I thought I was getting better about writing...Oh well.

This week I have been consumed with redecorating our half bath. I really wanted to to the kitchen but it would be too $$$. Then I wanted to do the study but as I cannot on a theme or color scheme I turned my attentions to the half bath. I found fabric for curtains last week that I love! It's a coffee theme with colors of rust, brown, tan, cream, and black. I JUST finished giving the walls a second coat of "Crisp Autumn Leaves" (a orange/brown/rust kinda color) and I'm LOVING it. I know some people would think it's too dark or too bold but I think it's great. It's a very warm and rich color and I makes the room look TOTALLY different. Tomorrow I plan on hanging the curtains I made, mounting the towel ring, and hopefully hanging some cafe pictures (I only have one right now, so I'm going to look for more after work). I can't wait to see it finished. We haven't done any remodeling since the living room project this past summer.

On another note, Anthony started classes yesterday. I don't think his schedule is too bad this semester. Only 2 1/2 more years to go! (Yes, I'm trying to sound positive...)

Nothing else really going on now...

mood: high on paint fumes

While Juliet is usually the first one awake on Saturday morning, I'm the first person that gets out of bed. Right now it's very peaceful. We live on a quiet street so there is no traffic noise and the snow is lightly falling outside. Beautiful. (Wait, Juliet just broke the silence with her squeaker.) I love snow (except when I have to drive in it). We were supposed to get this big storm the last 2 days but our neighborhood didn't see any more than 2 inches. Boring.

Today will start soon: cleaning the house, doing laundry, washing the dishes (in the bathroom sink-another story), going to Walmart to get 4 new tires on the Jeep. Soon. Soon all that will begin. But for now, I'm enjoying the peace the "early" morning brings. This time by myself that I love. Perhaps that's why I like to get up earlier than him on Saturday...

mood: peaceful

Today is my birthday. It's also Anthony's birthday too! We don't have definite plans to celebrate but for starters, I'm off work and he's working from home so at least we can be together. :-) Later today starts the winter session of TR so I'll have to go out for that and I have to get a new driver's license and renew the Jeep registration. :-P Why does the gov't make you give them money on your birthday? It really sucks. Anyway, after I get home from TR, hopefully we'll be able to go out shopping. :-) At least then we can spend money on ourselves.

I can't believe the holidays are over and all the company is gone already. It was a quite a whirlwind 2 weeks for us. I think we were only home to sleep, shower and give Tyson his medicine. Other than that, we toted Juliet around with us (almost) everywhere and she did really well with all the changes. However, I think she was very happy to just have us home with her yesterday afternoon/evening.

We did discover that Juliet doesn't need to go in her cage every time we leave! Saturday we left her out in our house by herself for a total of 12 hours (I went home about half-way into it and took her for a walk and stuff). She didn't touch ANYTHING but her own stuff! We were pleasantly surprised (and happy!) that she didn't destroy any of our stuff.

I'm going to enjoy my birthday now!

mood: loved

Tonight I should have gotten at least 2 hours of cleaning in by now but alas, here I sit, doing nothing. I wasn't very motivated to clean tonight anyway because Anthony is working tonight (from home but still not really "here") and I melted our dust buster and filled our house with smoke and an awful burnt-plastic smell. However, unless I want to spend all tomorrow morning cleaning, I better get something done tonight as it is already 8:30.
Scott, Janine and kids are coming in tomorrow and should be here sometime in the early afternoon. I can't wait to see them! (This would explain my need to clean: they haven't seen our house yet.)
Dan, Jes and kid (only one, see?) are due to arrive sometime Saturday which should give my entire family ALMOST 24 hours together.
We'll be spending tomorrow (Christmas Eve) with my family and then Christmas Day with Anthony's. Of course, we will be toting Juliet (along with her food, water, cage, bones, treats...) along where ever we go so that we don't have to run home and let her out all the time. Plus at least she'll get a little more attention at various houses (even though she will probably have to be in her cage most of the time) than she would being stuck at home with no one but Pippin and Tyson for company.
Ok, I guess I should get off my butt now and do something productive. I'm sure I won't write anything before Friday, so Merry Christmas to everyone!

mood: busy

We decorated the tree last Saturday and it looks beautiful (and does much to put me in the Christmas "mood"). Juliet did ok with the whole process but she got a little too crazy when we were getting ready to put the ornaments on and I didn't want any of them to get broken, so we did have to put her in the cage for a little while.

Anthony had his last final on Thursday morning so now it really feels like Christmas vacation!

We have made 3-4 Christmas shopping excursions since Thanksgiving and we only have more outing to go! Er, hopefully. And then we'll be done...horray!!!!

I have been practicing like a crazy fool for the Christmas Cantata that is (drum roll) only one week from tomorrow. I know that God will use me for His glory, but I feel so unprepared and useless right now.

Last night I got my hair cut. It's definitely a different look (as I'm sure most of you have seen pictures by now) but so far I like it a lot.

Tomorrow will be filled with church services and a cantata practice (along with my personal practice at home). Monday I'm hoping to kinda get the house in order and I need to make bows for my mom. The ones we put on the banister were looking kinda sad last year so we got rid of them. Of course, we forgot that when we hung the garland tonight. Oops. So I will make yet another attempt at bows. I only do it about once a year (if that) so I'm not very fast or very good at it but they usually turn out presentable. :-D

mood: nostalgic

Yeah, I'm officially tired of not feeling good. It's been a week. Time to move on, right? Nope, I'm still sick, so it's been basically a "useless" week. I have gotten nothing accomplished other than going to work and coming home. Wait. I take that back. Monday I actually felt pretty good on my day off and was able to get most of the Christmas decorations out (minus the tree...it's up, but rather naked right now) and the laundry done. Other than that, yeah, Anthony has been making dinner and I have been doing nothing. I have been forcing myself to practice my two pieces for the Christmas cantata plus an offertory for Sunday because, well, if I don't practice I won't be able to play the songs. If I can't play them, I will totally let the entire choir down. No pressure.
We were supposed to be hosts to some friends of ours on Sunday afternoon in between services but I had to call and cancel that because I'm still sick. (Arg!) But they have a little baby so I don't want to get them sick. I mean, I wouldn't want to get them sick even if they didn't have a baby, but, well, ah, you know what I mean, right? I had the meal planned and most of it bought and everything. :-P
So basically I have no formal plans this weekend because I don't know how I'll feel. My main goal is to actually decorate the tree cause it's getting depressing to sit on the couch and stare at a boring ol' fake pine tree (no lights, garland, ornaments...NOTHING). But since I'm the one that has to put the lights on, I have to gear myself up to actually do that. Everything else about the tree is fun. Putting on lights sucks but the end result is beautiful.

mood: tired of being sick

I can't believe the end of November is upon me and I haven't posted hardly anything this month! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving, celebrating with both Anthony's family and mine. I've been feeling the onset of a cold for a couple days and yesterday I just lounged around and slept or watched TV. I'm feeling a tad bit better today but I'm still waiting for it to become a full-blown cold. (Hopefully it won't...)

We had planned to get our Christmas stuff from my parents' yesterday but since both of us weren't feeling great, we decided to wait til today. Now I just hope we still feel up to it. We might try to do some Christmas shopping too. Again, all depends how I/we feel (he was feeling a little sick yesterday too).

mood: thirsty

I definitely wouldn't put this week up there on my top weeks ever. Nothing really BAD happened, it was just well, eh. So I'll share the highlights. :-)

Last Friday we took Juliet on a LONG walk: 2 miles to my parents' house. It was a beautiful night so we said "Why not?" She got a chance to really get out and run because they have a fenced yard. We hadn't ever seen her run full-tilt before and it was cool to see. We ate a quick dinner of Wendy's with my family and the took the 2 mile walk home in the dark.

Saturday we did have Domino and Juliet meet. That did not go well (which I kinda feared would happen because Domino doesn't really get along with other dogs) but we still went to Anthony's parents'. However Domino spent most of the evening in his cage. We had a nice time though visiting with his family (which for the first half was only his parents and Matthew because the older 3 were at a youth group hike). When everyone was back home, we played 2 rounds of canasta: girls won the first, guys won the second. So much for taking advantage of the time change and getting extra sleep. :-) But it was so much fun!

Monday I had an awesome night at TR! (They needed me to switch to Monday's for this session. I have no clue if I'll be staying on that day or not after Dec.7, when the session ends.) This fall is much more "fun" than last year because I was new at it and didn't really know what I was doing. Now I understand how to help the rider more and what I should/shouldn't be doing to help them progress. The girl I'm working with right now is 13 years old and after only a couple lessons is about ready to ride independently. That means she goes off lead and rides all by herself. I'll stay right by the horse to make sure nothing goes "wrong" but she will be the one in charge. It's so exciting to see this happen!

Wednesday night brought forth another good night at Awana. Nothing really spectacular, except that the one boy who doesn't really care for me actually focused and worked hard on his verses and didn't whine or pout or complain at me the whole night! I guess that in itself is pretty spectacular since I usually end up yelling at him most of the night (probably why he doesn't like me very much).

So I should just leave my week there because everything else is eh. Now I'm just hoping for a better weekend, which it should be. Laurelyn is coming over tomorrow afternoon! 

mood: indescribable

Tonight we carved out pumpkin! Last year I did an intricate design that had to be traced and then took hours to cut out. This year I wanted us both to carve the pumpkin (which meant not making it tedious and a one-person job) and I think he turned out fabulous! Before we carved the nose, he totally looked like the abomidable snowman from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Haha, totally not planned. :-) But then we did the nose and even though we tried to make it look like his nose, it didn't quite work. I'm still really happy about how he turned out. :-)

Tomorrow night we're going to watch Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. (We've been watching the movie after I have finished reading it's respective book.) Saturday afternoon we're going to see how Juliet and my in-laws' dog Domino get along. NOT quite sure how that will go because he's a tiny dog (Boston terrier) and Juliet, well, ISN'T tiny. If all goes well, we'll be spending the evening at their house with Juliet so I'm really hoping the get along at least as well as Jet and Juliet (hopefully better!).

mood: creative

Last night I stayed up reading until about 1am but I finished Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I'm starting to develop opinions now, but I still want to wait and see how it all ends before they are conclusive. Of course, then I have to re-read Lord of the Rings to fully develop my comparison between the two works so I still have a long way to go! Oye.

I'm trying to think of something to update other than more stuff about Juliet but I can't think of anything. She's the most "interesting" thing happening in my life right now but I'm sure it's not that interesting to anyone else...

Uh, well, I have stupidly agreed to play more songs for the church stuff. I'm working on four accompaniment pieces right now and I NEED to start working on a solo piece for offertory (that I'm assigned to play in 3 weeks).

We got our pumpkin on Saturday and now we just have to find time to carve it. I don't think I'm going to do anything fancy this year.

Yeah, that's about it. Today I'm just working on laundry, making dinner, will take Juliet for a walk, and have TR later in the afternoon. (They needed someone else on Monday's and my class on Thursday had a boy drop it for this session so they were over-staffed.) 

We have now had Juliet for over a week and she's already feeling like a part of our (little) family. It's so nice to come home to Juliet as opposed to an empty house. Well, I guess technically it wasn't empty because Pippin was here, but I think you get my point. :-)
I've been trying to work more with her this week on training. She's doing much better on the leash. For example, her and I went on a 20 minute walk yesterday and she only almost tripped me twice. That's progress! We've also been working on "Sit" "Down" and "Stay". She has sit pretty well (she knew that one when we got her) but down is a little more tricky. I have no idea why. She's also getting the hang of stay...er, at least when I have a treat. Hehe. Her major "vice" that we are trying to train out of her is mouthing. She likes to take your hand and put it in her mouth. I don't know why. She's not "biting"...more like "playing" with your fingers, hand, wrist, whatever she can get ahold of. Anyone have any tips for how to stop a dog from doing this other than saying "No bite"? I never had to deal with this with Jet, but we had him since he was 6 weeks old so we knew all the training that he got. I'm guessing this was an encouraged behavior at her previous home because she does it frequently, especially when she gets excited. It's very annoying. (Like I said, it doesn't hurt because she's not biting, but it's not a behavior we want in our dog.)
Oh, and it went, er, ok with Jet. Juliet loved him, which was the main problem. She wanted to play constantly and poor Jet is very old and just wants to sleep. She would run up behind and chase him around the living room and then try to jump on top of him. I saw Jet today and the poor old guy is still limping. We tried to keep her from bothering him, but it was hard. Hopefully if we just take her to my parents for an afternoon/evening or something, they will be ok. I'd hate to have to leave her if we're going to spend the day there, but if we have to, we have to. I don't want to stress Jet out. Poor old guy. He'll be 12 in November.

mood: thankful

My parents are out of town this weekend, so we are dog-sitting Jet. It's been...interesting. We took Jet and Juliet to a park to meet for the first time and it all went really well: tails wagging, lots of sniffing, no growling. Awesome. So we stayed there for about 20 minutes and then headed to our house to REALLY see how they'll get along. Thus commences the interesting part. Juliet is thoroughly enjoying chasing Jet around the house and wanting to "play". Jet is NOT enjoying it at all. He basically just runs from her. I told him that he better start standing up to her or she's gonna keep pushing him around. I don't know if he got that or not. ;-) Hehe. But luckily, by around 9pm Juliet had settled down and was content to be like Jet and lie on her rug for the rest of the night. Ah peace!
We'll just have to see how today goes...

mood: amused

Tuesday afternoon Anthony picked up the newest member of our family: Juliet! They told us she's a collie mix, but we've had several people tell us they think there's some German Shepherd in her too. Since we got her from a shelter, we don't know much about her. They estimated her age at 2.5 years. We do know that she had a family before because she has some training.

This is what she knows (that we have discovered so far anyway):
-sit
-come
-housebroken (TOTALLY AWESOME!)
-crate-trained (also totally awesome!)
-leave it (like when you are playing with her, she'll just drop the toy)

However, she has VERY bad leash manners so we'll definitely have to work on that. She also has kennel cough right now from being in the shelter so she's on antibiotics for 10 days (well, I guess it's only 8 now). She kept us up the first night coughing...poor thing. :-( I hope she gets better soon. We go to see "our" veterinarian tomorrow evening for a complete physical and to get any other shots/treatments she might need (hopefully it's not much!) 

Now we're just all hoping Jet will get along with her because I'd like to be able to take her over to my parents at times. Plus when my parents go out of town, we'll need to watch Jet and it would be much easier if we could just bring him to our house. We'll just have to wait and see.

mood: excited

Today we are moving my piano home!!!!! I can't wait! By 2 pm, my neighbors should be hearing music coming from our house. :-) I've totally missed having a piano and I'm just so excited. :-D

mood: ecstatic

(I wrote this at 1:30 this morning, but my internet went down and wouldn't let me post it. So I saved it.)

Instead of going to bed, I've been reading some of my past journal entries on here. It was all quite amusing until I started reading about my Grandma H. Two years ago this past week (Sept 15, maybe?), she went home to be with her Savior. I knew it was in September, but I'm really bad at remembering dates. I can't believe it's been that long, yet so much has happened in my life that it feels like forever. I know it's not important in this life, but I would have loved for her to be for my college graduation, to see me walk down the aisle and marry my wonderful husband, to show her around our first home. She would have loved to see it all. My grandma was always so interested in all her grandchildren's lives.
As a Christian, and knowing that my grandma was a Christian too, I rest in the hope that I will see her in heaven, but I wonder things. I know she doesn't "miss" me (it's heaven...why would you want to be here???), but I wonder if people in heaven think about people still on earth. Like, did she know I was getting married? I'm guessing that the saints in heaven have one focus: the LORD and Savior Jesus Christ and God the Father. But the human part of me wonders these things...
I really feel like I'm just rambling. I guess I am but I can't really think too clearly right now. I still think about my grandma everytime I play RummyQ, work on a craft project, see a yucha plant (haha, I hate those things, but she loved them). I miss her when I realize I forgot how to start a crochet project and have to look it up in a book instead of just walking to her living room to ask. I'm jealous that 2 of my brother's children got to meet her and my children will never get to meet her or any of my grandparents (not the "I'm mad" jealous...just sad that my kids won't know any of my grandparents).
I guess I'll end this post with a poem I must attribute to my brother Scott. It was written while we were thinking of our memories for my grandma's memorial service. For those who truly knew my grandma, I hope it makes you smile. It made me crack a smile through my tears tonight.

There once was a woman named Grandma

Who went to dinner and lowered the hamma’

On some poor young server

Who didn’t deserve her

‘Cause the hash browns were as crispy as manna

mood: contemplative

It's a beautiful day and I have it off. Too bad I need to get stuff done around the house and can't really enjoy it. Since we were at his parents' house almost every day because Angela was in town, we never really got settled from our trip. We unpacked the night we got back but I've only done a little laundry and we're starting to run out of clean clothes. Scary! We don't really have any food either. Time to meal plan and make a grocery list too.
I guess I decided to challenge myself this week because I agreed to play for our choir that's singing next Sunday. Our director gave me the music yesterday afternoon and we had one practice that evening (it's a song we've sung before but I've never played it). Why I agree to do stuff like this I'll never know, especially since my piano isn't at the house yet. That means I'm going to be spending a lot of time at my parents' this week practicing. While I don't mind going over there at all, it's just more convenient if I can just sit down to play without having to make a trip out of it. I think we're going to try and move it this weekend! I can't wait. :-D

mood: hungry

The weather has been so much cooler  here lately (upper 60's, low 70's) and I'm so excited for fall. I'm ready for cute sweaters and comfy blankets to curl up in. The leaves are already starting to change and I think it will be really beautiful this year. Aren't the colors based on rainfall? If so, I pretty sure we got a lot this summer. At least it's felt like it to me. :-)

I'm sad to announce that all the things I was looking forward to in my last post are almost over:
~I had a great time at a Mexican restaurant with my cousin's a couple weeks ago. Then they came over and saw our house and we talked for a few hours. Sidenote: I got to watch Laurelyn's ferret for the weekend and it was really fun! He's so cute but I must admit, he does smell.
~My best friend's wedding was last weekend and it was so amazing. I'm so exited for Dan and Rachel!!!
~Angela's last full day of visiting is tomorrow and then she heads home Sunday afternoon. Bummer. :-( 

So right now, I'm looking forward to fall I guess. I don't have any big leads on jobs, no more trips are planned, no more company coming until Christmas. Ah well, what can ya do? Right now I guess I'll head to be cause I'm tired and it's late and I have to get up early. 

location: study mood: calm music: Pippin rolling around in her ball

Well, I HAD a job interview scheduled for this Monday. However yesterday I got a call from them saying they needed cancel my appointment as they are putting the position on hold for a couple months. Awesome. :-P I'm so bummed cause this was my first interview since I started looking over a year ago. I guess they could still call me back on it in a couple months, but it's still disappointing. Plus, I rushed my pants suit to my seamstress and now I don't even need it (right now). I didn't have the heart to tell her when I picked it up yesterday afternoon that she really didn't need to rush it for me. She said good luck and I said thank you.

Today we're having my parents over to celebrate my mom's birthday! I'm excited that we can have people over now and aren't living in a constant state of construction. The house is looking really good if I do say so myself. We even hung the picture above the couch! Hopefully the curtains that came in on Wednesday will make it up over the windows today. They are red-striped panels with the grommets on the top. I love them! They were pretty cheap, but ah well. We don't have a lot of money right now to get high-quality curtains.

Anthony starts classes on Monday morning. I wonder when I'll stop feeling left out by all the people that get to go back to school in the fall. Maybe once I get a job? Who knows, but right now I feel kinda "dumb" because I don't think I've used my brain much since graduating. I DEFINATELY feel like my degree is a waste at this point. Hopefully someday it will be worth all the money and time I put into it...

I do have some stuff to look forward to in the next couple weeks though! Friday the girl cousins in the the state are getting together for dinner, Saturday I'm getting together with a friend to hang out, and then two weeks from today my best friend is getting married!!! And Anthony's sister Angela is coming in the week we get back from the wedding! Yeah for family and friends.

I'll have to write another time about my new classes I'm in at the therapeutic riding place. It's much different than any other one I've worked. However, right now I need to go do more laundry and start baking Mom's cake!

mood: okay

The only thing on my list that we have left is to take the painters tape off the ceiling! We spent over 6 hours Saturday working on the floors but they look so much better. I just need to go over them with lemon oil and get some area rugs and we'll be good to go! I can finally walk in my entire house (sans basement) without shoes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ah, it's the little joys in life that make me happy. :-) 

I have already finished Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and am 80 pages into the Chamber of Secrets.

Oh, and it's officially summer here. Up until this point, having no A/C didn't really matter. Now, it's really hot in our house. And when I'm sweating just sitting on the couch, I'm really cranky.

mood: lethargic

Exactly. That has been our life for two months and it seems as though it will continue. However, I am starting to see the dim light at the end of the tunnel.
~Living room/dining room are painted!
~Carpet is gone!!!!
~Kitchen is organized
~New door going from the house to the garage is in place (They just had a hollow bedroom door. Yeah, that's makes me feel REAL safe.)

Things that need to be finished up:
~Take down the tape around the ceiling from painting the cove molding. This will be more complicated than all the other tape I peeled off. I'm going to have to go around with a razor blade and score it because the paint that we just painted onto the cove is starting to peel off when I peel off the tape. Arg! Didn't have this problem with ANY of the other tape. which is why I haven't done it yet.
~Touch up the walls where the tape messed UP the paint
~Take up tack strips
~Scrub, scrub, and scrub some more to get the padding residue off the wood floor.

So yeah, it's getting there, slowly, but eventually we'll have a pretty house. :-) AND I can bring over my piano and the side table Dan made for us once the floor is all done. I can't wait! 

mood: toasty-warm