Spring Is Near...

Of course I do realize that there could still be plenty more cold, we've had snow here before in April, but who cares... It is supposed to be close to 80 degrees here today!! What is up with no blogs in nearly two weeks?!? Sigh. Oh well... Yesterday a friend of ours and I took the kids to the AMA Supercross at the Georgia Dome, Carolyn was going to go, but changed her mind as she decided she did not want to mingle with 55,000 other people downtown at the Dome, and really, who can blame her, I didn't either, but the kids wanted to go, so...

First stop was to our friends house to have a party for Lucas and pick them up, so we hung out, grilled hot dogs and had cake...

Yes, I left my camera in the truck, but managed to "steal" these from Kevin's FB page. The kids loved it! Me, yeah, it was okay... I did enjoy the "Main Event" where the pros were racing, the kids were a bit bummed that their favorite lost, but it was an exciting race.

Sitting in the nose bleed seats, but still a good view. The kids thoroughly enjoyed it. The thing I hate about events like that though, is when it is over, trying to get out of there along with 55,000 other people... Luckily we had gotten a good parking space in a church parking lot across the street from the Dome and managed to get out the back and avoid the interstate and most of the traffic, whew!

So yeah, that is what is going on. Still no final decisions on anything else. Hopefully within the next few weeks. :)

Sigh...

Well, still no final approval on relocating from my Corporate HQ... So yeah, still in limbo. I've resigned myself to the fact that I'm stuck here, for now... ;) Who knows, more on that when I find out...

What else is going on? Life. Tanner is going off on a ski trip this weekend with my neighbor and TJ, Taylor is having five girls over for a slumber party this weekend and Chance wants me to take him roller skating... Ugh. I suppose I will, but wow, I really don't like skating. I guess the trade off will be I'll make him go see True Grit with me... :)

Pictures?? Yeah, I don't have any because I haven't taken any in a month or so, I need to work on that. So yeah, there is the update from me for now... :)

Happy Valentine's Day Carolyn!!

They Keep Opening...

The door's that is... :)

I think the thing that amuses me the most are the people who aren't accustomed to change... This isn't even a "for sure" thing yet, but there are people who actually get an attitude that we MIGHT be moving... Mind boggling. Oh well, one thing I never did was care what anyone else thought, I could not imagine living my life that way. So anyway, we still don't know one way or the other, and we are fine with whatever happens, but like I said, another door opened today, two more to go...

I would add that we as a family, if it all works out, are VERY excited about it and as far as I'm concerned, that is ALL that matters... ;)

Limbo...

That kind of sums it up really... ;)

The Birthday Bash...

Marci threw a party for Joshua's birthday today, so we loaded up in the truck and headed to Buckhead, something we never do... :) We don't venture far from Acworth, but we had a GREAT time and got to visit with everyone. Was GREAT to see Tori, haven't seen her in years, I was trying to figure out when we last saw each other, and I believe it was when she was over here for Christmas, which was years ago. Sorry my camera SUCKS, but it does, so none of the photos came out all that great, sigh...

Marci had the party at Truffles Cafe, which is right next to her office in Buckhead...

Taylor at the party...

Carolyn and Taylor...

Tori and Marci, and yeah, like I said, my camera sucks, need to get a new one sometime... :)

Marci and Gideon, he is SO adorable!!

So that is how we spent our day, now going to watch a movie, unless my neighbor calls and wants to do the P90X stretching tonight, he had to work late, so we'll see... :)

New Home...

Or actually work place, still have to locate the home... :) Nothing is completely final yet, but the doors are flying open at an amazingly rapid pace for even me, funny how things work out when it is "the thing to do"...

That "A" on the map is where the GE facility is where I would be working...

We'll soon see if it all works out, but so far, as I said, the doors are opening before I even arrive practically... I'll keep you posted... ;)

Digital Photos...

Sigh... As I'm sure everyone does, I have tons of digital photos, and over the years of switching PC's, rebuilding my PC, etc, many of them are duplicates. Every time I wipe out Carolyn's or my PC, I back the data up to my server, so there are nearly 100,000 digital photos on the server, but if you were to eliminate the duplicates, there are probably only about 20,000 originals, if that. Anyway. I decided to use Picasa's facial recognition feature to catalog them all, so nearly four days later, it is mostly complete. It is nice now to just pick a name and see every photo I have with that person in it, but wow, what a chore... Why would I want to do that you might ask? Well, take this video for instance:



I just clicked on Tanner's name, "starred" a handful of pictures, clicked make a movie and upload to YouTube... Of course you could make a much better "movie" if you spent more time on it, but that is why I wanted to do it, I am ALWAYS looking for a 'certain' photo and can never find it, or I spend a while looking for it. Now I don't have to do that... So now that that is done, I can get back to doing something useful, like finishing that drywall in the downstairs kitchen... :(

Day 18...

Of the whole P90X thing that is... I'm about over it to be honest, but will continue on... :) Other than that? Yeah, just life. Still working on that kitchen downstairs, but these days, I do not do any remodeling during the week, only during the weekends. Too busy with work, family, etc during the week. I'm currently home alone, which is rare. Tanner is ice skating with friends, Chance is at his friends house, of course that is why I am home alone, Carolyn, Taylor and her friend went to pick up Chance and his friend, so I will soon be NOT home alone... :)

I did go get the rest of the drywall today to finish that kitchen, took out the sink and cabinets there and took down the drywall behind them. Yeah, I'm already over it, but continue on I must... :)

Of course at this point I said screw it and quit, I did get it hung on the other wall you can't see though, I suppose I'll finish it tomorrow and try to get the first coat of mud on the new pieces and the second coat on the ones I already had hung, we'll see how that works out...

Taylor and her friend with one of the puppies, I think Carolyn has them all sold already, and they won't even be ready to go to their new homes until February 14th. Of course Chance's dog, Brianna, is pregnant now too, sigh... Yes, that is a mouse trap under the cabinet there. I do believe we have finally eliminated them all, but WOW, what a chore that was!! Started when Chance got a male and female to breed for his snake. Then they "escaped" and now 39 mice later, we are hopefully mice free, what an effing nightmare!! Sigh...

So yeah, that is basically what is going on here. I'm still starving all the time, I eat all day long. I'm about over it to because I really don't like to eat. What can you do? Keep eating I suppose.

This is AWESOME!!

I have tried to use several online sites over the years to print my blog in book form, but never found one I liked until now...

Blog2Print...

This one prints comments, and is semi-customizable, the only thing I didn't care for was it didn't allow page breaks to be inserted, not a show stopper though...

Fairly reasonable too, from January 2010 until today, I had 63 blog posts, who knows how many pictures and it was 121 pages. Hard cover was $60.45 and soft cover was $50.65... You could also download the PDF for like $7.95 or have it printed in black and white for $20 I think... It would not allow me to do 2007 in one book though as there were 378 posts, actually, it wouldn't allow me to do it online, said to call, so I guess it still might be possible... So I shall start blogging more now... :) Then just print copies of each year for the kiddoes...

I Forgot...

How much I absolutely DETEST mudding drywall... Of course I'm really not all that good at it, so it takes me about four coats, so that might have something to do with it as well.

I really should have just finished it since I just had that one little wall there left to do, but I reach the point where I am just done, so I quit, no matter where I am in the process...

There is always tomorrow... :) Day 14 of P90X here in a few! I made it two weeks!! Hard to believe, particularly if you realize how much I really don't like working out. I really can't remember ever actually working out to be honest.

Kids go back to school tomorrow as well, they are kind of bummed because their Winter Break got canceled to make up for the snow days. I'm sure there will be a lot of parents who actually had trips planned, etc, so they might be a bit bummed as well, oh well, it is what it is...

Sigh...

Yeah, I thought I'd get that drywall done today, but the problem with this house is:

Every time I remove sheetrock, without fail, I find crap like this... Who does that?? If you aren't going to use a long enough piece of wire or a junction box, at least wrap it with electrical tape?? Wow!

So I said screw it, went to Home Depot and got new boxes, outlets, switches, etc and just replaced everything. From now on, whenever I gut a room, I am just going to do that so that I know it is wired correctly, etc before I cover it back up...

So needless to say, that is all the drywall I got hung today, oh well, I'm off tomorrow, so hopefully I can get the rest hung and get the first coat of mud on it... :)

Now it is off for the P90X workout... I'm tired of working out too, I actually hate working out, but continue on I will, at least for this 90 day program, after the 90 days? Who knows, time will tell...

Oh yeah, here are three of the puppies, they are getting bigger and are way too cute...

That Didn't Take Long...

So yeah, if I'm going to gut the upstairs kitchen, master bath, etc, Carolyn has to have somewhere to cook for the month or so that it will take me (being optimistic there :)... So I decided to "quickly" redo the kitchen downstairs as it needed it...

Of course I did not take a before picture, but I found this one from a few years ago... :)

Let it begin...

So I basically just ripped the entire thing out, I did leave the sink there until I've got the sheet rock hung, once I get around the window there, I will toss that sink and cabinet at the dump...

So that is basically all that is left in the downstairs kitchen...

So there you have it... Let the games begin... I am really optimistic about this, but we'll see how it goes. I am going to take that floor up too and put down slate, I already have the slate for it, so who knows, may do that next week. Going to hang the sheetrock first. Yeah, I ripped it all down because it had wallpaper over wallpaper on it, and it will be easier to just hang new sheetrock than to mess with trying to get off those layers of wallpaper and try to get it smooth enough to paint... Who knows, my next post may have pics of the sheetrock up... :)

Somebody Stop Me...

I'm thinking of gutting half of the upstairs and redoing it...

Before...

After...

The layout of this house sucks!! I am determined to correct it though, as best I can anyway... The first thing I will have to do though is gut the downstairs kitchen and redo it, because that will be Carolyn's kitchen for the few months it will take to do the upstairs... We'll see how that works out.

Day Ten...

Of the P90X thing that is... Doesn't seem like it has been that long, but I suppose it has, time flies. I'm not following the nutrition part exactly, but that is because Phase I of the nutrition part is the "Shredder", and I have ZERO fat to shred, I'm actually trying to gain 30 - 40 pounds. I do eat what is on the "list", I just eat LOTS of it! I've only actually deviated from the "list" once, when I had to go over to fix Marci's garage that she ran into, I stopped for gas and bought a custard filled donut, which was pretty tasty I might add... :)

P90X Program...

Even though I feel like I eat 24/7, I am literally starving ALL the time! I eat about 6 - 8 times a day too, I guess I need to start eating more each time... Sigh. Have I mentioned how much I hate eating?? Oh well... 80 days to go...

Of course the kids have been out of school all week as well, so they are having a blast! They are out again today, and I'm sure will be out again tomorrow as well, I suppose we shall find out this afternoon. Having lived up north, it is amazing to watch these fools here in the Atlanta area when there is a little snow and ice... Not sure what they would do if they lived in an area where there is snow and ice on the ground for 3 - 5 months of the year??

Tanner playing in the snow...

Taylor on the back deck...

Not sure why there isn't a picture of Chance, oh yeah, he is inside playing Black Ops on his PS3 trying to get to some 'extreme' level or something... :) He does play in it, the snow that is, it's just that no one was out with the camera when he was out in it... Myself? Yeah, I prefer to look at it out the window, I DETEST the cold! Oh well, January is nearly half over and Spring will be here in a few months. I suppose Spring will be here about the time we are done with the P90X program. That is another thing, every night we have to trudge over to my neighbors house in the snow because he is the one with all the equipment, DVD's, etc and that is where we do our hour to hour and fifteen minute workouts each night. Of course he lives next to the house right behind us, so it's not like it's THAT much of a walk... :)

Well, I suppose I should go eat my first meal of the day before I die of starvation!! I am literally famished as I type this...

Snow, Again, Sigh...

Let's see, what is it? 70 more days until Spring? Sigh... This is what we woke up to this AM...

Carolyn in the front, obviously... :)

Front shot, and of course once the kids get up and start sledding, making snowmen, etc, this will all be a huge muddy mess...

So far, only about 3", and of course it really all depends on where you insert the ruler, 4" was the most I found, but it is a bit higher it seems in some of the drifts...

I do like the snow, for a VERY brief period of time, and luckily, since we live in Acworth, this will all be gone by the end of the week... :)

Back area... The dogs aren't quite sure what to think of it all, although, I am sure they are GLAD I put a heater in that garage for them, although they really don't need it with the dog house I built for them last year...

I'll post some more pictures once the kids get out of bed and start playing in the snow... Until then, I shall just attempt to stay warm, and now, I better go make more coffee, because the first pot is long gone...

P90X...

Is what I'm up to... Of course last night was the first actual night of excercising, so we'll see how that works out. You have to replace habits you are no longer interested in with something, so I'm sure it will. Chance and Tanner are doing it with me, along with our neighbor's Jimmy and Nate. We'll see how long everyone lasts... :)

Sigh...

Supposedly, the last time there was snow on Christmas Day in these parts was 1882, I haven't actually verified that, but have seen it in enough news stories that I'll assume it's true... :)

Taylor, a few minutes ago, trying to find something for her to use as a sled...

View from the back...

Pool, yeah, that thing runs 24/7 now, and likely will until March... :(

Back area we recently cleared out...

Taylor trying out the various items we tried to use as a sled, when I say "we", I mean Taylor, I have zero interest myself, it's all I can do to be outside to take a picture... Oh well, the kids LOVE it, and with any luck, the next few months will fly by and then it will be Spring!! :) In case you are wondering, a trash bag appears to work the best...

Merry Christmas!!

Sadly, my digital camera situation is not good, I need to have my good one repaired, so note to self: get that done soon!! So yeah, not many pictures were taken, and the ones that were aren't all that great. Of course I've been sick for the past three days, so didn't really care much... Hope that everyone had a fabulous day with friends and family!!

Getting ready to tear into the "loot", the kids have been anxiously awaiting this morning, as I'm sure kids all over the world have... :)

Cory spent the night last night, so was here this morning for the festivities, Jessica came over a little later to enjoy the "Christmas feast" with us. Taylor (I think) made those ornaments for Cory's tree...

Chance wanted some dumbbells for Christmas so he can start working out, and yeah, that's one of the few pictures of Tanner that even turned out, sigh...

This has pretty much been me for the past three days, hopefully it is nearly over... :(

Merry Christmas Eve...

I hope everyone is doing well, we've been passing around a bug of some sort here, I've felt like shit the past two days, starting to feel better now though. I got it from Chance, hopefully no one else gets it... :) Although, Tanner, sadly, isn't sounding too good... Marci called earlier and was going to come over, yeah, I told her to STAY AWAY! :) Everyone is still in a good mood though, and we all have the holiday spirit going, the kids are all about to go to bed, because they cannot wait until tomorrow morning...

Carolyn's sister Linda, and her husband Mike came up a few days ago, we had a great time. Exchanged presents, Cory and Jessica came over and we had a good dinner.

All the kids... This was when Chance was feeling like crap, hopefully no one else gets it!!

I'm sure you can tell from this picture just how GREAT I feel, but whatever, I try not to let sickness kick my ass, but it's been a struggle. I AM feeling better now though as I am typing this, thankfully!!

Uncle Mike and Aunt Linda with the kids...

A good time was had by all, always enjoy the fellowship with Mike and Linda. Now, it is time to get ready for the morning... Although, I think the only thing I have left to do is go to bed, we've been done for some time now. Looking forward to the AM, it is GREAT watching the kids on Christmas morning... Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!!!