PEC

This weekend was PEC, a conference for Peter's work.  We ended up staying in the Sheraton hotel in Station Square from Thursday night through Sunday.  Since we are a one car family and Peter had to be there almost 24/7, it made it easier to stay there.  Thursday after work, we checked in, grabbed dinner, and then Peter had to do some set up work.

Friday I went to work as normal and then went shopping after until Peter would be able to go to dinner.  I found some great bargains at Target including 2 scarves for $3.24 each, an umbrella for $7, and sparkly black flip flops for the wedding for $3.  

Saturday I had Karen's baby shower, did some shopping at Joann (stocked up on fat quarters for 80 cents and baby flannel for $2.39/yard) and then had a picnic at Peter's work.

Sunday was only half day for the conference so we were out of there by lunchtime.  We hit up Rey Azteca for lunch and then enjoyed relaxing at home for the evening.

When I wasn't shopping, working, or at the baby shower, I just stayed in the hotel room and did some crafting.  I worked my tail off on making the treat bags for Mark and Jackie's wedding.  I got about 3/4 of the way done so that's great news!

Why do weekends have to fly by?

Time For a Change

Last week was the worst week at work that I've ever had. My supervisor is completely useless. A co-worker left the department and due to poor management, we've been scrambling to make things work in my department. We have a new addition, but she has no HR experience and was supposed to be an administrative assistant. Now she's being dumped on with HR things. My other co-worker is leaving in a few short weeks for 4 months at a client. Last week my supervisor lost his temper with me for no reason. The co-worker the left the department and the new addition both didn't do something they were supposed to do. When I got pulled into it, I tried to inform my supervisor and he was cutting me off, asking irrelevant questions, and told me to shut up and quit acting like I know everything. I was super peeved. I cleared out my desk and told Peter he needed to come pick me up. I sent my supervisor an email saying that I didn't appreciate what had happened and that I was taking the afternoon off to think about what I need to do. He denied telling me to shut up and said that he's only ever been supportive of me since he's gotten here. Um, what??

Anyways...this and everything else that has been going on with being completely overworked, underpaid, and demotivated has pushed me to actively seek other employment. I'm still working at the same place for now. I don't want to hurt myself and Peter financially by quitting. I almost, almost, almost did though. Peter was super supportive and we talked for days about how we would make things work if necessary.

I'm trusting God through this and that He has a plan. I know that He can see the whole picture while I can only see a piece of the puzzle.

Random Rambles

Well, we've been back to the ol' grind for 2 weeks. Vacation seems like it was so long ago. Work was like I never left and my supervisor did nothing while I was away. He left things for me to come back to...nice. I'm also feeling under the weather and wish that summer would be over and it would be autumn. I'm sick of the heat.

I also feel slightly overwhelmed because I feel like I'm behind in everything. I know there's always something to do or more to be done, but I feel like the house is a wreck, work is nuts, and I'm not making enough time for the things I enjoy in life and for those that I love sharing life with.

Tomorrow's a new day. I feel like the Lord is teaching me something, but I just don't know what yet...

The Fall

No, I'm not referring to the Fall in the biblical sense. I'm talking about my fall at work today. Hello, Worker's Comp. It's nice to meet you. Not! Luckily nothing is broken. Just lots of bruises and sprains and bumps on my legs. Yes, legs. You didn't think I'd hurt just one now did you?

Ahh, welcome to my life.

Sunshine

The good thing about today's forecast: 70 degrees, partly cloudy (currently not a cloud in the sky!)

The bad thing about today's forecast: it's Friday and I'm stuck inside at work with no windows to even see the beautiful sunshine.

Tomorrow it's supposed to be equally as warm, but rain. Today's forecast also called for rain though, so maybe we'll get lucky two days in a row.

Well, a girl can dream :P

A Short Version of "Weekend"

Peter had to attend a meeting at work yesterday.  And since I've been using a few hours of PTO every week for taking Peter to the eye doctor, I figured I'd go in to my work and make a few of those hours back.  It was Saturday so no one would be there.  I played music loud enough to actually sing along as I worked.  And I wore a hoodie and lounge pants.  It was actually an easy work session.  Unfortunately, his meeting was a little longer than expected and he did some work at his boss's house and after 6 hours, it was finally time to leave.  On any other work day, that would've been fine, except this was Saaaaaturday.  We're not supposed to work on Saturday haha.  I actually did get much accomplished at work though which was good.

After work we went up to the Schindel's and met Grice and we all hung out for a while.  It was great fun!  Steph and I went shopping for a bit to have "girl time" and left the guys at home for some "guy time".   :)  It was great to catch up with them and meet Grice and share an evening together.  We had a yummy dinner, great conversation, and laughed hysterically quite a few times.  We also ate brownies and played Mad Gab.  I don't think I've ever laughed that hard during a game and think that Jeff and Grice should always be on the same team!  haha  

Peter and I didn't get home til pretty late and were wiped out so headed right for bed.  When we woke up this morning I felt awful.  I've been fighting off a cold for a good solid week now and the mornings are the worst.  My head felt 5 times its normal size and I was extremely dizzy when I tried to get up.  Not to mention every bone in my body ached.  After taking some ibuprofen I felt better, but still not up to doing anything but lay in bed.  Peter went to church without me and I was bummed to miss it.  Especially since Pastor Tim was preaching today and I really love his sermons.  I'll have to get a dvd copy of it on Tuesday.  I didn't even make it out of bed before Peter got back from church at a little after noon.  He helped me get downstairs and I just laid on the couch and eventually had some lunch.  By 3 or so I was starting to get some energy back.  But that didn't last too long haha.  I spent my day in my pjs and robe watching Lifetime movies on the couch haha.  Peter was a trooper and even cuddled up with me for the last movie about the life of Tim Binion.  It was pretty good, but my favorite part was just sharing a blanket with my hubby and having the living dark except for a lit candle and the movie playing.  :)

I can't believe it's back to the daily grind tomorrow.  Somehow I feel jipped of a whole weekend since I worked 6 hours on Saturday.  Oh well, I guess it all evens out with taking a half day off each week :P

Thanks a lot, Ike!

Remnants of Hurricane Ike hit the Pittsburgh area on Sunday evening. Winds reaching over 75 mph were even reported! Thanks to Ike our power went out around 9 PM on Sunday night and as of this morning when we left for work, it was still out. Over 36 hours. Luckily we were able to empty our 5 ft stand up freezer into a friend's until our power comes back on. When I thought of losing all of that food, I was clear sick. We would have had a huge neighborhood cookout before I just threw it out. Even though there is only 2 of us, I buy in bulk. Simply because it's cheaper and we have the stand up freezer in the basement (that we purchased for $40 on craigslist) to put it in. We also cleared out some fridge items, but will have lost maybe $25-35 in food that we weren't able to put anywhere. All in all, not bad. Not as bad as Texas that's for sure.

I called my office yesterday morning before leaving home, just to make sure they had power. They did. Until I arrived haha. Literally, a minute after I got to work and set my purse down at my desk, the power went out. And didn't come back on all day haha. We were dispersed to different places to work and I even got to hang out at Peter's office a bit to do some work. At 1:00 I called it a day and Peter and I headed home after stopping for lunch. We both had a wonderful nap and then moved the food. We had to eat dinner out again and grabbed a pizza. When we got home to a dark house, we lit some candles and played cards for a bit before heading to bed. We've really been catching up on sleep the past 2 days haha.

Today we both had power and internet at our offices so we've just been working away now. Wondering if when we return home in a little over an hour if they'll be any power.

We were talking on the way home from dinner last night that even with the misfortune of no power, we are so blessed. Blessed to have a full freezer of food and a place to store it until we have power again and blessed with a home and everything in it. And it's a beautiful fall week to have lost power. We didn't lose it until after the humidity of Sunday went away. So it's been breezy and cool. Could've been in the dead of summer or winter when it's boiling or freezing.

A Mega Update

Well I've certainly been on a blogging hiatus for the entire month of July. That's largely due to the fact that every spare minute is spent doing things. Whether it be traveling, visiting family, working in the yard or around the house, etc. This post is to catch up on what we've been up to for the past few weeks. These pictures are in chronological order too haha.

Peter and I ventured to Arlington for the annual RESNA conference. He was there for work and I was there tagging along. I previously posted about this, but here are some pictures from our trip...

This is actually the perimeter of the Pentagon.  We drove right by it on our way to our hotel.  It was pretty cool to see, but odd that you could drive so closely to it.

We stayed at the Hyatt which was pretty sweet.  The lobby was 3 floors high and all open with escalators.  I enjoyed reading there on Sunday afternoon while Peter finished up his last meeting.  Of course I didn't get a picture of it though haha.  Oops.

Our very nice room:

This couch was great.  It had a really nice view and on Saturday night a big storm hit and we sat on the couch watching the lightning and rain.

Here's part of the view from the couch...

After we arrived, we wandered around the Crystal City area where our hotel was and grabbed some dinner.  This is on our way back to the hotel.

Peter and I on Saturday morning before heading to the morning meeting and attempting to visit Emily.

The very cool morning meeting we attended.  It was really cool to see some of the users of the devices that his company creates.

This is a drive-by shot of the Washington Monument on our way back home to PA.

The weekend after our trip to Arlington, we headed to Hollidaysburg for the weekend of July 4th to celebrate Ash's 21st birthday.  Unfortunately, I'm sure that it was a birthday she'll never forget.  On Thursday night she and Drew were in a car accident right at the end of my parents' driveway.  We didn't know it was her and Drew when we heard the awful crash from inside the house.  Well Peter got there first and my mom and I were getting a flash light since it was pitch black out. Peter made it back to the house and said "it's Ashley and she's bleeding". My heart sank. Especially when my mom got the flashlight and I had to tell her it was Ashley and she just was like"Oh my God!" Luckily one off duty paramedic was the second car behind them. He was on his way home from work and stopped to help. Ashley said her neck hurt and she was bleeding.  An ambulance came and took her on a stretcher with a neck brace to the ER with my mom. Bryson was sleeping over so we were trying to keep him calm too. I think at first it looked and sounded a lot worse than it was.  It was just pretty emotional since it was Ashley and we heard it all, etc. They were turning to come in the driveway and an 18 yr old girl was behind them, going like 50 mph (speed limit is 35) and was on her cell phone not paying attention. She managed to total both her car (an 07 SUV) and Ashley's taurus. Around 2 AM Ashley was released from the hospital. She just had a few stitches.  She was extremely blessed becuase it could have been a whole lot worse. The dad of the girl was kind of a jerk and trying to make it like it wasn't her fault. The grass was all wet though and there were tire marks where the girl drove and she didn't hit the breaks until like 3 houses down when she wound up in the middle of our neighbors front yard.  Drew said he knew it was going to happen cause he saw the person not slowing down and said "hold on!". Ash turned to look and that's how she hit her face. It was right off the passengar window in the front since Drew was driving. Her old taurus doesn't have side airbags so she was screwed. And her car only had 30K miles on it since it was my great aunt's. Practically brand new. She'll get like $1500 for it. Bummer.  I'd rather the car be a wreck then her or Drew though.

Here's 2 pictures my dad had Peter take with his phone incase the insurance needed them.

This is the only other picture I took while we were home.  I think since we were up until like 3 AM on Thursday that it threw me off since I'm usually going to bed at 10 PM.  On Friday I slept in until almost 11 which hasn't happened in a long time.  But it doesn't really count since I still got less than 8 hours of sleep haha.  We still had Ashley's party on Friday and cooked hamburgers and hot dogs and had lots of yummy food.  We also played volleyball and Drew set off some great fireworks.  Turned out to be a good birthday after all I hope.

The next weekend (told ya we've been busy!) Jeff and Paula came down on Saturday to help us do some things around the house.  Peter and Jeff were able to trim a bunch of trees which was great and also cleaned out the gutters which as helpful since they were so full of crud and it make some leaking in our basement occur.  Here's 2 pictures Peter took of Jeff trimming one of the trees:

Paula and I tried shopping for a new screen door for the back but had no luck since it's only 30" x 77".  We'd have to special order it and it'd be like almost $400.  No way!  haha.  Our goal was to get a screen door since both backdoors are just glass.  We found a wooden screen door that we got in hopes that we could cut it down to size.  Well we got it home and Jeff said it wouldn't really work.  Bummer.  Fortunately we found in our garage the screen part to the second door.  We never knew it existed and figured it out by mistake.  So we took the other door back and are going to fix up the old one with new screen since it's ripped and new wooden pieces.  We picked those up and I hope to get that done this weekend.  I'll post pictures when we're all done.  We also got curtains at Lowe's for $7.50 for two 84" long panels and 2 tiebacks.  They were originally $40.  We picked up 3 and used scissors and the sewing machine to make them fit our windows better.  I didn't want them to be so long.  We used extra fabric to make 3 more tiebacks.  I picked up some cheap ($1.27 for 8) black rubber o-rings (used for plumbing haha) to replace the cream colored plastic ones on the tie backs.  The look great and make the living room look so nice.  

Here's the finished product.  I think I'm going to get new curtain rods since the ones we have don't fit the windows very well.  I found some I like a target really well and since we have those gift cards coming I'll use part of that to buy them.  They're only like 12 bucks each.  This picture turned out pretty cute with the wrought iron railing in the pic with my bucket of flowers at the bottom of the steps.  My house is so cozy :)

This is a little blurry but you can see the curtains pretty well here.  One day I hope to buy a matching end table for the other side of the couch.  I got the one on the left side for $50 bucks.  There was one small scratch on it that was barely noticeable and it was on the back part of the table so they put it on clearance for $50.  They normally sell for $250.  Even if I got another one for the other side it would average $150 a table which isn't too bad since they are really good tables and have two storage drawers and are beautiful looking...but I just can't bring myself to pay 5 times as much for the other one...at least not right now haha.  I have a small table from my aunt Pat's house and my leg massager filling the space for now.

This is a close-up of what the fabric looks like:

I got small fleur de lis picture hooks at JoAnn Fabrics for like 6 bucks.  I didn't want huge curtain hold backs because I didn't think it'd look right.  You can see the small o-rings I've sewed on the tie backs too.  

With some of the leftover fabric I made two pillow covers for some old dingy pillows we had sitting around.

And then I still had extra fabric so I covered Cadi's blue bed with it to match the living room better than blue haha.  She loved it.  She was crawling all over me while I was trying to cover it and laid down in it immediately when I put it on the floor.  For all of the supplies (curtains, o-rings and picture hooks) it was less than $25 with the coupons I had on top of the curtains being on clearance already.  Not bad for all the curtains and 2 pillows and Cadi's bed and I still have a bunch left over haha.  

Paula and I also worked on refinishing the front door.  It was painted white with an ever so slight pink tint.  We thought it was only 1 coat but it turned out to have like 4 different yucky colors on it underneath so stripping it wasn't as easy as initially planned.  We both took off Monday to finish it and it looked much better.  We stained it a dark walnut color to cover over some of the blemishes that were on it.  Outside it didn't look as dark as it did when we got it on.  But now that I've diligently polished the knocker, lock and handle, it's looking much better.  I still have to put a coat of polyurethane on it and then it'll be done.  It's the original door and very beautiful.  It was a lot of work with stripping, cleaning, sanding, staining, etc., but Monday's weather was perfect and we were outside so I didn't much mind.  

This is what it looked like before, which wasn't bad but it was kind of a pink tint and you could see the dirt on it.  We were going for more of a natural wood looking door.

This is the after.  You can see how the handle and everything shined up nicely.  Although not perfectly since I couldn't take the handle and lock off so it was harder to do and then I decided to have it not completely shiny for a bit of character.  I still need to sand it a bit to make the wood show through some more and then put up my welcome sign from my aunt Pat's house again.  It's hard to see in the picture, but the wood grain is much more visible now than before.

While Paula was here we also dug out the junk on the right side of the driveway.  I bought a sprayer at Home Depot and put bleach it in to spray on the weeds and vines.  It's been killing it which is great because we plan on planting grass in the fall.  I also picked up some metal skewers for when I make kabobs at HD since my wooden ones burn up too easily.  They were nice and long and had a circle hook on the end to hold it by.  They were 4 in a pack on clearance for 74 cents.  There were only 2 packs so I picked up both.  Well when I rang out, they each rang up as 1 cent haha.  I wish they had more packs but oh well.  2 cents for 8 really nice skewers.  Can't beat that.  I can also use them to make s'mores when we get our fire pit built.  We also got rid of the rhododendron and moved a piece of it up towards the house and will see if it takes.  If not, we'll buy a new one and plant it there.  Paula also dug up the small area on the left of the driveway after where we mulched.  She leveled it out and planted grass which is starting to sprout up!  And Peter dug out the rest of the holly bush and they filled that area in and planted grass.  

I also put out our solar lights we got cheap at the end of the year last year.  They are too blue looking because it's an LED bulb so I got other ones at Wal-Mart with an amber bulb, but they looked orange so I took them back.  I wanted a natural light color but it's impossible unless you get low voltage lights and I want solar.  So I took the blueish ones apart and tape pieces of tan plastic bags over the small bulb (it won't burn since it's LED) and it turned out nicely.  It's not as bright as it was originally, but still looks nice and much more natural looking instead of the blueish it did with the plain LED lights.  They look nice with the candles I have in the front facing windows.  Things are sure coming along!  

The house from the road.  I can't believe how different it looks from when we first moved in.  We're also going to be cutting down all 3 pine trees and planting grass.  Just too much stuff.

The area where we've been spraying bleach.  It works like heavy duty weed killer but is a lot cheaper!  We will have to keep spraying a few time and then turn over the soil and plant grass in the fall.

This area already has grass planted and has a few seeds sprouting already.

As does this area where the holly bush used to be.  We're keeping the dogwood (tree on right) and getting rid of those two pines and the stones that surround them to make more lawn.  You can already see the grass coming up nicely here and it's only been 2 weeks.

Since Peter's birthday was the following Tuesday, Paula and I stopped and picked up a cake on our way home from one of the many Home Depot/Lowe's trips.  We made salmon cakes with corn and rice pilaf for dinner and then I snuck upstairs to get the hidden cake and light the candles and brought it down.  Peter was completely surprised-it was great!  I gave him all of his presents on Thursday and Friday before Jeff and Paula came since we had some down time and I wanted to be able to give him his presents without having to rush.  We also went out to dinner on Friday night.  We had plans to go to a Young Adults picnic outing on Tuesday so I knew we wouldn't have much time on his actual birthday.  I did save the card for that day though.  

Last weekend we were completely wiped out and just relaxed the majority of the time.  We did get some grocery shopping in on Saturday morning which was fun for Peter because they give out free samples of different foods all throughout our Giant Eagle in Monroeville on Saturdays.  It made the trip a lot more fun for him haha and subsided his hunger until we got home.  This is the weekend that I made the pillows from the leftover fabric and recovered Cadi's bed.  I also polished the brass/copper pieces on the door.  All in all it was a restful weekend which was really needed.  

This is a random shot of us from last week.  Turned out pretty nicely so I thought I'd post it.  :)

We have this small trash can that seals that we dump Cadi's big bag of cat food in.  It keeps it fresh and prevents Cadi from being able to open the cupboard and chew through the bag (which happened in the past).  We got a new bag since it was nearing empty and as I was throwing the bag away Cadi decided to eat straight from the newly filled can.  It was so cute!  

This one is my favorite since you can see her munching away. 

Other than all of this, we've been busy with work.  I won 2 tickets to see "Annie Get Your Gun" at the Benedum downtown on Sunday evening along with a $50 gift certificate to Jamie's Restaurant and Lounge on Liberty Ave.  I've never been there but some of my coworkers have and they said it's really good.  My coworker listens to this AM station all the time and they give away stuff and it's pretty easy to win.  She won the same thing the day before haha.  Peter went on an overnight business trip this week so he's been busy too.  We're both glad it's once again the weekend and plan on resting and being productive and having an evening out this weekend.  We'll see how it all goes haha.

Work Work Work

Aside from work, we helped some friends paint an apartment in one night on Monday.  There were enough of us there that the work went fast and finished by the time everyone left.  Initially they had planned to be painting all week.  

I also had another dentist appointment on Tuesday.  When I arrived a few minutes late, they had given my appointment to another person.  Well I asked how long of a wait and she said not long and I said if it was like an hour we'd go grab dinner for Peter who was starving and come back.  Being told "no definitely not that long" we waited.  Well it was an hour.  I was mad because of my stressful day at work prior to my arrival, the dense traffic which caused me to be late (by less than 10 mins).  Plus I'm at the dentist ALL THE TIME!  I have never just not showed up and that's what our receptionist claimed she thought would happen?   I was like whaaaaat?   I pieced it together later though that they had a cancellation right before my appointment and so they were hoping I came earlier.  When I didn't, the person that arrived early for their appointment after mine was ushered in causing me to wait.  This ultimately meant I  missed Young Adults as I didn't even leave the dentist until after 7 PM.  And to top it off they had to send my crown back to the lab to be altered so it's still not finished.  They're supposed to call me because it was only supposed to take 2-3 days.  I'm going to call them tomorrow though because sometimes I think their receptionist isn't the brightest bulb in the chandelier, if you know what I mean.

It was nice to leave early on Friday though.  I have some PTO hours I had to use because of year end and didn't want to lose them.  With the licensing visit tomorrow, I couldn't use them.  So I did on Friday.  Peter and I drove to Arlington VA for the annual RESNA conference which is where we've been since.  His company is here presenting, etc.  It's been cool to see some of their product users and get to know them; as well as learn more about the field of alternative augmentative communication.  

Traffic down here is nuts though.  We were going to go to Richmond to visit Emily but the traffic was insane.  Bumper to stickin' bumper with no end in sight.  We had an interesting experience with the HOV lanes as well and saw a cop pull over 4 cars simultaneously.  We cancelled our meeting with Emily and got back to the hotel 4 hours later.  Whew.  Kind of a wasted afternoon haha.  Oh well.

Now Peter is finishing up a presentation with Bruce and we'll be heading home.  The lobby here at the Hyatt is pretty nice with 3 floors plus two floors below with meeting rooms and chairs/couches all over.  

It will be nice to get back to Pittsburgh though.  At least we know how to deal with that traffic haha.