Dear Boots,

Happy 365 Days!

Happy 52 Weeks!

Happy 12 Months!

Happy 1 Year!

Love,

Your Wife

VacStayWorkation

Tonight, I start 9 days of vacation with my lovey huzzy, Boots. We are going to work on our house and have lots of good visiting time on our Anniversary Honeymoon. I'll be back in October and hopefully be rejuvenated with lots of things (and pictures!) to post about.

Our Vacation To Do List!

1. Polyurethane select parts of kitchen

2. Restain kitchen cabinets

3. Get all dishes, utensils and various other kitchen accoutrements washed and put up in their new homes

4. Paint trim and quarter-round in bedroom

5. Paint mini bathroom

Five is enough. If we get all that done I'll definitely feel like a winner.

Ya'll, I just don't get it.  I can not wrap my head around the madness that is the new Target Missoni collection.  What is up with all the people going crazy over this zig-zaggy, psychedelic hippie technicolor stuff?  I haven't seen anything that I would want to buy.  Help me understand!

My Inspiration Is In The Toilet!

No, really, it is.

On one hand, my inspiration is in the toilet because I have nothing to write.  On the other hand, my inspiration is in the toilet because......  Just look at these pictures!

Yep, I'm in the bathroom.  

These are the floors in the ladies' room at Zaxby's.  Actually all the floors in the whole restaurant look like this.  Beautiful, worn, stained concrete.

Boots and I could do this, right?

What would a stained concrete floor look like in our bathroom?  It would be able to withstand any water we spilled on it.  And if we got tired of it we could put something on top of it, like tile.

Thoughts?

31

Happy Birthday to my wunnerful amerzing huzzband, Boots!

Nasty!

Over the weekend I made a little trip two blocks from the house to the local laundrymat to wash mine and Boots comforter.  The laundrymat was closed down and renovated a few months ago, but this was my first time to actually step foot inside the building.  It was nice and clean, but not air-conditioned.  The fall air was a relief blowing through the propped open door.  I just want to share some pictures of my experience.

Obviously, somebody's tried it.

This is the biggest washer they have and it costs $3 to use, but it does a good job.

Washy washy.

Maybe "washer" refers to the whole place not just a machine.

If you go, be sure to take a pocketful of quarters.  It may cost just 25 cents to dry, but it only dries for ten minutes at a time.

Ten Years

September 11, 2001.

I was 12 years old and in the 7th grade.  It was a regular Tuesday morning and I had just finished first block-- PE, which I wasn't too fond of because of my nasty classmates being sweaty and stinky the rest of the day.  We were standing in front of the junior high building, buying our snacks from the machines.  I remember my 8th grade cousin Angela running over to my little circle of four friends and telling us that the World Trade Towers had been hit.

I didn't even know what she was talking about.  What were the World Trade Towers?  Where were they?  Angela said they were how we controlled our trading with other countries, that now we wouldn't be able to have gas for our cars and something about imports and exports.  I was somewhat ashamed inside for not having a clue about the things she was talking about and wishing I did so I'd be a more informed and concerned citizen.  At the same time, I envisioned us living without electricity and going back to a much simpler way of life. I wasn't worried in the least about what my new life would be like because I knew my good ol' farm boy country daddy would take care of our family.  I knew I was safe way down here in Alabama, terrorists would never find us down here.  So what if we didn't have gas or electricity?  We'd have food and maybe I wouldn't have to go to school.

When the bell rang and second block began, our science teacher seemed pretty upset by the news and kept the TV on the whole class period.  We watched the news the whole day in all our classes and learned about attacks on the Pentagon and the brave Americans who fought the terrorists in an airplane over Pennsylvania.  Footage of the airplanes hitting the buildings played over and over again everyday for weeks on the TV until I grew sick of it and wished everyone would just shut up and move on and forget about it.  We heard stories about angels holding the doors to stairwells open so people could escape and I wondered if they were true.

I didn't know anyone who had died in the terrorism attacks and my world didn't change at all other than "9-11" and "September 11" becoming permanent phrases in everyone's speech.  Toby Keith's and Alan Jackson's songs played at least once an hour on every station it seemed like.  American flags took on new significance to me and I saw an explosion of American pride in everyone's lives--flags on lawns and houses, stickers on cars, even t-shirts with flags.  Osama Bin Laden became public enemy number one and we waited years for him to be caught.  When his actual demise finally came, I felt somewhat relieved that justice had been served.  But has it really?

I'm 22 now and this September 11, ten years after the attacks, I'm remembering the day by reading the newspaper articles about remembrances around the country today, watching the images I first saw ten years ago again, and watching new images of people visiting the memorials dedicated to the thousands of people who lost their lives that day.  The past nine September 11's were basically just another day because every day since September 11, 2001 has been a day of remembrance.  I've thought about September 11 everyday in some form since then.  There's something in the newspaper or on the news about terrorists or new regulations in airports because of the attacks everyday.  We can't forget.  Our lives are permanently changed in someway forever.

Despite its problems, America is still the greatest country in the world and I thank God that it's mine.



(A special thank you to my Canadian blogfriends who are remembering with us on this day.)

Stripey!

Click this link and tell me how much you love it!  stripes

There's just something about these stripes that just makes me go, "Hmmm......"  I'm currently in the process of trying to convince Boots that we need stripes in our bathroom.  So far, he's not going for it.  I'm feeling white-on-white stripes with a barely noticeable difference.  I want our bathroom to feel airy and clean, but fun and unique without being too loud.

Thoughts?  You'd better comment or Boots is going to wake up to a tone-on-tone stripey bathroom one morning!

Paranoid (Alternate Title: Serves Me Right)

I'm a worrier, everyone knows this.  I like to have all the angles figured out and know what I'm going to do if any number of things happens.  I try to prevent bad things from happening if I can by being extra careful and terribly safe if I can be/know how to be.  I try not to, but I'm always reading cheap magazine articles about what foods cause cancer and which ones prevent it even though I'm convinced that even oxygen is contagious these days.  I've tried to slack up and not worry so much, but old habits are hard to break.

Since our water leak we've been particular about potential water problems down the road.  The inside of the cabinets under the sink and underneath the countertops where water might run off and drip are going to be polyurethaned to maybe help prevent the inevitable moisture from causing this problem again.  Our bathroom floor is going to be tile because wood definitely wouldn't work since Boots slings water like a buffalo when he showers.

This morning we went to Boots chiropractor appointment and then grocery shopping at Publix.  I vacuumed the sawdust out of the pantry cabinet when we came home and put away our foodstuffs while Boots ran out to get a haircut.

This is the kind of junk you eat when you don't exactly have a functioning kitchen. 

I started a load of dirty towels and got a little happy with the vacuum, going to town on all the crumbs and dirt spread out on our beautiful kitchen floor.  I thought about how our lives would be different since the flood.  Different in the respect that we'll be extra scared to run a load of dishes in the dishwasher and just go to bed.  Will we even hook up our next fridge's icemaker or will we make ice the old fashioned way with trays?  Our clothes and dishwashing schedule will have to work around one of us being in the house and awake since they can't possibly be trusted not to ruin the floors.

Its not a good feeling to be thinking about future water leaks and then look up and see one.  My stomach turned over and I ran like a mad woman for my cell phone and some dry towels.  I wiped water up with a fury and dialed the number.  Boots finally picked up the phone the third time I called and I screamed in a panicked voice, "The wash machine is leaking water all over the floor!"  Terror makes me incomprehensible so I had to tell him twice more before he got the message.  Boots hurried home and I photographed the damage.

I had planned on writing a post on what might happen if the floors got wet and experimenting the damage on a scrap board.  Don't guess that's necessary now, huh?

We pulled the wash machine out of its cubbyhole and turned it back on, watching for more water.  We searched for leaks with a flash light and checked all the hoses, but couldn't find the problem until Boots checked the other side of the wall inside the shed.

We have a leak!  Boots is planning to weld that little drippy section so I hope that works.

Oh, boy.  Our Tara feels like the Money Pit these days.  Does it pay to worry?  You decide.

Hilarious!

I have a new favorite tv commercial.  This one has currently jumped the line of all the "Mayhem" commercials.  Click this link to watch it!  commercial

Fell Off The Wagon!

I tried to post everyday for a month, but didn't make it.  I ran out of steam five days ago and almost went on a self-imposed sabbatical.  Seriously, I thought about taking the month off from posting.  There hasn't been much going on in the home improvement court (until today, more on that later) and I haven't had anything funny to say write.

Ya ever have to think about something so hard you can't listen to the radio and have to drive in silence on the way to work?  Just me?

Its Wednesday and the hurricane finally stopped raining on us.  My tomatoes and brown yard send their thanks, by the way.

I put up my first batch of peas (black-eye pink-eye purple hull, apparently I've had too much pop music and not enough vegetables) last Friday night and it was the first time I used my new stove.  Check it!

Here's hoping I don't give Boots the food poisoning when we eat them.

I had three people ask me when me and Boots are going to have a baby.  Geez Louise folks, let's have some freezer burnt cake first! 

I dreamed I made peppermint candy with the Barefoot Contessa (or at least we intended to).  We went shopping at the Winn-Dixie for ingredients which were really weird- peach schnapps, Bailey's Irish Creme, and some-sort-of-something extract, but not peppermint.  After checking out, our exit was blocked by a pack of dogs fighting right in the door!  Once we got outside, Contessa grabbed a stick off a tree and rinsed her hands in the water that started flowing from the trunk because apparently they were sticky from the liquor bottles.  Weird?  Very.

Oh! And!  The point of this whole random junk post?

This!

My kitchen is on its way to becoming useable and beautiful!  I'm so excited!  I've been rippin' recipes out of magazines left. and. right!  Boots better get ready because I am fixing to bring it in the cooking department!

Dear Boots......

For my birthday, or maybe even Christmas, I want a meat mallet.  This one's at Publix.

Love ya!

Etsy Likes......

If I were cute, I'd wear these.

If I could not kill it, I'd have one of these.

(Notice I'm not posting the pictures, trying to not get arrested on the internets!)