So Long 2010

The last day of the year has arrived! I thought for my last entry of the year I would take a look back at what Harry and I have accomplished this year.

The major decision made this year was Harry’s retirement date – which is now set at September 2013. This also allowed us to firm up our timeline for the next 3 years. We set our date for purchasing our fiver this year and for when we plan to put the house on the market – March 1, 2014.

We took two great vacations this year – a cruise to the Bahamas in April and that quiet vacation, after my “excitement” with appendicitis, to Plymouth in October.

We have done A LOT on the house front this year. Writing it all down last night really made us realize how much we have accomplished in one year. Here are the major items checked off our “to-do” list in 2010:

• Purchased appliances for kitchen
• Purchased flooring for kitchen, downstairs and upstairs bedrooms
• Purchased closet organizers
• Purchased vanity and mirror for upstairs bathroom
• Paid all of the above off!
• Sold the truck, canoe, pop-up trailer and old snow blower
• Brought at least 10 bags of clothes to donate and threw out as many or more of garbage and shredding
• Harry built 2 additional shelving units in the garage to match the 1st one he built last year
• Painted the upstairs guest bedroom
• Completed the flooring in the upstairs
• Installed closet organizers
• Planned and ordered the upcoming kitchen remodel and purchased everything we will need for the job

I’d say 2010 has been a good year! We hope that 2011 is going to be the same (without the illness and emergency surgery!!).

Happy New Year’s Eve Everyone!! Tomorrow I will take a look forward to the new year.

Early Start to the Work Day

Before I forget, I also accomplished one other thing yesterday! The back deck is all cleaned off. Harry did half of it Tuesday evening and I finished it off yesterday morning. I don’t know if you can tell in the picture, but that’s a pretty big pile of snow down there!!

I am heading in to work early today. Two of our desk people are off today and tomorrow, so my manager asked if I would like to come in early, since she would be alone until I get there at 10 o’clock. Well, maybe “like” is too strong, but I did decide to go in for 8:30 – I figure I will make up the time I missed Monday morning due to the storm. So that’s a good thing.

Daily weather update – warming up today! It is supposed to be in the mid 30s today, and in the 40s tomorrow and Saturday. Sure would be nice if this was a foreshadowing of the rest of the winter.

Another Nice Day Off

I really do love having this day in the middle of the week for my day off! I don’t know why, but I feel like I get so much accomplished. Let’s see….today I did the usual – cleaning up in the kitchen and 3 loads of laundry. Exciting, huh? I have the bedding done on the guest bed, and we are now ready for the next guest. I also made a quick run to Wal-Mart to do a little grocery shopping. The most satisfying thing that I got done today was to clean out the closet in the downstairs guest room. Several more things added to our growing lawn sale pile in the garage for next summer. And now I am cooking Fricassee with some of our left-over turkey and veggies – it smells good – hope it is tasty as well.

Time for a relaxing evening!!

Back to Normal

The storm is over and we are back to normal outside. It’s hard to tell for sure how many inches we got because the wind was blowing so hard. But the best estimate seems to be 24 to 26 inches, although we have drifts that are much deeper than that.

This is what our back deck looks like – more than 26 inches out here.

Now we have to go out there and clean it off before the weekend, because we are supposed to have a little mini heatwave in a couple days – going up to the 40s!! Talk about crazy weather. If that snow is still there at that time, it will all pack down and turn into a hard icy mess when the cold returns. Been there, done that. How long is it until spring?

One More Note from Today

Wow – three posts in one day! I think that’s a record!!

I did end up making it to work this morning – only a couple hours late! The snow plow finally came through our development around 9 am. Harry went back out and cleaned the driveway again, since the plow had filled in the mouth of our driveway, plus we had gotten several inches since the first cleanup. Then Harry took me over to work. The main roads weren’t much better than ours was – I am very glad that I only live about 5 miles from my work. It was a pretty quiet day, although we did have a number of hardy souls who came in to do their business. Now I am home for the evening and glad to be settled in. Let me tell you - neither of us are going to miss these winter storms.

More Pictures from the Snowy North

I am snowed in. Harry tried to take me in to work about an hour ago. He finished clearing up our driveway about 6 am, but the road – now that’s another story. Our road hasn’t seen a plow truck in quite a while. Which is unusual. Usually no matter how much snow we get, the plow comes through at least every few hours. Today we have almost as much snow on the road as we do in our driveway. To compound the travel problem, where we live we have a small hill to go up no matter which direction we go on the road. We made it, ohhh about 100 yards or a little more. Then we were stuck, and I had to steer the car back home while Harry pushed! I won’t be going anywhere until the plow truck comes through. This is the first time I haven’t been able to make it to work because of snow.

Pictures of our driveway and road…. (mind you, this is only about 2 hours after Harry cleared our driveway, sidewalk and steps)

This is the left turn out of our driveway – the snow is already filling in the tracks from our attempt.

This is the road in the other direction.

Another view of the road, or let me rephrase that, where the road usually is….

Yay for the Monster :)

Monster snow blower, that is!! Last year, at the end of the season, we decided to buy a bigger snow blower. The one that Harry had previously was short on horse power, was easily plugged up, sometimes was harder to use than not. So we bought the monster!! Twice as much horse power, all the bells and whistles, had a wider front and a longer throw. We haven’t had to use it until this morning.

Here is the view from our garage.

Harry took this one of our front steps from the sidewalk.

Harry - very happy that he has the monster this morning!!

Stormy Night

Our first real storm of the winter has begun! Right now we only have an inch or maybe a little more, but it’s really coming down.

That’s me under all that winter gear!

We only went out for a few minutes, just to get out there and take a couple pictures.

This is the view standing in the garage looking out toward the road. Yes, that is our driveway.

More pictures to come tomorrow…

I’ve also had some comments/questions about Harry’s Christmas gift. It is called a Wood Station. It is a very unique gift for sure, I have never seen anything like it. I love the way it displays the information on the wood - we can’t see where the illumination comes from at all.

Hope everyone is snug as a bug in a rug wherever you are tonight. (haha – using that expression is giving me flashbacks to my childhood!)

Christmas Recap

A great day was had by all, with the opening of presents and an awesome dinner. I don’t have a lot of pictures because I kept forgetting to take them!  

Of course I couldn’t forget to get a shot of Harry’s delicious turkey coming out of the oven!

Yes, it was as good as it looks!

It was a great day of relaxing and watching movies on tv. Later in the morning, we took a break to open our gifts. Andrew gets the prize for most creative gift of the year with his dad’s present.

Looks like a nicely shaped piece of wood, doesn’t it?

Ta-da!!!

So cool! And 62.6 is obviously our inside temperature!!

After dinner, Andrew and Tori had to pack up and head out for MA. They will be traveling later today as well, so we are hoping for safe and uneventful travels for them – we are supposed to be getting our first major storm of the winter later today. Looks like it will be the first major outing for Harry’s new snow thrower. <sigh> Well, we knew we weren’t going to get through the whole winter without much snow. I just wish it had come last night instead of tonight so I wouldn’t have to drive to work in it. I’m glad I don’t live far from work.

Anyway – order of business for today – so long Christmas! Time to get this house back to normal. Up early and down early – that’s my motto!

Merry Christmas :)

Time for relaxing and enjoying now!!

Andrew and Tori arrived yesterday afternoon, and we spent the rest of the day just hanging out and catching up.

It will be a whirlwind trip, as they are planning on leaving this afternoon and heading for his sister’s place in MA. We still have gifts to open and Christmas dinner to prepare,  so it is going to be a fast day! The two of them are night owls and stayed up much later than us, so we probably still have several hours until they emerge. Lots of time to get the food ready to go in the oven.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and happy Christmas, wherever you are today!

Happy Christmas Eve!

What a nice morning! We are hanging out, watching the news reporting on everyone traveling today, and enjoying our morning coffee. I am glad that we are not traveling today. It is nice to be able to relax at home.

I have been off since yesterday. I had such a productive day yesterday – I love it! The office has been decluttered (yes there was a desk under there) although there is still some work to be done, as I have filled a box with paperwork that needs to be shredded. I also straightened up the guest room downstairs and got the one remaining gift ready for wrapping. Last night we had a get-together with some coworkers of Harry’s at a local restaurant called Dinosaur Barbeque. AND on the way home from that, we stopped and did some grocery shopping for Christmas dinner!! Phew!

This morning I am planning more of the same, with our goal to be finished and ready for company by lunchtime. Andrew and his girlfriend are arriving early afternoon to celebrate the holiday with us. And yes, we are definitely going to have a white Christmas – I know everyone was concerned! (I am looking forward to our green Christmas days!!)

Anyone out there heading to do shopping today? Better get moving – there is only 16 1/2 hours left until Christmas!!

RV Christmas Gifts

We have already started celebrating the season! We have been happy to enjoy some gifts suited for our future lifestyle.

I might start using this portable dish rack before we start traveling – it’s awesome!

A lot of the books on the left above were Harry’s choices, but I will probably check them out too. I have to admit that I’m not as quite as excited about the technical stuff as Harry!

Here he is checking out his new DVD on towing and hitching and other essential “must-know” items.

I’m actually thinking of checking out some of those new RV recipes.

Lots of fun time spent learning all this stuff coming up in the next couple of years!!

Going Fast!

This week, that is! Tomorrow is Wednesday already, and my last day to work this week. Someone else at my office needed to trade days, which worked out great for me, because now I have four days off in a row. We have just about everything ready for our company this weekend. We only need to pick up a few items for our Christmas dinner. The only major item left on the list is that we do still have Christmas cards to write. It is definitely my least favorite part of holiday “must-dos" and the one that I always leave to the last minute. Tomorrow I have to open, so I will be leaving bright and early in the morning, but after that, I am off until next Monday! Woohoo!! Now I guess I better get working on those cards!

Cold Pizza

Not too exciting of a name, but it is a really delicious finger food for a holiday get-together. I made it today for Harry’s work function tomorrow, and thought I would share the recipe in today’s blog.

First – the ingredients:

2 packages of Pillsbury Crescent Dinner rolls

2 8 oz. packages of cream cheese

1/2 cup of mayonnaise

1 package of Original Ranch dip mix

1 cup each of veggies, chopped in small pieces

• carrots
• cauliflower
• broccoli
• tomato (seeds removed)
• red pepper
• green pepper

First, open rolls of packages and back at 375 degrees for 7-9 minutes.

Let baked rolls cool.

Mix softened cream cheese, ranch mix and 1/2 cup of mayonnaise.

Spread the mixture on top of pieces and sprinkle with veggies. Harry wants to eat some now, but he has to wait – they’re not ready!

Put in refrigerator to chill, then cut into small pieces.

All ready for the party!