Ticker

Courtesy of Sabrina. Cute!

I guess I win. Scrap!

This is actually a really good photo of the tower. You don't see the supporting bottom that makes it so hideous. The 1958 building has two rooms/doors, so Steve and I would each have a craft room! It also has old barometric, etc., equipment in it that is actually pretty cool and might get to a museum someday. Like I said, if the tower can't be leased and make us a couple of bucks, it's outta here. We have already been told that this won't be a problem. We'd probably sell to to a ham radio geek.

This is the left side of the eyesore. We are still in the property at this point. It's cross-fenced. This picture was taken to the right of the building/tower.

Okay, here's the side of the ugly house. They built up a mound, so that side entry is actually upstairs. Like I said, we will eventually change the roofline (I think they have it this way to get the most from their solar panels).

Hams

To all.....

We put an offer on an ugly house with a great big 132 foot tower on it. WHAT are we thinking? We are preapproved to purchase this house and keep our current house, which is GREAT for our retirement. If everything works out, Sabrina and Matt will move into our NE Nickernut Ave house, and we will move to our new NW Nickernut Ave house (can you BELIEVE that?!). The house needs many changes, but we plan to stay there for 30 years, which means we'll have a ton of time to make those changes. Plus, if we get a hold of AT&T and they want to lease our ugly tower, they will pay for those changes, and perhaps a cell phone or two as well.
We will find out by Monday night whether our offer is accepted or not. Wish us luck, I think. I am a little nervous, 'cause that house is ugly, but I think we may be making a wise move. I mean, they live on NICKERNUT, their youngest child was born in HOMER, a flock of GEESE flew overhead in the lucky V for...... VICTORIOUS?, and almost landed in the POND .......... I think it's fate.

http://tinyurl.com/b2u76

Here's the address on the listing and some comparables in the area.

Anyway, wish us luck!

Exploring the sandbox with Cooper. She threw a cracker in the bucket so Cooper went in to make sure it was doing okay.

My little beach babe in her new suit. It's a little big and the straps need adjusting, but she LOVED spending the day in her pool with her new swingset nearby, and thoroughly wiped herself out. We had fun!

10/13/04

Morgan's two bottom toofs and a cheesy grin

We were cleaning the spiders off the front of the house and planting shrubs when Morgan became attracted to the hose. She eventually became soaked and had to be disrobed. Now we really fit in with the rednecks, with our kid and her droopy diaper running around the yard! She had fun.

Morgan and her daddy at a recent barbecue

This is another layout for this week. I like this one. I have done a few zoo layouts, have had some custom orders for them as well, but this is my favorite so far. We'll see what I think next week!
P.S. The adobe photoshop program is fabulous. I just scan both sides of my 12x12 page, and then stitch them together. Then I stitched the stitched photos, so you could see the whole thing together! Fabulous.
P.S.S. Oh, and Alyca... I splurged! Don't tell Steve! I bought uppercase Paige. Had to do it. Full size. Hence.... ZOO. Now I need lowercase! I'll wait until I start paying myself back, though. I sure have bought a lot of stuff, and the income has been a lot smaller of a percentage. $$$$$$$$ out ..... $ in. That'll change soon, I REALLY hope. I am enjoying myself, and I hope I remain compensated. I have been entering many contests lately too. Cross your fingers that I eventually get published! It would sure help with the advertisement of my work! Hence... $$

This is a spring layout from this week. I get better every time, so next week I probably won't even like this layout, just as this week, I don't LOVE the baby girl layout. I like it, but I don't LOVE it anymore.

This is a baby girl layout from last week. The title says "A baby fills a special place in your heart you never knew was empty," and the vellum overaly on page 2 says "That love is all there is, is all we know of love."

ME

I have no time to create a scrapbook page of Me. I guess it is thematic to the fact that I have no time for "me" either. I am too busy looking at my dirty house, trying to pretend to get in a few hours of work so that I can keep full time status, although it give me a headache, because someone STOLE MY GLASSES, and because I have a small toddler, now 16 months, who is aware that Mommy isn't looking at her, and continually comes up to the computer, pushes in the keyboard, grabs my leg, swivels my chair, reaches up her two little arms, and says "Hi", wanting to be held. It's sweet, but that means I get nothing done.
I am only going to stay at 32 until bab number two gets here, because we'll be able to pay some extra bills off, and with double insurance coverage, as with Morgan, the next baby will be able to arrive via C-section, with $0 out of my own pocket, save premiums. Not even a deductible to satisfy. That's cool!
When Morgan is napping, I feel the most tormented. It's daylight, I have weeds to pull, dishes to wash, a book I could read, scrapbooking to do, but then there's also that damn work that needs to get done. She only goes down once a day for 1 1/2-2 hours, so I have to choose my occupation wisely, as there are days when time flies by so quickly that she's awake before I make a decision.
I am a very creative person, so I often find it interesting that my chosen occupation requires so little of that side of my brain. Medical claims involve rules and regulations, leaving little room for interpretation and creative thought. But it pays fairly well, I can make my own hours, I can work from home, the medical benefits are good and the premium is small, my 401K is doing better than Steve's PERS, and between all that, I gotta stick with it. But I really look forward to when our second bambino gets here, because I will definitely cut back to 20 hours a week then. It will be great if I can manage my time where I get up at 5:30-6 and get in my time before the kids are even out of bed. Then the rest of the day can be all about THEM. I sometimes feel like a bad mom because I am trying to distract Morgan with something to occupy her while I try and work, rather than giving her my undivided attention while she explores every facet of her world. I need to do better about that. In June some girlfriends pressured me into signing her up for swimming lessons. The reason I wasn't gung ho about it was because a: it's in Bend, and I will have to pay out-of-district prices as I live in Redmond b: It's in Bend, which means it will cost me $5 every time we go to class, and it's two days a week, c: it's at 5:30pm, which is Morgan's dinnertime - will she make it? .... But, Rylee, 18months, and Krysta, 12months, will be there, the class is for 6-18 month old babies, which means we'll meet a lot of other parents of kids who are the same age, and Rylee's mama works full time, so she can't do it at an earlier time, and she wants the girls to play together, so I signed up. We will just have picnics two days a week for the month of June. And, because she is so great about babysitting Morgan if I need her for a staff meeting or a wedding or such, I am dragging Sabrina and Raegan along too. It should be fun. Morgan already has her suit. I hope she likes the pool! She certainly enjoys bathtime.
Anyway, I digress. I know I don't have time for my own personal scrapbooking, but I have been scrapping a lot when I find a moment, lately. I am trying to establish myself on Ebay. I was inspired at the latest Scrapbook Convention, and then again when I came across a team of scrappers on Ebay who's creative vision should be framed displayed at the National Gallery in London, England. I want to be one of them! I have sold a few things on Ebay, have entered a few contests, and am enjoying myself. We took the closet doors off our back bedroom closet, installed a table, and I scrap in the bedroom so that I can shut the door and keep Miss Grubby Fingers from my embellishments and bits of paper. I will post a few of my latest creations. At this point, my goal is to just get my supplies paid for. I don't want to set my sights tooo high at the onset. But I am certainly addicted! Because of Morgan, I know I have 18 YEARS of childhood memories to preserve, so it is certainly a hobby that will never go out of style.
Other than that.... Steve made me go to the COCC physiology lab for this Fire Department sponsored Health Assessment. I REALLY did NOT want to go, but am glad he made me. They weighed me, squeezed my fat, and then had me walk and run on a treadmill for 20 minutes, occasionally pricking my finger, so that they could determine my VO2 rate and let me know how hard I need to work out, and at what heart rate my body starts to produce lactic acid, which isn't good. I think I am at 160. WE are going to get heart rate monitors so that when we go jogging or I take Morgan on speedy walks, I can see where I am at. It's all with the goal of being healthy. My fat % is in no way accurate, but nobody believes me. I would feel much better if they'd calipered my butt-thigh, but they did not. So the number looks good, but I know it isn't right. I've seen myself naked!
So, I am trying to work, trying to scrap, trying to be a good mama, and contemplating bab #2. I think we'll only do 2, so we are tying to determine when the best time would be to do that. I don't want this stage to go by too quickly, yet I am ready to take them to Disneyland, and Steve says we have to wait until the youngest is 48 inches so they'll remember the experience. We'd better bake a baby now!
Ahhh, there's that time thing again. I took a few minutes to catch you up on me, and now Morgan is letting me know that she is done napping now, and ready to play outside with "pooker"(Cooper), the "pane" (plane) flying overhead, the "choo choo" (trains) chugging by, a "cockooo" (cracker) in her hand, and a "dee" (drink) in the other.

Morgan at the park! You won't see this one at babyzone because I can't get it to resize small enough for them to accept without it getting distorted - I think it's a great photo though! We went downtown Bend to feed the geese. Morgan thought they were cool! She kept transferring her crackers to one hand and reaching to touch them with the other. They snapped at her a few times, but it didn't seem to hurt. She liked throwing the cracker bits in the water for them to chomp. It was a fun trip! We need to do that more often.

Scrapbook assignment

Okay, here's your assignment. I have ZERO time to do this myself, but it will be neat to see what you come up with. The assignment, you ask?

Me. All about me.

I want you to creatively describe yourself using your imagination and embellishments on a scrabpook page, 12 x 12.

Create away.

Hee hee

Bucket-o-MorgiePie

She's like a little old biddie, a busy body, always wanting to see what's happening in the neighborhood. Silly goose.

What a cute kid

Morgan's buddies. I can "bearly" keep her away from them. I have to sneak them out of the living room to get them in her room, and now she wants to sleep with them too. Why must my little giant have such big friends?