knsalem

Charlie in a Blanket

2012-01-27T13:43:00.001-08:00

Flood of 2012

2012-01-20T09:51:00.000-08:00

After it snowed it rained...and rained...and rained.

Here is what my work looks like. My office is the building on the left in the first picture. Pictures were taken by my friend Josh who lives on campus with his mom, Patty, who is our kitchen director. They, along with some other staff, had to evacuate their homes that are behind our office and temporarily move into Alder House (one of our cabins). I'm told everyone is ok and the horses are fine. Our church also has flooding all around it. A group banned together last night to make sand bags for the church and the community. Its pretty crazy out here. We're fine and my parents are fine, but some of my friends are not; a few of them were hit pretty bad and are staying in hotels until the water lowers so they can figure out what to do. Prayers are appreciated.

First Snow!

2012-01-18T09:12:00.000-08:00

It snowed this first time this winter on Sunday (15th), and has snowed on and off again since then. Yesturday was the most so far, but nothing to worry about yet. Yea snow!

Driving Home

2012-01-17T10:25:00.000-08:00

My commute to and from work is sometimes absolutely beautiful. I don't always have time to stop and take a picture, but last week had two sunsets that were worth the time pulling over.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-04T15:26:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances and I didn’t really have much plans for New-Years. I was supposed to pick up a couple of sparkling cider bottles at the store the day before, but I never saw the shopping list, so that didn’t happen. Oops. Well, I think that other than having Monday off, we just hung out at home, played Halo till after midnight and then went to bed. On Monday, we did some shopping and headed over to Mary’s parents home where I played Halo with Dad for several hours, then watched the Rose Bowel Game with the Ducks and that other team. Oregon won! Then it was back to Halo and dinner.

Merry Christmas

2011-12-27T14:55:00.000-08:00

Aah, Christmas, here at last, gone so fast.
My work had their Christmas party this year at Redhawk Winery. It was open bar, so I got to taste a few of their wines. I think I had four glasses. They had pre-chosen a wine to go with each part of the meal. They even served a desert wine last. It was good. At the party I was given a coaster for my coffee mug as my Christmas present from the office. It says "Instant Drafter, just add coffee". I was also presented with the 5 years of dedicated service engraved blue glass paper weight. It is a little something-something that is given to those who have made it to their five year mark with the company.
Mary-Frances’ work Christmas party was at the same church where it was held the previous year. They made dinner with appetizers that were delicious. This year they had a secret Santa gift exchange, that went well. Mary-Frances made a crochet golf club cover for her receiver. He loved it.We were invited over to one of our friends parents home dinner for a Christmas get together. We drove up to their house in the fog that was really thick, and since it's Oregon, half the people on the road drive with their lights OFF when it's foggy. Their freakin' nuts. Anyways, we arrived without any problems and got to hang out playing Yahtzee, and eating cookies. Dinner was tastie, and I got to drink a beer with Jason Fumasi. He brought a Oakshire beer with him. It was good.
Both Mary-Frances and I got a couple days off for Christmas Vacation, which always is makes going back to work so much harder. Let's see, well, Christmas day we awoke, made breakfast, opened stockings, went to Sunday service, came back home, opened presents that we got for each other and ones that we got from family. Charlie got a box this year, but not much else. Oh, well he did get a plastic toy that kind of looks like a turkey wish bone.
We then packed up the car and headed over to the Proctors, where we had lunch and dinner and got to give and receive more gifts. Mary’s dad got a new Hi-Def TV for his gaming. Mary-Frances and I were hiding the TV at our place till Christmas Eve, where we snuck it back over to their house, hiding it in the garage. When all the presents were opened, and Dan had left the room to do some computer stuff, I pulled the TV out and set it in his 'man' cave for him to discover. He eventually found it and was quite shocked and surprised, and could not figure where it came from. He loved it. It is great for Halo!
We spent the night and hung out most of the next day. Last but not least, I drew up a couple cartoons that I posted on my Facebook. Apparently it wasn't obvious enough that I drew them, so I am posting one of them here for you to enjoy.

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-28T08:37:00.000-08:00

This year we spent Thanksgiving with Mary-Frances’ parents. It was their first Thanksgiving in Salem. We made the deal that if they did the food shopping, we would do the cooking.
We had all our stuff packed and ready to go Wednesday night so that we could stay a couple of days in their new home. Thursday morning I made pancakes, eggs and sausage, a typical holiday breakfast. We used our turkey cooker again this year, as it as proved to be invaluable. It cooks the turkey just right, and leaves the oven free for me to bake the Block Island Potatoes, Pumpkin Pie, and bread rolls. Mary-Frances picked up a Chocolate Moose Cake for those who didn’t want my Pumpkin Pie. For veggies we had corn on the cob and Mary-Frances made green beans with bacon. Dan made a sweet potato dish for himself, as he is the only one who likes sweet potatoes.
The drink that I made was a new one that I tried once before, with overwhelming succsess…Butterbeer! It was too sweet for Mary-Frances though.
We watched the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade and the Peanuts Thanksgiving specials. Yes, that is plural, there are two Peanut Thanksgiving Specials.
We did go shopping on Black Friday as their deals cannot be beat. We did not however go when stores opened or when sales started, that’s just stupid. Unless you are trying to get the $5 TV that the store only has two of, it’s better to wait till the crowds die down. Everything else that is on sale is typically still there.
We stayed a couple of nights at their house, giving it a great "home for the holidays" feel. On Saturday we watched the Beavers and Ducks Civil War game. Yes, I watched a football game that wasn’t the Super Bowl. Crazy, I know.

Grandma Kenney

2011-11-14T13:34:00.000-08:00

Grandma Kenney/ McClain Slideshow from Sean Kenney on Vimeo.

On October 27, 2011 my Grandmother passed away.
Freida Eloise Schomer was born May 19, 1917 in Fresno California to Christian and Bertha Schomer. By the age of 9, both of Freida’s parents had passed away, at which time she, along with her brothers and sisters, went to live with their grandmother, Fidelia Garis.

Freida graduated from the Fresno High School and then Fresno State College. It was here where she met Alfred Kenney. At the age of 24, Freida announced her betrothal to Alfred Kenney (28) informally to friends in the local paper. The couple was married Sunday morning on June 1, 1941. The ceremony was solemnized in the Westminster Presbyterian Church by Reverend E.M. Keeler. At the time Freida was working as a member of the faculty of the Alvine School in Caruthers, while Alfred was the owner of an automobile service shop.

At the age of 26 she gave birth to her first child, Charles, then later to her daughter, Joan. Freida and Alfred along with their two children, moved to Princeton, New Jersey where she held a teaching position and Alfred attended Westminster Choir College. There they stayed for four years until Alfred graduated, at which time they moved back to Fresno, California. Freida soon took up another teaching position, now at Jane Addams School.

In June of 1961, the family moved again, this time to Carmichael California. Freida started another teaching position with the San Juan Unified School District. By 1966 Charles married and moved out the house as well Joan. She was now in her ‘empty-nest’ stage of life. She was 49.

By the time she turned 51 in 1968, Freida’s first grandson was born. She retired from teaching in 1975 after 36 years. Five years later on December 7, 1980, at the age of 67, Alfred passed away. She would spend the next 14 years alone in the house until she met David Henry McClain in the year of 1994. Freida Kenney fell in love for the second time in her life and married David. They spent every moment they had together even when David’s health started to fail. On March 22, 1999 Freida had a stroke, possibly as a result of the stress of caring for Dave as he was in the hospital. After catching pneumonia, David would pass away that same year.

As a result of her stroke, Grandma Freida needed 24 hour care. For the first two years, her son and daughter-in-law moved into her home to provide that care. By August of 2001 she then moved to Eureka to be cared for by her Daughter for the next 10 years, until she finally passed away in their home. She lived to see 9 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren born. She was 94.

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T08:39:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I had another successful Halloween Party last night. We had a mixture of friends from Canyonview (Mary’s work), and our Young Marrieds group from Northwest Hills. Our guests included a Doctor, Snow White, a Knight of Camelot, Peacock, Fairy/Butterfly, Old Man, Rapper, Beekeeper, Baby bee and flower, Blind guy, and an 80’s Chic. Snow White (Julie J). made a pumpkin “pie” that was delicious. It was all the pumpkin pie goodness, but without the crust.

This year we were able to get people to head down to the spooky basement where they enjoyed the fine arts that is foosball. Miss Peacock (Patty) made several peacock honks and calls throughout the night to be more authentic. Blind man (Grant) also played in character.

Around 7:30 the scavenger hunt began!
There were three teams of three that were given a single clue to locate a bag of clothes. They where to choose an article of clothing from the bag, then trade their clue with another team that would send them to the location of yet another bag of clothes. There were five clues in total and once they had found all five, they would report back to living room where they would receive information of what to do with their findings…

Each team was to now build a scarecrow! They had to assemble the items they had found in the scavenger hunt using masking tape and stuffing to create their scarecrow. They were given markers to draw a face to help sell its personality. After ten minutes were up they put down their markers and stuffing and all gathered in the living room for judging. Our neighbor, Amy, came over to be our judge. Each team was given the opportunity to appeal to Amy as to why their scarecrow should win by providing a name, and brief bio. The winning team each received a $5 gift card to Starbucks or Dutch Bros (their choice).

After the game we proceeded to vote for best costume. The best costume for the night was Miss. Peacock. Second place was Snow White, and third place was the Rapper. We had a lot of fun, and hope our guests did too. Thanks guys for another awesome Halloween Party!

For tonight, Hallween night, Mary-Frances and I plan to drive over to Mary's parents house and hang out with them and help pass out candy to all the little kids in awesome costumes. Kids in crappy or no costumes get nothing. Ahh, I love Halloween. Pics coming soon.

PS) Charlie is doing much better now. :)

Charlie Poops

2011-10-19T16:24:00.000-07:00

Charlie pooped on the Proctor’s new carpet which is totally not his style. I knew then that something wasn’t right about the whole thing. I really couldn’t believe it was Charlie as that’s so out of place for him. Anyways, during the night Charlie woke up and ran down stairs. This behavior too was odd for him. He came back up a little while later. It wasn’t until the morning that I found that he had pooped on the floor. There was almost a trail of poop from the stairs to the front door. I guess he really had to go.

Well, I cleaned up the poop, and was getting ready to take him outside when he pooped again on the floor. Now, we are really treading on foreign territory here. He never poops inside and he can always hold it. Not only that, but it was really soft. Now I know this sounds gross, but it’s all in the details.

On the walk he was just pooping water. We went to church and left him in his crate; while we were gone he had diarrhea. The red flag was that there was blood in his stool as well. We took him to the vet were he had a temperature of a 101 and was dehydrated. They checked him over and got really concerned for him. So much so that they said that they may have to keep him over night incase he takes a turn for the worst. Not encouraging words.

They tested his blood and a stool sample. Both came back negative (which is good). They put a catheter on his leg to get some fluids in him and allowed us to take him home for the night. He ate his dinner (as he didn’t eat his breakfast) and drank his water. The vet gave us a pill that he needs to take once a day and a liquid that he has to take twice a day. He hates both. His stool is looking better now, but he is still kind of lethargic at times. He also doesn’t have a huge desire to eat when he is supposed to either. We are both concerned for him and are watching him closely. We are praying that he gets well soon. No more trips to the vet.

Mary-Frances's parents moved to Salem

2011-10-19T14:57:00.000-07:00

If you had not already heard, Mary's parents stayed with us for about a month while they looked for a new place to live.

We picked Mary-Frances’ mother up at the airport Saturday, Aug 21st as she arrived first. Dad was staying behind to take care of the last minute details before driving up.

We went out and saw The Help at the Cinebarre to celebrate her birthday that was earlier in the month. To make her stay more comfortable we bought an air-filter and some other necessities, like wine and Popsicle. Before she arrived I got to talk to some strange guy who delivered all her oxygen and machines so I would be able to work them if I needed to. Mary’s Dad arrived at the end of August with Ron (Mary’s brother-in-law), Rocky (Nephew) and the three dogs that would also be living with us, Buddy, Sophie, and Trudy. Ron and Rocky drove home the following day.

We got the dogs used to being in their crates while we were all out and about, but getting them to go outside when they had to, still needed some work. Charlie was jealous of the dogs for a while but I think he started to really enjoy their presence. He even played with Sophie a couple of times. This is a huge improvement for Charlie as he does not play normally. Buddy got me in trouble while I was out walking all four dogs at once. Trudy had stopped to poop, so I stopped to pick it up (with a baggy, not with my hand). Well a father and daughter were strolling down the sidewalk towards us, her on a three wheeler and him walking behind. Well, once the dogs saw them, I could not get them to stop barking and lunging for them. I held them back on their leashes, while the father encouraged his daughter to keep going passed. Well, Buddy got too close and grabbed the little girls pant leg. I pulled him off as fast as I could but it was too late. He had also nipped her leg. I apologized for Buddy's outburst. The girl started to squint her face up like she was hurt. Dad pulled up her pant leg to reveal the tiny red mark of Buddy’s nip. Well, that led the dad to proceed to tell me off in a nice set of colorful words about how I need to handle the dogs better. I am not sure what was going through his head walking by four barking and lunging dogs in the first place. I mean, nothing about their demeanor said "I am friendly come pet me", and I was holding them back. Perhaps his logic told him that he should not have to walk around to avoid us. But by that same logic I would assume he would then walk up to a gang of thugs with weapons and would be surprised that they attack him. Oh well.

While they stayed at our place, they had our old oil drum removed and hired some landscapers to come in and clean out all the over grown branches, remove some awfully placed trees and bushes and just made our house look prettier. We really appreciated that!

Mary’s parents found a rental that was brought to their attention via a member of our church. Mary put it in the weekly prayer list that her parents needed a rental, they saw it, said to themselves, "hey, we have a house that we cannot sell at this time, how about we rent it to this family?" They made contact, parents went out to see the home, loved it, filled out all the paperwork and moved in around September 30th. Their stuff arrived a few days late as the truck drivers got lost. Probably because of their map. All their stuff is now moved in and the house is pretty much set up. We had our first dinner together in their new pad on Saturday. That’s when we noticed that Charlie wasn’t feeling well.

Chimney Cleaning...or lack of

2011-10-03T11:51:00.001-07:00

OK, now that we had the birds out of our chimney, we called back Murphy’s Chimney cleaning service to come out and do a cleaning. We wanted to get the awful soot smell out of the house before Mary’s mother arrived. So he came out, propped his ladder on our chimney and knocked several bricks down, landing on the flu. We knew that the top of our chimney was loose and in bad shape, because this same guy came out and did an inspection to give us a quote on a repair. So, I figure that sometime in-between then and now he forgot about that. So, he said that he could not do anything until the chimney was repaired, and since the bricks where now sitting on our flu, he could not open it to do a proper cleaning. So, be packed his stuff up, and said to call him when we were ready to repair/rebuild the chimney. Now the top looks worse than it did before. But at least if it ever falls over, it will fall on our roof and not the neighbor's house.

Really Lame Note: While we were sitting in the living room waiting for my friends to go to dinner for my birthday (MF) suit was falling inside the house because it was so windy outside and Patrick had to get his hands dirty to get the flu to shut a little more to keep the suit from completely covering our living room. So mad at the chimney guy right now.

Mary-Frances' Birthday

2011-10-03T11:43:00.000-07:00

For Mary-Frances’ birthday, on September 3rd, we walked around downtown Silverton visiting the antique stores and yarn shops. Ate lunch at O’Briens, and bought some chocolate bon-bons at The Chocolate Box. For dinner we went out with the Furlos, Jessica Becker and the in-laws. Our first dinner choice was closed due to remodel, so we went with the next best thing, Chula Vista Mexican restaurant. It was a fun and relaxing evening. The following day we spent at Detroit Lake with the Fumasi’s hanging out and berry picking. Well, Mary-Frances was hanging out, and I went berry picking. The berries were then baked in a cobbler, which we enjoyed during a game of Yahtzee.

Court Street Christian Church

2011-09-20T16:58:00.000-07:00

I love our new church! They sell coffee, hot chocolate and Italian sodas in the lobby before each service! And they only cost $2 each! One of the gals even decorates my cup when I come! Gotta love it. :)

Small groups start tomorrow (Wednesday). We've decided to try one of the Young Married groups to see if it's a good fit for us.

Chimney Birds

2011-07-23T09:13:00.000-07:00

OK, so our chimney is in bad shape. The mortar needs replacing inside and out, and the top 7 or so layers needs to be rebuilt, and cap needs to be put on it. Not to mention it is filthy and needs a good cleaning. Well, that is where out little story begins.
We received a coupon in the mail from a chimney repair/sweep company that said that they would clean the chimney for $95.99 and provide a free inspection. So, we called them up and they came out. He opened the flu and said, “There are birds in your chimney. They should be gone in 3-4 weeks, call me when they leave and I will come back”.
So, now we have to wait till the birds are full grown and leave the nest before we can get the chimney cleaned. Well, on Friday I heard a little flutter and a lot of bird chirping. Loud chirping. I thought it was a bird outside the window at first and ignored it. As the day went on (I had the day off), the chirping didn’t stop. After Mary-Frances got home, and I was finished cooking dinner, that the chirping was so annoying that I went to investigate. I realized that the chirping was coming from the chimney, and not outside. I then deduced that the chirping was really close.
I opened the flu, and the littlest bird fell out onto the floor. It was hardly moving, and covered in soot. I got a paper towel and picked it up and put it in a Mary-Kay packing box.
I then noticed that a second, older bird was still in the chimney, and he was the one making all the noise. He wasn’t in a spot where I could reach my hand up and grab, nor was he in a spot where I could see him. I put on some latex gloves and got a wire hanger from our neighbor and proceeded to poke around for the bird. Eventually, I found it and was lucky enough for the bird to grab the hanger with his feet that I was able to pull him out of the chimney. I put him in the box with his sibling. We drove the birds to the wildlife center where they told us they were baby Swifts and that would care for the animals until they were big/old enough to be either released back into the wild or to be put back into their nest. How they plan to do that, I have no idea.

Mary's Sister, and Family Come to Visit

2011-07-22T09:12:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances’s sister, Candi, and family came to visit us for a day. They showed up after work and we hung out around the house chatting, playing Halo, Foosball and Pool. We picked up Papa Murphy’s pizza for dinner (because they didn’t want the Spaghetti that we had planned to make). They were on their annual family vacation, driving around to all their favorite tourist hot spots. They had brought Ron’s (Candi’s husband) little brother with them. He was probably 16. They were a fun group to hang out with and talk to. The next morning, the youngest girl, Sommer, helped me make breakfast for everyone. Once they were all packed up, they headed off around noon. It was great to have them stay with us, and look forward to seeing them again.

Fourth of July

2011-07-04T09:11:00.000-07:00

Happy Fourth!
We didn’t have much plans for the fourth, and we were aching to do something. We were invited to join our neighbors at Detroit Lake with their family for their annual celebration. We were seriously considering it, until our friends Jason and Anna Fumasi said they were going to be in town for the fourth, and asked us to join them. Well, more specifically, Anna and her family at their Lake House. Jason drove in first and we took him to lunch before he headed out to his family’s place further South. Anna showed up later, as she had to work. We met her at Dutch Bros. and followed her to Detroit Lake where her family own a home right on the lake.
They close the road by 5pm to vehicles so people can watch the fireworks in the road without being run over. However, since we showed up way after five, they wouldn’t allow us down the road (where their house is) till her mom came up and confirmed that they did live on the road. When we were finally allowed to pass, I had to drive very carefully not to run anyone over as the road was practically blocked on both sides of people who had no interest in moving out of the way of my wheels.
We watched the fireworks from their driveway and had fun. We hung out all night and spend the night on their futon. The following day we went out on their boat twice. Anna drove us out on the Lake where we had lunch/snack the first time. Just before we let Anna's dog jump out of the boat for a swim (she loves the water) we saw a kid on a cliff side getting ready to jump into the water and a family in a boat watching him. We got closer and saw that they were our neighbors! So, we got to see them after all. The second time we went out, Anna wanted to water board. We had a lot of fun hanging out with our friend and her family.

Sacramento Trip

2011-06-23T11:08:00.000-07:00

The Kenney Family had a family reunion of sorts, as a last get together before David & Jo moved to Texas, and to celebrate Father's Day. Mary-Frances and I planned our trip out to coincide with everyone else’s arrival and departure. I woke up Saturday morning to go into work and get done what I needed to get done before we left for the weekend. We were on the road by 8am and arrived in Sacramento around 4:20pm. We were trying to race David & Jo to Sacramento Top-gear style, but they hit some major traffic delaying them.
We hung out at my sister Rebecca's new rental home, and slept at my parents house in my old bedroom. We brought Charlie with us and he loved meeting all the new people, kids and dogs. Reece especially warmed up to Charlie.
It was great, we had the whole weekend planned and ate plenty of food. We spent a lot of time loafing around John and Rebecca's place in their air-conditioning as it was 90 plus outside. My Aunt, Uncle and Grandma showed up for one day. Unfortunately Grandma wasn't feeling too well and ended up in the hospital for a couple of days, but she eventually was able to go home. Another crazy thing that happened was my cousin Shannon had her first baby a week or so earlier than expected.
But nothing, nothing prepared us for what was about to happen next…
On our way back to Mom & Dad’s from Rebecca & Johns, I saw a small white dog limping in the Arcade Church parking lot, that is next to the apartment buildings. At first glance I thought what I was seeing was a strap tied around his hind legs, causing him to limp. I slowed the car and flipped a U-turn, drove back, and parked the car in the lot. By the this time the dog was in the middle of the road. Mary-Frances was first to get out of the car and head for him. Just at this moment an "A-Team" style van sped past in front of the dog. We stood in shock thinking that we were going to watch him get hit. Once the van had passed, the little dog was still there and started to head over to us. Phew, that was close!
The dog had one of those extendable leashes tied around his neck, and he was just dragging it along as he walked. He definitely was limping and his leg appeared to be broken. Mary-Frances was able to grab the leash and held it trying to calm the dog. I got out of the car and brought Charlie over to it, hoping against hope that it would be curious about Charlie and his fear would evaporate. This seemed to do the trick.
The little dog was a miniature Poodle that we named ‘Marconi’ as that was the street we found him on. Mary-Frances picked him up and we got in our car and started to look for an emergency vet on the GPS that may be open at this hour to take a look at his leg.
We found one that was a couple of miles away, set the GPS to GO and headed out. Marconi was warming up to us quite quickly. He was licking Mary-Frances and licking Charlie. He seemed to be in good spirits despite his leg.
Well we found the Vet, but it had apparently gone out of business since the last time our GPS was updated. Crap. Time for plan B. We went back to the GPS and started to call any Vet clinic that might be open, as it was after 11pm at this point. We got a hold of someone who gave us the number for the Animal Shelter in Rancho Cordova. We were given the option to keep the dog till tomorrow at which point they would pick up the dog, or we could bring it by tonight. We opted for tonight, so we drove out to Rancho and pulled into the back of the building were we were met by the employee who was on graveyard.
She set Marconi down on his feet to see what may be wrong. She first thought it was his hips, but soon came to the same conclusion that we did, his leg was broken. However, the break was an old one and was probably callused over. She said that they will have to x-ray it to see the extent of the damage and if the leg could be saved. She took our information and let us out. She said that the owner has 25 days to claim their dog, at which time he would go up for adoption. I called the next day to see how Marconi was doing, and they said he was happy, he wasn’t chipped, so they had no way of contacting the owner. We hope all best for the little guy.
All and all our weekend in Sacramento was fun. There was food, drinks, games, hanging out, drama, ice cream, puking, pirates, water fights, hospitalizations, possessed cars, and rescued dogs. Not bad for five days.

April - May

2011-06-13T10:09:00.000-07:00

The Run Down:

Ok, in April we got our Taxes done and God greatly blessed us with a return that allowed us to pay off the rest of our debt! So besides the House we are DEBT FREE! Very excited! Work also became very busy for me due to the Auction Committee starting up again.

In May we had dinner with my cousins, Trina & Ken. It was great reconecting with them and getting to know their daughter Ashley; who loves Sponge Bob. She made a Patrick (starfish) for Patrick, who put it on our fridge.

May 20th was Graduation here at Canyonview for the Equestrian College students. They start things off with riding demonstrations of what they learned throughout their two years and it was cool to see them doing the jumping and working with the cows. Being in the office all day, I usually don't get to see all that they do on the equestrian side of campus.

Work also picked up even more when my co-worker's son finally arrived from Korea (adoption). So I have been doing what I normally do in the office, preping for the Auction, and trying to keep up with all the summer camp regsitrations. Thankfully she won't be taking three months off since he's not a newborn (1 actually) and will be coming back in June. To help me out in the office, Jennifer Price (daughter in-law to one of our founders), has been coming in daily. She's a lot of fun and has also become my walking partner for the Summer.

Young Marrieds had our monthly event at Lakeshore Lanes Miniture Golf Course in Albany. Turned out to just be our friends the Colliers and us. Rachelle of course won; because she's awesome like that, and Patrick got second place. I got last =(. The next day we went out to Detroit Lake to spend the day with our friends, Jason & Anna with Anna's family at their lake house. I kicked Jason's butt in Yahtzee (as you may have seen on facebook). 4 yahtzees in one game!!! Never in my life have I ever gotten more than one until that day. :)

Movies we have seen so far are as follows: Thor, Pirates, and X-men.
We hope to see Super 8 soon.

31 years old and lookin' 26

2011-04-07T12:24:00.000-07:00

This year for my Birthday, I wanted to see the Where Science meets Imagination exhibit that is currently in Seattle Washington. This past weekend was the best time for us to do it, so we took Friday off and drove up in the morning to spend a couple of hours taking pictures of the Star Wars miniatures and costumes. This exhibit was in Oregon several years back, but we just missed it before we actually moved out here. So since I was kind of bummed that I didn’t get to see it then, when I heard that it was going to be on this side of the country again, I wasn’t going to miss it. The miniatures that I was most interested in where from the Original Trilogy (OT), and not so much from the prequels. I had a lot of fun taking pictures, however, once I got home and looking back at the pictures I wish I took more. The rest of the weekend we spent with our Friends the Fumasi’s. They took us to the Theo Chocolate Factory, a park of Cherry Blossoms, Woodland Park (not in that order), and other fun activities. On Tuesday we saw Sucker Punch! It's a Zack Snyder film, so it had all the great visuals and action typical with his movies, as well as washed out colors a dirty kind of environment. It was enjoyable to watch for the most part. A bit predictable, and over the top, so it’s not a film to take seriously. About two weeks ago I threw out my back while I was brushing my teeth in the morning before church. I saw something on my face that I wanted to closer look at, so I leaned forward and pop! Shearing pain ran up and down my spine. I tried to do some stretches to loosen up the muscles. Mary-Frances stepped on my back hoping to crack some joints. It all helped a little, but it was a week before I felt more back to normal. Now for today, they only thing we have planned is to get our taxes done and maybe get some Coldstone Ice Cream.
Anyone thinking of last minute gift ideas, check out my wish lists on Amazon:
Misc Toys, Games and Movies, Music and Books, Star Wars, Hobbies and Models, and Transformers

Baby Blanket Delivery

2011-03-21T10:20:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances’ first crochet baby blanket project was for the Frys, a couple from our Young Marrieds group. She has been needing to give it to them since she finished the blanket, and the baby was born. Luckily, with our trip down to Coos Bay, we were passing Eugene, where they lived. We arranged to meet up with them for lunch at their home. Mary-Frances presented her gift and got to see "Small Fry", aka Jonathan, enjoy his new baby blanket.

Happy Fifth Anniversary

2011-03-21T10:14:00.000-07:00

For our fifth year anniversary, we drove down to Coos Bay for the weekend. It is a small lumber mill town with not much scenery or much to do, unfortunately. Least not where we stayed. Mary-Frances was fortunate enough to be given a coupon for a buy-one-night-get-one-night-free for a bed and breakfast awhile back, so we took advantage of it here. We stayed at the Coos Bay Manor B&B for the two nights. We took Friday off to make the three hour drive down, arriving mid evening. One of the reasons that this B&B was chosen was that they allowed pets, so we brought Charlie along with us. Upon arrival, there were 4 other guests there, and they all brought their dogs too. The house was now full of little dogs and they all had bits of intimidation with the others as well as slight dominance. But for the most part they all got along. Well…not Charlie and Ziggy, the owners little dog. He constantly snorted, that sounded like growling, and Charlie did not like this unfriendly noise, so he kept his distance for the most part. The first night there was our anniversary, so we went out to dinner and chatted it up. The next morning our host set out a thermos of coffee outside our door for the 7:30 ‘wake up’ call for me. I got up and grabbed the little tray and stand, but not before stepping in a wet spot on the carpet. I looked down and could see the foaming of the liquid oozing between my toes. Man I was glad I was not in my socks at that moment. I headed downstairs to tell the host that I believed one of the other dogs had peed just outside our door. He came up with a towel and stamped it dry. “Oh, it must have been recent as it’s still warm” he says to me. Ick! For breakfast we were served a fruit bowel of strawberries, bananas, and blueberries, then sausage, hashbrowns and ….something I cannot recall. The second morning we had waffles. Anyways, since we were there for a full day, we needed to find something to keep us occupied. We did a little driving to see the sights and to take in the Coos bay experience. Stopped at a coffee shop/used book store for our afternoon pick-me-up, then got back on the road. We spent most of our time at the Umpqua River Lighthouse. It is the sister to the Heceta Head Lighthouse that we stayed at awhile back. Both lighthouses and the Lighthouse keeper homes were built using the same blueprints. Pictures in our shutterfly. After the lighthouse, we toured the town and found a little beach spot to watch the waves smash themselves on the rocks. Charlie enjoyed watching the seagulls. For the evening we enjoyed our leftovers from the night before and played the new games that Mary-Frances bought at the Lighthouse gift shop. Becoming bord with the game, we started to play Yahtzee instead. Our Last morning there we just packed up and headed home. All in all it was a relaxing weekend.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

2011-03-17T16:18:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I celebrated our 4th Annual St. Patrick’s Day dinner this past weekend with some friends. We invited three couples to join us, and last minute they all cancelled. So, since we had dinner all cooked and ready for people, we started calling around to see if anyone else was available. We ended up with a couple from Young Marrieds and a couple from Canyonview. We cooked our traditional meal, Guinness Beef strew & Block Island Potatoes. I also made Irish Coffee, and Mike Collier and I did an Irish Car Bomb together. After dinner I served our homemade Irish Chocolate Cake, this time without the Baileys in the frosting so Mary-Frances would eat it, plus one of our guests was preggers. After dinner we sat at the couch and just had fun hang out.

What's goin on?

2011-03-06T18:41:00.000-08:00

Well lets see...in February....

I (MF) started back to work on Valentine's Day; which was a blessing because I wasn't originally scheduled to return to work until March. Reason why they decided to bring me back sooner is because the last week of February Canyonview hosted the CHA Region 1 Conference and they realized they need their receptionist. :)

I have also been crocheting non-stop. I have finished another baby blanket, several coffee sleeves, and washcloths/dishcloths. My next adventures will be two more baby blankets and pot scrubbers (safe for your non-stick cookware). See my SwiftHook blog for more details. Or you can go to the SwiftHook Etsy shop.

Patrick and I have (mostly Patrick) have been playing Need for Speed: Shift due to Sean & Sarah's recommendation. We enjoy it, but I get frustrated too easily. Some day I will beat Patrick's time dang-it!

We held our 4th Annual Hot Chocolate Party in February as well. We sadly forgot to take pictures though. This year we did a peppermint hot chocolate because someone told us it was National Mint Chocolate Day. We also did a peanut butter hot chocolate, double chocolate hot chocolate, an Italian hot chocolate, a Cafe-Style hot chocolate, and our traditional Switzerland hot chocolate. We not only had friends from church over to enjoy the chocolaty goodness, but we also invited our neighbors across the street. They brought their youngest son with them and apparently Charlie was able to steel a marshmallow from him when we weren't looking (tisk tisk).

Our Young Marrieds small group decided to go out to dinner to McMenamins and to a swing dance lesson at OSU for our February event. Sadly only a few couples came to the dinner and even sadder was that only us and one other couple went to the dance lesson. But we had a good time. Once the lesson was over the dance studio was open for all levels to dance. After being wall flowers for a few minutes our friends suggested frozen yogurt and we agreed. Over all it was a good night.

I think that's it. March should be a good month for updates...lots going on...stay tuned. :)

Mary-Frances's new blog

2011-02-10T14:42:00.000-08:00

SwiftHook

We Have HEAT!!!

2011-01-19T11:13:00.000-08:00

OK, OK, OK! Breath….in….out….
Wow, what a trek from when our furnace kicked the bucket till now. If you haven’t been following too closely to our heating problems, let me sum it up for you…
Our furnace ran out of oil back in October, so it stopped working. We figured out the problem, spent like $290 for more oil and figured that was all we needed. It wasn’t. Furnace still not coming back on, we hired a technician to look at it. In his inspection he found that our exchanger had a gapping crack in it and he ‘condemned’ the furnace. We called the insurance company to see about replacing it. They then sent out their own technician (which we had to pay for) to tell us the same thing. Mary-Frances found this tech to be very unpleasant.
Insurance said they will pay this technician to replace it and it would only cost us $1400 out of pocket. Apparently there were some charges that the insurance didn’t cover, but they didn’t elaborate too much on what those where. The issue we were now facing was that the insurance only covered it if we got a REPLACEMENT, not an upgrade. So, we had to get another inefficient oil furnace going this route, not to mention we were not happy with the service this technician has been providing us. We thought long and hard and decided that we were going to take the CASH-OUT option. Which means the insurance company would cut us a check for the amount they would have paid the technician to do the job that we could use to do with what we wanted, aka, get the furnace we wanted and the technician we wanted. Unfortunately this only amounted to $1500. But that is better than nothing.
So, we got a quote from another Heating company for a GAS furnace, and were sold. I took our little craft hammer and tore down as much of the wall surrounding our current furnace as I could, and when they arrived; they took down the rest, loaded it all and the old furnace into their truck and took it to the dump for us. The installation of the new furnace took two days.
The only problem was we didn’t have gas coming into the house to actually turn it on. We called the gas company before the New Year and scheduled a time for them to come and get-er-done. They said the 20th of January (or if we paid an additional $200 we could get a rush on that). This also meant that the Heating Company would have to come back once the gas was in to hook it up to the furnace. We weren’t out of the cold yet. So, for two weeks we waited for the gas as our new furnace sat, looking pretty but unusable. Then we got a call from the gas company. Apparently, due to a computer ‘glitch’ our paper work didn’t go through, and they didn’t know if they were going to have the necessary permits ready to begin connecting gas to our house by the 20th. It may get pushed back further. Mind you, we are now in our third month of no heat in a 50 degree house. We could see our breath when we talked, our olive oil and our soap froze numerous times. We had to heat our plates to keep our food from cooling down to fast. It was like living in our refrigerator. The warmest we got our house with space heaters was 63 degrees.
Well, our heating company got wind of this issue, and went to bat for us and got the gas company off their butts and they showed up at our house on Monday, the 17th and finished the gas hook up on the 18th. The heating company then came back today to make the final hook up to the furnace and then tested the system, and we are good to go!
We now officially have heat again, three months and $5741 later.
If you are moved to tears and feel the love inside you, we would welcome any donations with glad hearts. We are calling it our Furnace Relief Donation. Just click the provided Paypal Donate button and donate as much or as little as you want. All Donations will go to paying off our furnace.

Young Marrieds Retreat 2011

2011-01-16T10:37:00.000-08:00

This year for the Young Marrieds retreat, we as a group (the Young Married’s group) wanted to do something a little different. We all agreed that we would prefer to be able to share a room with our spouse (as in all previous years we haven’t) and have a more ‘marriage’ focus in the teaching. So, with a lot of searching and effort, we found a speaker(s) and the location, Aldersgate.
Mary-Frances and I left Charlie with the neighbors again and drove the 20 minutes to the camp. It is a large property that can cater to most groups (as there was another group there the same time we were, but we only saw them during meals). We had our own meeting room with a fireplace just down the hall from our rooms, and around the corner was the dinning hall. Aldersgate cooked our lunch, dinner and brunch which was really good and the coffee was plentiful.
The retreat was a nice distribution between meetings and time alone with our spouse to talk. It was good to take the time out to take the time to talk about certain issues, conflicts, and our feelings regarding our relationship and learn how to recognize them in our spouse. During some down time Mary-Frances and I played Yahtzee with the speakers and another game that I never heard of before, nor know the name of. What we did was each person wrote out a sentence, and then passed the sentence to the person on our left, and that person had to draw what was happing in the sentence. You would then fold the original sentence back, pass the paper to left, and now you would have to guess what the original sentence was based off the new drawing. It would repeat like this till your original paper came back to you. It is similar in plot as Telephone and the end results are humorous for all to see and read. Anyone else play this game before? Seems like it could be fun for our family as we are all gifted artists and creative storytellers….Maybe we could start a email game with everyone?
On a side note, Mary-Frances and I have been watching Top Gear on Netflix to pass the time. Thank you Sean and Sarah for pointing it in our direction, we have really enjoyed the show. To pass the baton back, if you are into Anime, I would suggest The Last Exile series.

Merry Christmas 2010

2010-12-27T09:14:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas to all! Mary-Frances and I spent the holiday here in our home for our first Christmas in the new house. Yea for four day weekends! I know, there are some of you out there with two weeks off and wont be back to work or school till the new year, but I'll take my four day weekend and love it.
To tell you a little about what we did, on Friday, Christmas Eve, we saw Tron Legacy. Saturday morning, Christmas Day, I made breakfast, which was scrambled eggs, bacon, and pancakes.
We 'opened' our stockings first, as per tradition. I always thought the term "opening stockings" is kind of a weird one as we are not actually opening them, as they have a hole at the top already. "Opening" usually consists of turning it upside down and spilling out all the candy and little toys on the floor. Mary-Frances made me a new coffee cozy, and got me two Nightmare before Christmas trading figures, and some holiday coffee flavors. I got her some peanut-butter M&Ms, and a scarf.
Then on to our gifts: first, we opened the gifts from Sean and Sarah, Mary-Frances' mom and dad, etc. Included in that assortment, we got home-made granola (thanks Sarah), stale pop-corn (thanks Sean), hand crocheted blanket (thanks Mom), Nightmare Before Christmas Yahtzee (thanks Mom & Dad), and soap squares (thanks Gillian). Charlie got a squeaky duck toy, a BBQ bone treat, two fleece blanket set, and a one year subscription to XBOX Live, which unfortunately, I do not think he will ever use. But thank you anyways Sadie!
Now the good stuff; Our gifts to each other. We got the Last Starfighter, Toy Story, Princes Bride, Eat Pray Love, Lipstick Jungle, Biggest Loser Cook Book, Weird Oregon, and a Portable Photo Studio. After opening gifts we hoped online and skyped with the Kenney Family in Sacramento. It was great watching them chat and open presents. It was short of actually being there. Aaaaahhhhh.
Later we went for a family walk with Charlie, drove around looking for some store to be open for shallots, and cooked dinner. I cooked a turkey, block island potatoes, and Mary-Frances made the green beans with bacon. We sat at our dinning table, dimmed the lights (Dimmer switch! Huh, huh?...Oh I'm sorry, too Fabulous for you?), lit the candles and drank sparkling cider.
We finished the night playing six rounds of Yahtzee.
Sunday we went After-Christmas shopping and picked up some items for next year 50% off. Yeah for sales!

Oh I almost forgot, the best gift of all is that we paid off our Kia! And another thing, for those thinking about last minute gift ideas, take note that my Amazon wish list has been broken into separate categories to help better organize it.

Did I mention it was cold?

2010-12-01T13:30:00.001-08:00

We had a heating and A/C tech come to the house to give our furnace a once over today. He said the reason that the system wasn’t kicking on was due to air in the lines. So, once that was flushed out, it came on no problem. But since he was there to do a complete system check he started tinkering with it. The air filters needed replacing, and the oil filter, the belt on the fan was cracked, so it too needed replacing. He pulled the fan blower off as it was making a horrible noise and adjusted it so it wasn’t wobbling as it ran. He even vacuumed out all the excess build up. Basically going the whole nine yards to get the furnace up and running smoothly for another couple of years. During this time he was mentioning that the furnace itself is older than he was and is way too large for a house our size, and all and all it was horribly inefficient and should consider upgrading.
He finished with the fan blower and was about to put it back in when he noticed something that wasn’t right. The furnace tank had a crack in it. Something he would not have noticed unless he took the fan off, but it means that our Furnace isn’t safe to use, not that it couldn’t be used, but it would be emitting all the fumes and CO2 into the house that could lead to CO2 poisoning or a fire. So, now, he realizes that all he did was for nothing, as we need a new furnace.
We are going to get a quote for a new system, but it is probably going to run us around $2000. So, now that we just dropped almost $300 in oil, we may be upgrading with a non-oil furnace…good times.
OH, he mentioned that the inspector (you know, the one who inspected our house before we bought it) should have inspected the furnace and found this issue already, or if he wasn’t a heating specialist, should have required that we get someone to inspect the furnace because of its age alone. Grrr.

**Just got a quote from the heating company...its actually going to cost closer to $6,000 to take out the old furnace and replace it with a new one! So, now we're comparing prices between updating the oil furnace or getting gas heating installed instead. Meanwhile...brrrrrrrr.

Pittock Mansion in Portland

2010-12-01T09:59:00.001-08:00

Mary-Frances bought tickets online for the Pittock Mansion a while back, as they were having a special on prices. Accidently, and unbeknownst to her, she ended up buying 4 tickets. Anyways, the tickets were about to expire, so we went to the Mansion on Sunday. We got there just after it opened so we made it before the crowds really got big. The Mansion is just gorgeous. It is decorated for Christmas during this time of year, and each room was designed by a different interior designer. The home is currently owned by the state and sits on 46 acres of property with a view of Portland. It is a self guided tour with volunteers almost in each room to answer any questions you may have. Upon leaving, we gave our second set of two tickets to another couple that hadn’t bought tickets yet, as we wouldn’t use them in time before they expired. Looking at the website I noticed they have a behind-the-scenes-tour that looks like it would be fun to take. Coincidently, the Mansion was featured in First Love, Unhinged, The Haunting of Sarah Hardy, and in The Amazing Race which I know you have all seen. Hard to believe that the Mansion was almost demolished after it was badly damaged in a storm. I can only imagine what it would have been like to live there and how neat it would have been to entertain there. It would be cool to have a Halloween Party here. Pictures where allowed, but without the flash, that made some of the pics really dark and blury.

Our Thanksgiving trip to Mississippi

2010-11-29T15:44:00.000-08:00

Travel Hiccups:

Tuesday -
#1 - Our ride to the airport runs 45 minutes late in picking us up as he got lost to our house.

#2 - Salt Lake City wouldn't allow our plane to land because they were having trouble getting the runways cleared of snow (land VERY late). This also made us leave PDX late, and had to circle for a while above Salt Lake, with the possibility of landing in Boise Idaho if weather didn't clear up.

#3 - Can't find our connecting flight on the boards; have to get help at a help desk. Starving, need food, blood sugar getting low.

#4 - Connecting flight is still there! Other side of Airport. Last to board. We sit on the plane for two hours before we leave the gate. Wont let us use restroom till we take off.

#5 - 10 seconds after leaving the gate the plane starts to shake then comes to an abrupt halt, lights go out. Patrick bangs head against wall. Sit for half hour longer waiting to find out what happened. Apparently, the taxi slipped on the ice, causing the tow to jack knife, damaging the landing gear. After accident report was done and photos were taken, they taxied us back into the gate so we can all get off the plane. Still in Salt Lake City. Bladder almost explodes on plane.

#6 - Flight gets canceled. Must get new flight, hotel, and meal vouchers. New flight for the next morning is for Salt Lake City to Memphis then to Oklahoma City. We asked for it to be changed to just Memphis since that is closer to my grandparent's house (which is our final destination). They say, "sure no problem." Least hotel has heat.

#7 - Waiting for the hotel van to pick us up from the airport. The van fills up twice without us and a woman convinces a van from a different hotel to drive the rest of us to our hotel instead. (totaling around 1.5 hours of wait in the snow). Driver gives Patrick hard time for little tip.

Wednesday -
#8 - The lady at Starbucks takes our order and our meal vouchers, but afterward I realize she never gave me my cinnamon swirl coffee cake..she said she didn't charge me for it and now our meal voucher is gone and I have not coffee cake. This is of course after she tried to get us to buy more stuff to max out the voucher, so it wouldn't go to waste...I'm officially grouchy.

#9 - We land in Memphis the next day, but our luggage had continued to Oklahoma City! Have to go to grandparent's house without.

Thursday (Thanksgiving) -
#10- Turns out mom got the Stomach Flu on Wednesday night and is too sick to join the rest of the family for Thanksgiving. She stays the entire trip in her hotel room.

#11 - Guy from airport says he's bringing out luggage, but my phone dies (my phone charger is in the luggage) and he can't find the house so he gives up and goes back to Memphis. Patrick and Dad have to go get our luggage themselves from the airport while I stay with my poor mother in her hotel room. She sleeps most of the time.

#12 - Trip to the airport to get our luggage takes twice as long due to weather and road construction. Dad & Patrick don't get back until after dinner. We eat left overs once we get back to my grandparent's house.

Friday - Was ok. I got to play card games with my aunts, cousins, and grandma. We also watched a few football games with grandpa and my uncles.

Saturday -
#13 - Dad is supposed to pick us up and take us to the airport, but now he's sick too. My cousin Kent has to take us instead.

#14 - We get home and pick up Charlie from the neighbors. He had gotten into the cat food and ate a whole bowl of it. Now he's extremely itchy and keeps scratching and biting himself. His entire body is red and has small scratches and scabs everywhere. Oh, and fleas! I found 5 fleas on him that night too. So now we need to give him another bath, a new dose of flea meds, and Benadryl to help with the allergic reaction. Meanwhile he's keeping us up all night with his scratching and biting.

Sigh....HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!

On the flip side: I'm glad I was able to see my family again since its been so long and even meet a few of my cousins and second cousins for the first time. I love them very much and wish I had more time with them.

First Snow of the Year

2010-11-23T08:26:00.000-08:00

There has been talk about it snowing this day or that day, but last night, it finally snowed for the first time this year. It is a light covering over everything, and I am sure that all will be melted by the end of the day or tomorrow. Mary-Frances and I took the day off today as we are waiting for our ride to the Airport to go to Mississippi to visit her grandparents for Thanksgiving.

Soo cocococooold!

2010-11-22T13:48:00.000-08:00

Fun times having an old house in the winter...Our house has Oil forced air heating. If you don't know what that is exactly, you're not alone. Basically we have a 275 gallon tank sitting on the side of our house that holds the oil. It is then pumped into the furnace that resides in the basement where it is burned. The heat is then blown throughout the house until the thermostat says it's warm enough. This means no monthly heating bills, just one lump sum to buy the oil, and it could last as long or as short as it wants depending on the efficiency of our system.
Well over a month ago, we ran out of oil. So, no heat. We have curled up in blankets and been using the space-heater. I found some clear plastic insulation that is for the windows in the basement, so I put those up. Going to need more to finish off the house.
Well money is tight, but we bought some oil not too long ago to get the house heated.
But I cannot get it to come ON! I turned up the thermostat and hit the reset button on the burner, but it won’t stay on. Grrr. So, we are still without heat.
The worst part is that it is rumored to be a 'bad' winter this year. It is already 52 degrees inside the house. Man, I wish our fireplace was in better condition right now so we could use it.

PS) From Mary-Frances: Talked to a local heating company and they said because we ran out of oil our filters are probably clogged and the whole system needs to be serviced for the furnace to run again. Sigh...more money...good grief. But hopefully if everything goes well we'll have heat by Wednesday afternoon. Cross your fingers. I would but they are frozen together by now.

Happy Halloween Everybuddy

2010-10-31T13:34:00.000-07:00

Oh man, you've guys missed a lot! Go back and catch up on our latest posts.

Halloween is here and gone already. This is the biggest day of the year for all those costumers. For this year, Mary-Frances and I held our 4th Annual Halloween party in our new home. We spent most of the month decorating the house and making it look cool. We pick up a few new decorations each year, and this year we got a fog machine, a child size skeleton (that we hung in the laundry shoot), a black light bulb, and some other little things that I cannot remember. The black light bulb was a HUGE disappointment. It was presenting itself as trying to look like a black light, you know, the kind that makes things glow, but I think it was just a regular light bulb that was black. Freaking $1 rip off. Should have known by the price and that it came from Wal-mart. The fog machine was a slight disappointment too as it didn’t have a timer, so it didn’t end up getting used. Oh well. Maybe I’ll figure something out for it next time.
So, this year, Mary-Frances and I dressed up has Katara and a Dai Li agent from Avatar: The Last Airbender. Charlie was Appa. I made Charlie’s and my costumes (Charlie’s took the longest), but ended up buying Mary-France’s. However, I did end up modifying her costume a bit to function better and be more comfortable.
The party started at 5pm, and shortly after that our first guests arrived. We had 19 people show up this year. Costumes included Juno & Bleeker (winner of the Costume Contest)Waldo & Wenda (Second Place), Robin Hood & Little John (Placed Third), Indiana Jones & Gypsy, Prom King & Queen, Mrs White & Prof Plumb, Sheldon Cooper & Leslie Winkle, Dr. Temperance Brennan & Sp Agent Seeley Booth, Shaggy, Po Teletubby, Avril Lavigne.
It was a good time to hang out, eat snacks, drink hot chocolate and play catch phrase. After catch phrase, we began our Scavenger hunt game. For this years game we made them all split up in teams of four (two couples together) and to trick-or-treat around the neighborhood. They had to perform 1 of three options to earn their candy (each team member had their own list). Such performances included moon-walking, coming up with a poem, saying their costume characters name in a big super hero voice, jumping jacks etc. They had 45 minutes to collect as much candy as they could, at which point they came back to the house, to tally their booty. ‘Good’ candy was +1 point, full size was +5 points, non-candy items (like a pencil or toys) was +3 points, ‘crappy’ candy was -1, and healthy items where also negative points. The winning team got a goodie-bag of a fleece blanket, chocolate covered pretzels, and a two plastic popcorn cups.
I cleaned up the basement and had a table down there with coffee, pool table and foosball, but for the life of me, I couldn’t get anyone to do down and hang out there. I guess it wasn’t inviting enough. It would have been roomier than the cramped living room, but it worked out OK.
We had a second secrete scavenger hunt game within the house, but I think it was too secrete as no one seemed to notice it. It was a set of clues hidden throughout the house that would have taken them to a chest of trinkets that they could keep, but everyone missed it, except one couple, the Furlos, who were the last to leave and got an inside tip.
We had a lot of fun, and it was nice to have the party in our home this year. We have a lot to clean up now, but the mess represents that everyone had fun, right? Lookin’ forward to next year.

Charlie was Stung by a Bee

2010-10-30T13:37:00.000-07:00

It happened so fast. I was walking by a wasp nest, and the next thing I know Charlie is shaking his head, again and again. I stop and look at his ear and I see this blobby looking thing. I pull at it to get it out of his hair. Kind of reminds me of an eye booger. Well I head back home and Charlie is acting all mopey. I brought him in the house and took the tweezers to look at his ear again, and sure enough, I pulled out the stinger. He wasn’t happy about it. I put toothpaste on his ear, as I read that is a quick home remedy to help with the pain. He just curled up in his bed and started shaking and rocking back and forth like he had the hic-ups. His ear started to swell, so we took him into the vet.
He was perkier by the time we got to the vet, so his demeanor was improving. But they gave him a shot and us some meds for him so he doesn’t have a severe allergic reaction. But by the end of the day he was his old self again. Now, both Mary-Frances and Charlie have been stung by this nest. I also brought a wasp home with me, as I think it was stuck on my jacket. It met our fly swatter and I haven’t seen it since.

Pumpkin Carving at Canyonview

2010-10-27T15:19:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I went to Canyonview’s annual pumpkin carving ritual. We ate dinner there, and then walked over to their barn where they had 25 some pumpkins available to choose from. Yeah for free pumpkins! It was a little awkward for me, since I didn’t know anyone, and no one else’s spouse was there, but I powered through it. It was neat to meet Mary-Frances co-workers as well as some of the students that go there that she keeps talking about.
I carved a creepy face jack-o-lantern, and Mary-Frances went with the shaving route and shaved out a fish and bowl. It looks cute when lit properly. My Nightmare before Christmas pumpkin is looking sickly already.

Harvest Party

2010-10-24T15:18:00.000-07:00

This was Mary-Frances's and my's first harvest party with the Young Marrieds. We all met at a pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkins. We arrived a little late, so everyone else had already tromped through the pumpkin patch, which was a little disappointing for us. But we quickly walked out and found a good one really quick and caught up with the rest of our group at the hose station, to clean off the mud. We were planning on going through the Corn Maze that they had, but the group bailed on the idea, as it was too rainy and cold.
While there, we bought a few smaller pumpkins and squash to help decorate our house for Halloween. From the farm, we headed to the Colliers home, were we gutted and carved the pumpkins, ate pizza for dinner, played bite the apple on a string, and voted for best pumpkins. I got second place for my Nightmare Before Christmas scene.

Oktoberfest in Washington

2010-10-11T13:32:00.000-07:00

Jason Fumasi and his wife Anna moved to Washington for a new job. So, when Oktoberfest came to town, they invited us up for the weakened. We drove up there Saturday morning, and spent the evening walking around at a Pumpkin festival that is held every year at a local park. It consists of a classic car show, vender booths, and food stations. Later that night we went to the Ram restaurant to watch the Beaver football game. After probably an hour the restaurant had ‘technical’ difficulties with their cable, so they ‘lost’ the game. It was probably to kick us out to make room for more people. Anyways, we then drove to the store to get ice cream and food for burgers.
On Sunday we went to the Oktoberfest at their state fairgrounds. I tasted some new beers and we ate brats and fries, played hammerschlagen, and watched dachshunds race. It was enjoyable. On our way home however, we had a déjà-vous moment on the freeway. It was dark, and raining, and off to my left I see this thing fall off (or was bounced off) a car, hit the pavement, sent sparks into the air and head right for our car. BAM! It hit us on the driver side, hard. I pulled over to check to see if there was any damage, but couldn’t see anything in the dark, and it felt OK. However in more light we saw the extent of the damage. It scratched the front bumper and even sliced our tire, so now it has a very slow leak. Totally not cool.

Mary-Frances Stung by a Bee

2010-10-08T13:47:00.000-07:00

She was out walking Charlie for not more that 3 minutes before she came back into the house in pain. She was stung twice on the arm by a wasp. It got itself caught in her sweater and proceeded to sting her. I quickly slapped some mud on it to help cool the pain. It worked for the most part, but when it dried, the burning feeling returned. So, I slapped more mud on it. It was her first time ever getting stung. She didn’t enjoy it.

Mary-Frances 26th Birthday & Old Wheeler Hotel

2010-10-04T13:31:00.000-07:00

On Mary-Frances birthday we had a small and short celebration, and spent that weekend at Silver Falls National Forest camp ground with three other couples from Young Marrieds (see previous post). I had plans to take her out for her birthday for the weekend, but time and money didn’t permit it right away. So, a couple weekends after her birthday I drove her up to a small town called Wheeler, that is just passed Tillamook. Located right off the highway is the Old Wheeler Hotel. It is a very cute and vintage hotel, that has been beautifully restored. I reserved Room #4, which had a Jacuzzi with a view. It was supposed to be a two person Jacuzzi, but it was a little tight for us both. We walked around the little town to the antique stores and had dinner and a little diner down the street. It was very relaxing as we had nothing planned except to hang out. The next morning there was a small breakfast set out including eggs, juice, beagles, and yogurt. We both loved the atmosphere so much that we didn’t really want to leave. We drug our feet as long as possible before we had to head back towards home. Later that evening we had plans to go to a 30th birthday party for a friend of ours from Young Marrieds, so we couldn’t stay too long even though we wanted too. It is defiantly a place we would love to stay at again and would recommend to anyone who is in the area.

Sun River

2010-09-27T13:30:00.000-07:00

The Furlos bid on and won a weekend get-a-way at Sun River near Bend. They had a four bedroom cabin (#8) all to themselves for the weekend. So, not wanting to be totally alone, they invited us to join them. We split up meals, similar to our camping trip, played games, had some quite reading time, did some hiking, and curled up next to the fireplace and watched CSI. Taking advantage of being in Bend, we stopped by Chris and Jen Charon’s home to say Hi and see little baby Jayden. Mary-Frances crocheted Jayden a little purple hippo, so she was excited to give it to her. Chris was able to be there for a little while before he had to split, but it was really nice to see them both, and do a little catch up.

Familia

2010-09-13T11:53:00.000-07:00

Mom & Dad Kenney visited us this last weekend with Rebecca & the little ones. They arrived Thursday evening, just in time for dinner (Turkey and Bean Chili & Cornbread). On Friday they went to the A.C. Gilbert's Discovery Village while Patrick and I were at work. That night Rebecca made enchiladas and a birthday cake for me. :) Saturday we went to the Saturday Farmer's Market and Roshni scored a really cute poncho with hood and Rebecca and I scored some yummy vegetables and triple crown black berries.
Later that evening after hanging out at the house for awhile, we took them to Bush Park to tour the Mansion. Patrick remembered that when Dad was here last time, he was disappointed that he didn't get to tour the home, so we made sure to make a point to go this time. So with much effort and shooing, we forced everyone in the car to make it in time before the Mansion closed. I jumped out of the car and rushed inside the barn to pay for the three tickets. Walking out and feeling good that we didn't miss the last tour, Dad announced that he didn't want to go. Discouraged now, Patrick took his place and went with Rebecca and Mom, while I and Dad watched Roshni on the playground. This is when Roshni realized she had to use the restroom, and proceeded to go right then and there. Another child and mother took notice first and it got my attention seeing Roshni walking around without her pants on anymore. The tour got out and we had a great story to tell them.
Charlie was really good at handling the kids, as he doesn't really like kids. He would growl at Roshni when ever she would run around the house or do any loud playing. We could almost hear Charlie's grumpy old man speech in his barks, growls and nips saying "Stop that jumping, no running in the house, just sit there and be quite will you, give me that food"
Sunday we went to church and took them to our Young Marrieds interaction group. They seemed to enjoy themselves. Afterwards we drove to Silverton, showed them where I work, took them to the Oregon Gardens but passed on that as it was $10 per person. Luckely the Frank Lloyd Write house was there too, so we got to go inside for a brief moment or two, and walked the grounds. It is the only FLW house in the whole state or Oregon, so it was a real treat (even though it was moved there, and not original). Monday morning, they headed home.
It was a joy having the family over.

Camping with Young Marrieds

2010-09-06T13:28:00.000-07:00

For Labor day weekend, the Young Marrieds held a camping trip at Silver Falls National Forest. We have been there many times before to look at the water falls, but this was the first time camping. We got there on an almost empty tank of gas and set up our tent. We brought Charlie with us and he spent a lot of time barking at other dogs or playing children. That got old quickly. The weekend was fun as there was no agenda. We split up the cooking, so one couple had dinner, while another had lunch, and another had breakfast. When we weren’t huddled up next to the fire, we hiked around the park and took the water fall trails. Jason Fumasi and I played Monkey Bar Wrestling. A mother spectator seemed to enjoy watching a little too much. It was a good weekend to spend some quality time with those who came to get to know them better.

Happy Birthday Mary-Frances!!

2010-09-03T13:32:00.000-07:00

Today is Mary-France's 26th Birthday!

After work we walked over to Oregon State Fair. Unfortunately, we forgot to get our photo booth pictures taken, but we had fun walking around and seeing the animals. Her new co-workers really made her day special at work though with getting her favorite candy, a bottle of Cherry Coke, treated her to a Hot Chocolate from Starbucks, and decorated her desk with streamers, balloons, and happy birthday signs. They sang happy birthday to her at breakfast the moment she walked in the kitchen. She was very happy all day.

Got the job!

2010-08-25T15:06:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances got the job at Canyonview Camp, and she starts on the 27th, full time!

Mary's family B-day Party

2010-08-22T14:58:00.000-07:00

We were invited to Mary’s cousin's, husband’s second 25th birthday party (guy in the center). They held it on a ranch style home, were we parked in their cut field and ate next to the house. They had a family friend run the BBQ (burgers and chicken); he is a great cook. It was potluck style, so others brought in some great dishes. Mary-Frances and I played latter-ball (aka lawn golf) for a couple games to help pass the time. It soon got cold quick and neither Mary nor I brought a jacket, so we had to borrow one from our hosts. It was some good family fun. They had a live band that played some cool songs for an hour or two. There was plenty of beer, and a spot in the back for people to set up tents so they didn’t have to drive home drunk. We had a lot of fun, and it was hard to pull Mary-Frances away when it was time for us to get to bed. Thanks guys for having us over!

AUGUST (so far)

2010-08-21T12:25:00.000-07:00

What happened so far in August:

Young Marrieds had a Leadership Retreat early this month and we attended. Last time we went we decided not to join leadership, but this year we are. I will be in charge of "publicity" aka communications in the group and out. I'm looking forward to this next ministry year and believe that there is some awesome potential for the Young Marrieds Interaction Group as a whole.

We planed a Young Marrieds Date Night the weekend after the Leadership Retreat at our friends' house. They are sorority parents at Oregon State University and during the summer all the girls are out of the house, so we have to opportunity to use the space. We had dinner and dessert in the courtyard and watched a movie in the theater room (basement). We watched Roman Holiday. It was the first time I saw it and loved it. Dinner was our famous Dr. Pepper Pork Roast. The next day the girls had a clothing swap at the same house after helping with the Sunday BBQ at the church. I got rid of A LOT of clothes (some were difficult to part with, but it was time) and scored three "new" jackets, five shirts, a hat and a pair of earrings.

On the 18th I had an interview. The funny thing is it was at the equestrian college I mentioned I took my friend to in July; Canyonview Camp. Apparently Amy, neighbor across the street, is the daughter-in-law of the former director who told her that they were needing a new receptionist. The interview went well and I had a second interview with the whole staff Monday, August 23. On August 25 I was informed that I got the job!

We're still waiting for Jason to get his butt up here.

JULY

2010-08-21T11:10:00.000-07:00

What happened in July:

I, Mary-Frances, stopped working at the church. I am currently looking for a job closer to home and meanwhile working my Mary Kay business as usual. To help pass the time I have been working my business, doing house work, running errands, a couple lunch dates with girlfriends, and from time to time I'll go to the park with my friend who is a daycare provider and help her watch all 10 kids on the playground while enjoying the sun and adult conversation time.

We had our first overnight house guest! My dear friend Jessica Becker (one of my bridesmaids) was in town visiting her grandmother. She decided to stay with us while the rest of the family went up to Washington so she could tour a equestrian college out here. It was great having her visit and I hope she decides to go to the college so I could maybe see her more often.

Crochet Projects! My friend taught me how to crochet. I made a little alligator for Patrick earlier this year and two coffee cozies for Patrick and I in July.

We now own a Foosball Table & Air Hockey Table in the basement. We would love to school any of you when you visit. :)

We have been getting to know our neighbors. Amy & Matt live across the street from us and have two adorable little boys and a beautiful red hair retriever. They are very kind and generous. As a housewarming present they gave us their old lawn mower aka "The Marlboro Man". Our other neighbors that we've gotten to know are next door to us (on the corner). Joe & Cathy are a very friendly couple. We've gone over just to chat on their front or back porch and enjoy a few burgers from time to time. Their daughter and son-in-law come over often and we've enjoyed getting to know them too. They adore Charlie and watched him for a weekend while we were at Leadership Retreat in August.

My Mary Kay unit had our year end awards night at my director's house. I was #6 in sales this year and was given a ribbon and bar pin along with other prizes through out the night.

Young Marrieds (our small group at church) had a Girls Day Out while the most of the men went backpacking in the mountains. It ended up just being two cars worth of girls for shopping and dinner. Afterward we went to a drive-in theater to see Despicable Me and Inception. Since there was just three of us girls left we had the husbands who didn't go to the mountains join us for the movie. I liked both movies a lot.

The Summer has been great out here so one Sunday after church Patrick and I decided to go to the coast for a few hours and take Charlie for the first time. Turns out he's a people watcher. And since he was picked up in Hollywood before being sent to the humane society up here I'm guessing this wasn't his first trip to the beach. He didn't even care when the freezing cold water rushed over his paws.

Housewarming June 27th

2010-06-18T13:52:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I are hosting a Housewarming party on Sunday, June 27th beginning at 2pm till whenever. If you would like to stop by, let us know and we'll tell ya where (if you don't have our updated address yet). Hope to see you there for fun, games, personal tours, commentary and lots more!

U-Haul it, I'll pack it

2010-06-01T17:01:00.000-07:00

OH man, glad that is over with. So, Mary-Frances and I got up early in the morning and started to get the apartment ready with more packed boxes. Then we headed to the U-Haul to pick up a truck. We got it home and started to load it up around 10:30. Our first helpers arrived (Matt and Katerine). It was murder on our legs to walk up and down those three flights of steps. After our second pair of helpers arrived (Jesse and James), things were moving a little faster. The guys were quick to grab all the large items, such as the beds, mattresses, entertainment center etc. while the Katherine was carting as much as she could carry.We made two trips with the U-haul as well as four cars fully loaded with our crap. We had a fourth helper, Kurt, join us latter, but not too late to get some exercise. It was a lot easier to unload the boxes then it was to load them, as coming out, there wasn't so far to go, or so many stairs to climb. Mary and I labeled each room and had little arrows pointing the way, so when someone grabbed a properly labeled box, they would know which room it went into. This was to avoid getting asked "Where does this go?" by everyone for every box. This method wasn't perfect, but it worked for the most part. We did find boxes in the bedroom that needed to go in the basement, and visa-versa, however, but that's half the fun. Luckily there wasn't any casualties during the move, and we only had one band-aid applied.

By mid, day, we bought like, four papa Murphy's pizzas and soda and treated all our helpers. While the time was up for them, Mary-Frances and I went pack to the apartment for another load, after we dropped off the U-Haul. We weren't finished by the end of the day, so we came back again the next day, just Mary and I, and we loaded up the last remaining little things that never made it into a box. We took another 4-6 car loads before we didn't have to climb those stairs again. Oh man were my legs burning. Now is the fun part of unpacking...

Moving Day, May 29th

2010-05-27T12:23:00.000-07:00

Well it was rumored that our moving day was going to be Saturday the 29th, and as the day approaches, it looks like it is now our official moving day. We will be packing, moving, and unpacking all weekend. We will have some members from the young married church group helping us and we plan to provide pizza for lunch. So, anyone wanting to come up and help us move, feel free. Trucks welcome.

Home Appraisal

2010-05-18T11:40:00.001-07:00

Our home appraisal was done on the 15th and we just got the results back today. So far all is going smoothly. We just need to get some last minute paper work in and we should be closing within the next 10 days. Oh, just an interesting bit of information if anyone out there is thinking about an FHA loan...The loan states that you are able to accept financial 'help' in paying for the house from family members only, not friends. In other words, say you have $6000 but it isn't enough to cover the total down payment and closing. You can be gifted money from your family. But here's the kicker, in doing so you are not just asking the family member for the cash, but also a letter stating that they are gifting the money to you to help with your down payment, a copy of the deposit slip, copies of their bank statements proving that they had the money and it wasn't gifted to them to be gifted to you. It's their way of closing the loop hole of a friend helping you by giving the money to your family member who thus gives it to you. Make sense? So, be prepared to show a paper trail of the money and where it comes from if you ask for financial help from family members. Oh, and if you haven’t checked it recently, I have uploaded the rest of the pictures of the house into our shutterfly.

Update on Debby Proctor

2010-05-04T08:35:00.000-07:00

If you have not heard by now, Mary's mother is home. She progressed really well with her physical therapy and the doctors were so impressed that they sent her home. She is still working on moving around and going up and down stairs, so the road to full recovery is still going to be a slow one. She hasn't gone back to work yet but it is looking very hopeful that it could be soon. The doctors did caution her and us that since they still do not know what triggered this back in December, that it could happen again and we should be prepared for that. But we are glad to see her getting back to her normal self. Thanks all for your prayers and support.

Home Inspection

2010-05-04T08:21:00.000-07:00

Come on inside and join us for a drink. Be sure to drink it all, or pour it down the sink. Our inspection went great. I think the house got a low 'A' or a high 'B' grade. All in all the house is in great shape. No rot, or termite damage. Dry basement. Most of the house is still original, which I love. It needs to be stripped of the thousand layers of paint on the windows so they will open. There are a few leaky pipes at the bathroom sinks. Cracks in the plaster that could use some patching. The electrical does need to be grounded (all two prong old school stuff), but it does have a new electrical box. The biggest issue is the grout at the top of the chimney. It needs to be cleaned of all the loose grout and refilled with new grout. Otherwise the house is move in ready and as the inspector said, it's 'a great old house'. I uploaded the photos I took during our first walk through to our shutterfly (link on the right). We do have more that I'll upload later.

Buying a House

2010-04-26T08:45:00.000-07:00

If you have not heard already, Mary-Frances and I are looking at buying a house. We got preapproved and have been "shopping" for a couple months. We were searching online on such websites as Prudential.com, Realtor.com, and Homefinder.com. They all have different search options and sometimes have listings that the other sites don't have. My pet peeve with these online searches is they all have such simple searches. 'Advanced' search, really isn't all that much more than the simple search.

But anyways. Back to the topic at hand...Mary-Frances and I found this great 1927 home (pictured above) located in a nice neighborhood closer to my work and the I-5, for Mary-Frances to commute to her work. It is a four bedroom, two and half bath, w/ an unfinished basement. We put an offer on the house and it was accepted. We now have to wait for the inspection of the home (May 3rd), the appraisal of the home by the lender, process the loan, sign the closing papers and then we will have a moving date, which should be in or around the end of May. We have till May 28th to close. Hopefully this date will work well and we won't have to pay for rent at the apartment in June. Plus it will allow us to use the three day weekend to move out/in.

In the meantime we have started packing the rooms and items we don't use on a regular basis to get started on the 'moving-out' process. Once we have an exact moving date, all of you are invited up to Oregon to help us move.

On a side note, one quick suggestion for those planning on buying a house sometime in the future. Start saving now. Even if you went with a FHA loan with 3.5% down (the lowest you can do besides zero down), you are still looking at least $5,000 to $10,000, PLUS closing costs, which could easily be another $5,000. That said, unless you get zero down, you are looking at a minimum of $12,000 to $15,000 out of pocket. At $250 a month, it will take 5 years to save up $15,000 (7 years for $21,000). So, get it in your budget now, if you haven’t already. So, even though you may not be ready to buy a house now, in 5 to 7 years from now you might be, and it would be nice to be ready financially too.

We will post pictures of the house inside and out on Shutterfly once we are a little further in the process.

Happy 30th Birthday to Patrick!!!

2010-04-07T07:49:00.000-07:00

Well, I cannot believe I am 30. No longer in my 20's. Can’t say "Oh you're in your 20's, you are still young". Nope. Well, the only way to get over this little hump is to drink it away. So....
Mary-France's and I drove down to Corvallis on Saturday (the 3rd) were we met up with a couple couples, and then continued to drive to Eugene. Our First stop of the evening was OakShire Brewing. They had a bar open (or is it 'open bar'?) where they were offering samples of like eight of the beers that they make. I tried four different shots. I had to hand them off to someone else to finish though. Just too much for a sample for me. Luckily we were there just in time for the last tour of the evening. So we hung out a little longer, with a beer in one hand and learning in the other.
Our Next stop was the Ninkasi Brewing Co. They weren't offering free samples, so we all bought three sets of 5 to give them a try. I think my favorite was the Oatis Oatmeal Stout. But the fun didn't stop there. Our next stop was the Steelhead Brewing Co. Eight more samples. Time to get a little food too. We ordered some great mozzarella sticks and their awesome nachos. I would have to say our waitress was really cool. Time was getting on and everyone was ready for dinner. So we walked over to the Oregon Electric Station. It was an old railroad station that was converted into a restaurant. Walking in it was like walking into a upper scale Old Spaghetti Factory, but real vintage, instead of trying to look vintage. It had a great atmosphere and good food. For desert I had a Mud Pie, which is coffee and vanilla ice cream, with Oreo crust, topped with fudge and whipped cream. Typically they put almonds with it, but I cannot stand nuts in my ice cream.
Well that was my celebration in a nut shell. What did I do on my birthday? Well, I went to work, got a call from Rebecca, Dad, Dan, & Debby. After work I stopped by Cold Stone and picked up my complementary birthday Ice cream (which cost me $1.50?). Once I got home, a package from the Schwartzhoff's was waiting for me. Awesome guys, thanks! Then Mary and I went to the Cinebarre for dinner and a movie. We saw Green Zone, an action political movie. It was enjoyable. The constant shaking of the camera made us sick, but all in all it was good. Not necessarily a have-to-see-in-theaters, but good. While we were in the theater I got more calls from Wendy, Mom, Grandma and Joan, David, and Sean.

Happy 4 Year Anniversary

2010-03-18T08:06:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I celebrated our 4 year wedding anniversary!

Happy St. Patrick's Day

2010-03-17T09:49:00.000-07:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Mary-Frances and I held another dinner party for friends from church. We all worn some form of green or orange. Mary-Frances made guiness beef stew as our main course, and I prepared corn on the cob, salad, block island potatos and for the first time this year Irish Coffee. For drinks we had guiness, Irish car bombs and italian soda. Everyone had a grand ol' time eating diner and chatting. The Furgasuns brought Soda bread which was really tasty. For desert, we had Irish Chocolate cake. Always a crowd pleaser.

Update on Mary's Mother

2010-02-25T08:48:00.000-08:00

Since my last post about Mary's mom, the paralytic that she was on did a number on her, and since coming off it, she is still unable to move. The doctors where hoping that she wouldn't have to have the tracheotomy surgery, however since she was not showing any signs of improving, they preformed the trach. It went really well and she has recovered from it nicely. The doctors have moved her out of ICU and into a care facility deep in the heart of San Diego (over an hour from her home). The drive has been very time consuming for Dan (Mary's dad).
The doctors have been going through physical therapy with Debby to help build her muscles back and get her body to "remember" how to move again.
In addition, they have been taking her on and off the respirator to allow her to breath on her own for awhile to build those muscles too. I believe that she is now off the respirator all together and breathing through the trach.
She still has a long way to go to recovery as she is still unable to speak as well as move.
She has been wanting to see us, so Mary-Frances and I have bought plane tickets to fly down there Feb 28 through March 6th. We will be staying in a Hotel in San Diego to be closer to the care facility with her Dad.

Hot Chocolate Party No. 3

2010-02-18T14:48:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances and I held our third Annual Hot Chocolate party this last Saturday. I know it sounds kind of weird to have a Hot Chocolate party, but if you never had real Hot Chocolate, you don't know what you are missing! We invited four couples this year but one couldn't make it =( I premade 7 different hot chocolates the night before and re-heated them the day of. We got little ladles for each mug so they could sample each one as many times as they wanted to see which cup they liked the best, at which time I made them a whole cup, served with homemade whipped cream. The nights most popular Hot Chocolate was the Double Chocolate Hot Chocolate. It was made with milk chocolate, dark chocolate, coco powder, heavy cream, milk and other ingredients as well. The seventh bonus drink (as I usually only make six) was a homemade Eggnog Hot Chocolate. I made 18oz of that, and it was all gone by the end of the night. In fact, all the samples were gone. Let's see, off the top of my head we served a bay-leaf hot chocolate, nutella hot chocolate, double chocolate hot chocolate, eggnog hot chocolate, chocolate a la taza, heisse schokolade and life-in-a-cup hot chocolate. We all then retired to the living room for games and socialization! It was a lot of fun. Next year, six more hot chocolates!

Free Hugs

2010-02-13T14:22:00.000-08:00

This year, Mary-Frances signed us both up for Free Hugs, an outreach program that our young marrieds was doing. So today, we showed up at the church around 10am, prayed, then our group split up into two groups of 4 (or two couples). One group went downtown, while Mary, Jason, Anna, and I went to the farmers market. We set up in front of the door and waited with our signs ready.
We were there till about 1pm. During this time, we got all kinds of responses. Most, if not all who saw the sign smiled and walked by. Some would give you the "this is too uncomfortable to hug a stranger" vibe and say that they were all hugged out, or got plenty at home already. One excuse some guy gave was that he had scurvy. We also got questions if we were doing this as a social experiment for school, or what the catch was. We got questions of who we were and why we were doing this. Which our reply was we are (insert name here) and we are just loving people 'cause He loved us first. Some were skeptical others where hesitant.
Well despite all that, we got tons of hugs. There were so many people who genuinely needed a hug and were grateful for one. We got all kinds of complements for us to keep up the good work. The idea of reaching out to help others for nothing inspired a few passer-bys to return the favor and they bought us crepes at a near by vender. Another bought us flowers, and another have us jerky. All and all, we had fun, many were touched on a personal level, and others just had fun. We ended the evening at subway for lunch. I think we may do it again next year.

Charlie, Charlie and more Charlie

2010-02-06T13:51:00.000-08:00

Due to overwhelming cuteness, here is Charlie! He has been great this whole time. Since getting him, he has gained like two pounds, his color has changed, got a hair cut, nails trimmed, a bath, and he pees on our carpet! YEA! Is Charlie house broken? That's an interesting question. Well you might argue that since he never pees in the house when we are home and holds it like a good boy, till we let him outside, you might say yes, he's house broken. On the other hand, when we are not home, all bets are off, so no, he isn't. I bought him doggie diapers to help with the situation. Stupid diapers! It should say on the package "FOR GIRLS ONLY"!! It just didn't fit up-high for boys.
"Hey, look, Charlie pee'd on the sofa"
"But he was wearing a doggie diaper"
"Looks like he got the whole stereo system!"
"But he was wearing a doggie diaper!"
"Oh my gosh, he got it on the coffee maker!"
"But he was wearing a doggie diaper! Weren't you!?!"
But it just didn't cover enough did it? Noooooo. So we got him the "PEE BAND". Works great, as long as he doesn't get it off. Now he looks like a worm.
On other Charlie news, he graduated Beginners Training Class! After 8 weeks he can now "sit", "watch-me", "Leave-it", loose-leash walk (kinda), and greet others without jumping up. He still hasn't picked up on "lay-down" or his "trick" yet. But we are still working on those. Oh, I almost forgot, he got an ear infection due to the wet weather, so we had to take him to the vet to get some medicine that we had to put in his ear each morning and every evening for three weeks. It was all smelly and gross before, but now it's clean and oily. That goopy stuff just never seems to dry.

Happy Anni-lentines

2010-02-02T14:17:00.000-08:00

Today is Mary-Frances and mines "Valentines-Day", we celebrate the day we first met (in person) seven years ago! Happy Anni-lentines!

Young Married's Winter Retreat

2010-01-18T13:32:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances and I enjoyed our third trip to Camp Tapawingo with the Young Marrieds group. Mary however was just starting to get over being sick the day we had to go, and she pretty much had no voice the whole weakened. We dropped Charlie off at Mary-Frances' friends on Friday night just before we left, and stayed through till Sunday afternoon. Tom Ramsey was our guest speaker. Yes, that's right, I got to go camping with Tom once more. Man, the last time that I went camping with Tom was like...like...uh...11 years go!
We stayed in separate cabins (again), course the girls got the nice cabin while the boys got the "good-enough" cabin. We always get the short end of the stick. Skits were great this year. They were based on parables. We had a lot of fun, and this time we didn't get hurt. Charlie was super excited to see us again when we came to pick him up.

Happy New Year 2010!

2010-01-01T09:40:00.000-08:00

Not knowing what we were going to do for new years, we called up Jason Fumasi and asked if he was busy, and he said that he was having a party and for us to come on over. So we drove to Corvallis to hang out. They had dinner and drinks. We brought Charlie with us to play with all the other dogs that where there. He had a brief moment of terror as he went for their cats. It was funny though to see the cat jump like 10 feet in the air up the window. We played, Apples to Apples (hey there seems to be a trend here) to help pass the time. Unfortunately, Jason doesn't have TV so we never got to see the ball drop. Oh, well, it looks exactly the same every year.

Christmas 2009

2009-12-30T09:05:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances and I made a last minute decision to drive down to San Diego to be with her Dad as her mom is still in Intensive care. We drove out Tuesday the 21st to Sacramento, our first stop. We stopped at my parents house where they were having Christmas with Sharon and Jake and the kids, as they were in town. It was just a coincidence that we also were there that day. Everyone got to meet Charlie (as we had to take him with us). He was doing really well with all the kids and babies. We then all sat down at the dinner table for a traditional Kenney Family Dinner. Later that night we all said our goodbyes and drove to Sean and Sarah’s new apartment, where we were staying for the night. Charlie had too much fun trying to chase Steve, their cat.
We were up and out the door early the next morning. We got stuck in LA traffic for a few hours, but made it to Shannon and Josh’s for dinner. We got to hang out with them for a little while and played Apples to Apples. Shannon won. Shannon and Josh were going to Seattle Washington shortly to visit a friend of hers, and while they were there we had made plans to go up and see them for a day. However, since we were now in San Diego, that wasn’t going to happen. That’s why we made dinner plans to see them when we got into town. To make up for it. After the game we were tired and headed over to the Proctor residence.
We got to meet Truly, Debby’s new Toy Yorkie. She was so cute. She got along really well with Charlie. They didn’t seem to mind each other at all. I do think that she may have taught Charlie some bad habits though. We went and got to see mom at the ICU. She was still being sedated and on the paralytic. The doctors were saying that they were still unsure what caused the initial problem. There is some swelling in her from the fluids that they were putting in her. She has tubes going down her throat to feed her as well as breathe for her. The doctor continued to say that they are playing the waiting game to see how things go. She should have gotten better by now, so they are unsure why she hasn’t. The also mentioned the possibility of a tracheotomy. Something I know neither her dad or mom would be thrilled about.
That night we went to the Christmas Eve serves at Rancho Del Ray. It was an emotional night. On Christmas day, we had a brief moment of stockings, then went back to visit mom. One of the Proctor’s family friends invited us over for Christmas dinner, which was fun. They introduced Mary to Scattergories, one of her new favorite games.
On Saturday, Candi, Ron and the kids were back in town to visit, which was really cool. Mary got to hang out with her sister and we all got to hang out together and play games. We stayed with her dad until Monday, which then we headed back up to Oregon, spending the night in Sacramento as our half way point.
On our way back we heard that Debby was able to get off the paralytic as the spasming had stopped. She was also now able to inhale on her own, but could not exhale enough CO2, so they still kept her sedated and on the respirator. The waiting game continues.

Debby Proctor

2009-12-15T08:56:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances' mom, Debby went to the hospital as she was having trouble breathing. Debby wasn't as concerned as Dan was about the situation. After a short while Debby was able to go home, but ended back at the hospital. She was omitted to ICU today. Her muscles were spasming, cutting off the air passageways to her lungs, making it impossible for her to breath. She was sedated and put on a paralytic to stop the muscle spasms. We will have to just wait and see how things proceed.

First Snow

2009-12-13T08:50:00.000-08:00

Taking Charlie outside down to the little doggie area that is provided by our Apt. Complex, I noticed that it started to rain...or was it rain? It was too light and slow. Slow...Snow! It was snowing! I went back upstairs to mention to Mary that it was snowing and she looked out the window and it started to come down a little harder. In the end we had a light covering of snow this morning that melted off by the afternoon. It was our first snow of the year.

Charlie

2009-12-12T08:16:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances and I had been searching for a dog for a week or two. We searched online at all the local humane societies. Mary would stop by one or two almost every day to look (as they would get new dogs all the time). We drove to Portland to look, but still were unable to find a dog and spoke to both of us. Most of the dogs I saw, my heart went out to and I wanted to take them all home. Except the Chihuahua's.

Well, today we went to the Willamette Humane Society to look. We met a small young puppy. She was very timid and too scared to play around us until her handler came in to check on us. I wasn't feeling the love and Mary wasn't either. So we left to 'think about it' and proceeded to the Safe Haven Humane Society. We walked in and saw Charlie. He was given the name 'Ziggy' after Ziggy Marley, but it didn’t stick. There was a white board on his cage where people were encouraged to write something about the dog, one kid wrote "Boring".

We were allowed into his cage to pet him. He lightly sat up and put his paws on our thigh and our hearts melted. Trying not to jump on the first dog we saw, we walked around, but migrated back to Charlie. We walked to the front desk and said we wanted him. They handed us the paper work, signed it, paid for him and walked out the door with Charlie in tow. Wow, that was quick and easy.

The brief history that the Humane Society had was that he was found as a stray in or around Hollywood, and was shipped up to them in October. He had very maty hair and had major dreadlocks (hence his nickname). They cleaned him up at which point he was adopted by an elderly woman who ended up bringing him back as she said he wasn’t getting along with her grandson. So he was back at the shelter until we picked him up. They suspect he is 8 years old, but not 100% positive, and are not sure of his breed. We suspect he is Yorkie/Dotson Terrier mix.

Instead of driving straight home to play, we went straight to PetSmart to pick up food, treats, a collar, leash, and a crate (that we later returned and picked up a larger one). We also signed up for training classes that are on Saturdays.

We now have a dog!

For all your Christmas Vacation Needs

2009-12-01T13:09:00.000-08:00

DVD Ultimate Collectors Edition, contains the movie, four coasters, Marty Moose button, Marty Moose Christmas hat, & Marty Moose Snow powder. The Blu-Ray Ultimate Collectors Edition has everything the DVD set has, but it looks like it also comes with a minature Marty the Moose Mug. Shweet.

Marty the Moose Mugs, made by the original artist (not 100% movie accurate, but you wont find better)

The Christmas Advant house

Griswold Balckhawks Jersey

Eddie's Furry hat

German Pyramid (You remember, the fan that Eddie touches and it just falls part...)

Add them as I find them...

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-30T12:40:00.000-08:00

This year Nate and Shelly came to visit on Thanksgiving Day, which also happened to be Shelly's Birthday. We made her dinner and bought some cake to celebrate. On Black Friday Mary-Frances went out with Shelly and some of her girl-friends grabbed some hot chocolate and coffee to tide them over as they spent the morning watching the crazy people shopping for great deals on crap they don't need, spending money they don't have. Nate and I met up with them then proceeded to go shopping ourselves at Target, Worst Buy and even the Mall.
At around 4pm we all packed into the car and drove to Creswell were we met, Joan, Ted, Shannon, Beau, Grandma McClain, and two of Shannon's friends for Thanksgiving dinner. I cannot remember the last time I had thanksgiving with the cousins...The food was great and we all left a few pounds heavier.
Nate and Shelly came back with us and hung out in Salem and with us untill Sunday afternoon. It was really cool having them over. Nate even fixed my computer wireless card! YEAH! You two are welcome back anytime.

Sean & Sarah Come to Oregon!

2009-11-11T12:17:00.001-08:00

Sean and Sarah drove up from Sacramento and arrived at our door just past 11pm. They unloaded their one bag and we chatted for a bit before heading to bed. Saturday we hopped into the car and drove two hours to Tillamook Cheese Factory. They had a free self guided tour. It wasn't quite what we were expecting, but somewhat interesting all the same. The center of attention at the cheese factory was their ice cream and grocery outlet. Ready to move on we headed to Cape Meares lighthouse since it was close by. It was a pretty small lighthouse in of itself. It stood about 200 feet above sea level. Unfortunately the lighthouse keeper's residence was torn down some time ago (after 1963 when it went automated). The parking lot is now were the houses once where.
We had a great view of the Oregon Coast line. It was raining on us off and on, typical Oregon weather. The sun peaked out for just a short while. Ready to head back, we trucked it back to Salem. For dinner we went out to the Best Little Roadhouse and later to the cake restaurant for dessert. Later that night we played Password and Catch Phrase. We had some good an hard laughs.
For Sunday, their last day visiting, we walked very briefly downtown, went to Bush Park, DeepWood (which of course both were closed), then to lunch. At which time we said our goodbyes and they drove off back to Sacramento. We really enjoyed their visit and look forward to Jason's visit, who currently is the only family member who has not yet come. Till then...

Carpenney Halloween 2009!

2009-11-02T07:51:00.000-08:00

Phew! Boy, once it's over, it sure is a weight off the old back. Mary-Frances and I have planning and looking forward to this years Halloween for months, weeks, and even days! For this years costumes, Mary-Frances and I were going as Coraline and Wybie. Preparations for our costumes kind of went as follows: Mary borrowed Sharon's blue wig, and had our neighbor (a stylist) cut it. I bought a black trench coat at the good will. Mary ordered yellow rain boots, which were canceled cause the delivery date was going to be in Nov. We both went to the mall to get shoes. I ordered my gloves and welders mask online. Mary bought the stripped shirt on sale at old navy. I heated up the welders mask to form it, bought 'extra' parts at the hardware store, glued them on and painted it. I bought the reflector tape at the fabric store, ironed it on. We both pulled the rest of the items out of our drawers and wham bam, we were done.
This year we had the Halloween Party at the Carpenters new home. They have a very nice two story home with a good sized back yard in a recently built neighborhood full of kids. They were estimating around 150-200 kids to come to the door. I don't think it was quite that many, but it was a lot. Mary-Frances and I arrived early so that we could set up some of our decorations and hide little clue envelopes around the house for the scavenger hunt game that we planned. Once we were done and ready, we just sat back and waited for guests to arrive. They started to trickle in at 6:30pm. First guests were Roger Radcliffe and Anita from 101 Dalmatians who brought their reverse Dalmatians (black dogs with white spots. Over time food was brought, and more guests fully costumed all arrived. We had Jerry Seinfeld and Elaine Benes, Harry Potter and Preggers Hermione Granger, Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs and Abby Sciuto, Dwight Schrute and Angela Martin, Visa Eagle and God's Gift to Women, Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf, Grapes and Guy from MTV, and OSU grad and a Beavers Fan, a Nudist on Strike and a Dr. Pepper Shaker. It was a good turn out and a lot of great costumes and creativity.
Around eight, we started our game. Mary got everyone’s attention while all the lights went out in the house. Then the unthinkable happened, a Murder! Mr. Pumpkin was killed and now we had to split up and find the murderer in the house. So, we split up into nine teams, each armed with flashlights to search the house. We gave each team a set of cards that contained a list of suspects, possible murder weapons and crime scenes. By following clues and riddles they find, it would lead them to their next card/clue. By collecting them all they would be able to determine who the murderer was. If you haven’t figured it out, we played 'full-scale' Clue. The game lasted about 45 mins before we had a winner. After the game we voted for best costumes and pet costumes. The winner's were Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs and Abby Sciuto, second place went to Jerry Seinfeld and Elaine Benes, and third was Roger Radcliffe and Anita.
Everyone had a blast and it was a lot of fun. The party wound down around 11. Great decorations, good food, and fun company. Looking forward to next years Halloween Party! Check out the rest of the costumes and pictures in our shutterfly.

Eureka!

2009-10-26T15:34:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I made plans to visit the Romo's and Grandma this past weekend. We left after work on Friday and drove all night. Oh man, it was so foggy, raining and dark that it made for unpleasant driving conditions. But we made it in around a quarter to two. A guest bed room was set up in Nate’s old room. The worst part about going to bed after a 6 hour drive is the ringing in your ears that is keeping you awake as you now lay in a quite room . But we did fall asleep at last. When we woke up Mary hit the shower while I went to the grocery store with Joan to pick up some milk and hotdogs. Nate and Shelly came over and they wanted to go out for lunch (since that was around the time we finally got up). When we were ready, we went to a bagel shop. Afterward we walked around the town admiring the architecture. I wish I brought the camera with me to lunch, but I thought to myself "oh you don't need it, we are just getting bagels". Boy did I regret not having it. We headed back to the house, picked up Monte then headed to a park. We hiked around a bit, this time armed with the camera, snapping pictures left and right. We got to see Montes home (were Dan and Katelyn used to live) and Nate and Shelly’s home. Grandma's Mercedes is being stored at Nate’s. Unfortunately the engine seized up a long time ago and has been slowly falling into disrepair. It's a sad sight. Some year, with the right amount of time, attention and money, I would love to see it fully restored (sentimental reasons).
Grandma treated us all to dinner at a Mexican restaurant. It was very good. We met Monte's wife, Julie, for the first time but someone forgot to introduce us (bad Monte). After dinner Mary-Frances went off with Shelly to their place and Grandma, Joan, Nate, Monte and I all sat down and a long heart to heart talk. We chatted for a couple of hours and I think the outcome was pretty positive. We went to bed really late again. The next morning Monte, Nate, Shelly, Julie, Mary-Frances and I all went out to breakfast before we had to leave. We came back to the house to say good-bye to grandma and Joan. Grandma expressed how grateful she was that we came down to visit her and look forward to us (personally) as well as anyone else to come visit her anytime. We are thinking about going back for thanksgiving or meet half way at Shannon’s, but we'll see how things work for everyone as time gets closer. We both had a fun time and it was a nice spending time with grandma and the cousins. I was trying to deduce the last time I was in Eureka. I recall that the last time I was there, Shannon was moved into Nate’s room, Nate was in both Monte’s and Shannon’s room (as the wall between the two rooms was removed). Monte’s Mustang was sitting in the driveway, and Monte was somewhere…where? I cannot recall, he was either away to school, or (at least I thought) was serving somewhere in the armed forces. Perhaps he was just out duck hunting. Don't recall. How long ago was that exactly? Not sure, but I think around 15 years.

Dale

2009-10-19T14:04:00.000-07:00

I got a call yesterday that my Hen, Dale, past away during the night. Since my rooster disappeared she was the last hen that remained from the batch I received back in '99 (or was it 2000?). For the past couple of days she had been very lethargic and inactive. I was hoping that my rooster and hen would live long enough to when I got a house that I could bring them up to Oregon, but it just didn’t happen in time. Goodbye Dale… =(

The Marta Visit

2009-10-12T15:05:00.000-07:00

Sharon and Jake originally called us asking about coming up for Christmas, but since they were on their vacation here in October, that they wondered if they could move it up to now. Taking the opportunity, Sharon, Jake, and the kids drove up from Sacramento. Friday after work they headed over from a friends house. Isaac came in already chanting how excited he was to see the Spruce Goose. They unloaded and I started dinner. We got to hang out and just relax the first evening. The next morning (the 10th) after I came home from work, we got the kids ready and drove up to the Evergreen Aviation Museum where the Spruce Goose is being stored. We walked around and saw all the planes and helicopters, military vehicles and the Space Museum next door. The kids had a blast. We snapped tons of pics (see our shutterfly page). On Sunday, we took them to church, afterwords Mary had an appointment with some friends to take their family pictures. We then went to the park while we waited for her to finish. Upon Rebecca's recommendation, Jake and Sharon wanted to take the kids to the Discovery Museum. A short history is that the homes there were either built on location or moved there at one time to make this kids park. Each house has different rooms in them where the kids can 'discover' different things. They have a train room, a safari room, China room, bubble room, dinosaurs, shopping, recycle rooms, and more. They had a huge play area too and a maze of slides. A lot of fun for kids. Well, seeing how the homes were built in the 1800's they had their old style stair cases. Coming down the stairs I made the comment that I liked the odd steep style, while Mary-Frances was thinking "why, people get hurt on these stairs..." and that's when she missed a step, lost her balance and came down on her ankle, spraining it. Crying out in pain, one of the employee’s came over, asked if he could help, went and got a bag of ice and we filled out an accident report. Regaining her composure, we stepped outside to sit down on one of the benches. Feeling bad, the manager came out and gave us 4 free passes for our next visit. We came home and Mary put up her leg for the rest of the evening. Sharon and Jake packed up and got ready to head back to Sacramento. We ended the night watching The Office. The next morning, bright and early they headed out. We enjoyed their visit and look forward to the next one. Sean and Sarah were planning on coming up the following weekend, but had to postpone. Mary-Frances went to the doctor and got an x-ray. They said it wasn’t broken and gave her an aircast splint to wear.

Surprise B&B Get-A-Way!

2009-09-29T14:15:00.000-07:00

Well our weekend didn't end the way we planned it from the start. It was a typical Saturday morning at work while Mary-Frances was at home doing some chores. Around 12:30pm I got a call from her telling me that I had to call Dave Lilley (her co-workers husband) as soon as I could 'cause he had a proposition for me. "OK...", I said to myself.
Well, a little hesitant I called him. He answered and proceeded to give me the low down. He said that he and his wife had made reservations at a Bed & Breakfast near the coast for this weekend, it was already paid for and ready to go. Unfortunately they were no longer able to go due to family complications and the trip was non-refundable, so it was going to end up going to waste. So, he ask if Mary-Frances and I were interested in going instead to take their place. The catch was that we had to check in by 3:30pm or risk the possibility of being marked as a "no-show" and loosing the reservation. So, I called Mary-Frances and asked if she was interested, and she said sure. So, I had her start packing while I drove home to pick her up. We then drove 40 mins down to Corvallis to pick up the reservation papers (needed at check-in), then headed out to the town of Yachats, where the B&B was. Now, we've never been to Yachats nor heard of the Bed and Breakfast. We really didn't know were we were going nor what was in store. Our new GPS came in real handy.
We had Dave and Kay call ahead to inform the B&B that we were coming and that we would be a little late. We finally got there at 4pm. Boy were we in for a surprise. Our stay was at the Heceta Head Lightstation. And yes, the house you see in the link is the home we stayed in. In fact, we stayed in the upstairs room that is the second window from the left in that very photo. Just gorgeous. We had our own little private parking area in back away from the public parking. Normally, the house is open from noon till about 5pm most days of the week to tourists. They closed off the upstairs to keep our rooms private while we stayed there. We entered through the guest kitchen and found our way up the second stairway to our room. We stayed in The Mariners II Room. We had our own bathroom with shower and there was the option to connect to the adjoining room if we were a larger party. And of course our view was the ocean.
We unloaded our stuff, took some photos and headed out to Florance for dinner. After dinner we came back to the B&B and to walk around a bit and enjoy the ocean. We walked up to the Lighthouse once the sun started to do down for a private viewing. If we planned it right we could have had a great view of the sun setting, but we just missed it. It was nice to be there after hours with no one else there but us ‘special guests’. The grounds and the house were for us the rest of the evening. It was totally cool. Mary wanted to explore the house a bit and look at all the photos and items out for display. That’s when I discovered a small binder with newspaper clippings and letters written from other guests. As I started to read I learned that the lighthouse is considered haunted and is on the top ten list of most haunted lighthouses in the US. So I read through the binder learning about the “ghost" resident "Rue” and the stories that have been told over the years.
There were 5 other couples staying there with us. Most, we didn't see till breakfast, when we came down the next morning. Set up in the dinning room was a place setting for 12 guests. We were all called to the table by a ringing bell at 8:30am. Once we were all seated, our seven course breakfast was served. First was chopped apples, pears and strawberries with a honey sauce, toppped with whipped cream and a mint leaf served in a desert glass, with a side of tomato bread. Next came Fresh Crab Cakes with Remoulade, then a Blueberry freeze with White Chocolate to clean our pallet. Afterwards we were served an Egg patty w/melted cheese and broccoli. Our Meat course was home made sausage links with maple and honey glaze. For desert was a black berry upside down cake, then finally a fig with cream and brae cheese.
After breakfast we packed up and loaded the car. We didn't have to check out till 10:30am to allow them to clean the rooms before they opened to the public. We took the short hike back up to the lighthouse and took the official tour of the interior. Walking back down we stopped at the gift shop that used to be the old carriage house. We picked up a souvenir for us and a small gift for Dave and Kay Lilley as a "thank-you" for the weekend get-a-way. I was hoping that we could take the official tour of the house, but they didn't open till after we had to leave back to Corvallis for a Young Marrieds baseball game that we signed up to bring food for. Unfortunately our camera battery died the first night so we didn't get as many photos as we would have liked. In our haste to get out the door we forgot to grab our second, fully charged battery. Guess that means we will just have to go back some day and take more pictures. Full set of pics are in our Shutterfly library, click the link in the right column.

Oregon State Fair 2009

2009-09-07T11:21:00.000-07:00

The last day of the Oregon State Fair we just had to go. We left in the morning and arrived an hour after it opened. Tons of carnival rides and games and of course, carnies. Mary wanted to ride the Farris Wheel. Well it cost 8 tickets per person, and tickets where $0.50 ea. So, it would have cost $8.00 for the both of us to ride it. We changed our minds.
We spent most of the time walking around and looking at all the animals. We got to see sea lions, goats, cows, rabbits, lamas, and pigs. We caught a couple 'best in show' shows. It was interesting seeing a line of Lamas being judged. Very nervous animals. It sprinkled on us a little, but not much to get in a tizzy about. We caught a glimpse of some performers walking on tightrope and doing the hula-hoop balancing thing. Lots of venders inside selling all kinds of infomercial items. Heard a lot of '...if you act now, you will get, not one, not two, but three bundles. Now that's a $100 value, yours today for only $20..."
We passed the jerky hut and they were handing out free samples. Now, I couldn't pass up free jerky. So I asked for Hot, and ate it. Hmm, not hot, it had no tingle at all. So they gave me Habanero hot. Hmmm, again, still nothing. I said give me HOT. So they gave be the double habanero. Finally, a jerky that I would classify as 'hot'. Not inferno, but hot. So Mary bought me a pack and we moved on. When we were ready to head out we stopped by the black and white photo booth and got our traditional set of pictures. We ended the day relaxing at home watching Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Mary-Frances Birthday

2009-09-03T11:18:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances awoke to find a Happy Birthday Balloon in the living room. Sitting on the coffee table I left for her her card, yellow roses in a cool vase, and a pair of earrings. It started her Birthday off on the right foot. Once she arrived at work she found a happy birthday sign taped to her computer, balloons, and roses from her co-worker's garden on her desk. Later that evening her two friends, Bobbie-Jo and Julie took her out to dinner at Olive Garden. It was a good birthday.

Dinner and a Movie Date Night

2009-08-30T10:52:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I starting planning another Trilogy Night at the Pynn's sorority house (they are house parents) while all the girls were home for the summer. However, through much thought and compromise, we switched it up to a Date Night for the Young Married's. I had it all planned. We would eat in the dinning hall, set up the tables and chairs so each couple could have their own private seating, candles and flower vase, romantic lighting and soft music playing. The food would be pot-luck style, but served as a sit down restaurant. Well, as the day approached, we learned that the dinning hall was going through renovations and wouldn't be available. OK, we would just have to move the table and chairs into another of the large rooms, no problem. When the day arrived we got a call that all the tables and chairs were picked up to be repaired. They were supposed to come the following week, but decided to come early.
Well with some last minute decisions and thinking, we moved other tables and chair outside in their garden area. Brought out some lights, fake plants, a fountain, and made the best of it. There were four couples (including us) that came. We had a strawberry nut salad to start off, then Dr. Pepper Pork Roast and Block Island potatoes for our entree. For desert was a berry truffle. Hmm good. After dinner we played password. As soon as it was getting dark and everyone was ready to move on, we went downstairs to their private theater room, popped pop-corn and watched Across the Universe. We had a lot of fun, and everyone said that they look forward to the next date night.

Great YouTubes!

2009-08-29T10:48:00.000-07:00

Curt Nelson (our new Children's Ministry Pastor) trying to recruit people:

"Matt" vs. "Daddy"
Video taken by dear friends, Matt & Carrie Gardner.

Quincy Work Picnic

2009-07-25T15:13:00.000-07:00

"The time has come," the Walrus said, "To talk of many things: Of shoes and ships and sealing wax, of cabbages, and kings, and why the sea is boiling hot, and whether pigs have wings." Quincy Engineering had their annual company picnic at Bush pasture park. Mary-Frances and I arrived a little late, but it appears that it was barely noticed. We arrived in time to play a few games of ladder ball and snack on chips and soda.
Later a game of Volleyball ensued and most of the office and their family played. Now, I love volleyball and is really the only sport that I like, but I could not play without being a ref. The only 'rule' that they seemed to really stick to was rotation. Everything else kind of went out the window. So it was down to just the basics: hit the ball over the net, and don't let it hit the ground. It just drives me too batty to watch them doing 'lifting' or hitting the net, or punching the ball. Makes me shiver.
Russ, one of the engineers (aren't they all?) brought his BBQ and we had steaks, buggers, Hot dogs, salad, cookies, brownies, carrot cake, all on the grill...hmmm. After being doped up on caffeine and stuffed to the max that our stomachs could hold, we called it an afternoon and headed home. It wasn't nearly as much fun as when we went to Detroit Lake, but it was fun.

Kenney/Schwartzhoff Visit to Oregon

2009-07-25T12:52:00.000-07:00

As the Ang's left, my family arrived. Mom, Dad, Rebecca and Roshni drove up from Sacramento for a week long visit. They arrived Monday evening and left Friday Morning.
The weather here was probably at its best for summer heat. I think it stayed in the 80's.
While Mary-Frances and I were at work during the day, the fam drove around Salem seeing the sites. They went to Bush Park, Silver Falls, and the Aviation Museum. Dad was hoping to go inside the Bush House, but it was closed.
When we were able to come home we spent the rest of the evening relaxing in our apartment playing with the baby. Thankfully John said it was OK for Rebecca to watch Coraline without him, so I picked it up on Blu-Ray and we watched it Tuesday night. Dad really enjoyed the movie. He said that there are so few films where he gets involved with the story, and he was with Coraline.
Mary was hoping that we could get a off of work to hang out with them for a whole day, but we couldn't. Shannon came up to visit from Eugene and spent the day with them. She stayed for dinner, and afterwards we went to a local cake deli together for dessert. Hmm, it was really good. While it was a buisy two weeks of visitors, we look forward to our next guests.

Ang Visit to Oregon

2009-07-18T14:06:00.000-07:00

YEA! New visitors! Mary-Frances and I have been looking forward to this visit since it was mentioned that it was coming four months ago. The Ang family came up to visit us all the way from Arizona. They arrived Tuesday Night for dinner. I made them one of our favorite dinners, Croissant Tacos. There was just enough for everyone. Luckily for me they all seemed to really like it. During our dinner conversation we happened to mention that we had a pool. That was all the kids had to hear, before their swim suits were on and we were out the door. The kids swam till the pool was closed. Wednesday, I went into work that morning and asked for the day off. Since we were totally slow at the moment it was OK'd and I got to go home. Mary also got the time off but it wasn't as easy with her.
The first stop of the evening was Silver Falls National Park. We hiked down to the South Falls and then down to the lower South Falls. Oh boy was the hiking hard. We, or at least I, had hoped to take the five mile hike all around the park and see all 10 waterfalls, however, a quarter way through, we decided to head back to the lodge. Back at the Lodge, we bought ice-cream and cold drinks. Then we drove them to 3D Blacklight, Pirate, Mini-Golf. They had a blast. Played nine holes; Ron (brother-inlaw) was the winner. The 3D glasses did hurt the eyes if we wore them too long, but it was a trippy effect. At the last hole we got tons of winning tickets and all the kids got a little toy at the exchange counter, similar to Chuck-E-Cheese. Ron and Candi really enjoyed Oregon so much that they are thinking about moving here. If all their ducks are lined up that is. The girls helped Mary make dinner, then played catch phrase, mad gab and halo. They left the following morning as they still had plenty of sights to see for their vacation.

Trilogy Night II

2009-07-18T13:50:00.001-07:00

Mary-Frances and I hosted our second Trilogy Night for our young Marrieds Sunday Class. It went well for the most part. We bought movie theme plates, cups and table runner. Provided Popcorn, drinks, hot dogs and pizza. Our theme this time was Super-Heroes, so we watched Superman Returns, Iron Man, and The Incredible Hulk. Unfortunately the church is concerned about their projector being on for 5-6 hours at a time so they are not interested in letting us use it, so it may be our last Trilogy Night held at the church. Now we just need to find another location that is big enough to hold 5 or more couples and has a large screen w/ stereo sound that we can utilize for the next Trilogy Night.

Woodburn Annual Tulip Festival

2009-05-13T12:28:00.001-07:00

Oh boy. Mary-Frances and I attended the Tuplip Festival this year. A small group of friends where going to go after church so we decided that we would meet them there. That's where the fun began, or ended. As soon as we got off the highway off-ramp, we were stuck in a line of cars that was about eight miles long. How long did it take us to go the last eight miles to the entrance, you ask? Two and a half hours. Our friends made it in an hour before us because they took a back road shortcut. Once we were able to finally get in and park we ate a braughtworst dog 'cause we were starving. We walked around a little while, and then met up with the group. Within seconds of finding each other, they said they were leaving to go out to dinner and invited us to go long with them. Since Mary and I just ate and just got there, we declined. We went through the shop and the tulip field. It was just gorgeous. We left after about an hour or so after arriving and headed out to watch a movie.

Comic-Con and Stumptown Fest

2009-05-13T12:00:00.000-07:00

OK, this is a long over due. Mary-Frances and I attended the Emerald City Comic-Con in Seattle Washington. It is much smaller compared to the San Diego Comic-Con, but it was still fun. There were dozens of local artists as well as some not so local. Tons of vendors selling comics, posters, and odd toys. I have to admit that the only reason I heard about it was from Chris Turnham's Blog. He mentioned that he was going to be there signing his new art book. Mary really enjoyed his art, so we got his book. I also got his autograph on my Coraline Press kit. While we were talking to Chris, he mentioned that a few more artists from Laika would be attending the Stumptown Comic Fest Convention in a few weeks. So, we marked our calendars and went in hopes to meet some more artists. Unfortunately, I didn't see anyone. It was even smaller than Emerald City. The majority of the artists there were freelance. Very few were from DC Comics, or Dark Horse. A little disappointed, Mary and I left after walking around for a few hours. I only later discovered that Graham Annable had a booth there, and I totally missed him. Grrr. Oh well. He says that he attends the event every year, so I might have another opportunity to meet him next time.

Getting The Ball Rolling!

2009-04-26T19:31:00.000-07:00

One year ago the only debt we had was our car. All our credit cards were paid off and we were feeling pretty good. Then I lost my job and the debt started up again. Why did we end up back in debt? Because we didn't have an Emergency Fund! If we had some money saved up then, we would be probably still be debt free to this day. Lesson learned.
We just finished taking Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University course at a local church and have learned the tools and steps we need to become debt free permanently. Now we are back in the game and paying off that debt to be debt free once again, and to stay that way.

We have finished Baby Step #1 towards financial peace! ("Baby Emergency Fund").
We have also begun the Debt Snow Ball and have paid off one credit card so far!

Very exciting times!

Want to learn more? Read Dave Ramsey's book "Total Money Makeover". You can find it in just about every bookstore, Walmart, Target, grocery stores, and so on.

Patrick's 29th Birthday

2009-04-08T09:03:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was my 29th Birthday! Yea to getting older! This is my last year in my twenties. Finally 'adult' age is creeping up on me.

Well, the day went like this: I went to work, where my co-workers wished me a Happy Birthday and got a Carrot-Cake that we all took the time to eat. I had plenty of leftovers so I took it home with me.

After work we had two couples come over for food and games. We had pizza for dinner, carrot-cake, Cold-Stone Ice-cream for dessert. The girls played Killer Bunnies and the guys played Halo 3 on Xbox live. It was small, quiet, but fun. I enjoyed myself. Mary-Frances got me the three Coraline Dolls w/card. I got phone calls from Rebecca and Mom & Dad, and a card from the Marta's. Now I have to go spend my Amazon Gift Card! Thanks Schwartzhoff's!

Shannon and Josh's Wedding Day

2009-04-03T11:21:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances was a Brides Maid for her best-est friend in the whole world this last weekend. We got on a plan and flew down to San Diego on Wednesday.
Friday morning we woke up early to drive to LAX to pick up a long time family friend, Jerrod Furlong. We was coming to town to see one of his friends. By the time we got back, Mary's sister showed up to visit with her husband and children. They drove 6 hours from Arizona to see us (and others). We spent the evening hanging out, playing Halo, and saw Coraline in theaters (We have now seen it three times! I am looking forward to a fourth). Just as the movie ended, Mary and I rushed out to the Wedding Rehearsal. I volunteered to adjust the chairs while Mary practiced walking down the aisle. As quickly as the rehearsal started it was over. The rehearsal dinner was at the Old Spaghetti Factory. Good food, great price, all around fun atmosphere. After dinner, we met up with some of Mary's friends at the California Pizza Kitchen.
Thankfully Mary's sister and her family stayed around playing games so they were still at the house when we got back. It was fun to be able to spend more time with them. We are looking forward to their visit here to Oregon sometime in June.

Saturday was the Big day. We arrived a little early for the wedding and found our seats. Sharon notified me that I was volunteered to be a secondary filmographer. So I was handed a video camera and went to town. I got all the best shots that I could. tried to stay way from wide shots and kept things moving. Cut out the boring things and got all the important stuff. Mary did a toast for the Bride, she was so nervous, but she did great. She got a few complements afterwards. I got a question about how I liked 'my' video camera.
I stepped on the photographer running backwards to follow the Bride and Groom as they left under a shower of sparklers. That was fun. Reminded me of the Wedding from Pirates of Penzance.

I flew home Sunday evening to get back home for work, but Mary stayed an extra couple of days and flew home Wednesday. Good times.

St. Patrick's Day

2009-03-22T18:47:00.000-07:00

We hosted our second annual St. Patrick's Day party at our apartment this year, the Saturday before. We invited three couples to come over from our young married's class. Mary-Frances cooked up the Irish Beef Strew with Guinness. I made rock island potatoes, mashed potatoes, corn on the cob. For desert, I made my now seemingly traditional Chocolate Irish cake. Everyone seemed to love the food. They all showed up wearing green for the occasion. We were given a bouquet of flowers and a home made wine as party gifts. They were awesome, thanks guys!

After dinner we proceeded to get excited playing Catch Phrase. The women won one round the guys won two. This year we got some beer mugs so we could keep with the theme. We had a slew of beverages. We had Hot Chocolate, Guinness, Cranberry Apple Juice, regular Apple Juice, Milk, and Irish Car Bombs. Oh, and we busted open the wine. All and all, it was a great night and we had a lot of fun. Looking forward to next years party.

Chickens and Ducks

2009-03-22T16:27:00.001-07:00

Recently my pet Rooster went missing from my parents backyard and the side gate was found mysteriously ajar. Perhaps the wind blew the gate open and rooster set off and got lost. Hoping that I would come looking for him and to bring him home safely. Perhaps picked up by another neighbor and brought home, or by animal control. However, I suspect foul play.

Their next door neighbors called the Sacramento county back in 2000 to complain about the rooster, hoping that we weren't zoned to have 'live-stock' on our property. We then received a 'Violation' notice and a representative to our door saying that he was going to take them if we didn't get rid of all our chickens. When I called to check myself, the zoning department told me that we were 100% legal to have a rooster on our property. Apparently they didn't read their own rule book before hand. I called the guy who came to our door and quoted him the law that allowed us to keep the rooster, and he was like "uh...you're right, sorry". I then wrote a letter to our neighbors explaining to them the situation, quoted the zoning law that said it was legal for us to have chickens/a rooster. I thought it was over at that point. I was wrong.

In 2005 they tried again. They called the Sacramento County Zoning, and again we got a Violation notice, along with a guy coming to our door saying to get rid of them or he would take them. And again, we had to remind them that we were legal and they needed to take a hike. I can forgive once not reading their own manual before sending violation notices, but to do it twice? Common! Just goes to show you, do your own homework, it is quite possible the notice you get is an ERROR, due to not checking to see if you meet the 'qualifications'. But it didn't end there either.

In 2006 our neighbors called again. This time they got the Sacramento Channel 3 Problem Solvers to get the Sacramento County to get off their butts and to get rid of the rooster once and for all. Well, this time, the county did their homework, and said "this is ridicules, this is a closed case, wont be open ever again, they are legal to have the rooster" -not a direct quote. I don't think that was the out come the neighbors where looking for. The irony about it is, our neighbors never ONCE called us, wrote us, or came over to talk to us about their 'complaint' in all the nine years. They just went straight to the law enforcement. If they had actually come over to talk to us like neighbors who respect each other or like adults, perhaps things would have gone differently. Perhaps we could have made a compromise and met somewhere in the middle.

Unfortunately, this isn't an isolated incident with these people. It's been an on going battle (strictly on their side, and us defending ourselves) with one issue or another. So, with all that history said, my point is I honestly believe that my parents neighbor saw an opportunity and entered (broken-in) our back yard and took matters into their own hands. Which of course is illegal and punishable to 20 years jail time and thousands of dollars in fines...but never mind that. It wouldn't be neighborly of us to suspect or accuse them.

I received the rooster nine years ago from my sister as a birthday present. He was one of two roosters that I received. I have had, I think, 15 chickens and a Duck over the past 15 or so years and they have all been killed by one thing or another. I am really heart broken that my Rooster has just disappeared. What hurts the most is not that he may have died, but not knowing what happened. Not knowing where he is, or if someone killed him. Being physically unable to take care of things myself has been very difficult for me emotionally. I do appreciated the support and encouragement I received from those who gave it.

Coraline 3D

2009-03-19T11:44:00.001-07:00

Mary-Frances and I went out and saw Coraline 3D twice now. It is one of my new favorite Annimated films. I love the characters, the music, the theme, set design, everything. So I went out and got the Soundtrack and a 1st edition of the Book. Also found out that the movie was made here in Portland, Oregon! Yea Oregon!

If you waited till the end of the film they gave you a password for their website Coraline.com to win a pair of Nike Dunks, limited to 2000. Neither Mary nor I won a pair, but Joanna K. did. The shoes themselves were all different. Some came with Mice and Cat heads w/tails, some came with props from the movie, some came with the button eyes box, or in a wooden box, etc. etc. There has been so many promotional items for this film it's crazy. There have been Button keys 'hidden' all through out the US on posters and such for people to take. There have been boxes of all shapes and sizes shipped out to bloggers, containing all kinds of goodies. For any collector, these items would be great to find/get.

Check it out if you havn't already:
Coraline.com
Bobinsky's blog
Author Neil Gaiman

Three Years and Counting!

2009-03-18T16:12:00.000-07:00

Today is Mary-Frances' and my three year Wedding anniversary.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!

More Than Meets the Eye

2009-03-13T08:24:00.000-07:00

Mary-Frances and I purchased a second vehicle. We saved up
and bought the car from a friend. They were selling it and offered it to us for a $1, so we took it. They saw our need for a second car and came to the rescue. Now I have a car to take me to and from work. It is a stick, so I had to learn how to drive it. It is a 1991 Toyota Celica. I noticed that it was the right color and shape as the Gen1 Transformer Cliffjumper, who was a 1981 Porsche 924 Turbo. So I got him a custom License plate and ordered some Autobot emblems to put on the side. I figure he has the same theme as the beat up 1976 Bumblebee Camaro. Adds character.

While still on the topic of cars, Jack was rear ended, again. A Co-worker of Mary's backed into Jack with a trailer. It ripped the corner open and damaged the styrofoam inside the bumper. We were quoted like $700 to replace the thing, so he wanted to buy us a new bumper and replace it himself instead of having his insurance pay for it. Going this route I think it saves him close to $300. So hopefully that will get fixed soon. Jack sure seems to be having his share of incidents. Let's reflect. I had to replace three of the four tires, all four tires have been flate at one point or another after that. The side mirror got scratched, the drivers door got a pinged. The spolier also got scratched up, and the bumber has now been hit twice. Not to mention the paint transer to my doors as strangers hit my car while opening their own doors.

Also, Sunday afternoon, I came upon a disturbing site. Someone had broken into Cliffjumper during the night. Apparently, they (the criminals) where on a splurge. They hit around nine cars that night, one that happened to belong to a police officer. Mary and I think that they based their target cars more on proximity to the street and lacked a car alarm. I didn't have anything in my car worth taking. The only thing they made off with was my blue CD wallet that I had like forever. I kept burned copies of my CDs in it specifically for this reason. I figured, it I ever got broken into and some stole my CDs, they were not going to get my originals, just copies. So it would only cost pennies to replace and not like $300. So, I got the window replaced, and I am going to have to get the handle fixed. I think they figured it was one of those cars that if you pull the handle on the inside it would unlock and open. Well it's not, so they broke the handle. While this breakin ended up being costly to us to repair, it is laughable to think that they got nothing of value for their trouble. Well, least from my car. I will probably be finding glass in the car for months.

Winter Retreat

2009-01-23T09:30:00.000-08:00

Wow, hard to believe that it's been a year since we went on our last Young Marrieds' Winter Retreat. All packed up and ready to go Friday evening; we drove to Camp Tapawingo for the holiday weekend.

They split women and men in different cabins again. The women's cabin was practically an apartment, with a full kitchen and living area, while the men's cabin was as rustic as you would expect. Our first night we had our introduction chapel service, then a game afterwards.

It was so cold that each morning the frost made the area look like it had just snowed. It also made the wood steps and walkways very slick. The food was awesome, the free time was entertaining and the worship was enlightening. You always seem to get to the end of the retreat and wish you had another day. On our last night we all split into groups to do a skit based on either the creation of man or the fall of man (eating from the tree). The idea was based off 'Who's Line is it Anyway" where they give you a bag full of random props, costumes and a plot and you have to come up with something. Our group went on last. We came up with the idea before we went on, so we all had a good idea what our roles where and where it was going, but when it came down to performing it was all adlib. I got several compliments afterward about how humors it was. I need to get a video of it to post.

Christmas 2008

2009-01-15T09:01:00.000-08:00

Mary-Frances and I drove South for the winter. This year was Christmas in Sacramento. It was still snowing when we left so we were not sure how the drive was going to be on I-5 over the Mountains and through Shasta. Apparently there was a rumor that we may not make it through at all and would have to cancel going to Sacramento this year. But low and behold, the road was clear the entire way there. It snowed on us a couple of times and at one point was so foggy you could not see more than a hundred feet in front of us, but we made it to my Parents house on time, Christmas Eve.

Christmas Morning was awesome. John made the best breakfast in the world! It has been three years since we had a Christmas with everyone on my side of the family there at the same time. Jason was late arriving, as usual. I got to see my Chickens again! Rooster is so big. He woke me up a couple of times with is crowing at 5am. His crowing sounds so 'old' and weak now. I mean he is over 5 years old, so it's no big surprise.

I made our Christmas gifts for everyone this year again. I re-wrote an old Childrens's story I had created when I was in Elementary School. I drew new illustrations for it and had it printed in a hard-cover book through Blurb.com. According to its shipping estimated time frame it was supposed to be shipped out Christmas Eve and arrive the day after Christmas. I had missed the 'arrive-by Christmas Eve' order date by one day. Well shipping day came and went. I checked its progress online and it said that the New Shipping day was going to be Friday, (the day after Christmas) and that day came and went. It was Monday before the books finally shipped out.

When the books finally arrived the following Friday, due to the New Year Holiday and over a week after Christmas Day, John had them all packaged up and ready to ship out the following Monday. So everyone finally got our Christmas gift, two weeks after Christmas! Yeah! You can get your's too by clicking the link on the right under 'Patrick's Books'. It's like $30 for the book 'cause it's not mass printed.

Over all, Christmas was great! Next year we are spending Christmas with Mary's Parents and hopefully with her sister too.

Oh the weather outside is frightful.....

2008-12-19T14:57:00.000-08:00

Monday the 15th:
The winter is here and the snow has started. There was a light snow fall after we got back from Southern California. It really didn't stop. Yesterday it started to snow pretty hard. On my way home, snow was everywhere. I started to go up the hill to our apartment and Jack (our Kia) started to slide sideways. Woo hoo. I slide right off the side of the road. There was also another car there too who had also didn't make it up. Well my cell phone was dead and my car wasn't going to make it home, and I was out at night in the middle of a snow storm. Yeah, fun. Well as the time went by a car was coming down the hill. Apparently it was the mother of the son who was also stuck there with me. She had chains on and offered to take me up the hill. So God was watching over me and I got home safely and warmly.

This morning I walked back down the hill to my car. It was still too snowy to drive up the hill, so I drove the car to Shucks Autosupply (aka Kragen) and bought cables. I made it up with hill with no problem then. Mary was kind of worried about me while I was out, since I forgot to bring my cell phone with me (it had been charging). But I made it home safely.

Saturday the 20th:
align="center">It snowed off and on throughout the whole week. Patrick made it to work a couple of days this past week and stayed home a couple. Mary had been sick all week, causing her to miss work anyways. It snowed a lot again today and rained. The rain then froze. They predicted an ice storm this weekend and sure enough we got ice. Good times!

Monday the 22nd:
Well does anyone remember what my first post on this blog was, way back when we first moved here? And where I was when I created this blog? That's right! Snowed in at Patrick's work. Well guest what...history repeats itself. I am finally feeling better and ready to go back to work and the weather turned on us again and I'm stuck at Patrick's work. Better than being stuck at home for the 8th day in a row! There is at least a half inch of ice over everything. Walking on it is pretty neat. You break through the ice to crunch on the half foot of snow underneath. We drove into work today to get out of the house, but feel that it would have been better to stay home. I think it dropped like 6" of new snow since we woke up this morning by the time we got to Quincy. We'll post our pictures of what home looks like real soon. Till then, Merry Christmas! We probably got a total of a foot of snow. Portland was worse however.

Planes and Automobiles

2008-12-15T13:16:00.001-08:00

We made plans to fly down to San Diego December 6-13 to visit the Southern California side of our families for an early Christmas. Our flight was very turbulent, making the trip rather unpleasant. We were picked up at the airport by Mary's parents who drove us back to their home.

We got to meet up with my Mother and sisters after church on Sunday. Sharon and Rebecca made dinner while Mom watched Isaac. Isaac was sad to have to be put to bed since he was having so much fun hanging out with is Aunts and Uncle. It was fun to play with the kiddos and Mary really enjoyed chatting with Sharon on Friday (like the old days). Later that night when we returned home, stockings were filled and opened. Within in our stocking stuffing we got a card that read "Two day pass park hopper for Disneyland!" YEAH! Mom got to drive a motorized wheelchair to help allow her to come with us all those two days. She wasn't too thrilled about the idea at first, but then ended up having a lot of fun with it.

Unfortunately the two days that we were there the park closed at 6pm for the Disney Staff Christmas Party. We ate lunch at the French Market to get one of the 13 Nightmare Before Christmas Ornaments being offered and had dinner at the Winery in California. Those who ate the lasagna really liked it, those who ate something else weren't impressed. The rides we went on were the Haunted Mansion, Indiana Jones Adventure, Finding Nemo Subs, Pirates of the Caribbean, Buzz Lightyear, Monsters Inc, Screamin, Space Mountain, Autotopia, & Mary and Dad went on the Tea Cups as part of their Disneyland tradition. Got a lot of window shopping in and some buying shopping too. It was a blast the whole time. It was nice to be back there even if it was for a short while.

Wednesday night we had "Early Christmas" with Mary's parents and exchanged gifts. The best was when dad was talking about a gamer chair he wanted but decided not to buy it. Instead he picked up one that was less expensive. Meanwhile right next to him was the box for the chair that he really wanted. We had switched out the chairs while he was out and placed it exactly where the other one had been to create the illusion that it was the same chair. It was sitting right there in plain sight. It was hilarious when he finally noticed.

Friday we stopped by Sharon's again for a short visit before we drove up to David & Joanna's; a drive that took us three hours due to traffic. We went out to dinner and went to a church that was putting on a Live Christmas Story through Bethlehem. They had King Herod, Roman soldiers, and a marketplace with a real camel! They had other animals too that the kids could go and pet. Meanwhile you are walking through and they are telling you the story of Jesus' birth. It was pretty cool.

We came back home on Saturday. Our friends picked us up from the airport and drove us home. Apparently it had already snowed in Oregon the day before.

November

2008-11-28T16:04:00.000-08:00

Holiday Open House!
November 22nd, I had my very first Mary Kay Holiday Open House. Our friends, Ron & Heather, allowed me to use their house for the day so that I was closer to most of my customers in the Corvallis area.

Thanksgiving!
We had three couples from our church group over for Thanksgiving. We had Turkey, Biscuits, Block Island Potatoes, I made Martha Stewart's Pom Cornbread Stuffing, Corn on the Cob, Green Bean Casserole, Sweet Potatoes with marshmallows, and another kind of potato dish. We finished the night with pumpkin pie, and Patrick made home-made hot chocolate. We all watched Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving and also learned how to play a new game: Pit (its like spoons). We prepared left-overs for everyone to take home. They seemed to really enjoy themselves.

Black Friday!
Yes we went shopping. No we did not get up at 4am. We went to Target and got Friends seasons and a portable DVD player. We continued to the smaller mall for some Starbucks and to look for a nativity scene. We came back for lunch, decorated the apartment for Christmas, put up our tree, and are now just enjoying the peacefulness of being home.

We leave next Saturday, December 6 for San Diego and will fly back on December 13. We look forward to seeing family & friends for an early Christmas get away.

Happy Holidays Everyone!