Decided to roll Week 3 and 4 Recap together since there isn't a whole lot to report.
Lots of progress in the yard. Both lemon trees, both orange tress, and the kumquat tree have all been tamed AND sprayed.
Scott took out a couple of the rose bushes and rebuilt one of the planters to make room for an eventual-pathway. He also took out some random tree that was planted in a really awkward spot- we had no idea what it was, but we knew it attracted a lot of bugs. I have decided that when the time comes, I will empty out the planters entirely and plant from scratch- front and back (which means no more rosemary bush). I'm not sure what kind of flowers I'll put in instead. I think I'd like to put lilies in the front under the window (where the rosemary bush is now). Maybe snap dragons along the driveway. Scott is pretty adamant that he doesn't want any climbing vines- so no jasmine or honey suckle :\
The lawn is finally looking like a lawn again! Scott had to fix the sprinklers (a couple of times). Luckily he is Mr. Handyman and it was no big deal for him. We haven't even done any reseeding or fertilizing yet, so once we do hopefully it will be really gorgeous.
Measure Twice, Cut Once. Or even better: make sure you have all the parts you need before you take apart the bathroom sink. Scott got really ambitious last week when I was taking my final and decided to replace our bathroom faucet with the nice one my mum sent us. Unfortunately, he didn't know that we were missing the base plate for it until AFTER he had taken apart the existing faucet.
We went to look for it on the manufacturer's website, but it said that they didn't make the part in the finish we need. Scott was really annoyed, and emailed them about it. He got a very apologetic response the next day and was assured that they would send out the needed part at no cost: which is Sweeeet. Until we get that part though, we do not have a working bathroom sink. (It would have been way more work to put the old one back on than it would be to just brush our teeth in the kitchen for a few days). Hopefully it will be here soon!
Repaint? We've been using those paper temporary blinds since we moved in and I've been putting off getting real curtains. It makes sense to paint first, so you only have to hang the curtains once. The temporary blinds, however, are starting to metaphorically wear thin.
The living room technically is painted. The only problem is Scott really does not love the color. It's too yellow for him. Something more tan-colored would be much better, and I am feeling the same way. BUT that would mean repainting the living room (which means moving my 20 gallon fish tank AGAIN, and repacking the bookshelves that I just unpacked this weekend AGAIN, and uninstalling the washer and dryer in the kitchen to get in behind it.)
Whatever we do though, we need to get started soon because the bathroom needs to get finished ASAP. We have unpainted sections of the wall in there (where the old broken mirror was) and the repeated exposure to moisture is not going to be good. Not to mention we really need to get new cabinetry so we can finish unpacking the bathroom (there is no place to put any of our stuff right now), and get our new hardware hung.
I think I'll swing by Home Depot and pick up some of those paint cards and we will deliberate. Maybe we can pick out our new colors and go wall by wall rather than room by room- and get the walls with windows done first.
May 27, 2008
May 19, 2008
99 percentile
Last weekend I got to talking to my father in law about our SAT and ACT scores. So, for the first time in I-don't-know-how-many years I opened up my old file box, blew the dust off the envelope, and took a second look at the scores from my junior year of high school.
I knew I scored really well in English. I had forgotten just how well. Top 99 percentile in all the English and Reading sections.
I was thinking a little bit a couple days ago about what this means, and it makes me smile:
If you were to take 100 people who took the ACTs in 2002, and put us all in a room together, odds are I would be the top person in that room.
Sweeet.
I knew I scored really well in English. I had forgotten just how well. Top 99 percentile in all the English and Reading sections.
I was thinking a little bit a couple days ago about what this means, and it makes me smile:
If you were to take 100 people who took the ACTs in 2002, and put us all in a room together, odds are I would be the top person in that room.
Sweeet.
May 12, 2008
House Diaries - Week Two Recap
Life needed to return to some semblance of "normal" this week. No more half days or days off (although I did skip astronomy on Tuesday night). Normal is a misnomer, however, because we've actually been living in TOTAL CHAOS.
Everything is somewhere out in a box in the garage. Don't ask me where. Don't ask Scott where. Neither of us has a clue.
I am so sick of fast food. Our entire kitchen was pretty much still at the apartment, so we've been eating out for every lunch and every dinner this week. Killer Pizza from Mars, Carls Jr, Burger King, Boston Market, Sbarros, etc. Last night we finally went grocery shopping and got some easy food that will fit in our little temporary mini-fridge. Thank god
Scott is the best husband. He, his dad, and Bryce went over to the apartment on Saturday morning and finished packing and moving everything over so I could sleep in (getting up an hour earlier everyday has been taking its toll on me). He's been such a pro through this whole move. <3
We have internets again! The cable guy came over Saturday morning (while I was sleeping in). It took him like 4 hours and apparently it was set up in a way that completely defies logic and will require Scott eventually crawling up in the attick to rewire, but we have cable/internet! It is significantly faster than Time Warner in our apartment (TimeWarner sucks). I'll be stopping by the Apple store after work today to pick up an Airport Extreme to make it even faster ^_^
The BBQ has been christened. Since we couldn't go to Karl Strauss' Beerfest with Sarah and Sandra on Saturday, they brought Beerfest to us. We broke in the built-in grill in the backyard with New York steaks, boiled corn on the cob, and not one- but TWO chocolate cakes. It was awesome. They also brought us Tiki torches and much needed cleaning supplies.
We finally found our fridge! The space available for our fridge is really awkward: only 66 1/2" tall, and 32 1/4" wide. We were hoping to find a fridge with 20 or 21 cubic feet so that we won't feel inclined to replace it once we have kids. At Lowe's we found one that was almost perfect: perfect size, stainless steel, if only it weren't for this awful GREY trim! Apparently last year's model came with black trim, but they changed it this year. I told the sales lady that was pretty stupid of them, and she agreed.
We were almost resigned to taking it anyway, but we decided to go check out one last appliance store that is tucked away in a side street near Car Country Carlsbad. I can't even remember what it was called but this place was pretty great. We found a fridge with perfect dimensions, stainless steel, and only 18.2 cubic feet. It was a little smaller than what we wanted, but unless we tear out the cabinets that is really as good as we can make it. Scott and I each walked by and picked it out separately, actually, which pretty much decided us. The best part is that it was about $200 cheaper than the grey fridge.
Scott's dad pointed out also that it would be very easy to compensate for the size by getting a cheap freezer off Craigslist to put in the garage (and if it's in the garage it really doesn't matter what color it is). He bought the fridge for us as a house warming gift, which is super awesome. It's being delivered next Saturday, so we just need to hold out in our mini fridge for another week!
The Yard is (being) Tamed. We have all kinds of fruit trees and herbs and roses but everything is crazy overgrown and wild and dying. I pruned our huge rosemary bush- enough to give us a supply that would last us years to come. Scott took a chainsaw to the brown/droopy fronds of the two huge queen palms out front.
I tried to prune the rose bushes in the backyard. One in particular is currently six or seven feet high, about five feet across, and FILLED with earwigs (YUCK). I quickly realized my attempts were futile and am more inclined than ever to tear all the rose bushes out alltogether and start over with smaller, easier to maintain flowers. We pruned down the kumquat tree as well so it is no longer hanging onto the bar.
We picked up all the fruit that had dropped and started rotting on the ground- hopefully that will help keep the bugs down. We probably would have continued with the lemon trees except our huge green waste trash can was packed full already.
On the Drawing Board...
Scott wants to try to get things organized to a point where we are only tackling one project at a time rather than splitting our energy/resources in a hundred different directions. So, the rest of this week is going to be largely dedicated to getting OUT of chaos! We'll need to get (mostly) unpacked so we can have our garage back. The painting isn't done, but at this point it just isn't feasible to wait until its finished. We'll have to go room by room a little later on.
Top Priorities of this Week:
-Clean out the apartment. We still have some food in the fridge and I think some more kitchen stuff over there. Scott is planning on picking it up during his lunch break in the next couple of days and going through the final walk through.
-Get unpacked! We'll need to get a variety of those plastic food containers to keep the cockroaches out of our cupboards. We'll probably need to go find things like additional shelving, hooks, etc to help keep things organized. (We have significantly less storage in this place than we did in our apartment.)
Secondary Priorities: (these will probably carry over into the next couple of weeks)
-Fix the rest of our cabinet hinges and install the new cabinet hardware
-Prune the lemon trees
-Take out the rose bushes
-Pest Control. Spray the fruit trees, cut down on the snail population
-Get our new security system installed
-Outdoor lighting
-Find some new electric plate/light plate covers
-Paint the bathroom so we can hang the new hardware (towel rack, etc)
-Find curtains
-and much, much more...
Everything is somewhere out in a box in the garage. Don't ask me where. Don't ask Scott where. Neither of us has a clue.
I am so sick of fast food. Our entire kitchen was pretty much still at the apartment, so we've been eating out for every lunch and every dinner this week. Killer Pizza from Mars, Carls Jr, Burger King, Boston Market, Sbarros, etc. Last night we finally went grocery shopping and got some easy food that will fit in our little temporary mini-fridge. Thank god
Scott is the best husband. He, his dad, and Bryce went over to the apartment on Saturday morning and finished packing and moving everything over so I could sleep in (getting up an hour earlier everyday has been taking its toll on me). He's been such a pro through this whole move. <3
We have internets again! The cable guy came over Saturday morning (while I was sleeping in). It took him like 4 hours and apparently it was set up in a way that completely defies logic and will require Scott eventually crawling up in the attick to rewire, but we have cable/internet! It is significantly faster than Time Warner in our apartment (TimeWarner sucks). I'll be stopping by the Apple store after work today to pick up an Airport Extreme to make it even faster ^_^
The BBQ has been christened. Since we couldn't go to Karl Strauss' Beerfest with Sarah and Sandra on Saturday, they brought Beerfest to us. We broke in the built-in grill in the backyard with New York steaks, boiled corn on the cob, and not one- but TWO chocolate cakes. It was awesome. They also brought us Tiki torches and much needed cleaning supplies.
We finally found our fridge! The space available for our fridge is really awkward: only 66 1/2" tall, and 32 1/4" wide. We were hoping to find a fridge with 20 or 21 cubic feet so that we won't feel inclined to replace it once we have kids. At Lowe's we found one that was almost perfect: perfect size, stainless steel, if only it weren't for this awful GREY trim! Apparently last year's model came with black trim, but they changed it this year. I told the sales lady that was pretty stupid of them, and she agreed.
We were almost resigned to taking it anyway, but we decided to go check out one last appliance store that is tucked away in a side street near Car Country Carlsbad. I can't even remember what it was called but this place was pretty great. We found a fridge with perfect dimensions, stainless steel, and only 18.2 cubic feet. It was a little smaller than what we wanted, but unless we tear out the cabinets that is really as good as we can make it. Scott and I each walked by and picked it out separately, actually, which pretty much decided us. The best part is that it was about $200 cheaper than the grey fridge.
Scott's dad pointed out also that it would be very easy to compensate for the size by getting a cheap freezer off Craigslist to put in the garage (and if it's in the garage it really doesn't matter what color it is). He bought the fridge for us as a house warming gift, which is super awesome. It's being delivered next Saturday, so we just need to hold out in our mini fridge for another week!
The Yard is (being) Tamed. We have all kinds of fruit trees and herbs and roses but everything is crazy overgrown and wild and dying. I pruned our huge rosemary bush- enough to give us a supply that would last us years to come. Scott took a chainsaw to the brown/droopy fronds of the two huge queen palms out front.
I tried to prune the rose bushes in the backyard. One in particular is currently six or seven feet high, about five feet across, and FILLED with earwigs (YUCK). I quickly realized my attempts were futile and am more inclined than ever to tear all the rose bushes out alltogether and start over with smaller, easier to maintain flowers. We pruned down the kumquat tree as well so it is no longer hanging onto the bar.
We picked up all the fruit that had dropped and started rotting on the ground- hopefully that will help keep the bugs down. We probably would have continued with the lemon trees except our huge green waste trash can was packed full already.
On the Drawing Board...
Scott wants to try to get things organized to a point where we are only tackling one project at a time rather than splitting our energy/resources in a hundred different directions. So, the rest of this week is going to be largely dedicated to getting OUT of chaos! We'll need to get (mostly) unpacked so we can have our garage back. The painting isn't done, but at this point it just isn't feasible to wait until its finished. We'll have to go room by room a little later on.
Top Priorities of this Week:
-Clean out the apartment. We still have some food in the fridge and I think some more kitchen stuff over there. Scott is planning on picking it up during his lunch break in the next couple of days and going through the final walk through.
-Get unpacked! We'll need to get a variety of those plastic food containers to keep the cockroaches out of our cupboards. We'll probably need to go find things like additional shelving, hooks, etc to help keep things organized. (We have significantly less storage in this place than we did in our apartment.)
Secondary Priorities: (these will probably carry over into the next couple of weeks)
-Fix the rest of our cabinet hinges and install the new cabinet hardware
-Prune the lemon trees
-Take out the rose bushes
-Pest Control. Spray the fruit trees, cut down on the snail population
-Get our new security system installed
-Outdoor lighting
-Find some new electric plate/light plate covers
-Paint the bathroom so we can hang the new hardware (towel rack, etc)
-Find curtains
-and much, much more...
May 5, 2008
House Diaries - Week One Recap
Our first week owning the house was spent almost exclusively painting, cleaning, packing, and moving. I took half days for most of the week, and Friday off entirely, but still didn't get nearly as much done as I wanted to.
First thing Saturday morning, ChemDry came and cleaned the carpets in the bedrooms. He did a fantastic job getting out all the awful stains we thought were a lost cause. When I could look at them without getting the creepy-crawlies anymore I realized how glad I was we didn't skimp on that.
Scott explored the attick and found quite a collection of Mexican porn and a lungful of fiberglass insulation. He also found a whole bunch of cockroaches and saw a few blackwidows.
D&S Termite came to do the chemical treatment required for our loan. At first the guy thought we were selling the house and he offered to caulk up the termite evidence: "so the buyers would never know". After we explained that WE, in fact, are the buyers, he became more than helpful. He showed Scott how he could do the same kind of chemical treatment himself with a 3/8 drill bit and some WD40, and he even sprayed our cockroaches at no extra charge. The rest of the day turned into a packing extraveganza and wild goose chase for a rental truck.
Speaking of which, I definitely recommend Penske over Uhaul- they were much better prepared to handle our needs (even without a reservation), the truck was brand new and easy to handle-- (I got to drive it down the block) ^_^, and the prices were good. We rented a 16', and figured we more than saved in time/gas what we would have spent moving in Scott's pickup. It was well worth it.
Sunday was our BIG moving day. Scott and Bryce got all of our furniture, clothes, and most of our belongings over. Wrestling the couch into the living room turned into a far greater challenge than originally anticipated, moving my aquarium was an entirely separate debauchle, but the day closed with no real incident and we were able to pass our first- exhuasted- night in our new home.
First thing Saturday morning, ChemDry came and cleaned the carpets in the bedrooms. He did a fantastic job getting out all the awful stains we thought were a lost cause. When I could look at them without getting the creepy-crawlies anymore I realized how glad I was we didn't skimp on that.
Scott explored the attick and found quite a collection of Mexican porn and a lungful of fiberglass insulation. He also found a whole bunch of cockroaches and saw a few blackwidows.
D&S Termite came to do the chemical treatment required for our loan. At first the guy thought we were selling the house and he offered to caulk up the termite evidence: "so the buyers would never know". After we explained that WE, in fact, are the buyers, he became more than helpful. He showed Scott how he could do the same kind of chemical treatment himself with a 3/8 drill bit and some WD40, and he even sprayed our cockroaches at no extra charge. The rest of the day turned into a packing extraveganza and wild goose chase for a rental truck.
Speaking of which, I definitely recommend Penske over Uhaul- they were much better prepared to handle our needs (even without a reservation), the truck was brand new and easy to handle-- (I got to drive it down the block) ^_^, and the prices were good. We rented a 16', and figured we more than saved in time/gas what we would have spent moving in Scott's pickup. It was well worth it.
Sunday was our BIG moving day. Scott and Bryce got all of our furniture, clothes, and most of our belongings over. Wrestling the couch into the living room turned into a far greater challenge than originally anticipated, moving my aquarium was an entirely separate debauchle, but the day closed with no real incident and we were able to pass our first- exhuasted- night in our new home.
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