After a couple months of marveling at how neither of us have gotten sick despite of how crazy-busy we have been, my body finally gave in and I've got a cold. :( I thought it was just a sore throat from all the dust kicked up by packing our belongings, but alas it seems to actually be a cold.
Thankfully we didn't drive yesterday. We spent the day in IL, visiting friends at the U. of Illinois. It was a good day. Chris went for a bike ride/walk (the bike tire popped - sad!) and I went to a tailor, only to find out my next bridesmaid dress didn't need alterations at all. I think that's the first time EVER that I have not needed alterations! Yay. We were also joined at dinner by a friend from summer camp whom I had not seen since 1998 - it was great to see her. Old friends that show up and are still awesome are so.. reassuring. Exciting. Refreshing. Fun :)
Today we continue on our trip. We'll be crossing Missouri and getting into Kansas. Hoping this is more interesting than people have warned us it won't be. Sick + boring driving = inevitable drowsiness..
10.02.2011
9.30.2011
Here we go!
We’ve come a long way since my last post! This will be a picture dump post, so get ready.
First, the promised picture of my plant, waiting to leave. This is a well-traveled plant. He was given to me by a student staff member before she left the University of Illinois, and lived in my office there in a small pot for a year. Then I drove him down to FL with me, and eventually transferred him to a large pot where he lived quite happily in our kitchen. That large pot was taken by a friend when we left, and now this little cutting is traveling across country again to a new home in CO. Here’s hoping he survives the adventure!
We’ve decided to use this little toy car to help show our travels as we go. So here it is in North Florida.
We’ll try to catch a picture as we pass into each state. Though we missed the initial welcome sign going into Georgia, Chris did get a picture of the rain!
We stayed the night Wednesday in GA with Grandma. Was good to see her and catch up a bit. She made us her famous full southern breakfast – eggs, grits, bacon, sausage, and from scratch no-recipe biscuits (seriously amazing..). We didn’t need to eat for 8 hours after that! Here is Grandma being shy about having her picture taken :)
Yesterday we said goodbye to Grandma and headed to TN to visit our friends Mark and Heidi. As you go from GA to TN, you pass back and forth between the states a couple times which is entertaining.
We stopped at the rest area just inside TN, which was gorgeous! And, Chris found some Cheerwine, which he was very excited about.
Today we depart our friends in TN and head to IL. Up, up and away!
First, the promised picture of my plant, waiting to leave. This is a well-traveled plant. He was given to me by a student staff member before she left the University of Illinois, and lived in my office there in a small pot for a year. Then I drove him down to FL with me, and eventually transferred him to a large pot where he lived quite happily in our kitchen. That large pot was taken by a friend when we left, and now this little cutting is traveling across country again to a new home in CO. Here’s hoping he survives the adventure!
We’ve decided to use this little toy car to help show our travels as we go. So here it is in North Florida.
We’ll try to catch a picture as we pass into each state. Though we missed the initial welcome sign going into Georgia, Chris did get a picture of the rain!
We stayed the night Wednesday in GA with Grandma. Was good to see her and catch up a bit. She made us her famous full southern breakfast – eggs, grits, bacon, sausage, and from scratch no-recipe biscuits (seriously amazing..). We didn’t need to eat for 8 hours after that! Here is Grandma being shy about having her picture taken :)
Yesterday we said goodbye to Grandma and headed to TN to visit our friends Mark and Heidi. As you go from GA to TN, you pass back and forth between the states a couple times which is entertaining.
We stopped at the rest area just inside TN, which was gorgeous! And, Chris found some Cheerwine, which he was very excited about.
Today we depart our friends in TN and head to IL. Up, up and away!
9.27.2011
Movers
I ran some errands yesterday and (almost literally) ran into a car full of my students at the Target in Hialeah. They helped me find lumbar pillows to use for the drive. Good times!
Having movers come pack the house has not been quite the magical experience I was promised. They sent only two poor guys to pack our whole house, and it took them eleven hours. They only took one 5-minute break the entire day.. Didn't even stop to eat.
Anyway, we're almost out. They're taking out the beds now. We're hoping to get on the road within an hour. I have a picture of my little plant, waiting by the window. But this internet is not fast enough to transfer it now. Later :)
Having movers come pack the house has not been quite the magical experience I was promised. They sent only two poor guys to pack our whole house, and it took them eleven hours. They only took one 5-minute break the entire day.. Didn't even stop to eat.
Anyway, we're almost out. They're taking out the beds now. We're hoping to get on the road within an hour. I have a picture of my little plant, waiting by the window. But this internet is not fast enough to transfer it now. Later :)
9.25.2011
Ding!
Like a well timed meal, there is little that is more satisfying to me than a series of things coming to completion at the same time. Ding! Everything is in order, all the food hits the table perfectly done and piping hot.
Similarly with a move. I get a little thrill with each box of kleenex finished in the last couple days, each jar of jam, every task completed at just the right time so there isn't a crunch. This move, getting a job offer the day before my last day at MDC exemplified this.
I am willing to put a lot of effort into making these little successes. Last weekend we had a "potluck/take stuff from our pantry" party in an effort to make sure we didn't waste too much food before the move. I planned an entire main dish of chicken just to use up a packet of soup mix. But boy was I pleased to have found a good (and truly delicious!) way to use up that little packet.
I've also been having fun using up some of our more expensive baking ingredients. With all the gluten-free cooking we do, some of the flours are expensive/hard to find so the thought of them mouldering in storage going bad is hard to handle. So this week I baked these little delights:
Gluten-Free Cherry Sour Cream Muffins. Making these muffins used up the last of our sour cream, frozen cherries, sugar, Egg Beaters, muffin cups and *almost* the last of the butter. Plus we were almost out of breakfast cereal so this prevented us from having to purchase more. Ding!
Today is our last big purging/organizing push before the movers come tomorrow. We have a TON of stuff to get through, but I'm hoping that at the end of the day everything will be ready and we'll be able to keep going with minimal stress!
Similarly with a move. I get a little thrill with each box of kleenex finished in the last couple days, each jar of jam, every task completed at just the right time so there isn't a crunch. This move, getting a job offer the day before my last day at MDC exemplified this.
I am willing to put a lot of effort into making these little successes. Last weekend we had a "potluck/take stuff from our pantry" party in an effort to make sure we didn't waste too much food before the move. I planned an entire main dish of chicken just to use up a packet of soup mix. But boy was I pleased to have found a good (and truly delicious!) way to use up that little packet.
I've also been having fun using up some of our more expensive baking ingredients. With all the gluten-free cooking we do, some of the flours are expensive/hard to find so the thought of them mouldering in storage going bad is hard to handle. So this week I baked these little delights:
Gluten-Free Cherry Sour Cream Muffins. Making these muffins used up the last of our sour cream, frozen cherries, sugar, Egg Beaters, muffin cups and *almost* the last of the butter. Plus we were almost out of breakfast cereal so this prevented us from having to purchase more. Ding!
Today is our last big purging/organizing push before the movers come tomorrow. We have a TON of stuff to get through, but I'm hoping that at the end of the day everything will be ready and we'll be able to keep going with minimal stress!
10.16.2009
New Job!
Ok so I haven't posted in a while. I'll keep it brief:
I GOT A JOB!! :D Hooray.
Almost exactly four months since I had my last day at IL. Weird. Today marks four months since I arrived in Florida, and I'd say things are going very well! Meets and/or exceeds expectations. hah.
So this is where things start to get really busy, I guess. Am looking forward to the excitement. This job promises to challenge me in a lot of ways, and I think it's going to be awesome.
A quick synopsis of other goings-on:
~Canned homemade apple sauce and apple butter.
~A lovely congratulations party, which involved getting plants!
~Helping get the plants situated in the backyard. Hopefully my cilantro doesn't get rained to death.
~Snorkeling! Nurse shark, jelly fish, playing with schools of fish, giant conchs, cleaner fish... No sunburn!
~Finally got my license plate! That saga is enough for a post on its own.
~Making good progress on the house! Got the bathrooms outfitted, and working on a picture project for the bedroom.
~My family is coming to visit in December! For a whole week ^^ I get bouncy every time I think of it.
Ok that's enough. Hooray things are going so well!
I GOT A JOB!! :D Hooray.
Almost exactly four months since I had my last day at IL. Weird. Today marks four months since I arrived in Florida, and I'd say things are going very well! Meets and/or exceeds expectations. hah.
So this is where things start to get really busy, I guess. Am looking forward to the excitement. This job promises to challenge me in a lot of ways, and I think it's going to be awesome.
A quick synopsis of other goings-on:
~Canned homemade apple sauce and apple butter.
~A lovely congratulations party, which involved getting plants!
~Helping get the plants situated in the backyard. Hopefully my cilantro doesn't get rained to death.
~Snorkeling! Nurse shark, jelly fish, playing with schools of fish, giant conchs, cleaner fish... No sunburn!
~Finally got my license plate! That saga is enough for a post on its own.
~Making good progress on the house! Got the bathrooms outfitted, and working on a picture project for the bedroom.
~My family is coming to visit in December! For a whole week ^^ I get bouncy every time I think of it.
Ok that's enough. Hooray things are going so well!
8.23.2009
New place in Doral
Pictures of the New Place: the Annotated Version
Per requests, we have finally taken pictures of the new place! So I present to you a virtual, annotated tour of our new house. Click on the images to make them bigger.
Starting from the front door...
Ahh the living room:
Garage. Look at all the toys!
Downstairs bathroom. I know you can't tell, but this paint job is *amazing* compared to what it used to be. You can still see the old horrendous orange in some poorly-painted places. Also, I spent an hour in that tiny room scraping various colors of paint off the tiles. In the upstairs bathroom there was even paint in the toilet!
Our gigantic kitchen:
One of the funny things about combining our two kitchens was the ridiculous amount of spices we had. This is from the day I loaded the spice cupboard - not including about 5 huge containers already put away:
And heading upstairs, I present... The hallway (from our bedroom door):
A scene from The Office:
Our bedroom. I think the gold walls are actually starting to grow on me. Can't wait to get dressers though!
Two things you can't see from here - the gigantic walk-in closet off to the right, and the new shower head (that bf is very excited about). Not sure if the walls are green? off-yellow? some days they look like they've got some orange in them...
I hope you have enjoyed your tour! I'll let y'all know when we're ready for overnight guests :)
Not pictured: guest bedroom AKA "I don't know where to put this!" storage room, for now; walk-in closet; guest bathroom; front of house (really not that exciting, I promise).
Per requests, we have finally taken pictures of the new place! So I present to you a virtual, annotated tour of our new house. Click on the images to make them bigger.
Starting from the front door...
Ahh the living room:
Garage. Look at all the toys!
Downstairs bathroom. I know you can't tell, but this paint job is *amazing* compared to what it used to be. You can still see the old horrendous orange in some poorly-painted places. Also, I spent an hour in that tiny room scraping various colors of paint off the tiles. In the upstairs bathroom there was even paint in the toilet!
Our gigantic kitchen:
One of the funny things about combining our two kitchens was the ridiculous amount of spices we had. This is from the day I loaded the spice cupboard - not including about 5 huge containers already put away:
And heading upstairs, I present... The hallway (from our bedroom door):
A scene from The Office:
Our bedroom. I think the gold walls are actually starting to grow on me. Can't wait to get dressers though!
Two things you can't see from here - the gigantic walk-in closet off to the right, and the new shower head (that bf is very excited about). Not sure if the walls are green? off-yellow? some days they look like they've got some orange in them...
I hope you have enjoyed your tour! I'll let y'all know when we're ready for overnight guests :)
Not pictured: guest bedroom AKA "I don't know where to put this!" storage room, for now; walk-in closet; guest bathroom; front of house (really not that exciting, I promise).
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