What’s been happening

Sam, Alex and his friend, Mike finished painting the house and shed last week. They look really good and I am so glad that it is finally finished!! They also cleaned the yard up some. The flower bed near the driveway still needs much work though. Sam poured cement and put up the flag pole that I’ve been wanting. We will have electricity run to it next year for a light for the flag. In the meantime, Jake has been raising and lowering the flag and has learned how to properly fold it.
Sam got his deer this year for the first time. See moblog. He used the new camper for the trip. It is now winterized and parked on the side of the house. We thought it would fit on the west side of the house but it didn’t. I suggested we (meaning Sam, Alex and Mike) knock down the ratty wood fence on the east side and park it there that way it doesn’t take up all of the driveway. It worked out real well and now we still have plenty of driveway space.
Sunrise opens on Dec. 5th. I was supposed to take a class at work that day, but I am going to un-enroll myself and go skiing instead!! I have been training hard all year for my ski legs to be ready!! My goal since last year has been to be able to ski all day from the top of the mountain. Last year I was able to ski all day but only from halfway up without my calves burning so bad that I would have to stop and rest. I have been fighting a cold since Tuesday morning so I didn’t go to the gym on Wednesday (my day off) because I was blowing my nose so much. I went Monday though and today. Sam even ventured to the gym with me for the first time today. He didn’t stay as long as I did but it’s a start!
My iPod died again. I thought it was the battery like last time. I couldn’t get it to do ANYTHING. It wouldn’t even reset. So I sent it back on the 5th to have the battery changed. It turned out to be a hardware problem that will cost at least $130 to fix. I decided that it wasn’t worth it to spend that much money and not even have a warranty. So I went to Walmart and bought a new one. I also bought their extended warranty that was only $20 for 2 yrs after the Apple warranty of 1 yr. I use my iPod so much that it really is a necessity for me to get through my workouts. I think I got the same one Jenny has, but I’m not sure. It is the Silver 120 GB iPod Classic. It is exactly the same size as my old iPod video so I won’t need to buy any new accessories. I had no problem getting all my stuff transferred from iTunes onto the new iPod. It has to charge for about 4 hours and then it will be ready to use.
Patrick will be home for a few weeks starting on Tuesday. We don’t know his exact plans yet or if he will stay in Phoenix for a few days or come up here right away. But he will be home for Thanksgiving until Dec 9th. Then he ships to Germany. We think he got a pretty sweet first tour!!
We are driving down to the Valley on Friday and staying for the weekend. I need to do some shopping for Christmas and stock up at Costco. I also need to buy ski pants and a jacket. If Patrick stays in the Valley after flying into Phoenix, then he will come home with us when we come home on Sunday.

The year is winding down

I can’t believe that the year is almost over! The time seems to pass faster the older I get.
Sam is on his hunting trip to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. He is hunting for mule deer. I thought they were hunting for elk. He called this morning from the top of a hill where they finally had a cell signal. He said they saw a few mule deer but didn’t mention why he didn’t shoot at them. He also said the camper is working out great. The hot water in the shower working great he said knowing that was important to me. The kids have actually been behaving in his absence! I told them that we would start on the weekend chores when I got back from the gym. When I got home, they were already hard at work doing them.
I have been pushing myself hard at the gym trying to get my legs ready for ski season. Today, I burned 1001 calories just on the Elliptical in 65 mins because I wanted to see what would happen to the calorie meter when I passed 999.9 calories. The point went away and it went to 1000. I was hoping it would reset. I wasn’t sure I could walk after so I sat down for a few minutes. Anyway, it was quite a challenge. But I don’t see myself doing it everyday. I also realized a few days ago that I will have to get through these next few months not pigging out with all the food that we get at the hospital during the holidays. I think I should just have the goal NOT to gain any weight.

Family Update

Autumn is here and it’s starting to get colder. It’s still in the 70’s during the day, but drops down into the mid 20’s to 30’s at night. The leaves are falling. It is nothing on the scale of upstate NY but people from the Valley (Phoenix area) seem to think it is awesome.  Alex has been coming up intermittently to paint the outside of our house before is gets too cold. The front is finished and Sam is going to try to finish the rest this week and next. He is leaving on a hunting trip to the Grand Canyon on Thursday. I’m not sure exactly where he will be, I just know it is somewhere around there. After much discussion over several weeks, he bought a camper today and is busy getting it stocked and ready. Will moblog pics. It is pretty new (2004), I think 19 feet long and sleeps 5-6. It has a bathroom and shower (major necessities). It is worth about $11,000 and he paid $7700 from a private seller who lives just a few blocks away. It came with a generator and special hitch too.

The kids got their first report cards last week. Tara got straight A’s as usual. Jake got 2 A’s and 3 B’s, Erin got 4 A’s and 1 B. We are working on Jake being more responsible, respectful and truthful. Last week, he had missing homework assignments and issues with truthfulness. He was grounded and we took his cellphone away. Since we’ve done both those things before, we decided to throw in some manual labor (Sam’s idea-moving a dirt pile), and a 5 page hand-written essay on the afore-mentioned topics (My idea). Hopefully, he’ll learn his teachers’ homework is less time-consuming than what I can think up.

Moblog Entry

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