he'd had a chance to give them to me, three black magic roses. Now, Kev's not big on flowers and I appreciate plants more so it all works out in the end, but to get them for no apparent reason other than he just wanted to get them for me, well that's pretty awesome and it totally made my day.

I think I might be spoiled, I also think I might have the most fantabulous husband ever. :)

October 19th, 2006

Today is the 19th, of October, and it's suddenly dawned on me just how long ago it was that I updated my blog. I'm not sure why that was, it wasn't for a lack of stuff going on, true I've also been pretty busy at work and hadn't much time, but for the most part it was probably because I just didn't feel much like blogging.

Before I give an update though, I wanted to mention that today is my baby brother's birthday, well he's no longer a baby, Stefan is now thirteen. I couldn't be more proud of both my brothers, they've grown into the kind of brothers that make not having a sister not such a bad thing after all, and I wouldn't trade them for the world. I still think that I am in denial at times that they are growing up, at times it seems so very fast. I was sixteen when Stef was born, Bunny was eight, so to both of us he'll always be the baby, he's also the most mild mannered out of us three, the most understanding and tolerant and it can be argued that he's also the most mature one... even though we've got years and years on him. ;) So happy, happy birthday to my baby brother.

In other news. it's been a busy few weeks. Unsure about my commitments at work it hasn't been easy trying to accomplish much on the weekends. We spent a very quiet Thanksgiving at home this year, on the Monday my parents invited us over for dinner, and Kev & I played a game of Balderdash with my brothers after dinner but other than that we kept a very low profile.

The thanksgiving service we'd had a few weeks back for the house went well. In everything we've done together, we've acknowledged god's intervention - he seems to be always looking out for us, so it seemed very fitting that we continue to acknowledge his presence in our lives, ask for his continued blessings and welcome him into our new home. It was also the first time the family had gotten together in a while so that also meant a lot to me. For the meal, I ended up roasting potatoes & baking quite a few pieces of chicken. I served these with a vegetable stiry fry, garlic bread and two trays of chinese noodles and rice. Turns out that, as expected, it was just the kind of thanksgiving meal that was welcomed by those who attended. :)

And with that the month of September ended.

I spent the first weekend in October working on our housewarming evite [which mostly involved ensuring I had the correct email addresses for everyone and more importantly that I didn't forget anyone], and also planning what to have on hand for folks to eat. So far we have about 30 folks confirmed as attending, I've structured it as an open house event where people can come and go between the hours of 1pm on the 4th and 1am on the 5th, the idea being that we want to encourage folks to come out to visit at various times during the day, not just in the late afternoon, so as to maximize our time with everyone and ensure that we get to visit with and devote a decent amount of time to everyone. So the invites are out, the RSVPs are rolling in, I've got a menu planned and I've still got about two weeks before the actual party, which is fine, because as Bruce so kindly pointed out, it's being planned for four days after our fiscal year-end at work. :)

Last Saturday night we took a break from working on things around the house and headed out to Emma's place for a few hours of board games and general merriment.

On Sunday I got up around 8:30am, which is considered late for me as I'm usually up with the sun in the mornings, I grabbed my toothbrush and went to look out the front window as I brushed my teeth - I'm still not quite sure why I did this, part of me thinks that I was subconsciously wondering if the leaves on the tree in our front yard had turned as yet. Turns out, it was a good thing that I bothered to look outside because there dangling in front of me was a piece of the fascia from our roof. I guess the wind had a field day with it and it eventually tore right off - so we're now in the process of finding someone [who isn't going to charge $250] to climb on to our roof and nail it back in place. Fun times. :)

Tonight being Stef's birthday we're heading over to my folks for dinner, tomorrow is going to be spent working on stuff around the house and then on Saturday we're hosting a birthday party for Stef, to the tune of 21 kids and 15 adults. Can you say super busy?

Plus we're still doing little minor stuff around the house on the weekends, there are a few cupboard shelving in the kitchen that I want adjusted to make things more practical, Kev has also replaced two of our ventilation fans so far, so he'll probably be tackling the third one on Sunday. I also want to paint a few of the interiors of the under the counter cupboards in the washrooms but not quite sure if to put that off until the spring when we can paint with proper ventilation... maybe I'll do that and make my winter project the tearing down of all the wallpaper in the kitchen... I think Kev's still trying to figure out what to do with the shower door for the new bathroom, he's convinced that if we continue to have a shower door that opens towards the bathtub area we're going to end up with rotting wood again from a) all the water that leaks off the door as it swings open and b) water leaking off us as we step out of the shower. A mat on the raised bathtub floor solves problem b) but not necessarily problem a).

In the meantime, we're still waking up earlier than we need to because of having to share the one bathroom and I find myself crashing even earlier at night because of it. Fun times, fun times in Hoppland. :)

Bought a scarecrow :)

So on Monday of last week, we stopped by Canadian Tire to grab some tools, I also wanted to check out the glass measuring cups that they had on sale - to see if they were up to snuff. We ended up leaving with neither the tools nor the cups but instead with the cutest little bouncing scarecrow ever, he's the adorable little guy in the middle, in the pic above. He now sits on my kitchen counter and makes me smile in the mornings. I'm not big on Halloween so a scarecrow is very likely the closest I'm ever going to to get to having "Halloween" decorations in our home.

After leaving Canadian Tire we decided to pop across the street to get a bite. While standing in line I noticed a nice little lady checking Kevin out. Now men being men, I knew he'd be totally clueless that she was checking him out, so before he did something embarassing which could burst her happy-place bubble I decided to nudge him to let him know before we sat down to eat. I think I was about half way through my meal when the nice little lady came over to us, looked him right in the eye and said something along the lines of "I have a mental disorder and people usually say that if they look into my eyes they can see if I'm crazy or not, do you think I look crazy?"

Heh. Make what you will of that, for me I'm going to go with the theory that it's yet further proof that my husband's a stud. ;)