Drywall Despair

Well, as I have said before the drywall has been hung but we are waiting for the guy to come and tape then mud. Waiting, waiting and oh yeah, waiting. Everyone says he is the best in the area and a nice guy to boot but he's finishing up a job...then he has to finishe up another job, then he'll work on ours and who knows, maybe he will be done by Thanksgiving...or maybe not.

I have heard that drywall is often a stumbling block. I have also been assured that everyone else is ready and that there *shouldn't* be any other hold-ups. This gives us a weekend to primer, either Thanksgiving weekend or the weekend after that. My dreams of painting any rooms have been hopelessly crushed. Let's talk about something more pleasant shall we?

The antique doors are back just as we were finishing up the very last of the other doors. I am not posting any pictures of the mission doors until they are done and hanging in the house. Let's just say I am pleased. I spent most of yesterday cleaning the last bits of white paint from the cracks and corners with some help from Dad. Today he is giving them one last sand and I will be staining tommorrow and next week.

Kitten has been changed back to her old food and so far so good. She is acting different lately, quiet and not as lovey--we think she is pouting from all the pills we shot down her throat because she isn't used to us handling her like that. Speaking of Kitten, we went to this craft house north of Plain City last night called Hunter's House and it was pretty cool. I picked up a grapevine star to hand on the front door and I found Andrew's Christmas present for me this year. Luckily, he was there too :) It's a painting of a cat that looks exactly like Kitten sleeping on a white bed in a country house with the window open showing a road and garden beyond. It is too sweet for words. So Andrew's Christmas shopping is basically done.

That's about all. I will post when, say the drywaller actually gets in the house! jules

A Cat on Valium is pretty darn funny.

Okay so Friday night it proved slightly more difficult to give kitten her pills. I managed in the morning because Kitten had no idea what was going on. The only medicine Andrew and I have ever had to administer was ear drops. We managed though to give her the flagyl and then—because she hadn’t eaten anything, a quarter of a little yellow valium pill. The vet said what 20 minutes and right on the nose our sweet, cuddly cat began to act like an angry drunk. I have never in my life heard Andrew laugh so hysterically for so long. I think we both felt guilty for laughing at her but we couldn’t help it. Not only did she want to be active but also the relaxant of the pill made her list, fall of, and generally careen wildly.

And, she cried for food. I put down her bowl and she ate a whole serving. So that was good. Saturday we were completely unsuccessful in giving her any pills but Sunday and this morning we did better. I think I have now perfected using the pill shooter.

Unfortunately we haven’t gotten her to eat more than a couple of tablespoons of food since then valium or no valium. She is hungry but she hates the kibble—but this seems to be the only thing on the planet that won’t make her sick so she is stuck. I sympathize but it is no excuse for her attempts to knock over the trash can in a drunkenly like binge.

But at least she isn’t getting sick and she is eating some so that is an improvement. Not much to report on the house.

Hey Look Two Posts in One Week

Wow what a stressful week it has been. Drywallers have hung all celings and drywall this week, (good) mudding and stomping may take 2 to 3 (bad) So painting may get pushed back to the week beofre or after Thanksgiving (bad.)

In the meantime I will finish painting the last of the upstairs doors and hopefully finish the antique doors. I am bringing more and more boxes to Mom and Dad's and the apartment is slowly transitioning to disaster are to desolate.

Andrew took his exams in Muncie today. Now Paramedic school to go.

The biggest news, really, is that kitten has been quite sick. The Doritos seemed to have kicked off a downward spiral of not eating, eating very little and then getting sick. I have been a stressed out mess all week over her. We now have her on this stuff called flagyl that is supposed to restore the balance of bacteria in her digestive system and I gave her the first dose this morning with a handy plastic pill shooter. She swallowed it like magic. I have helped Dad give the now departed Chubby pills and he was awful about it. We'd have to wrap him in a towel like a little cat burrito and then we found out that sometimes when he could, he would hide a pill under his tongue and sput it out outside. Andrew says Chubby was evil but that isn't true--Chubby was just clever and a little cantankerous. I miss him.

Anyway we also have little valium tablets to give to her to increase her appetite--a side effect of valium, for cats at least, is a raging case of the munchies.

So while her personality has remained unchanged, it's been quite disconcerting to see her lose weight (vet assures me that now she is at a healthy weight) and not eat. So we'll see how the weekend goes.

Not much else to report really. Everyone keeps telling us how this is an exciting time and so much is going on blah blah blah but for Andrew and me I think, it feels right now like we are hamsters in the wheel, running in place.

Maybe I will take pictures of the house this weekend but really, how exciting can a bunch of white walls be? Jules

Drywall started today!

Mom emailed me earlier today and the drywallers are in. I still hope that we can be in by December 1st and it looks like I'll be painting next weekend or the week after next. We have all downstairs doors done and over half of the upstairs doors painted. I will finish the upstairs doors tommorrow and while Andrew is at work Dad and i are going to get drywall and insulation for the third, south wall of the garage. The drywallers are taking care of the other two sides and will hang the other side for us if we get the material and put the insulation in. I am hoping the rooms we paint will have enough time to air out at least a little before we move in.

Speaking of moving I am slowly bringing more and more boxes out to Mom and Dad's house now that the doors are slowly moving out. In another week I will start a more aggressive phase of packing.

Kitten has been very naughty. She is mad her food has changed and eats only a little, lets it get stale and then expects more fresh. This is expensive kibble so she has to eat it stale or not. The other morning I woke up to find the cat food bag knocked off the counter and her eating a pile of it not 12 inches from her bowl with food in it. Thursday night she jumped on the counter and knocked over a bag of Doritos, ate some and then got violently day glo orange sick everywhere. Yuck.

Mom and I have taken up the family tree research again. Mom is doing the bulk of it right now and I am lending support. She even took a road trip with a cousin this week and we have been making a lot of progress. We are 8 generations back on this branch the farthest of all of them so it's been fun.

Not much else to report really. I'm tired and feeling behind. So many things that need to get done. Cell phones, land line, propane forwarding mail changing checks. I know it will all get done but sometimes the weight of it is wearing. At least we are somewhat packed and have nearly everything for the house--still need one more set of blinds, shower door and of course lots of primer and paint. Oh, and a ceiling fan.

Andrew is fine, plugging away studying and working. Last night we went to Macaroni Grill and saw a movie--Wallace and Grommit--funny but weird. Anyway it has been months and months since we did anything like that and it reminded me of a time when we did that two or three times a month. The funny thing about the movie was a father brought his daughter and three of her friends to the movie, they were about 9 and he kept falling asleep during the movie and snoring and then she would have to wake him up. It was funnier than the movie really.

As far as reading listening I am reading Undead and Unreturnable, a wholly fluffy romantic comedy mystery featuring a ditzy lead vampire. I am listening to nightmares and dreamscpes by Stephen King. I picked it up because it features Tim Curry, Stephen King and some other celebrities. My favorite has been the House on Maple Street, a very "sweet" horror story. I also like "Head Down" a piece King wrote for the New Yorker the year his son't little league team one the state championship. I'll never think about baseball the same and have a new appreciation for it.

I will post pictures when there is something interesting to post. Julie

Another post in one week--it's the guilt from not posting regularly---

I didn’t go outside for my lunch today because the beautiful weather and having to stay in nine hours would just depress me. I am still looking forward to tomorrow because even though it will be cooler the sun will still be out and Andrew has the whole day off. We have a lot planned. After getting groceries in the morning we will head out for the house were many projects await. We had the septic put in this week and the guy graded it out a bit but there are some really big dirt clods and he said we would come back and do more if we broke them down. So tomorrow I want to mow the lot and then Dad will disc up the clods and then Andrew will follow along with a (I have no idea how to spell this or what it is or does really, ) col-packer? And while they are doing that I will be running around picking up rocks to put in the gator because it will be a good time to get those rocks up. There still feels like two dozen rocks in the field outside the house site so I may try to get some of those up too.

Thank God for Dad helping us with the doors. He has been polyurethane-ing the doors we did Monday all week so last night we spent doing two more doors and a jamb. So if we can finishe those up tomorrow, next weekend we’ll just have the double closet downstairs doors left and then a bunch of upstairs doors to paint.

And, speaking of painting, I’ll be begging for help with painting around the end of the month. The shipments of drywall arrived this week and they should be starting this week or next. We are going to try to rent and indoor paint sprayer to do the primer and then I have a list of rooms to be painted in order of important so if we can’t get it done at least the top priority ones will be. Four hours of help on a weekend day will be much, much appreciated. I will be emailing select folks who live nearby, who have painted before, who are feeling healthy and who have already voiced they are willing to help. If you meet that criteria but we haven’t discussed painting help—email me.

Andrew is done with his last two Ball State classes and luckily enough, he doesn’t have to write a paper for either and has scheduled his finals for the first of November. Another great thing about being in the house in December is (drumroll please) Andrew will be halfway through with paramedic school! The CRV is working out well. We are saving a lot more in gas and Andrew is changing the oil in it tomorrow and at some point he needs to replace the front breaks—come to think of it, he has to do it to the Corrolla too. Poor guy, I never give him a break! 

I will be posting new pictures week of October 17th including some of the doors we have been doing. They have turned out as lovely as the trim and I think will look quite nice. The house essentially hasn’t changed from the outside but I will post some new pictures.

Kitchen Advisory:

Okay, so I’m not the greatest cook in the world. I am impatient, don’t’ read instructions well and am paranoid about making sure meat is well done. But I do make the best chocolate chip cookies ever. Now that I have found milk free chocolate chips (thank you, Trader Joe’s) and I have my lactose free milk, I am unstoppable and have probably made 6 batches since Labor Day. When Andrew and I go to Sam’s Club next, I am sure we are going to buy the giant bottle/bags of vanilla and brown sugar. Anyway this is my chocolate chip cookie secret:

Use the Crisco Butter Flavored sticks in the baking aisle near the regular tub o’ Crisco—it’s butter flavored but made from vegetable oil. I am going to experiment with brownies calling for butter but using these instead. The second secret is to use airbake cookie sheets and to let the oven preheat so it’s at full heat—that’s important to make the first batch come out well.

Another cool little thing Mom found is these little Crystal Light on the Go packs—have you tried these little suckers? I’m mildly put off that they contain aspartame but, considering I don’t drink any soda, it probably evens out. Their just little packets of crystal light just write for a bottle of water, pour it in, shake it up and your set to go! Pretty tasty.

Oh yes and in the last little bit of minutiae I feel compelled to share, Kitten has only thrown up 3 times (in one day, yikes) since we have but her on low allergen, ultra-high dollar kibble. Man we were talking about getting a second cat but now I am thinking this one is enough God love her.

12 gallons per minute at 57 feet!

Well, even though I don’t have that many new pictures to show because most of the action is going on inside but is basically boring to show, I thought I would try to write an extra long blog to catch up. As of Monday October 10th we have had our first inspection and the house is wired an plumbed pre-drywall. We also have insulation and on Thursday we dug the well. We knew odds were good it wouldn’t be too deep. Mom and Dad are at 63 feet and the nearest neighbor is at 67. But another neighbor is over 150 and someone down the road was over 200 feet, which just goes to show that you never know. For those of you who know about wells, you know that it is a very unpredictable expense and the drillers charge per foot! So we are very happy. I wish my grandfather who used to spot wells was around to spot ours but who knows, he may gave still had a hand in it from upstairs!

In other progress news, we now have the doors, all of them. I feel sick with being behind now when in September I thought I was doing so well. Drywall starts next week so primer-ing and painting is going to run into working on the doors. I feel my confidence is much less with the doors because there are so many grooves and so many different directions the wood grain is going in. Oh well, we will do the best we can I suppose. It is much more time consuming than the trim because there are two sides that need stained, polyed, then sanded, then polyed again. Plus the door jambs. At this rate, we may have to hang the upstairs doors and I’ll just paint them later.

Andrew had yesterday and today off though and both days we have run errands and worked on doors together. It was really nice to work on some things together and just spend some time that wasn’t evening or morning. Kitten had another trip to the vet as she has been throwing up a lot lately. Food allergy is the verdict and now she is on super high dollar kibble, but no throwing up so it is worth it.

I spent a good deal of last week in Pittsburgh for a conference. Coming in from the west, you can’t see any city at all then go into a tunnel carved in a big hill then when you pop out the other end, BAM! You’re in Pittsburgh. Despite the weather and the fact that all I could think about were all the doors waiting for me back home, I thought it was an interesting city but wouldn’t want to drive all the one way streets and triangular intersections. Pittsburgh seemed to be an interesting blend of nature (the three rivers) architecture (a lot of bridges and few interesting buildings) and art. It was really good to be home. In a couple of months I will be off to San Antonio for ALA Mid-winter but by then I will be in the house.

I have packed more boxes but am running out of room to put them. I feel as if there is so much more to do. I had a whole week off but feel like I got hardly anything done. I will post again when drywall is in. I think this week we are doing the septic. Bye, J

Um, I meant to post earlier...

I really, really did.

Okay so the house is going on absolutely smashingly (in a good way). Yesterday was the two month anniversary of the groundbreaking and we have it framed, walled, roofed and three quarters sided. We have the tubs, showers and bulk of the wiring in. Windows and doors are in. It looks like a real house. It is exciting--well, when we have the time to be excited. The past few weekends I have been devoting most of my time to staining the downstairs trim. With Dad's help we have nearly all of it done. It was a little touch and go there when we used some minwax cherry stain on the hard yellow pine--it was awful--even when the pine was pre treated. Then we got this stuff from our contractor called Wood Kote Gel Stain and it ROCKS. This trim is beautiful, rich, warm and some pieces I swear they look like art. You will see when you come to visit. Doors will come in next week and I will try to get them donw by the middle of the month so I can finish October painting the upstairs doors. November will be spent painting drywall and then moving.

Once the weather cools down I will do round two of packing, winter clothes and other things I couldn't pack away earlier. Andrew has started his second quarter of paramedic school. I think our gas conservation efforst are paying off, we fill our tanks 3 times a week, maybe four and that is pretty good, really it is for the driving we do. Speaking of driving (no I did not wreck yet again--knock on wood) I applied for a job at the Hilliard branch earlier this month (another reason why I have been too busy to post, preparing for the interview) while I didn't get it, I hope I made a good impression with all interviews in light of future opportunities. Some folks are moving around the system and I am hopeful. As the reality of the move draws nearer I worry the drive will not be do able for long. What this means for my career path, I'm not sure. There isn't a big market for librarians who like teens in Mechanicsburg :) and I like working for CML. We'll see. Not much else really, I will try to be better about posting. I don't have many pictures to post because everything is going on inside and I think a picture of a bunch of wires would not be that interesting to you. Yes, we plan to take pictures and measurements of all the walls before the dry wall goes in and we may even videotape a walk through. All for now. Julie

It's hard to know where to start...

I guess obviously, with our beautiful, fabulous house. This morning I stopped by after getting my teeth cleaned. It's roofed (plywood etc) and so when looking at it--I can really envision what our home is going to be. I took a picture but got the wrong angle with the sunshine so will try again this weekend. I had a long five day weekend (long story) and spent both Saturday and Sunday night at Mom and Dad's since Andy had to work nights. We are making a concentrated effort to save money on gas. Dad helped me paint the upstairs trim for the house. We did it in two hour installments and mowed the lot. The trim looks pretty good. I still have to do all the doors for the upstairs. This sunday Dad and I will start the trim for the downstairs, staining pine cherry to match the laminate and the mission french doors. Where is Andrew you ask? Working of course because some of his time during the week he is at school but he works a lot during the week too. He has his quarter exam tonight and will spend a lot of time next week trying to finish up his other class for his bachelor's. He continues to be at the top of his class. Hey I have to brag about him because he certainly won't!!!

In other news, Dad's friend invited him along to these folks who were cleaning out this barn that had a bunch of stuff in it. And Dad God bless em brought home some serious booty like a solid oak dresser--three drawers, mission style. I stripped just enough to find out it is all oak woohoo! And now it will go in a corner of the barn until...oh Lord spring probably. Dad also brought a two shelf bookcase that may or may not be salvagable, and two really sweet wooden medicine cabinets with mirrors.

Weather was gorgeous all labor day weekend. I tried to soak in as much sunshine and fresh air as I could. On Saturday Andrew and I made another strategic move to save on gas by trading in the blazer for an CRV, same year, about 20,000 less miles and we are going to try to just fill up the tank for the crv and corrolla once a week. I am very comfortable handling the crv and Andrew feels like he has enough leg room. The crv gets like 250 miles per tank so I think we will be set. We will swap out cars on a daily basis. Whoever has the longest commute of the day gets the corrolla and on weekends where andrew works at mechanicsburg I will ride over with him (6:30 am!) argh.

A reminder that I will be putting out a desperate plea for help with primering and painting in about--5 weeks? I will ask that those who can and able to to please email me around the first of October. Then I will email you folks with weekend days I have off and then if you could give me like four hours, morning or afternoon you would be pure gold! Morning folks get lunch Afternoon dinner and my eternal gratitude. Andrew and I would like to get 4 rooms painted before move in. As usual, thank you for all your love and good thoughts. Not to get all new-age-y or anything but we can definitely feel it. I will post more pictures this weekend.

Our house is getting wet! sniff, sniff

Hurricane Katrina will be delivering 3 to 5 inches of rain and high winds. Oh, our poor house. I know I know, it will dry out in the sunshine we get later this week and at least it's not snowing but I want to just throw a giant tent over it to keep it dry. The framers tried to put the floor joists in yesterday but gave up when it began to rain. The pictures you saw earlier was work done in one day and about two hours in the morning before it rained isn't it amazing! This folks our contractor has been getting don't laze about. The pictures I took don't adequately show the kitchen/dining/family room area but once the walls are in it will be easier to see. We are really happy with it.

In other exciting news I picked up trader joe's milk free chocolate chips and crisco butter flavored (but no butter or dairy of any kind) sticks and made cookies. I hadn't had a chocolate chip cookie since last fall so that was very, very cool. Not much else to report, I get my car back tonight and Andrew continues his work and school schedule. We had a nest of ground hornets in our hedge by the apartment door and I got stung a few weeks ago. The complex supposedly had a guy to spray it but for the past three weeks 10 to 15 of em have been flying around the sidewalk. I got stung in July and this weekend had one get in my hair and another in my sandal so you know, enough is enough. Last night I flashed a light on the nest, and sprayed it with a pencil stream of wasp spray for like 5 minutes. Boy did those suckers come out of that nest! But they were groggy and hit the ground. Andrew helped and felt a little bad for them last night but he wasn't the one who got stung. I did get a certain staisfaction out of it, a kind of "See you in Hell you little bastards!" mentality which I am ashamed to admit. This morning though I did feel a pang of guilt, many more came out to die in the night and it looks like a miniature massacure on our sidewalk. But then again, my sting took two weeks and soaks in epsom salt to go away so I don't feel too bad. Plus, with all the boxes and stuff I am hauling out of the apartment, it is less to worry about. Okay, well, if the rain stops by Thursday and the guys can work on it this weekend I will post new pictures next week. Later, jules

Reader's Advisory

Okay, well I haven't done this in a while so here is what I am reading/listening too. I am listening to Snobs, by Julian Fellowes and it is quite interesting. Fellowes wrote the screenplay to Gosford Park and stars in my beloved Bristish series Monarch of the Glen. Snobs details a middle class woman's roller coaster experiences with the british aristocracy. Fellowes goes back and forth between third person POV and that of an actor observing the others in a very Nick Caraway like fashion. The lead female, Edith, is barely likable but Fellowes pulls it off. I am also listening to the Goddess Rules by Clare Naylor. Very entertaining and another British title. I also tried the Ivy Chronicles but couldn't get past the first cd--not because of the narrator but because of the flat, vapid story. Sometimes I like vapid stories, the Goddess Rules is a bit Vapid, but the character had to be likable or it's a no-go. I am reading Marne David Kellogg's latest, Perfect, featuring the James-Bond-for-girls character Kick Keswick. This one is a bit more tedious than the first two, Priceless, and Brilliant but I am still enjoying it. If you like both Bridget Jones movies, make sure to get The edge of reason on DVD. One of the special features is Renee Z staying in character as Bridget Jones interviewing Colin Firth as well, Colin Firth. Music wise I am listening to Beekeeper by Tori Amos and it's pretty good as well as the farscape soundtrack which of course only confirms how geeky I am :)

Nice and Cool

Well, next week I should have some really interesting pictures to show regardign the house. I thought you would enjoy the pictures of Kitten though, always in the thick of things as I have been packing nonessentials these past couple of weeks. Summer reading is over at the library and while the branch hasn't slowed down that much, it is a bit better. Andrew has been working a lot lately and as I write I have all the windows open letting in some nice cool air. I had yesterday off and it was fabulous. Perfect, beautiful weather. I managed to read by the pond for a bit and loot at thehouse site but spent most of the day in teh barn working on the mission doors and listening to an audiobook. We found out thatone of the doors had six planes of plexiglass not real glass when some stripper ate a hole through the glass so I have put in an order to get that replaced. Dad has been putting wood filler in and sanding and I could get them stained this weekend. The canada door is very nearly done. Not much else to report really, hang on until next week. Julie

Just call me Crash* sigh

Well I don’t really have any new pictures to post. They finished the garage and basement floor last week but that’s not really too exciting to the casual observer. I may post pictures of Kitten *helping* me pack and they should start on the deck (?) or flooring this week so framing up shouldn’t be too far behind. The big news is that I got into a car wreck last Monday on 270. With all the traffic and crazy people it is inevitable I suppose. The kicker is I was being cautious and still got in a mess. I was past 71 and not quite to Westerville going a mere 50 mph because it was raining and we were getting close to the bottleneck near Minerva Park. Anyway I was about two cars behind this Volvo that hit its breaks. I hit my breaks but didn’t slam them because you know, sometimes people tap their brakes and then go right on. When I saw the left hand turn signal I though, uh-oh this must be bad. The Volvo tried to get into another lane but as I had observed, we were boxed in. As the car swerved though I did see a car in front of her at a dead stop and I found this baffling because all the lanes of traffic were going smoothly. I am long in the habit of watching the flow of traffic beside me as well as in front of me and I always am looking out for strings of brake lights ahead of me. So at this point I am punching down on the brakes and start to skid. My butt end of the car starts going to toward the lane to the right and I thought…oh this is bad! In a detached kind of way. I don’t remember consciously steering into the skid but the car straightened itself out just in time to ram the Volvo in front of me. The original standstill vehicle was at this point of course, long gone.

Yes I am okay, yes the other lady is okay and her car, is fine, trust me. My car, got crunched pretty badly. New hood, new bumper and ironically enough a new air conditioner which I had fixed I kid you not, not two weeks before said accident. I got cited but not for recklessness the lady ahead of me told the officer what happened (and mom thinks there is a chance maybe she wasn’t paying attention to the first car and that is why she slammed on her brakes so suddenly.) Anyway it was agreed that I wasn’t going some unreasonable crazy speed like so many folks do on 270—I still got cited of course, so had to pay a fine and of course I got points on my license which I have never had before and am quite appalled about but I know I know, I am fine and that’s all that is important. Just the day after a poor lady got killed not 6 miles from where I was at and the police suspected a third party involvement so I am lucky. We’ve been sitting tight all week, worried they were going to total it but they aren’t woohoo! No I can keep my ridiculously low car payment a while longer. I would like to resale it next summer and try to get a pre-owned hybrid if the price goes down. With all the driving we do gas is going to kill us as it is with Andrew’s blazer. He looks forward to a hybrid SUV. I know that he likes being able to stretch out in the truck after being used to driving such smaller cars and getting jobs closer to home may not be a reality for some time.

There really isn’t any other news. Work, school, sleep, house. We did go to the Champaign County fair last week and I found out I can eat sugar waffles (hurray) and I got to go down memory lane with Andrew. God bless him, he didn’t appear the slightest bit bored as I explained to him the inner workings of 4-H life. I do miss it.

Well two weeks since my last post isn't that bad is it?

Well on July 25th we broke ground on the house. It was a little later than we wanted but because of beautiful dry weather, we have had no delays in butting in the basement and foundation and we have every reason to expect the framing to start by the time school starts. We have signed our lives away for the next 30 years and despite the low interest rates it is pretty depressing still. We will be paying less than rent of course and this is something we can build and share together. Andrew and I have picked out appliances and about half the lighting for the house. We have been quite busy running errands, woring and working on the doors. Andrew painted the inside of the Canada door window black and found some nice molding at lowe's to frame the window so it should loo pretty sharp. Mom talked me into stripping the french doors compltely down including the muntins. Dad is going to help sand to catch us up. One door is in rough shape with split muntins on both sides but Dad assures is it is not beyond repair. We think it is a good bet that these french doors were at one time used as a transition into a backporch or veranda. There's some water damage and they are going to have a lot of character. I have decided to (after they are sanded to the true color and grain) to stain them cherry and then rub tung oil (I only love Formsby's refinisher more than tung oil) for a nice clean, muted tone.

In other news Mom has grown mutant elephant ears that are giant. Like the circumference of a trash can lid. Andrew got a 98 % on his first paramedic exam. I am not surprised that he is once again at the head of his class. Between class, work, lab, ride time, and clinicals Andrew's freetime is taken up with homeowrk, sleep and working on the door and not in any particular order.

The other night, Kitten, the little scamp, was sitting on the floor while I ate french fries sitting in the recliner. She showed absolutely no interest in my plat but it was all a ruse and while I was distracted talking to Andrew on the phone, she popped up on her hind legs (she can balance on her butt she is so chubby) and without an investigatory sniff she grabbed a four inch fry off the plate and ran. I was worried she would get sick but she ran under the dining room table and this fry disappeared in like 10 seconds. She didnt' get sick though.

I am expanding my professional development in YA Services on a National level. I am on the YALSA publication committee and the Editorial Advisory Task force. For those of you not in library land, I am basically working on the kinds of profeesional writing (books or articles in YALSA journals). It sounds boring but it fits my interests.

I have not been reading much at all since I last posted. I listened to Fell by M.E. Kerr and was floored by it. This is one of the classic YA novels that I have just not read and I listened to the wonderful Jeff Woodman read it. I am now obsessed with Fell and have the other two in the series. I just wish that Kerr would re-issue it with some editing to bring it up to date. Too many fo the references are 1985.
I am now listening to a fun chick lit book, whatever happened to Jane Spring by--oh Lord I don't know, it's in the car. There are so many chick lit books now and so many on audio that you have to be a bit picky and I am pleased to report that it is original and the narrator is top rate.

I am savoring the last few farscapes on dvd it is soooooo good.

I think I have brought you up to speed. Now that the house site will be changing nearly every week I will be more motivated to post. Hope all is well with you! Julie

Reader's Advisory

I’ve decided to borrow a theme from a friend’s blog and pepper my posts with what I am reading/watching/listening too. I suppose as a librarian I should be doing more informal advisory and so I will try. I just finished up watching the third series of Monarch of the Glen on DVD. For those of you who like BBC shows I highly recommend this—it’s set in Scotland and one you can’t catch on PBS. It’s about a young man’s wacky family on a degenerating 35,000 estate. Lots of beautiful scenery and quirky storylines. I’ve also recently become absolutely to Farscape, a space opera from the FX channel that aired from 1999 to—2003? My supervisor got me started on this and now I am a junkie. I never really was a big Star Trek fan, but this series by Henson Production (Muppets) is witty and funny. I am working through the first season.

As for books I am halfway through Every Which Way But Dead (start with Dead Witch Walking) by Kim Harrison. Set in Cincinnati, it’s a mix of mystery, light romance and supernatural intrigue. Not too violent or sexual. Another wonderful read along those lines is the Sookie Stackhouse series, start with Dead Until Dark. I adore these books and am a regular poster geek on the fan site message board.

As for listening, nothing much of interest I think—I’m quite worried Recorded Books didn’t pick up the rights to Eleven on Top, the latest in the Stephanie Plum series—or maybe my library just hasn’t gotten it yet.

And finally YA fiction—I have just started “Finding Lubchenko” the second novel by Michael Simmons (Pool Boy) and I have to say, two chapters into it I am pretty darn impressed.

Found my future writing desk..er, a piece of it anyway.

For the past couple of months I have been thinking about what kind of writing desk I wanted in our study. I thought I had settled on what I wanted, a mission style desk with a single drawer in good to okay condition. The ones I have seen on ebay and antique stores were going for a couple hundred dollars (who knew mission style was so popular) and I thought I was content to just keep looking. This weekend however was Mutual Days, were the two antique stores bring out lots of items them have been storing through out the year. I'm ashamed to say I walked past this piece but Andrew, wtih the slower and more patient eye pointed it out to me.

It's a solid walnut slanted writing desk--not a roll top but it does have two large drawers as deep as the desk itself with key holes and some decorative lines. It has a flat top at the edge of the slant to place inkwells. It has a nice patina and for some reason reminds me of my Grandfather--and it is huge like it came from a courthouse--it's going to take up quite a bit of the study I', afraid but Andrew thinks it will be all right. We got it for 30 dollars because well, the poor little guy has no legs. The previous owner had two legs on it and attached to a wall. Andrew has a couple of different ideas of how to build a walnut frame underneath it and then four walnut pillar legs. While the stain and poly looks pretty good, it has some scratches and white paint so when I am ready I will use the gentler formsby's stripper on it--but don't hold your breath for pictures, we are keeping it in the barn well until this winter or next spring because we have too many other projects. I am very pleased with it and think when it is done it will be wonderful piece...

How well can I type

with Kitten on my lap. She has been super snuggly all day. Her little bald patch is all grown in now and she is her sweet self. ALA was all right, I was fighting the tail end of a cold the whole time but my hjotel was comfortable and I had an easy enough time getting around. I reconnected with friends and made some new ones and picked up some advanced reading galleys of titles by some of my favorite authors so that is always a treat. I am balancing the keyboard on the very edge of my lap as kitten rests across both arms. I know, I should make her get down, but she is warm and purring and even when she is in the way she is comforting company. Dad has cut the driveway for the lot and we applied for our loan last week with fingers crossed. Luckily all of our permits are in place so once we get the green light from the bank we will be able to break ground immediately so I hope to be posting more exciting house pictures soon. As for teh doors, Andrew is nearly finished with the Canada door and it looks great. The second mission door is proving to be a challenge. The consistency of the paint is different and came up so gummy with the stripepr that I decided to chisel off the first layer of paint--it's more time consuming but it saves on stripper it less frustrating because then when I put the stripper on it, it comes up much easier and evenly. The mission doors needs more work thatn the canada door, new doorknobs ( I want to get tiger eye) and the floor sweeps on the bottom have like 50 nails in it. One of the doors has a bunch of tiny staples that almost look like carpet tacks. They will be lovely in the house though and I am glad I have Andrew to help. My goal is to get both doors to the point where Andrew can finish them by the time our trim and doors come in because I will be staining that.

We had a lvoely cool day yesterday but now we are back to summer weather. I have been tying up loose ends from the conference, spending time with family and packing more books up--boy andrew and I have a lot of books already...

Oh I can't think of anything creative

Sorry I haven’t posted for a while—a combination of being busy as always and of being a bit down in the dumps. Before I talk about what has been going on lately, let me speak in more general terms.

I cannot wait until Andrew and I are out in the country. Because of relatives visiting and our side refinishing projects I have been going out to Mom and Dad’s more often—both weekend days and maybe a weeknight or two. I felt as I got off 70 onto 29, wrapping up a pilot test of my commute as if I could finally let the breath I had been holding out of my lungs and with each mile taking me deeper into the country, I felt like an onion, mentally peeling layers to get back to feeling good about life and it’s possibilities. Passing a herd of beef cows in their smooth red and black summer coats, smelling the hayfields and forests through the open window as I whizzed by. I felt like myself again once I reached home. More an more it feels like I treasure every moment outside and working or visiting family and friends and I am using it to inoculate myself the coming week’s stresses and inconveniences—the noise and pollution, the waiting and the feeling of confinement in our around a patch because a ground chickadee had a nest there) working in the doors and hanging out by the pond. All I can think of is that this time next year we will have a clothesline up and lots of windows to air out the house and Kitten can watch all the birds.

Enough poetics. A couple of weeks ago I got into a fender bender in Urbana. No one was hurt. It was my fault and I feel very stupid as it will most likely raise our insurance rate a bit but considering that ten times a week I drive the busiest loop of outerbelt in the city and have seen pile-ups and flipped over cars, I’ll take my mini-crunch going less than five miles an hour in good ole’ Urbana. My rental rides very smooth but takes more gas of course. I’ve been very tired lately—summer reading program and people taking vacations have taken their toll on all of us. I am not really looking forward to going to Chicago this weekend although my schedule is more spacious than the past two times. I will not take any time off before I go back to work and I have decided to take two carry-ons, one for clothes and bath stuff and one for snacks so I don’t starve like I did in Boston. I can pack my suitcase in my carry-on. I am worried about transportation because the convention center is on the other side of the river from all the hotels and most of the evening events. I know some more people though and hope I can meet up with more people to share cabs. Andrew is trying to enjoy his last week of freedom before paramedic school. He is going to try to finish the Canada door. I will try to post pictures before I go to ALA and will email you all if I do so.

Andrew had a good birthday I think. He got some toys to help us lay the laminate floor and some other home improvement things. On father’s day Mom Dad and Andrew and I went out to Buca Di Beppo’s for dinner and I managed to avoid dairy—can’t believe I pulled it off. After running some errands we went out to the house to work on the doors a bit and spent the evening fishing out some of the bass that Dad has been feeding these past few years. They are eating the goldfish and so we are taking them over to the neighbor’s pond. It’s pretty fun to catch 4 pound bass and these are just the small mouth—there are bigger ones yet in there and a friend got a large catfish. It was beautiful weather, cool and dry for June and we hated to go back to the apartment. We are aiming to break ground in July so I will keep you posted. I will be posting more pictures soon and will email. Later, jules

Moving Right Along

Hi, we now have the zoning permit and the floor plans. By then end of next week we should have the contract and the health department test. We may go for the loan as early as next week but most likely the week after before I leave for ALA. The county will sit on the plans for a couple of weeks but in the meantime we can get the driveway put in. We still will break ground in July I think. In othernews Andrew and I have completely taken over mom and Dad's pole barn with out projects so it is a good thing they have the garage built. Andrew and I make a good team because we like doing different things. He is good with the details that normall drive me nuts. I managed to mow half the lot yesterday and then just gave up wtih the heat. We even bought some rubbermaid tubs to start packing. It's a mental thing for me and we are going to be so busy by the time we actually move that I want all the little stuff and books alredy in storage in the barn.

that's it I guess, I gotta get ready for work. jules

A good weekend’s work

Even though I had to work Saturday I still got a three day weekend (Friday, Sunday, Monday.) I spent most of Friday running errands (grocery, bank etc) and I did get the lot mowed before the rains rolled in and spotted another dozen rocks that Andrew and I picked up on Sunday. Andrew only had Sunday off so we just kind of relaxed. Yesterday I spent the morning picking up Andrew’s birthday presents and then went on to Mom and Dad’s to start working on the door from Canada seriously because this Saturday we are picking up two mission style French doors for the family room. I have to get the Canada door ready for Andrew to (sand and stain) while I start stripping the French doors. I put on an audio book and stripped both sides completely and one side cleaned with one round of Formsby’s condition/refinisher. Mom swears by the stuff and she’s right to do so. Not only does it pick up left over stripper, but continues to lift up dirt, shellac and gunk and moisturizes the wood to get it ready for whatever you want to do with it. It’s a good bet this door is a heavy yellow pine door that’s been stained (before the coat of shellac, and three kinds paint.) Andrew wants to stain it Cherry and I think that will look good. It was so satisfying to not be on a computer all day and to just plug in an audio book, get some Gatorade and just work on it. Mom and Dad came in occasionally to advise and do a little scraping. There may be a chance that Andrew will be off both Saturday and Sunday and that never happens. If so we are going to go to Oakridge and get some trees to plant along the back and side of the lot. We’ll also spend a lot of time working on the doors. Tomorrow I will go to pick up our preliminary floor plans to show to the contractor. I will be posting pictures soon of the door from Canada as it is refinished and the French Door find. Bye, Julie

We have a house number!

I have put off blogging because I have been depressed, busy and stressed. Andrew is back from his trip out of town. We had a family member pass away and the past couple of weeks have a decidedly blue tinge to them. Andrew has to work most of this weekend but on Sunday we hope to finish stripping the door we got at Canada—we have to wrap that project up in a couple of weeks because this Saturday I am going to pick up some old French doors with a mission style look. Quite a find I think. Anyway we got our approval/suggestions for putting in a driveway and got our house number-2321 South Parkview Rd. Our application for a zoning permit can now go through. We meet with the floor plan drafter again this Wednesday so things are moving a long. I mowed the lot yesterday two hours before it rained. It’s amazing how quickly the sky can go from beautiful to “Hang on Toto” but there you have it. I found another dozen rocks for Andrew and I to pick up tomorrow and only ran over a couple of pieces of plastic tile so we must be getting most of that. I have been invited to join my first American Library Association Young Adult Library Services division committee. It’s a two year appointment and should be a lot of fun. I am preparing for my trip to Chicago—trying to figure out how big a suitcase I should bring. I am not staying as long as I did last time so I may try to get away with a smaller case. I’m also going to dress a lot more casual for comfort since it will be so hot. Not much else to write. I imagine we will have the driveway in by the time I leave for Chicago.