workin' hard or hardly workin'?

Maybe its the fact that Justin has been working 70 hour weeks or that I am just lazy, but we have taken a serious break from doing any work on our house! (Take this picture as proof. No outlet cover, no register cover and no base board! I may have picked the worst spot in the house to showcase, but sometimes the little things are the last to get done!)


Anywho, I woke up yesterday with a little Demolition Dino in me and decided to tackle wallpaper removal (the same wallpaper I have purposely avoided the last 3 months. I was afraid it would be a sheer nightmare to remove.) Well, boy was I wrong! It came off in an hour! I just went to town ripping it down..I was so relieved it came down so easy. Now all I have left to do is remove the glue and I can paint. Funny thing, I swear the wall color below the paper is almost the same as the rest of my house.

You may ask, what is the other project I am working on? I'm painting baseboards. I feel like there is no end in sight, but I will eventually get it all painted so Justin can nail it back up. Maybe I will get it done by summer?! I can only hope.

goodbye exploder, hello pathfinder!

He did it!! He FINALLY did it! Justin bought a new car!!!! For anyone that knows us well, this has been a car search 2 years in the making! Talk about taking your time and checking out all your options. As much as I give him a hard time, the timing of the new car couldn't be better. The exploder has held up remarkably well and we ended up avoiding 2 years of unnecessary car payments. So, congratulations dearest Justin, and thank you for compromising on the color. (He told me white was his 3rd favorite color choice and the only reason he got the white was for his "wife". Either he is awfully sincere or he already knows how to work the system...)

dishwashing buds

Mommy's little 36lb helper...

first christmas tree

In true Spenser style, I spent about 15 minutes decorating our tree. Mom and Dad Atwood gave us one of their old trees and 2 boxes of lights (thanks:) and I rummaged around in the basement until I found random ornaments and a lovely tree topper. The tree was looking rather bare and sad until i received a box from the best Grams in the world. It was an early Christmas present full of ornaments! The tree is still half lit an half bare (baby Breck would destory ornaments if they were in his reach) but it looks pretty good for throwing it together! Next years tree should look a little more lively after I buy some decorations after the season is over.

I bought this as a Christmas present last yeah for Mom and she re-gifted it back to me, and I'm really glad because I love it!


Lovely little tree


Grammy's note to Breck- :)


Breck's new bed in our room. I finally gave in and gave him the blue snowflake blanket- he adores it



I was playing with him on the floor and he sat down right behind me on my legs, what a cutie!

thanksgiving 2009

Justin and I spent a glorious 4 days back home for Thanksgiving. We spent a lot of time with the Atwoods'/Huntrods/Langeruds'/Rodishs' and friends, too! Here are a few highlights of our time home...

nyc

My weekend in short.

Friday-
Had two of these installed (Dad, my car rides MUCH better now :)


My coworker took me here while the tires were being installed


For whatever reason I thought it was a good idea to nibble on 2 of these...(buffalo wings)


Only to barely make it home to do this...I experienced my first case of food poisoning. Thank you to the lady running the sample stand, you successfully ruined my night! (this picture is for Marin, she loves to send me those dang cat pictures haha)


Watched this on Saturday night wishing I was meeting my lover at the top of the Empire State Building...


Only to get a phone call from Justin on Sunday while he stood at the top of this...


Got to see New Moon with Hannah - yes, it was better than Twilight for those who care


Followed by a delicious dinner!

computer graveyard

Oh how I wish this post were an exaggeration, but this is hardcore truth. We have a computer graveyard in our basement and yesterday we added to it. The little hp decided to die, thats right, I woke up and it was no more. This computer has ALL of our Europe pictures on it (lets pray we have no issues getting the pictures off the hard drive!)

Some computers are old, some are broken (oops), 1 has even come down with a virus... you get the picture.

A gift from Microsoft to Justin- it now houses about 500,000,000 viruses

Poor macbook- I dropped it and broke it. Talk about a SAD day!

Justin used and abused this computer until it became too slow to use

Justin's very first "good"laptop

The following computers are the only 2 left standing...

5 years old and still kicking. We graduated high school together and worked on every homework assignment in college. Thank you for being the only one to stand by my side through it all

Yay for work computers (****ADDENDUM- A mere 2 hours after I posted this, this computer got the blue screen of death- talk about irony!!!!! We have serious computer issues)

When the old imac dies, I will run to the apple store, credit card in hand to buy this beauty. Perfection.

I realize this is a ridiculous post but lets be honest, we all use computers everyday and they are a huge part of our lives. They connect us to family, friends, bank accounts, stores, information of every sort etc etc. What would we do without them!?

house updates

Like I said in my previous post - this house is a constant work in progress! Just when I think we have something semi-figured out we,(mainly I), decide to go and change it. Ha, I guess that keeps life interesting.

Nothing is near perfect, but each little update makes me love this house even more.

New bookcase in the office. Justin found this off craigslist and its the perfect addition to this room. Shelley found these awesome lamps for us at Target and I bought matching shades there, too. All in all, each lamp cost $19.00 bucks- what a deal!

Mirror to go above bookcase- loooove.

Desk is a giant mess but again, I'm making progess (my theme these days)

I ripped out a GIANT bush all by myself! It might look crappy all winter, but I can promise it looks better than the monstrosity that lived there before.

3 hours of hard work gave us all these bags of leaves and sticks.

Our yard. with NO LEAVES!!

Still missing a blue curtain- I have to find a Kmart that carries it.

A little reminder of what once was- (see the nasty curtains?! blaaaah)


New curtains in the living room - a VAST improvement from before- there was some weirdo curtain contraption that I was more than happy to see go.

After 1 year I FINALLY found a nightstand for Justin's side of the bed! He could really care less but I am quite pleased, haha.