Vacation! Like, a Real One.

 People, David and I took this vacation back in SEPTEMBER, 2011.

I don't know what the phrase 'in a timely manner' means. 

 So, screw it.   Pictures only. Besides, if I have to attempt to write something clever, it would probably be another 3 months or something.  I think I'm going to let the pictures do the talking and just worry about some captions.

At least until the very end, in which case there was MAYHEM that deserves a story.  Which of course needs some serious gesturing, but you can't see those.

Also, Court gave me her pics of the trip, of which there were 2,500!!! Those took a while to go through.

Set up: 10 day vacation with my sis, Courtney, and her husband, Paul, to Oregon/Canada

 

I am not a morning person - the current time on this photo was 4 AM bc my sister is crazy and has to be at the airport with enough time to spare just in case we have to walk the whole way.

I am waking up and scaring people with my no-makeup status

Opposite of waking up - cot time.

David's turn on the cot. Paul is jealous

Bro Love Cot Snuggle

This is proof that my sister is crazy - she took 5 PHOTOS of this plane insert bc we thought it was mildly humorous.

Me, correctly mocking Court for the future masses of pictures I know will be taken - this is as we got to the airport in OR.

First stop - Sequim! Really cute small town, sadly also really close to Forks, so there was Twilight crap EVERYWHERE.

We stayed at maybe the sweetest, neatest B&B ever, run by the cutest couple. You'll see.

Walking the ground from the parking area

Cute personal touches everywhere.

Main house and garden

This is where we stayed - the Tack Room! It was awesome, SMELLED FAINTLY LIKE LEATHER, I loved it.

Our room upstairs. We had the whole little building to ourselves.

Side View of the main house from their wildflower beds

I might have gotten a little crazy with taking too many pictures myself, maybe Court was rubbing off on me.  But the place was so pretty!

This is the outdoor dining area - complete with a BBQ grill and anything you'll need to cook out.

Court and Paul stayed in another building, and they had actually been there before, so the owners wrote them a little welcome note.

Love this half door.

That little building is actually the bathroom - too cute!

Bathroom.

Hanging out in the hammock by our place.

They built all the structures on the property themselves - this was a quaint outdoor chapel

The Saloon is really a place to hang out, play games. The boys found some axes and manly things...heaven help us.

Love the facial expressions

I guess that wore them out

Inside - later we found out that little stove can turn the place into a sauna

There was a great old-timey Victrola that still worked - plays records from like the 30s. Boys decided an impromptu dance party was in order.

Looking out across the grounds

Boys put those axes to work for that night's bonfire

A real barn! Which means.....

PONIES!! Yes, please!

I had to pet them, naturally.

There were fresh flowers from their wildflower gardens EVERYWHERE

Another view of the pavilion - love the hanging windows

Lavender growing nearby

They also had a veggie garden, with lots of blueberries!

While wandering, we found an apple tree...with apples

You know we picked and ate those.

I feel like my mom would like this sign

One of the few pics with a ranch dogs in it - she is actually trained to hunt cougars, and has a broken nose from a fight with one back in the day. Crazy. My dogs are scared of possums.

The boys continue to capture their childhood innocence

You have just GOT to zoom in on this pic to see their faces. Priceless.

Who knows what I am doing here.

Here, Paul and I are pretending to be neighbors.

Court's place

Aww, love this pic

Setting up for dinner

Trying out the chairs around the firepit

Another view of the grounds

Heading in to 'town' to hit up the local market for dinner stuff

Court showing off our ridiculously large salmon filet

Cooking ensued

So did eating

Again, what am I doing? I find myself asking this question often.

So pretty when lit up at night.

The owners joined as that night around a campfire to tell stories.  It was good times.

It Begins....Gardening 2012

Yes, it is that time…already. 

 

Last year we had no idea what we are doing, and so we started our tomato seeds late and paid for it the rest of the season – by the time most of the plants matured, it was so hot none of the blooms could set and give us fruit.

Not this year!

DIRT. Kinda important. Organic!

Jan 4^th I was putting these bad boys into their transient homes before they move into the garden.  Last year we had no idea what the crud we were doing, and have come a long way since then.  We also discovered North haven Gardens, THE BEST GARDENING CENTER EVER, and they have helped us quite a bit. They have possibly the most knowledgeable people ever on staff, and they all are more than happy to talk to you for as long as you’d like.  One time a very nice lady walked around with us for 40 minutes, just giving us tips.

Moisten the dirt well, like a wrung out sponge, with warm water before filling pots. Yes, that is the same pot I make my soups in.  Don't judge me.

My boring, Home Depot Burpee varieties.

Seeds, getting ready for lift-off!I put around 3 per pot, use the end of a pen to make holes 1/4 inch deep and lightly cover with moist soil.

  Last year, we got started and there was so much to do and learn, and seed catalouges are HUGE and very scary. So we went went to out local HD and picked stuff out that bc it was already weeded down to varieties that do well in our area.

This year, seed catalogues are still scary but we have NHG to go to now, and they have all kinds of fun things to choose from.  We actually have issues narrowing it down.  We went with a purple variety, a pink brandywine, and yellow, cuz - color!  I admit I was imagining a very pretty bruchetta for some party. Or myself on a Friday night. Whichever.

My new, fun heirloom varieties!

Secret Weapon - Heat Mat

Seed Incubation! No light, but lots of good heat and covered to retain both heat and moisture.

Ok, these are more heirlooms but not tomatoes, I admit it. But do you SEE that melon on the left?! I'm so excited, I could care less what it tastes like - I just want to see it growing in the garden.

Anyway, Changes this year:

-          - No dumb peat pots. I hate those things. Roots grown into them so you can’t remove it, but they rarely truly break through the pot, and they aren’t dissolving, either.  We found lots of remnants when we ripped out the summer stuff to make way for fall. We use plastic pots from plants we bought at Lowe’s and transplanted.

-          -  No peat pellets, either.  They offer nothing except structure for the newbie plants.  We prefer a seed-starter mix, preferably organic.

-          -  Heat Mat – this keeps those little guys warm and tricks them into thinking it’s spring and they should sprout.  I planted the seeds and they had germinated and grown after just 3 days.  The package says 7-10 days.  Crazy.

-          - Fun heirloom varieties this year

-      - This year I'm keeping a journal, bc after all the work last year, I have no idea what we planted when and what we tried, and what worked...etc.  I'm all proud of myself, envisioning a library of yearly gardening knowledge, my future children fighting over them when I'm too old to continue.   But there will probably be food replicators just like Star Trek by then.

-          -  We’re actually doing this on time

So yeah, LOTS OF TOMATOES. Considering David doesn’t really like fresh tomatoes, this is really just a gift to me. And all of you too, if you live nearby and I can bring myself to share, cuz fresh tomatoes are just so, so good.

Dirt under the fingernails in January. It's gonna be a good year.

Halloween 2011

This year, we're doing Halloween right

A carload of pumpkins is always a good start.

David and I actually spent a lovely lunch break in the fall air roaming around, picking out pumpkins. Well, David roamed.  I neurotically darted btwn the different piles of pumpkins, trying to ascertain which ones were The Best.  Apparently, I have issues.

We had our community group over for a carving extravaganza.  Mainly, I used it as an excuse to buy the large box of those Friday's potato skins and not feel guilty. Mmmm

The crew

Jon, carve master

Katie's first pumpkin carving! What?!

Jon #2 - the craftsman

Jon actually required GRAPH PAPER to figure out his design. Seriously. I was very interested to see what was going to happen here.

Sexy pumpkin carving

This is what happens when I ask David to pose

Still at work

 

Jon #1 did two pumpkins

The Reveal!

Mine - I couldn't top the greatness of last year's pumpkin

Jon #2 - graph paper pumpkin

Jon #1's #1

Katie's

Jon #1's #2 - my favorite

The group

I totally made everyone pose

A few weeks after that - we went to a GREAT Halloween party, which produced this little marvel: The Hillbilly Pirate Cake.

Seriously.

I owed him for being awesome, and pompously told him to pick any theme and I would make him a cake. In the future, I will be more careful when I say things like this.


The cake with the Hillbilly Pirate captain himself.


Another thing I LOVED about his party, was that it was My Kind of People, meaning the nerd percentage was pretty high.  This meant that 5 whole people actually knew who I was! I was so excited, especially after toiling with my mom (read: she did it all herself after the first night) to make the perfect jacket from the series.

Do you know who I am? Are you super cool?

Shazam! Nailed it!

I am Kaylie from Firefly/Serenity. Love that series! If you are even slightly nerdy, you need to go watch it immediately.

Shame on you, Matt and Kelly, for not having seen it.  You lost some serious cred.

OF COURSE I made David dress up to match.

Kaylie's match in the series is Simon, who is a doctor.  It was hysterical, becuase away from me, David looks like That Guy Who Didn't Have A Costume.  David actually described himself as 'Douchebag Doctor'.

So, throughout the evening, I would point out David, describe who I had made him dress up as, and got lots of, "Ohh!!" from people, who originally probably thought he really was dressed up as a jerky doctor. It was humorous, and led me to promise that he could have a costume that could stand on its own next year.

It was a good party. So good, even David stayed up til around 3 in the morning. There may or may not have been some attempts by yours truly to play Rock Band for the first time in the wee hours of morning.

The results of this were apparently so entertaining that David, the next day, expressed some desire to buy the game just to watch me try to play it.

I blame whatever that smoking green stuff was that Kelly made me drink. :)


A few days later, actual Halloween occured, and Mom came over to help me hand out candy to the kiddies.

The house:

Entry

Scary ghost!

Spooky Walkway

Front Door

BOO!

More Door Action

Made Koa a costume while waiting on Trick or Treators. He actually wore this for hours without complaint.

Mom with her doggie helpers.  Koa was so great - whenever the doorbell rang, he would wander over to the front door and stand there and let kids pet him like it was no big deal.

The only issue was his eyeholes kept slipping - I definitely heard the 'thump' of him running into a wall a couple of times.

I never noticed how very furry this bat is.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!

My Brain is Trying to Kill Me

Sometimes when I'm doing something mundane, like washing my hair, I kind of zone out for a while, and when I come to I realize I'm in the middle of a conversation with myself in my head. Does this happen to anyone else, or do I need to start looking into serious pharmaceuticals?!

This also happens to me a lot at red lights. Except usually, at those, my mind delights in dredging up mortifying moments from my past and replaying them for my horrified entertainment. Like the time, newly married and still very shy, I went to get the mail and came back into the apt, only to see that David had redecorated the entryway in my absence (and it was ugly).  I don't remember the exact words that I started yelling, but it was probably unpleasant with a side note of profanity.  At this, 3 extremely good-looking guys (of course they were good-looking) walked out of the bedrooms to stare at me. I HAD WALKED INTO THE WRONG APT AND STARTED CURSING AT ITS OCCUPANTS.  I probably made some noise not unlike 'glark' and backed my profanic butt out of there as quickly as possible.

And for the next two years, proceeded to take extremely ridiculous measures to make sure I never ran into them again.

Another favorite is the time I met David's borderline-genius father for the first time. "Remember how you slammed your head, unintentionally, into not one, but three different objects in the room?!" my brain screams. " Ha ha! You cretin!"


My life is pretty blessed right now - I have a great husband, enjoy my job, we have our health, and we're slowly turning our house into our home.

So it's going to be a real shocker to everyone one day when this happens to me at a red light and I lose the will to live and roll into the intersection.