Once was Lost. Now is Found...

This picture shows two very momentous events in my Arkansas history:

1. The first snow of the year! (tho a week or so ago we had some flurries and even collected a flurry drift in our doorway... so even tho' this is the second time I've seen snow fall from the sky it's the only time the ground has begun to turn white) They predicted 3-5 inches! For all of you mid-westerners who are sick to death of snow, humor me. It's super exciting! :)

2. Marion got a Starbucks! I'm drinking a chai tea latte from only 5 minutes away instead of 25 or 35 or 45 (those are the three Starbucks in Memphis that I know of). The line for the drive thru was out of the parking lot and on to the street. I knew it would be a hit. Now if only a target would move in next door (there's a movie theater slated for the area too) I know it would be a hit.

SO also the picture shows that we found our camera. It was hiding on our bookshelf under a big dark drop cloth in the living room. Also, the whole ground is white now. I should have waited to take the picture till it looked like a good-ish amount of snow... but why risk it? It might melt or I might get busy and forget to document this once in a year experience. YAY FOR SNOW!

Here's some more proof that our camera is back safe and sound. ;)

This is our yard on Wednesday after a big rain storm. This lake ate up almost a third of our yard and a third of the street as well.
Maybe I should have made this picture bigger. This abandoned house is a few roads away from ours. I absolutely love it.
This is Bell Road, driving up to our house. :) Isn't it lovely?

Here's the first day of ceiling sanding and the cats enjoying the ladder in the new addition to the living room.

This is Walter after a few minutes on the job (the dust you see is in the air. I thought it was on the lens. Nope, it's just that dusty) and a larger view of the room a few days ago. Now all that's left is to sand the kitchen and paint the room. Can't wait! (oh and flooring... but that's next)

a year in review

every year seems to be punctuated by a new move, home, daily life. I don't know yet if this coming year will be any different. But as of yet, (drum roll please) there are no concrete plans to continue the pattern. There are, however, also no plans to live in the delta for the rest (or even a considerable amount of the rest) of our lives. The jobs just don't pan out for either of us. Sad, but true.

So here we are: renovating a house, spending time with family, helping dorothy out with the kids and her cleaning (she's going to a hire a maid, deborah! soon i will only help her with her kids, jk), and living the basic day to day.

Today's church. I love our church! Sundays are wonderful like that. I get to be a part of a vibrant & diverse (something you don't see much of in memphis) congregation and listen to the word of God delved deeply into in a church where the pastor has not forgotten that the point of Scripture is to impact lives. This church doesn't want you to stop at simply hearing the word, learning great systems and doctrines, but knows that you can study the word directly and God has something to show you... right there in that very passage. I feel so blessed to have found a happy medium. It's like I can breath again. No silly proof-texting. No heady intellectualism. For awhile I settled for the latter. At least then we were hearing the Word of God instead of cute stories with a verse thrown in here or there. But praise God for showing us Fellowship (and thank you, mom, for insisting that we try it out). I can't wait to get more involved! The next step is on the 27th when we go to the discovery dinner and learn more about the church personally. We'll see what follows that.

Tomorrow begins the new semester at University of Memphis. It took quite a bit of finagling to get walter squared away for classes but we did it and tomorrow walter starts three undergrad classes that qualify him for grad courses in the fall.
1. mechanics of materials
2. mechanics of fluids (i think...)
3. heat transfer (again, think i'm remembering this correctly)
basically it's the weeding out class from sophomore, junior, and senior years of mechanical engineering... then he's qualified to be a grad student! :) So yeah, it'll be a trying semester but I'm confident that he can do it (now just to convince him ;) ) It only took faxing records from Cedarville & Wheaton, meeting with the head of the engineering department, signing up for undergrad classes as a grad student, getting another MMR shot, and lots of calls to the help desk. All this while sending out resumes to every company that excites walter. It's been a busy couple of days. But it's done! (hooray!)

On Monday we're going to figure out if we (ourselves) will push the wall back into our garage giving us room for a laundry room and a larger kitchen and living room or if a contractor will do it for us within the next few weeks. This all while we wait for the windows to come in... the windows home depot promised us two weeks ago. Alas, the shell for our sun room looks beautiful. I absolutely can't wait for all the light that's going to shine into our home and the plants I'll be able to grow.

I'm sorting through things (both physically and mentally), figuring out the best next move (not to a new state or anything... I know, with us, this statement could be confusing), and honing some skills. More on that to come, I think.

But for now it's time to get on with today. My goals for this year (as of right now) are to develop a daily routine and to stick to it and to do the exercises that my chiropractor's assigned. Should be doable. We'll see how it goes.

sweeping update

So fall finally has arrived... and it took it's precious time. But oak trees are finally turning and there are beautiful yellows (and even some reds!) all around! We're planting bulbs and going tree shopping (we just planted a maple today and I'm hoping to procure a redbud and buy an ash in the very near future). Walter and I planted probably a hundred bulbs this afternoon. This made my hands rough and feel sticky when I try to knit. The hope of truly cold weather has rekindled my love for knitting and crocheting... so I'm honing my knitting skills this season. I'm so very excited! :)!

Just yesterday or the day before I thought to myself that I really needed to update this blog (you poor people who just have no idea what's going on in my life! hehe). But I nothing would come. It's not that words wouldn't come for what was going on in my life but I couldn't find anything to put words to. And now, even tho' I don't have adequate words life seems fuller and less dry. So I'll write. Thanks for checking back here after such a long silence.

Anyway, it's been warm... 80's even! But two weekends ago the temp shot down into the 50's (which felt almost like winter with it being so abrupt). Immediately I set about to celebrate fall. We rented Dead Poet's, I made spiced cider (alas, I'm the only one who drinks it) and apple crisp (let me tell you, Martha Stewart has nothing on my mom. I used Martha's recipe when I couldn't find my mom's... and my mom's is better. alas, live and learn). We actually watched Meet the Robinsons but DPS came the next night and it still felt like fall so that was alright. :) Of course the weather didn't last and instead I opened up the windows in the evenings to let cool air in and I picked up my knitting in hopes of cooler days. I'm learning all about different stitches and yarns and about understanding patterns... also about re-rolling yarn after my dogs get a hold of it...

Walter finished the fence. It's beautiful. We got dogs! Big wonderful dogs (as Walter called them) :). Alas, they're diggers. Now we need to go around the entire fence and reinforce the ground level so that they don't continuously romp in the sunflowers or play with the neighbor's dogs (both super cute but not the most convenient for calling them home or good neighbor relations). The cats don't love the dogs yet but they're beginning to feel free to walk within eye sight of them and that is a very good step. Walter's on to his next home project: building a deck and pergola top. It is going to be spectacular! Right now we just have a lot of mud and twine set up for the perfect prank... Walter's sick and hasn't been able to work on it for almost a week. Hopefully he'll be better soon... back to classes, his deck building, and ready to be an uncle again. The thought is that Dorothy will have her twins this week! Tomorrow, even (maybe, hopefully)! We can't wait to meet our little nephews (just imagine how dorothy must feel)!

Anyway, it's time to put this entry aside and whip up some chicken noodle soup, grilled cheese, and hot chocolate for my ailing husband. :) Hot chocolate may not be the best sick-remedy but I found some instant Mexican style hot chocolate at Walmart the other day and I can't stop drinking it. Amazing! Finally hot chocolate from a bag that i like. I just can't resist.

in lieu of iced tea

i'm in chicago!

the night before last alex picked me up from O'Hare. We stopped to get a slice of pizza that was (no joke) as large as my torso... well as long, my torso is (much to the media's dismay) considerably larger than 3/4 of an inch. my mom and i split a slice and alex amazed us with his eating ability. apparently it's a learned talent. he wasn't able to eat an entire slice the first time he visited Bacci.

The next morning my mom and i went on a morning walk chose our favorite neighborhood McMansion and then drove off to Qdoba for lunch. I had a mango salad (yum yum!) and my mom had a naked burrito. we picked up some burrito for karla and her mom and made our way to karla's house. Mom had never been there which made me the navigator. (Not a good sign) we pulled in to the driveway and were amazed that we didn't see any cars there. By my calculation there should have been two: karla's and her mom's. nevertheless we trekked to the door and rang the bell. No answer. I called k.'s phone but couldn't get my phone to connect to the network (darn AT&T and darn my nice little phone). we snooped around the house. looked in through the side door. explored the backyard. and then decided to leave. we went to JC Lichtto pick up some paint and then finally (just as an employee was walking us to our car) got a call from Karla amazed that we had been there. she'd been there all day.
"are you sure that you were at the right house? "
it looked like her house. exactly like it.
"did it have a stork in the yard?"
umm. i could have sworn it was karla's house.
we dropped off the paint, picked up the burritos. and ran over to karla's. this time we pulled into the correct driveway and were met at the door by a most doting grandma and her beautiful grandson (only 5 days old!) he has the cutest little nose that i think he got from karla and LOOONG skinny fingers. they're beautiful. we held her sleeping baby. visited. and walked the dog (buster, the puppy they've had for maybe 3 weeks).
when my mom and i came home we began work on the bedroom, ripping off the wallpaper border (NOT put on correctly... VERY hard to get off) and washing off glue. we breaked for chicago style pizza (YUM!) and High School Musical. Hehehe, I never thought i'd like that one but it was fun. It's exactly what i would have loved in HS. we finished the bedroom and dropped into bed around 12:15AM. (Happy Birthday MOM!)

Today we've removed a little more wallpaper (it was behind a dresser we hadn't moved yet), removed all the furniture, and painted the ceiling. Now it's on to the walls. I'll be sure to post pictures of the incredible results. ;) Back to work...