HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

We had a pretty quiet day today. We ate at my mother's house and then went to Melissa and Gavin's house to visit. They had Gavin's family over for dinner. It was a long day and I'm glad that it's over. I'm very exited to roll into the Christmas season now! Deidre and I will be out early on Black Friday with all of the other nuts out there. We both love being caught up in the madness! Let the shopping begin!

Does life get any better than this? This will probably always be my favorite picture of Avery!

Long Overdue Blog!

I finally figured out that today makes 6 weeks since I've done a blog! It just so happens that my darling granddaughter Avery is 6 weeks old today....hint hint. I have been enjoying being a grandmother and cannot imagine my life without her. Melissa and Gavin are great parents and are very much at ease with her. Her first two weeks were pretty quiet. She slept a lot. She has since gotten a little feisty here and there but is still a really good baby in my opinion. I am completely in love with her and on the days that I don't see her, I miss her so much. I can't imagine what I'll do when Melissa goes back to work and I don't see her as much as I do right now. I had the opportunity to babysit for a few hours this past Saturday night while Melissa and Gavin went out to dinner. I told Melissa that I wouldn't babysit unless they went out for at least three hours. Melissa was a little sad leaving her but I'm glad that they got out to relax for a bit. Dan and Tiffany were over to visit that night also. As you can see from the picture below, Tiff was not happy that she wasn't feeding the baby. They make the best auntie and uncle and I'm sure they'll be Avery's favorites!
On the adoption front....
Dan and Tiffany have FINALLY finished all of the necessary documents for the adoption. They are going to be fingerprinted next week and then hopefully by the end of the month, they will be officially waiting for their baby. The wait will be a long one and will require a lot of patience on everyone's part but we all know that it will be worth it. The waiting has proven to be pretty tough so far and the wait could be up to 18 months so keeping busy is a must at this point! Dan, Tiffany and I are all part of a yahoo group for people who are adopting from Ethiopia through the adoption agency that they are using. It's pretty interesting and you can find out lots of information, sometimes good and sometimes not so good but we all look at it daily at least once and check out all of the posts from the other members of the group. They are also now receiving updates from the adoption agency which tells them how many kids have been placed and how long people have waited and when the travel dates are for the people who have referrals for kids and will be traveling to Ethiopia. I am looking forward to having another child to love and spoil rotten!

Our little getaway........


Danny and I went to New York City with Dave and Deidre a couple of weeks ago. We had a good time and walked many miles. We saw a lot of things and did lots of shopping. We also went to see the musical Hairspray which was excellent. Before we left for the trip, Dave had gotten a piece of metal in his eye at work and refused to go to the doctor before our trip. As you can see from the picture below, things got a little tough for Dave. He is wearing my sunglasses.

Another baby on the way!!!!!

We had a baby shower for my niece Tia this past Saturday. Tia was home from Virginia for several days so I thought it would be a great time to have the shower. We had a good turnout and she got a lot of nice gifts. She is working on moving back to Maine before the baby is born. It will be good to have her and the baby here in Maine! She is having a little boy (although the little is in question.....her belly is pretty big!) and is due in February.

We took the rare opportunity on the day of the baby shower to make my mother sit down for a picture. If you know my mother, you'll know how hard this was to have her agree to it!

Holidays are coming right up! I'll try much harder to keep up with the blog and post lots of pictures.

Introducing our granddaughter.........

Avery Grace Stone

Avery arrived this morning, 9/26/07 at 7:37 am, weighing in at 7 lbs. 5 oz and is 20 1/2 inches long. Melissa had a very long hard labor but came through it beautifully. She looked forward to her epidural when she got to 5 centimeters. The epidural didn't work!!! To make a long story short, she had no pain relief until they finally made the decision to replace her epidural at 9 centimeters......kind of late but well worth it to Melissa. It actually allowed her to sleep for a couple of hours until she reached 10 centimeters. Melissa was exhausted but Avery wasn't waiting any longer and arrived on her own time. She has lots of dark hair and big hands and feet. Melissa, Gavin and Avery are all doing excellent!

This was a very emotional experience for me to watch my daughter going through such a hard night and then watching Avery be born. Words can never describe the feeling. She is beautiful and I cannot wait to spoil her rotten! She makes a perfect addition to our family. We've all decided that she's definately a keeper!!

Sofia Mae Andrade Has Arrived!

I had a very interesting weekend as you can see from these pictures! As most of you know, my little sister Lisa was also expecting a baby. She and Melissa are two weeks apart in age and their babies will be about two weeks apart as well. Lisa had what I would consider a dream delivery. They induced labor beginning at 9:30 pm and Sofia was born at 4:43 am. Boy, if we could all have it that easy! Lisa did really awesome during labor and delivery. No yelling at all which as some of you that know her would know that Lisa would have no problem telling someone if she was the least bit irritated with them. Felipe was such a trooper and did a great job. He is such a proud Papa. It was great practice for me and an awesome experience.

I am now ready to meet Avery!! It won't be much longer. It's exciting to have new babies in the family. Melissa is out of work now on modified bed rest. It looks like Avery will be making her appearance before her due date of the 29th. If Melissa hasn't gone into labor by her 39th week, they will be scheduling an induction. Melissa and Gavin had a Jack & Jill given by Gavin's sister Gigi and her husband Matt on Saturday night. It was a very nice shower and they received lots of great gifts.

One More Month.......

Here's the latest picture of Melissa and her belly. Her due date is September 29th so that means only one more month to go before we finally get to meet Miss Avery Grace Stone! We know of course that this could come sooner or a little later but none the less, we are all getting anxious. Melissa has been feeling good but she has been getting a bit more tired as expected of course. Her weight gain has been below 30 lbs. and has slowed a little bit lately. We finally made it to the Carter's outlet in Freeport last weekend and were really happy to find all kinds of really cute clothes for more reasonable prices than we've paid for some of the other stuff we've bought so lookout Freeport, we'll be back soon!
Avery's room is almost complete.....just a few finishing touches to go. The room is very cute. Melissa and Gavin have done a fantastic job putting everything together! Danny and his friend Tim built a new shelf for Avery's room and Danny has been working hard to get it completed. Melissa got the idea from Pottery Barn Kids. This shelf is almost an exact duplicate and costs much less to make. Here is a picture of the shelf at it's present state......He's almost finished, he just has to paint the roof and attach the back.

I'm very excited to be able to be with Melissa and Gavin at the hospital when Avery is born. I was so young when my own kids were born and don't remember a lot of details but I also did not watch them as they were being born. I know that this will be very special for me to watch her come into the world. I'm not as excited about watching Melissa go through labor but I'm confident that she will do really well. She is a real trooper when it comes to being in pain or being sick. She's just quiet and wants to be left alone so I'll be the one sitting in the corner stressing out unless she needs me.....lol. This is all subject to change of course so keep watching the blog because I'll post as soon as Avery is born and probably tell all of you how beautiful she is and how well Melissa and Gavin did! They are going to make great parents for Avery!

A Lovely Sunday Drive........

Danny and I took a drive to the Rockland Lobster Fest with our best friends, Dave and Deidre this past Sunday. It was a gorgeous day! The Lobster Fest wasn't all it was cracked up to be (no pun intended) but we still had a good day. It's been a while since Danny and I have been able to just get out for the day and relax. It's always entertaining to listen to Dave's theories on different subjects. For any of you who have had these types of conversations with Dave, you all know what I mean. For those who haven't, I've attached a very short clip below to give you all a little sample. Click on the link below to see how Dave provided some of the entertainment for us on our drive. (Sorry it's sideways but you'll get the idea) You'll have to click on it twice.

Melissa's Baby Shower.......

We had a baby shower for Melissa this past Sunday. It turned out to be a warm but nice day overall weather wise. Melissa received lots of really nice gifts from everyone. It was great to see you all! We are now on a countdown for baby Avery! I'm sure the time will go by a bit more slowly than it has up to this point. Melissa is feeling pretty good but starting to get a bit more tired lately. So far I would rate this an easy pregnancy....
The picture above is a diaper cake that Lisa made for Melissa. It had almost 200 diapers and the inside had lotions, powders, wash cloths and a few other needed items. It was very cute!

I literally could not have pulled the shower together without the help of Deidre and Nicole. Deidre is always game for helping me out whenever I get in over my head with a project. I could never ask for a better friend than Deidre. She has always been the most loyal friend that I've ever had. She and Nicole spent the night so they could help me get everything ready. The picture above shows them painting faces on the baby cupcakes that we made. I think that Nicole may have even had fun with us two "old" ladies! The picture below shows the final results of the baby cupcakes. We also managed to carve out a watermelon in the shape of a baby carriage for fruit salad. The food was a success!

It's A Girl!!

Let the shopping begin!!

I was absolutely shocked today to find out the Melissa and Gavin are having a baby girl today. To be honest, my bets were on a boy but I'm very happy because it really didn't matter to me either way. Anyone who knows how much I love to shop will know how much fun this will be for me. Everything looked good on the ultrasound. It still amazes me to see all of the advances that have been made since I had babies. I loved seeing Melissa and Gavin today and how excited they both were. It was a great experience for me. Knowing the sex of the baby somehow made it more real for me.......emotional......ok.........I teared up when the technician said it was a girl. I am beyond excited. Her name will be Avery Grace Stone. I will be Nana (although that's a debate with Gavin) and Danny will be Papa.

I CANNOT WAIT!!!

Our Week - We've had a pretty busy week. Danny had last week off and worked on tearing down the shed and doing other cleanup projects from the storm damage. We are making a bigger shed so we had cement poured to expand it. He'll be working on that as well as many other projects that need to be done. Just think, in a few weeks we'll be opening the pool. Geez, it was snowing a month ago! Danny left on Thursday to go to North Carolina on a fishing trip. He had a great time and came back with a great tan from being out on the water. They fished about 45 miles out to sea. He did pretty well not getting sea sick and caught an awesome mahi-mahi as you can see in the picture! He and the guys that he fished with ended up eating it for dinner. He came home late Sunday. Melissa's 26th birthday was on Sunday. I cannot believe that she is 26 already. It's funny how time flies as you get older. It seems like yesterday she was running around with her jelly belly doll. Melissa, Tiffany and I took the Downeaster to Boston on Saturday for some shopping and good food. We met up with Karen who spent the day with us. We came home exhausted with sore feet from all of the walking. Tiffany actually has many blisters to show from her day in Boston. We stopped to buy her another pair of shoes but the damage was already done. By the time we got back on the train to come home, Tiffany's toes were so swollen they looked so sore. Melissa actually did better than Tiffany and I and I was concerned about her walking too much and getting too tired. She is doing well. We'll find out the sex of the baby on Wednesday. I'll let them make the announcement on their blog first. I have a tendency to get excited and spill the beans before they want me to but it's their baby so they can do the honors. I'm just hanging back...........for now ;-)

On Sunday I had a cookout here at my house. We celebrated Melissa's birthday and Mother's day. As you can see, Stephen helped me out with the cooking (since Danny was not home yet) and Dana cooked up the second round of food. We had some great food. Ryan was leaving to go back to Iraq so we were all happy that he was able to join us also. It was nice to get together with my family and have my mother be there as well. It seems like we haven't done that in ages. I'm hoping for a warm summer with lots of sunny days so we'll be able to enjoy the pool.
We have tons of projects planned for the summer and I'm sure there will not be a dull moment. Over the next couple of weeks we need to try to get the shed rebuilt and do some yard projects as well. I'll post again soon!.......OK.........I'll post this week as soon as the ultrasound results are in!

Aftermath and Progress

We finally were able to find someone to cut the tree that fell across the septic system, the pool shed and the fence. As you can see from this picture below, there were some big branches driven into the ground from the force of the tree falling. One in particular is giving us some headaches. Danny has been unable to get it out of the ground. He has dug down to the crushed rock on top of the septic system and it still isn't budging!! This is going to be a tough one but we'll figure something out.

Below is a picture of the shed and fence damage. The shed is actually twisted. It's hard to see in the picture but the force of the twisting caused a window to bust out of the shed. The pool cover has several holes in it and will definitely need to be replaced. At this point, our damage is up around $8,600.00. The insurance company will only cover up to $500.00 to get a tree removed (and that's only if it does property damage). Try getting a tree that size removed for less. It was an eye opener for us!
We've seen a lot of other people with much more damage than we had so we feel lucky but it's a lot of work to get all of the work done and get estimates. I can't imagine how people with worse damage are dealing with it.

I scream, you scream......

No, you are not seeing things.....and yes, this person is indeed my daughter in law getting her dog, Maggie and ice cream from the ice cream truck that comes by their house. Maggie goes crazy when she hears the truck playing music. This dog could seriously have her own television show.

Pregnancy Update......

Here is the most recent picture of Melissa and Gavin. I cannot believe how big her belly is getting and she was only 4 months pregnant in this photo! We find out the sex of the baby on May 17th. She is feeling pretty good overall and hasn't had any big issues...just the usual, being tired and a few headaches. She has been lucky so far.

Planes, Trains and Boats...

Melissa, Tiffany and I will be taking the Amtrak "Downeaster" to Boston on May 12th. I'm looking forward to spending the day with them. We will probably just do the usual, shopping and eating of course. Danny will be flying to North Carolina to meet up with some friends to move a boat from North Carolina to Florida. They'll be doing some fishing and relaxing along the way. I think this will be a great little get away for both Danny and I.

Deidre and Dave will be going to Florida this coming Saturday. I'm sure it will be a lot of fun for them and give them plenty of time to just kick back and relax. I'm jealous! I wish we were going! Have fun guys!! I'll post again soon.

Sisters and Cousins

On Sunday, I hosted what I ended up calling (for some strange reason) Cousinfest. Well, it was actually just more of my female cousins getting together. We had a great turnout. There was only one cousin who had to work and could not make it. We had more food than we knew what to do with....(yes, even us!) I was especially pleased to see my sister Debbie come and make an appearance. It meant a lot to me that she made the effort. We made a few frozen drinks although nobody was really in the mood to drink much and told a few good stories. I created a family trivia game which ended up being a lot of fun. It's great for us to get together without the usual family craziness that sometimes tends to happen in our family. I'm hoping that this allow us to get to know each other a little better as adults and be able to stay in touch. Here are a few more pictures from our gathering.

Back row: Jamie, Cindy K., Patty Ann, Corina, Karen and Cyndi D. - Middle row: Debbie E., me and Cheryl D, - Front row: Lisa M. and Lisa D. (missing - Debbie B. & Andrea)

Back: me, Cyndi, Debbie E., Lisa D., Debbie B. Lisa M. and Corina in the front

SISTERS

Me, Lisa and Debbie

Cindy & Cheryl

Corina and Karen

Cyndi & Jamie

Lisa & Debbie

I'm still working on a picture of Patty Ann who doesn't have any sisters. I didn't get one of her but as soon as I do, I'll be sure to post it for everyone to see!! I'll post again soon. We have lots of baby showers and other events planned for the summer so we'll probably do this again in August I'm guessing. I hope we have another good turnout! I'll post again soon.

Rain, Wind & The Lake!!

I guess the weather is definitely in charge lately. In a matter of 10 days we've gone from warm and sunny to fourteen inches of heavy and wet snow to our latest visitor from Mother Nature. This first picture is a view down the road in front of our house. As you can see, the tree that we have talked about getting cut down (because we cannot see coming out of the driveway) is being taken care of by Mother Nature. See my earlier blog for pictures of this same tree with broken branches from the winter storm last week. I started out my day by driving down the road and seeing a small river across the end of my road that had a couple of cars sitting in it. I was amazed at how flooded the intersection was. They were in the midst of closing it down so of course I turned around. After getting to the intersection at the other end of the road, I was stopped and they were going to shut the whole road down. I called Danny (who had already left for work) and suggested that he might want to work from home because I wasn't sure if we'd be able to get back home later. These are the only two ways to my house. Meanwhile, I went to work and planned on seeing how the morning went. Danny went home and called to tell me about the branch when he got home. Here is some of the damage from that branch:
















That would be our fence and pool shed. As you can see, this is a really big branch. It slammed down across our septic system and tore through the fence and completely shifted the shed, busting open the door and breaking a window. We are not sure about the equipment inside yet. Our snow blower, lawn mower, pool equipment and lawn furniture are in there so I guess once we can get in there to see, we'll know what we're up against. Meanwhile..........yes there's more.......Danny took the dogs out down through the basement and things looked dry. Less than 30 minutes later, there was water pouring into the (finished!) basement. We have a lot of unpacked stuff down there like pictures and of course my prized dining room set! I came home after sneaking through some barriers to get here. Dana came over and brought his sump pump for us to use. This brother of mine.....ya gotta love him. He's always there when we need him. We used a squeegee (sp?) and a push broom along with the sump pump and worked on getting the water out. This pumps 30 gallons of water per minute and it ran for about 90 minutes.....that's equal to about 2700 gallons of water out of our basement! Boy, am I glad that I suggested Danny work from home. My dogs were crated in the basement. For those of you who know me....that would not have been a good situation for me to walk into! We had to take everything out of the basement and move it to the garage.....so much for me unpacking.....I'm throwing a lot of it out! My family pictures were okay and the dining room set didn't fair too badly. Some of the other furniture got wet but I'm not overly worried about that. Here are some pictures of what we have always wanted.....a lake in our backyard.....well.....not one that threatens our home but I guess this is the next best thing:













































Danny and I were just talking yesterday about how lucky we are to have come out of the last six months and have landed on our feet so well.
So....do we still feel lucky? Yes, we really do. We are lucky that we were able to come home. We are lucky that the dogs didn't get too stressed out. We are lucky that we didn't lose anything significant. We are lucky that the tree didn't land on the house. We are soooo lucky to have such an awesome and supportive family who are always there when you need them most. We are so lucky that our kids are all home safe and sound and nobody got hurt. And....we are lucky that we have insurance. :-)

HAPPY SPRING!

NOT!!!!!!!!!

Boy, I was getting pretty excited when we were finally getting some warm weather these past few weeks and then out of nowhere......BANG! We get hit with this damn snowstorm that surprised us all. Danny was out of town that night. We got 14" of very wet heavy snow here at my house. We have huge pine trees in the front yard and very big limbs came crashing down sometime in the middle of the night due to the weight of the snow on the branches. My neighbor also has a couple of big pine trees and his were worse. I slept like a log (no pun intended) that night and never heard the limbs snapping off the trees. At some point in the night my neighbors tree had a very large limb fall across the road. They had to use a chain saw to cut it up.......all of this while I slept (in the front part of the house) and never heard a thing. I guess it's a good thing they all fell away from the house. If they had fallen where I was sleeping, I guess I would not have known they were coming anyway. In any case, what a mess this storm made. I got up that morning not knowing how I was going to manage to get out of my driveway.....Danny had put the snow blower in the shed (over a hill) because he didn't think we'd need it anymore this year ;-) I ended up shoveling two tire paths out of the driveway to get out. Since Danny was out of town for the rest of the week and I was not in the mood to deal with the mess, I had the driveway plowed. Bub and Tiff had no power that night so they came over and spent the night. He shoveled the shed out and used the snow blower for the rest of the yard. I hope it's truly the last storm this year. I'm ready to see what it looks like under our pool cover! We never did get to actually see it. I'm ready to haul the mixer out!!

The Baking Babies

We had a really nice day on Easter. We ended up having twelve people over. Despite the fact that I am not considered to be a cook, everything came out pretty good. Nothing was cold or too dry so that's all that counts I guess. My wonderful son is becoming quite a cook as you can see from above. He made some fantastic homemade rolls. They were a big hit. Tiffany made her now famous coconut cake (also seen above) which everyone loves.....as you can see, Dana REALLY was impressed! There was not a crumb of either one when everyone left for the day. There was however an angel food cake that Ann made (she made two) with some strawberries and whipped cream. Danny and I managed to take care of that too. We didn't want anything to go to waste!

Danny has been traveling quite a bit lately. I'm hoping that things quiet down a little bit and we will be able to enjoy the spring and summer. I'll post again soon!

A New Family Member!

You are looking at an ultrasound picture of my grandchild. Yep that's right, Melissa and Gavin are having a baby! Danny and I could not be more excited. Melissa is due at the end of September. I went with her for this ultrasound and found it to be truly amazing!!! Boy have things changed over the past 26 years. I could not believe how clearly we could see the baby. He (just a hunch I have) was kicking his feet and arching his back and moving almost constantly. I did not take my eyes off the screen and neither did Melissa. I think we were both too fascinated to even talk.
Danny and I could not be any happier to be home and be able to share this experience. We truly believe that everything happens for a reason and sometimes you just have to take the long way around but the rewards are priceless! I'll continue to keep everyone updated of course but not too much because I know how grandparents can be......it's all they want to talk about.
On another note......I am also going to be an aunt! Lisa is pregnant also and is due in the beginning of September. The strange thing is that she and Melissa are two weeks apart in age and will both turn 26 this May. I guess this is going to be a busy year for everyone! I'll post again soon!

The chick cousins dinner...

As I said in my last blog, I was meeting up with some female cousins to get together for dinner. We met up on Sunday and had a really nice time just talking and telling funny stories. From left (front), Cheryl (Hall) Day, Cindy (Hall) Keith, me (Cheryl) - on the right (front), Cyndi (Holmes) Douglass, Jamie (Holmes) DeAngelis and Patty Ann (Stover) DePeter. It's always interesting to hear about other people's perspectives on their lives growing up. For me, I've alway thought about the fact that my life wasn't always the greatest growing up but I guess I never stopped to think about other people in my extended family might have been going through some of the same things that I did. For some of them, the things that they went through were worse than what I went through. We spent 2 hours together and it wasn't all gloom and doom believe me. We all had funny stories to tell. I think everyone had a really good time. We all agreed that we should do it more often. Nobody is getting any younger and as whacky as we all have been and still are, we were once a pretty close family growing up. We'll try to get together every couple of months. I've agreed to be in charge of organizing this so I'll be thinking about our next get together and where we'll do it. We would really like to get more cousins involved next time so I'll be looking for addresses, emails or phone numbers. I'll also be blogging more regularly now that I'm starting to manage my time a little better. Stay tuned!

I'm baaaaaccckkk!
Well since it's been forever since I've put anything in my blog, I thought I'd better put something in here before I lose my readers......lol. We have been busy doing small projects around the house. We've put a new door on the front of the house and on the side entrance, much fancier than the plain jane doors that were on previously. We also changed the color of the shutters so they would match the color of the new front door. It's made a big difference in the way the house looks. We're going to put granite steps and eventually buy a granite lamp post to replace the current one and a new granite mailbox post. This will definately change the way things look right now, especially the new stairs in the front. We can only do a little bit at a time so I'm happy that we've gotten that much done. We also had the ceilings re-worked. They had cracks in them because the house had settled. Most people wouldn't have even bothered but you have to remember that I'm married to Danny. Stuff like that bothers him when it normally wouldn't bother the average person. There's lots that we want to do so I'm sure we'll stay busy this year!
The warm weather has spoiled me over the past few days. On Sunday, I took the dogs down to Pine Point and walked them. I spent the whole day by myself which for me, is a real treat. It seems like there is always something to do lately and I was feeling quite stressed so getting out and enjoying some warm air helped. I'm glad that daylight savings time happened 3 weeks early this year! It's nice to come home from work and have it still be light for almost 2 hours. Speaking of work, everything is going really well for me there. There are days when I wonder if I'm wasting my experience from other jobs with this one but at this point in my life, it's a non-stressful job and it's really what I need right now. I'm not sure why I always feel so stressed. I know that a lot of it is brought on myself but I'm not in the place that I used to be in when I could say no to people and put myself first and not feel so badly about it. I know what I need to do to fix my stress but I just haven't managed to get there yet.........so.........I like my non-stressful job and I guess money certainly isn't everything. Of course Danny and I have certainly learned that the hard way. We're doing just fine! Danny is staying pretty busy at work. There have been some changes recently and it's keeping him pretty tied up lately. They are all good changes. He seems to have adapted pretty well to this career change.
I'm finally taking some time to get together with people that I haven't had a chance to. I'll be meeting up with some of my female cousins for lunch this weekend. That should be fun. I'll also be getting together with one of the funniest people I know next week. She sometimes goes by the name of Muffin. We'll be making a trip to the Christmas Tree Shop and then to dinner. I'm looking forward to that too.
Our neighbors have put their house up for sale recently. This is great because they have about 25 chickens that frequently jump over the fence into our yard. One day I came home and walked into the garage and out ran a chicken! I was not happy. Besides, they keep the dogs barking so good-bye neighbors! I hope the house sells quickly.
So.....all in all things are going pretty well for us. This year will be a great one for my family. Watch my blog in the coming weeks!

Settling in and freezing......
Well, we are finally what I would consider settled in. There are a few things needed on the walls but other than that and some touch up painting, we're finally starting to breathe. It has been pretty cold here during the past few weeks. At first I decided that it didn't bother me at all. Even standing out in the yard with Ella for 20 minutes at a time when it's 2 degrees wasn't getting to me. I figured that it was a sign of being one day closer to spring......but.......I'M TIRED OF THE COLD!!! I'm sick of getting shocks from everything that I touch and never feeling like I'm truly warm. I don't remember it being this cold in Rochester. If it was, I was most likely inside anyway and had to spend very little time outside. Now, with going back to working outside of the house, things have changed. I just keep thinking that it's now the end of January and we've most likely got about 8 weeks left of winter.
Time seems to be flying! I'm sure this has a lot to do with me going to work every day outside of the house too. I'm glad to be out amongst the rest of the working world again. I really love my job. I do a variety of different things so it really makes the days go by quickly. There are things that I haven't done yet that I'll be tasked with too so I'm sure before you know it, we'll be opening the pool and starting the blender up again! I can't wait for that!

We've been spending some time with the kids for the past couple of weekends and have gotten together with Deidre and Dave for a few dinners and played games as well as be entertained by Gavin. Danny and Bub dug out their ice fishing gear that's been stored away for the past 4 years and went ice fishing last weekend with Dave. They had a pretty good day catching different kinds of fish. The only one who went home empty handed was Dave. Oh well, maybe next time. These are the kinds of things that we've missed and are happy to be able to do them again.

Danny has been traveling quite a bit for work. He's been gone for a few days each week for the past few weeks. It's tiring for him but it comes with the territory and so he takes it all in stride.

It seems like it's been quite some time since I've put any pictures on here so I guess I'll have to take some updated ones and post them. I'll take some of the house as well now that it's in liveable condition.

I'll post again soon!

Since it's been almost 2 weeks, I thought I'd better update my blog again. I know that there are some people still out there who check it every now and then. The past two weeks have been pretty good overall. Everyone is still healthy, thank goodness. Danny and I (well okay, mostly Danny) painted the entry way which was a lavendar color and the living room a pale sage color. It looks so much better than before. We also hung some pictures up so things are starting to look a lot more like home again. Danny mounted the television on the wall (which I was opposed to in Rochester) and it turned out really well. It makes the living room seem bigger. The only thing that is hard for me to get used to is the small bedrooms. We still haven't put a bed in the spare room yet but we'll get there eventually. We'll need to get things in place before Sharon and Willy ( our great neighbors from Rochester) come up to visit. We'll look forward to them coming up to Maine for a visit. We'll do all of that touristy stuff with them so that will be fun. I can't wait! I miss them terribly.
This weekend has been a weekend of trying not to feel stuck to the house doing chores. We had Christy. Carolyn and her friend over for dinner on Friday night and then ended up going out with Carolyn and her friend for a while and just talked. We haven't really been out for a while and although we almost choked to death from the cigarette smoke, we agreed that it was nice to be out and relaxing with friends. Today we took the dogs for a LONG OVERDUE walk on the beach today. It was a balmy 45 degrees.....not bad at all. The dogs were in their glory and it was really nice to get out and get some fresh air. We came back and met Deidre and Dave for dinner, a run to Walmart and Lowes and then sat in Dunkin Donuts and just gabbed for a while. It was nice hanging out with them. We ended up getting some replacement lights that Danny is replacing in the hallway as we speak.....so much for the chore free weekend, huh? Tomorrow, if the weather cooperates, the kids are all coming over to watch the Patriots game and have dinner. Danny will be traveling to Atlanta this week so it'll be a pretty quiet week for me.

My new job is going very well. What a differece for me over the other job! I really feel a weight lifted off my shoulders. I stuck it out at the other place because we really needed to put some money away but continued to look for another job. I'm proud of myself for sticking it out. That situation was pretty tough for me to hold it together but I guess I'm just too stubborn to give in. Everything has a way of working out though as we've been finding out lately.

So, things are fairly quiet for now. I'm sure it won't stay that way but for now I'll take what I can get. I hope everyone is well and I'll update you all when I have something to report. I'll at least update every 2 weeks though, even if it's quiet.

The End Of 2006.........
Well, 2006 is finally coming to a close! This makes me happy because this year has certainly not been my favorite year but I guess things could be worse. This past week has been interesting.....Stephen went back into the hospital. His lung had collapsed again! They had to do surgery this time around which meant him staying in the hospital over Christmas. His surgery was done on Tuesday, which was the day after Christmas. He did very well and ended up going home late Thursday afternoon. He'll be staying with Dana and Ann for a few days and will hopefully be on the mend now and stay healthy for a while! My father went into the hospital on the 27th. He had been having some pain between his shoulders and experienced shortness of breath whenever he walked around. This had been going on for some time. He ended up having 3 stents put in! I guess it's a good thing his was persistent and followed through. I took him home this morning. He came through the procedure with flying colors. I think everyone is all healed up now and hopefully ready to start a healthy new year.
Our Christmas was very nice. We hosted a Christmas Eve gathering at our house and had quite a crowd. There was way too much food but I guess that goes with the territory. On Christmas Day, we visited Stephen in the hospital and mostly spent a quiet day. We opened gifts with our kids around 4:00 and then cooked dinner. Dana, Ann and their family came over and joined us. We had a good time but again, there was too much food. Tomorrow will be the day that I get the big green trash bag out and throw a bunch of stuff away, including the candy that I can't stay away from!
I'll be starting a new job on Tuesday of the new year! The other job that I had was not a good fit for me but I knew that from the very beginning. I continued to look for work while I worked there though and was pretty picky about places I applied to. I went for one interview. It was working in a small office doing a lot of different things. I wanted the job badly because it's really everything I've been looking for. Well, after a couple of weeks, they called me and offered me the position! It is literally 10 minutes from my house and the benefits are much better. There are lots of other perks that I didn't get with the previous position. I'm very excited about it and think that it will work out great for me.
I think that's about it for this week......I'm hoping that things are a bit boring for a while. I need boring right now.
My family and I all have new things to look forward to......good health and my new job! We are very lucky!!
Happy New Year Everyone! I hope you all have a great year!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I cannot believe that it's Christmas time already! It's been a few weeks since I've done a blog so this is going to be a combination blog.....a long one. The past few weeks have been pretty busy for us. We've closed and moved into our new house here in Scarborough. We had a lot of help and managed to get everything loaded and unloaded from the truck in record time. I would say that we are 3/4 unpacked at this point. I have nothing on the walls because we're going to paint two rooms so I'm holding off on it all. I like to think about things before I do them so I'll unpack all of the pictures and set them out to look at them for a few days before I make any decisions on what will be going where. Our friends and family have been great in helping us with our move and of course all of their love and support over these past few months. I know I've said it before but we could not have done it without them. It seems like since we've moved in, we haven't had a minute to breathe. After working all day, it's tough to come home and fix dinner, do laundry and all of the other usual stuff and then have multiple boxes to still unpack. Our weekends have been filled so far. We are hoping to get a lot done this weekend and then we'll be hosting Christmas Eve for my family here on Sunday evening. This Christmas will be different for us than the past few years have been. We won't be traveling to get home to Maine! It's nice to be back home but it will be nicer when the holidays have passed and life gets a little boring. I don't think that will happen anytime soon for us but I'm still looking forward to it. Life is very busy for us right now but it's nice to be back home. I still catch myself thinking "how the hell did we manage to get back here" and it seems like yesterday that I was so homesick and wanting to be back in Maine. I never thought I'd have to adjust to life back in Maine but between working outside of the house and moving to yet another house, it is taking some adjustment. I'm sure that by the time spring rolls around, we'll be settled into somewhat of a routine.

We had quite a scare last week.....my brother Stephen had not been feeling well for a few weeks. He called Dana and Ann to let them know how he'd been feeling on Thursday night. They went over and took him to the hospital. After running tests, they determined that he had a collapsed lung. They figured it had been collapsed for quite some time and admitted him so that they could re-inflate his lung. Dana, being the loyal brother that he is, spent the night in the chair next to Stephen's hospital bed. Now that's what family is all about!!!! They inserted a chest tube....now for those of you who know Stephen, that is huge! It's quite a painful procedure and for someone who doesn't like needles, he did pretty well overall. Thankfully, it took less time than they first anticipated to re-inflate his lung and he was able to go home on Saturday. He's taking it easy for a couple of weeks. Let's hope he follows their advice and gets back to being his old self soon! Just another thing to be thankful for this year.

I wanted to post more pictures but I guess I'm limited......I'll keep going though:

On Saturday, Melissa and I went to see the Magic of Christmas at Merrill Auditorium. Deidre and Dave's daughter Nicole sang in the chorus. I love seeing that show and try to go every year. It helps put you in the Christmas spirit. I find it relaxing. I guess Danny doesn't feel the same way about it which is why Melissa went with me instead of my original date. I had a good time but I found myself only watching Nicole the whole time though! Even though we were in the nosebleed section, I think Nicole did a great job! I even managed to get Melissa to sing a couple of songs during the sing along portion. I think she enjoyed it. She and I had a good time together.

Saturday was also Tiffany's 27th birthday! She got a wrap for her engagement ring which she has wanted for quite some time now.....she's a lucky girl being married to one of the best men on the face of the earth! Danny, Melissa and I went to dinner with Tiff and her parents, her sister and her sister's fiance (oops....or soon to be). She got many nice gifts from everyone. She's such a good girl and we love her a lot! Happy 27th Tiff.

I think the new year will certainly be an interesting one for us. I'm determined to spend some much needed time with people who we haven't been able to see or visit with yet. I'd like to spend some time with my extended family too. Things should settle down and we'll be able to enjoy our time more. Having our pool will keep us busy this summer too. Danny is staying busy with his new job. He's been traveling quite a bit in the last two weeks but hopefully that will slow down a little bit. For those of you wondering.....YES, he still likes his job. He has no desire to go back to hell. We are quite content right where we are in our lives. We don't have everything we had before but in many ways we have even more. As they say...."Money can't buy happiness". I can honestly say that's true in our case. Life is a learn as you go game. Stay tuned....there are new things on the job horizon for me in the new year.....I'll post more about it later next week.

Have a very Merry Christmas everyone!