Category Archives: Uncategorized

Halloween was successfully even if it was cold, windy and rainy. Raven had a good time and got a pretty good amount of candy. Even though trick or treating was from 6 to 7:30, we were finished by 7 and headed home to warm up. Raven spent the night gorging herself on her loot until it was time for bed. Raven dressed as the Nine-Tailed Fox demon trapped in Naruto from the anime/manga series Naruto. I was a creepy doll. She wore a pair of Mike’s thermal pants and thermal shirt under her costume to keep warm. You can see the shirt and pants bunched up around her stomach. It looks like she has a little pouch in the front of her belly. LOL And yes, the costume fits fine. Naruto’s jumper does not reach his ankles or his wrists so its suppose to look like that.

I have taken the Halloween decorations down and am gearing up for the “putting up the Christmas decorations” along with the inevitable “why are they up so early?” and “it’s not even Thanksgiving!” But if I have to put the damn decorations up than they are going up for more than a month. Anyway, I am making most of our decorations this year and need to get a jump on it.

Halloween is fast approaching and my original idea of going as a zombie Alice in wonderland is not going to happen. Even though I originally thought it was not going to cost too much money to make, I was wrong. The blue dress I planned on wearing is not going to work and after searching for over a week for a cheap dress that would, I gave up. Fortunately, I came up with another costume idea and it only cost me a total of $7 because I had everything but one item on hand.

Raven is going as Nine Tailed Fox/Naruto from the manga/anime Naruto. Since she is 14 this will probably be her last year trick or treating. She wasn’t originally going to go but I talked her into it and she in return talked a group of her friends into going.

So, Monday night (trick or treating is from 6 to 7:30) we will brave the cold in search of treats while wearing our awesome costumes. Speaking of cold, the weather turned nasty rather quickly and we are supposed to have snow tonight/early Saturday morning. Even though I love Thanksgiving/Christmas, I am not a fan of the cold. Burrrr!

Jenn, Andrea and Rachel!

Congrats to the winners and thanks to everyone who entered!

Last year, I used Shutterfly to order our photo Christmas cards (see the post here) and I am glad I did. They came out wonderfully and I could not have been happier … that is until this year. Shutterfly has generously given me the opportunity to host a giveaway on my blog. The giveaway is for 25 free photo Christmas cards from Shutterfly. All you have to do to enter is to leave a comment on this post with which card you will choose if you win. On Monday October 24, I will announce the three winners on my blog as well as contact the winners via email.

If you have never used Shutterfly for your photo needs, you really are missing out. I have used Shutterfly for more than holiday cards and have always been more than satisfied with their products. I have order a photo book from them (for a family member’s birthday present) as well as many, many prints. I know my Shutterfly order will feature nothing but the highest quality materials and will always reach me in a timely manner.

As for our holiday cards, I have it narrowed down to three designs. Charming and Lovely, Merry Little Moments or Deck Your Walls. Those are the three that I am drawn to. I think I will let Raven and Mike make the final decision since there is no way I can choose from those three!

One more thing before I end this post. Shutterfly wants to know if you blog? If so and you want a chance at 25 free cards this holiday season, register here: http://goo.gl/DDw7Q

I always decorate for Halloween (expect for the 3 years living with my MIL) but I don’t want to spend a whole lot of money of expensive decorations. So, I decided to makes some DIY Halloween decorations. The milk jug lanterns ended up costing me nothing since I had all the items on hand. Thanks to my mom and aunt who saved their milk jugs for me, I didn’t even have to make my family drink more milk than they normally would.

Things Needed:

• Milk Jugs
• Black Marker
• Knife or Scissors
• Christmas Lights

To start, clean the milk jugs thoroughly with warm, soapy water. If you don’t, the lingering milk will curdle and stink to high heaven. Once cleaned, rinse with water and let the jugs air dry for several hours. I turned my milk jugs upside down on top of a towel to dry. This way, you don’t have any water drops hiding at the bottom of the jug.

After the jugs are dry, cut a small opening in back of the jug. Make sure you are cutting the opposite side you will be drawing the face on. It is best to start with a small opening since you can always make the hole bigger if needed. Now comes the part where you get to be creative by drawing the face on the milk jug with a black marker. Draw whatever floats your boat, tickles your fancy, whatever!

Once you are happy with the way your jugs turned out, set them in place and stuff some Christmas lights inside the jug via the hole you previously cut out. I opted to pour birdseed in the bottom of the jugs to keep the wind from blowing them off the porch.

Here is how ours turned out.

My favorite is the mustache lantern.

Since my main client is a little dry at the moment, I know money might end up being tight for awhile and since Christmas will be coming up soon I need to start cutting back a little just in case my main client stays dry. So this year I am going to forgo purchasing a Halloween costume for myself and instead try to make one from things I already have on hand. I want to be zombie Alice in Wonderland and I already have a plain blue dress that might work. Actually the dress looks more like the dress worn by the Alice character in SyFy’s original movie Alice starring the oh so hot Andrew-Lee Potts. I have the black and white striped knee-highs, hair bow and makeup to turn myself into a zombie. Now all I have to do is add blood to the tights and maybe to the dress and I should be good. I also gotta go through my shoes and see if I have something that would work. What are you going to be for Halloween?

One of the things we love about our new home is the amount of deer that we get in our back yard. Even when London is outside using the bathroom, the deer are not too afraid to make themselves known. They seem to know how far London’s leash can go and stay out of his reach. Not that London would do anything but lick them if they would get close enough. Heck, I would wager that if the deer decided to rush London, he would turn tail and come running back inside as fast as he can. Throughout the day, it is not an uncommon sight to see 10 or more deer in our back yard eating apples and chestnuts from the trees.

Anyway, tonight is the homecoming dance and Raven is going. Actually, we are forcing her to go. She doesn’t like wearing dresses or dancing because it’s too girly but we tried to tell her that she will regret not going to school dances when she gets old. She has more than a few friends going so she will have some people to hang out with. When I took her dress shopping a few weeks ago, she actually enjoyed it more than I thought she would. This will be her first dance and I think I am more excited about it then she is!

Things are going pretty good since we have moved into our new home. My stress level has dropped considerably since we moved in and that has helped my overall attitude. Unfortunately, my over thinking mind won’t let things just die and it must continue to rehash the problems of the past 4 years. All these doubts are now coming back up along with the worries and the what ifs. I don’t want to think about those bad things and bad times but it seems as if I have no control over it. In order to keep these thoughts away, I have to have the TV or radio on even when I’m working. If my mind isn’t completely distracted (and even working will not distracted it 100 percent) then I start to think of the past 4 years and all the pain, anger and helplessness I felt. I hate remembering those things and wish I could just forget.

So, I am just finally getting around to posting photos of the house. Yes, it will be a month of use living here in a few days and we still haven’t gotten everything out of boxes but I am working on it.

Before posting the pictures I will give you some info on the house. It was built in 1920 and has 2 bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen, living room, computer room, basement, attic and a 2 car detached garage. So far, we love it! We still have work to do to it. For example, summer 2012 we want to build a new front porch and replace the back porch roof.  Anyway, here are some pictures of the house. I will upload new ones as we progress on the house.

LIVING ROOM

RAVEN’S ROOM

MINE & MIKE’S ROOM

KITCHEN

I don’t have any before pictures of the bathroom mainly because a. I forgot to take a before picture and b. All we really did to it was change the paint color. It was originally pink and we painted it blue. I also don’t have any of the computer room at this moment.

We have all been extremely busy since we closed on the house July 14. Our projected move in date is before August 19 since that is when Raven starts school. Raven busted her little butt to get her room done and it looks awesome. She scrapped, primed and painted with the color of her choosing.

We have been scrapping, painting, cleaning and fixing small things almost all day every day. Mike has been fixing leaks in the plumping while replacing faucets. He has also dealt with roof shingles and clogged gutters. We got the water turned on last week and are waiting for the electric company to turn the power on.

Here is a quick rundown of the rooms and what we have left to do to them.

• Raven’s Room – Completely Done! We are going to start moving some of her things in. Colors: Turquoise walls with black trim.
• Living Room – Just needs the carpeting installed but we are going to wait on that so we are not tracking mud or dirt all over the new carpet while working on the rest of the house. Colors: Gray walls with black trim and probably burgundy or dark red carpet.
• Our Bedroom – Just need to add carpeting which we are planning to do this week. Colors: Light green (in-between a sage and lime green) walls and white trim.
• Bathroom – Just needs painted. Colors: Light blue walls with white trim.
• Kitchen – Needs painted and the new floor down, which we are working on today. Colors: The wall color is called Pumpkin spice so it is an orange color with creme trim.
• Computer Room – Finished scraping it yesterday. Going to prime the ceiling and walls today. Mike has yet to pick out the color.
• Basement – We got a lot of the junk out of it and are trying to get rid of the excess condensation that forms on the back area of the basement. Thanks to my Dad and step-mom, we have a new hot water heater.

Here is a quick picture of Raven’s room before and after. I will post the rest of the house photos before we move in.

Also, this past weekend I photographed my step-brother’s wedding (pictures to come later) and we have been introducing (slowly) the stray kitten (who we named Nefarian) to Jedi and London so he can be ready to move into our new home.