A great 4 years!

We got Shadow four years ago yesterday. I can hardly believe it's only been four years. He's been super fun to have around and has become an important part of our family.

Next time, on time...please.

There is nothing I like more than when a plumber, cable man, air conditioning guy, (it really does not matter who), tells you they will be there between 10 and 12, and then shows up at 2. I like it even better when they do not call when they are going to be late, even when he asked you for the phone number you can be reached specifically to call in case he was not going to show up on time. Yeah, a great way to spend my day. I am extra annoyed because I missed Kathy's show today because he was late. If he called, me, not that upset. Him not calling, me, upset. Oh well. What are you gonna do?

Yeah, it's been a while.

So I have been thinking about updating our blog for a while and since Kathy has come into possession of a couple of 5 hour long movies that, to put it politely, I have absolutely no interest in watching, I figured I would take advantage of this time and update.

There is not much to say. Vacation has been pretty good. We are slowly but surely putting our bathroom back together. The insurance company is taking its time in letting us know what they are going to cover, if anything. I am going to have to make another phone call on Monday. It’s not pretty, but it is functional.

I started and stopped tutoring a kid after a week and a half. Apparently lowering my price and picking up her kid from football practice is not enough for the family. I drive forty minutes to meet the kid at school, he’s not there, so I drive to the house, only to find out that he is sick and does not want a tutoring session that day and I ask to get paid anyway because no one could bother calling me and letting me know is not enough for the mom. Oh well. Mind you, I never met the mom. This was all done via e-mail.

Anyway, ever since we went to Paris and London, I have been getting kind of excited about taking pictures. I uploaded a couple of pictures I took of our lilies when a butterfly decided to land on them. Oh, and one of Shadow hanging out our front window.

Enjoy!

Our Dream Vacation!

We're back! Ok, we've been back for a month but still! Here's the run down on our trip:

Day 1: Arrive in London, take a train, two subways, and a 1/2 mile walk to get to fancy schmancy hotel (I love cheaptickets!). Crash for 2 hours. Take a bus tour and walk around Buckingham Palace, Parliament and Big Ben. Take another two subways and make it back to the hotel in one piece. Total jet lag crash.

Day 2: London Eye--super cool. Tower of London--I LOVED IT!!! We spent 4 1/2 hours walking around the castle and taking a billion pictures. Walked along the Thames and up onto Tower Bridge. So much fun!


Day 3: Quick trip to Westminster Abbey, wasted 36 pounds touring Kensington Palace (they did some weird modern art exhibit inside, it was dumb), walked through Hyde Park (lonnnnngggg walk), checked out of the fancy schmancy hotel, caught a taxi to King's Cross Station....found Platform 9 3/4's (and yes I was the only adult in line to get their picture taken but I had fun!), and then took the Eurostar train to Paris. We were instantly pegged as tourists and accosted by a kid who kept trying to get us to pay him to get us a taxi. We dodged him and had a gourmet meal at McDonald's and then found our own taxi. Got to our not so fancy schmancy hotel and hit the hay.


Day 4: Eiffel Tower! Dream come true! Went up to the second level (the line was HUGE!!) and enjoyed every minute of it. Went to the Arc de Triomphe (it's very big), hopped onto the metro and went to Sacre Couer--beautiful. It was sunset so the atmosphere was relaxed and peaceful. We took the elevator up (Sacre Couer sits on top of a hill about the height of Hill Cumorah and it's just as steep), and walked back down. Dinner on Champs de Elysees (sp) and spent $17.00 on two tiny bottles of soda--eek!




Day 5: Notre Dame, St. Chapelle (cool medieval church with stained glass windows all around), went to Pont Neuf (first bridge in Paris), spent an hour looking for a bathroom, saw the outside of the Louvre because contrary to what was in our tour guide book, the Louvre is closed on Tuesdays. Visited Jardin de Palais Royal and Jardin de Tuileries, ice cream in the park and laughing at the snotty waiter, Palace de la Concorde (and yes we actually survived crossing the street), hopped the bus to the Trocadero (a building across the river from the Eiffel Tower), got dinner at an Italian Bistro next to the hotel and went to sleep.

Day 6: Boat ride down the Seine. Visited the Louvre--Mona Lisa is just a picture, I didn't find anything remarkable about it, went to Pont Alexander (another cool bridge), went back to the Eiffel Tower and went to the tippy top. It was freezing!!!! but I loved every minute of it. Came down, ate an ice cream crepe and sat and watched the carousel. It was magical.


Day 7: Versailles. A-MAZ-ING. Huge and grandious and just absolutely stunning.
I love the view from behind Apollo's fountain looking towards the palace. It's easy to see why Marie Antoinette got her head chopped off. Everything at Versailles is bigger than life--absolutely breath-taking. Came back to the Eiffel Tower and took pictures of it all lit up and glittering.
















I had a fantastic time and loved everything about London and Paris. The time flew by, I'm already thinking about where we'll go on our next vacation. What'cha think about an Alaskan cruise? Of course, this will be on our 15th or 20th anniversary but you can never plan too early right?

Au Revoir!

See you in a week, with tons of pictures to scrapbook and fun stories to tell!

The Smell of Spring

It happened. A wonderful thing that has quite possibly changed my attitude for the entire day.

Today, it smells like Spring.

I couldn't tell you exactly what Spring smells like, just like I can't tell you how I know what snow smells like--but I can smell it and for the first time in my life I'm so happy to say goodbye to winter and HELLO! to spring.

Take a whiff, you'll smell it too...

Snow Days Rule! Day 2!

Well, the powers at be have decided that the kids needed to have another day off, so we are at home again. The funny thing is I had already been approved for a personal day for Friday because Kathy and I are going to the temple for the Stake Temple day. I will not be back at work until Tuesday. Yeah, I am all broken up about it too.

Snow Days Rule!

My superintendent closed schools before we left yesterday for today, so I’ve known since about 2:15 that I would not be going to school today. Kathy had to wait until yesterday around 6 or 7, I think. Anyway, I am enjoying my day off, although some of my coworkers are predicting tomorrow we will either be off or delayed as well. We will see what happens. I am going to wait a little longer until I proceed with round one of shoveling the driveway. Anyway, here are some pictures I took around 10am this morning. Enjoy!

Good ridden 2009! Hello 2010!

I wanted to share with you all a few pictures from Christmas with Kathy’s family.

This is Kathy's Birthday present. Memories of a Christmas tradition with the Cornman family.



This is Kathy's neice, Morgan. She is showing off her unicorn she got for Christmas.



This is Kathy posing with the fireplace/heater her Dad got for us.



I say good ridden to 2009 because there were many ups and downs, although toward the end it felt like more downs than ups. Kathy’s mother passed away toward the end of June and everyone is trying to get adjusted to what will be the new normal in the family. Fortunately she was very much about keeping the family together, so that is what is we are doing, sticking together. As if that was not enough, in December we found out that Kathy’s father has cancer in his bladder. His treatments are going well, and the prognosis is very positive, so that is a good thing.

Still, let’s hope the bad news goes away with the year 2009.

We booked plane tickets for London and Paris the other day for our spring break in April. We have about 11 days off all together so we are planning on spending most of it in another continent. We are busy making plans to take advantage of every second we have there.

Welcome 2010.

Happy (uneventful) Halloween!

So my Halloween started on Thursday...and is blissfully close to an end.

The kids at school were wired all day Thursday and that culminated with a Halloween parade where, as usual, I'm the M.C. I don't mind, it's actually kind of fun and I can blabber on and be my cooky self. The only downfall is the sore throat afterwards but that is quickly rectified by endless amounts of cupcakes and candy--supplied of course by every student in the school.

Yesterday was the ward Halloween party and although it was not fun for me...most of it is actually a blur or chili, bowling pins, and endless amounts of yummy goodness...I think it went well. Not fantastic, but well. I don't think I spoke to anyone, I was too busy running around making sure everything was going relatively smoothly.

And now, we sit and wait for Shadow to bark like a maniac which means that 'strangers' aka 'trick or treaters' are coming to the door. But I am actually ok with that. I like seeing the kids in their costumes and I like that I have any excuse to sit around.

WAIT!!!! A major surprise! Lela, Linda, Scott, and Spencer just made a surprise visit and I am STILL giddy about it! We took Shadow with us while we went trick-or-treating up and down Kate Terrace and I have to say I had a great time. Yeah for great surprises!

Fun with animals! But not fun for the animals!

The stage was set perfectly. It was a great Sabbath day, very spiritual. I had been at church for most of the day. Kathy was with her sister and friends scrap booking. I came home late and was greeted by Kathy and Shadow. Always great. Around 9pm, we let Shadow out to use the potty and we started smelling an awful odor that seemed to envelope the house. Yup, Shadow got sprayed by a skunk.

We bathed him in tomato juice, and then in a peroxide, soap, and baking soda mixture to get the smell off. Then we cleaned up after the mess we made. We got to bed around 11:30.

Monday we went to PetSmart in Bridgewater to get some other stuff to clean him with because he still smelled a little bit. We wound up staying up until 11 o’clock with that as well. Also because it was the season premier of Heroes. Shadow is getting better smelling, though. And the house is getting better smelling.

With all the fuss about Shadow, we did not realize until Tuesday morning that we had locked one of our cats upstairs in one of the bedrooms. On Saturday. Poor cat was locked in the bedroom for three days with no food, water, or litter box.

Yeah, its been a bit nutty around here.

Happy Anniversary?

So today is Kathy and my 10th wedding anniversary. Yes, I cannot believe it has been 10 years. Today is also the day both of us went back to work and had students. Not much to celebrate.

My school day was some what uneventful. The student teacher I am supposed to be working with did not have his background check done so he cannot be in the school. He cannot be my student teacher if he cannot come in the school. I am also mentoring a new teacher this year and her computer (which is my old computer, by the way) decided to crash 15 minutes before school started.

None of this really affected my school day, though until they called me to the main office at the end of the day. Kathy was on the phone. She left her school to go buy lunch, only about a mile and a half away. When she tried to start her car to return to school, she heard a bang from under the hood and smoke came out. Turns out the battery over heated, popped one of the caps, and the car would not start. She called her school, but no one picked up to drive her back, so she walked back to her school, arriving five minutes late for a class.

Long story short, for her tenth wedding anniversary, Kathy got a new car battery. Only the best for my girl!

Wet Dog!

We went to Kathy's sister's house the other Sunday for her younger brother's birthday.

They have a pool.

We brought the dog.

Yeah, he was soaked! It is about 90 seconds long if you want to watch.



Shadow is kind of a chicken when it comes to going into the pool. He likes the water but he has to be able to feel the ground with his feet so it cannot be too deep.

...but I did it.

So I have been thinking about this a lot and I finally am posting this.

I went on trek this year as the water guy. I drove my truck around and made sure everyone had water. No one drank anything without me getting it for them. Well at one point, a couple of the adult leaders that were trekking needed a ride with a couple kids that were trekking and they shared a story with me.

One young lady was really concerned about hiking up a pretty steep hill with the handcart. She was tired and doubted her ability. Well, she made it to the top. After arriving at the top she told this leader, "It was hard, but I did it."

What a wonderful declaration! What a great thing to be able to feel, and to say! It made me excited to be there. Her excitement and exclamation made me feel like I too can overcome my trials. I want to say, "It was hard, but I did it."

More Outdoor Projects

Wahoo!! Outdoor projects are almost done! The past two weeks we've torn down the walls of the deck, painted the floor, beams, and steps red, the base black, and hung up cedar colored lattice. It is a MAJOR improvement from what was there...it's funny how you don't see how bad something is until you see it in a picture. Anyway, here's a picture of the ugly deck, and then the new deck.



Today we tore down the ugly red shed...it was a little harder than I thought it would be, John's Dad made a very sturdy shed back in the day! Scott had his trusty sledge hammer though and down that eyesore came! The yard looks huge now! Here's some pictures!









I'm so excited that the backyard is starting to look so good!

Pictures of Lilies!

Kathy and I planted these lilies last year and have been super excited to see them come back this year. They are bigger than when we planted them. I am not sure why I was so anxious to see them but I am. Enjoy!

Done! (almost) Part 2

Here are Kathy’s dad and brother helping with the shed.


Another with us. I am not amused.


Kathy MUST get herself on camera.


Shed done! Almost.



I say almost because we did not realize until later in the day that they shorted us four skylights. Yes, as it stands, right now, we have four holes in the roof of our new shed. Kathy called the company and they are shipping them out. We should have them by the end of the week, just in time for the rain.


This project is nearly complete. We have one other shed coming down. I am going to plan with the Teacher's Quorum when they want to come over the house and tear down our other old shed. Not this weekend, though, we are planning on having a garage sale this weekend. If anyone wants to come by the house on Saturday and give me money for some of our old stuff we don't want any more, come on over. I will gladly take your money.

Done! (almost) Part 1

Project tear down two sheds, construct one officially started a while ago. We tore down an old metal shed a few weeks ago. It came down super easy. I had to extend the concrete foundation it was sitting on because the shed going up is larger than the old one. I poured the concrete last week and Kathy’s father and brother came down to help me build the new shed. Here are a few pictures.


Preparations for the concrete are under way!




Concrete is done and dry. Fortunately it has met Shadow's strictest quality control standards.


While I was waiting for Kathy’s dad and brother to come, I decided to empty all of the boxes and set all the parts out. They drove an hour and a half to help me out, I did not want to waste their time. That’s a lot of parts.

Impromptu day at the beach!

So Kathy says to me at ten o’clock this morning, I want to go to the beach, a phrase she has never uttered in her life. At eleven o’clock this morning we pulled out of the drive way headed towards Point Pleasant. At twelve thirty we parked and headed toward the sand. At four o’clock, we left the beach about 60 dollars poorer but 3 pictures richer. Enjoy!



I am playing a game on my iPod! Super fun!



Kathy holding the life saver of the day. Good thing she thinks about these things, 'cause I sure don't.



This last one is just a random seagull.

Algebra Angels

I have been holding on to this picture for some time now and decided that I had a few minutes to post it. I think it is funny. You'll have to click on the picture to read the caption.