Lonely...

Lack of news = lack of updates! Sorry... There's still not much to report on, except that the biggest part of my earthly life (aka Peter) is in California for two weeks! :-( And I am a bit lonely. This house becomes quite huge when you have it all to yourself! And two weeks begins to feel like an eternity!
However, Mom is coming to keep me company next week! And I'm excited for that! She'll be here for a week. :-)
Nothing else really to post... I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

Oregon Coast Weekend...

Thank goodness for Presidents!!! :)
We enjoyed our long weekend at the coast... Oceanside to be exact. Weather was typical OR coastal weather, cool, damp and grey... but beautiful anyway!
Our crew consisted of: Peter and myself, Sherrie & Loren, Christie, Daniel & Laura (Veldkamp) and Amy & Chantry (Filener)

Peter captured our 10 minutes of sunshine! Isn't it beautiful?! This is directly in front (ok, actually kind of SW-ish) of the house we stayed in...After our morning coffee run! See, we're official bloggers, even our sweatshirts say so! :)
Serious game of Pente going on here!
L-R: Loren, Sherrie & ChristieDaniella and Laura :)
Spiral staircase to upstairs... Kinda neat for this place, but I don't think I'd ever want one! It was a bit wobbly and not very easy to carry luggage up and down. (or maybe it was the operator that was wobbly? Naw...)
At the Tillamook Cheese Factory... and of course we couldn't resist the fresh Tillamook ice cream! YUM.
Amy & Chantry - CUTE picture!
Looking NW from the house. The picture that you see is taken when the tide is about midway. If you look closely (click on the picture), there is an opening at the bottom of the rock, (look towards the side of the cliff that the houses are on). This is a small tunnel that you can walk through to the other side when the tide is low - wouldn't suggest it though when the tide is high! Here's Peter inside the tunnel! (sorry for the bluriness...), but you get the idea. :)
Love of my life...
And finally, one of our humble abode, looking up at it from the beach.
Thanks Sherrie and Loren for including us!
Click here for more pictures of the weekend!

Venus Fly Trap

Happy Valentines Day y'all!
Peter's sis stopped by tonight, and brought us a Venus Fly Trap! It's so cool! Sherrie stuck a fly in it this evening but it didn't snap, however, when Peter took it out of the can, we realized it does in fact work! :-)
Here's a couple of the snapped ones...The lucky fly that made it through the jaws of life, but somehow died anyway!It's quite a fascinating plant... I've never wanted a fly in the house, but right about now I'm wishing I could find one! :-)

We're off to the coast this weekend. Sherrie and Loren found a rental cottage that they invited us to come share with them... and it sounds like there will be quite the crew there! Around 10 of us I believe! I'm sure looking forward to the sand, water and squeaky tillamook cheese! (We'll be close to the Tillamook cheese factory...) :-)

Central Vac Works!!! New Bikes!!!

I guess the title says it all... We now have functional central vac, and I've never been so excited to vacuum in my life!

Our new toy, and my wonderful husband!Hardwood Attachment... :) We used to go through an ENTIRE swiffer bottle to clean this room, so I'm SOO glad to have this now! It's much cheaper than $6/bottle for the swiffer wet-jet refills!Carpet Attachment... B.C.V. (before central vac) we couldn't even vacuum the carpet downstairs because our old vacuum would overheat every time we tried! In other news, my new bike came in this week and they finished refurbishing Peter's!! So we ran down to our local bike shop and picked them up. Too bad it's sopping wet, raining today! :-( We'll have to break them in another day!
Here's Peter on his cleaned up Bontrager!
And here's me with my spankin' new TREK FX 7.2!!Can't wait to try them out!!!

Real quick update...

Central Vacuum 75% done!

Peter finished putting in all the plumbing in the walls, upstairs & down on Saturday... Also, the outlets are in too. Now he just has to run the plumbing from the attic to the garage and install the vacuum unit! Speaking from experience, (Peter's experience) this would be a MUCH easier project to do when you're building the house, not after it's already built!

Here's a pic of one of the outlets... maybe not as exciting for you as it is for us!!!!!!!Also, Friday was my last day as a Loan Ops Specialist, and as of tomorrow, I'll be a Credit Analyst! I know the learning curve will be HUGE, but I am really looking forward to a change of pace and atmosphere!

Week 4 of accounting class down the drain... this week is my Mid-Term. Ack!

Conundrum

Time for my usual weekly post, and I have nothing to post about. I fear this is going to be painfully boring.
None-the-less...

Recap of our week:
-Office has 1st coat of paint on it, and looks AWESOME. I would post pics, but I want it to look picture perfect before I do... and it still has a ways to go. Maybe next weekend?
-As of Friday, Peter was feeling 100% better. However, evidently gravity isn't holding up so well, and he seems to be on a downward trend again, feeling 69 1/2% better tonight. We'll see what tomorrow brings on that front.
-I finished week 3 of accounting class, and this time I'm not posting my quiz score.
-Our workers made it to the field!!! Janie Buell and Rose Davidson
-Peter has about 1/2 of the plumbing in for our central vac! Getting it downstairs hasn't been the most convenient of jobs, but it's almost there! :) Whoohoo!!!
I think that about covers it... I still haven't quite figured out who I'm doing this blog for; myself or those that I know read it, but regardless, I hope I haven't bored you to tears!

Have a great week!!!

Re - Decorating!!

I'm not even sure if it should be called "re-decorating" as I never really tried to decorate this room in the first place... it has always ended up getting what is "left over" of our furniture. But I'm excited none-the-less!
We bought a new futon mattress and cover online a few weeks ago, and they've arrived.
I have a beautiful picture in my head of how I want the room to turn out, so we'll see how close it comes to that idea!
Below are some pictures the new futon mattress, cover and rug. :) I plan on painting tomorrow afternoon... so another update should be coming soon. :)

New mattress... 8" thick! It's as comfy as a bed!

New mattress cover... coloring isn't so good in this picture, but it's chocolate brown with a turquoise blue swirly design.

And our new rug! It's chocolate brown w/ tan and turquoise accents... and looks perfect w/the futon cover!
The paint options are there too... I think we'll do the turquoise that's in the middle - the first one on that paint sample. It's called Jamaica Bay. I suppose if we can't be there, the next best thing is to paint the walls that color, right?!

Update...

Homework: Done
Quiz: 100%
Cool.

Progress.. hmm, I don't think so!

Financial Accounting Book - 737 pages

Working Papers - 1045 pages
Total Pages - 1782
Total Weeks in Quarter - 11
Total Days in Quarter - 77
Total Pages/Day - 1782 pages/77 days = 23.142857... pages/day
And I've read 16 pages so far this WEEK!
Yikes. I think I've forgotten how this whole school thing works.
My professor said to plan on 15 hours/week for this class... and I have hardly read for an hour...
I'm sure you know how I'm spending this sunny Saturday!

In other news... We were wandering around Fred Meyer the other day, and 50 foot strands of christmas lights were on sale for $2.75!
**Light Bulb above head**
WAH LAH!! Instant indirect lighting in the kitchen above the cabinets! Cool huh?!

Also in other news, HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANNIVERSARY MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.!
I'm so glad you were famous so I can have Monday off!

New Year, New Job!!

Finally moving on... it's time for a new learning curve!

Since we moved in April 2006 I've been working at Columbia River Bank here in The Dalles, in our Loan Operations department. This means, I've been in our admin building (not an actual "bank" setting), maintaining the back-end support and documentation of loans. I've learned how to produce legal documentation for lending, how to load that documentation onto our operating systems, and also many certification procedures and miscellaneous odds-n-ends. However, as I always have my eyes on something new, I appplied for a Credit Analyst position across the street in our actual "branch", and I got it! I'm quite excited!! I think it's a great opportunity, with MUCH potential for growth. The bank will pay for me to take the required courses here at our college, as well as a 7 month program that will certify me as a Credit Analyst, there-by qualifying me to become a loan officer! At this point, I'm not sure if I want to include lending in my long-term plans, but I do know that this certification will definitely make me more valuable to Columbia River Bank as well as other institutions.

Life is GOOD! (remind me of this after I start my class next week!)

We had the privelege this last Monday & Tuesday of having Troy Patterson and Steve Watts come stay with us! I had fun cooking, and attempting to be domestic! Our special meetings were on Wednesday night in Hood River. We're such a small town that we get special meeting workers for two nights! :-) We'll head in to Portland on Saturday night to stay with Tom and Audrey and then off to Portland Special's on Sunday.

Sorry there's no pictures in this post... I'll update when we get back from PDX!

HAPPY 2007!

GOODBYE JEFF!!!

We'll sure miss him, but we wish happy trails and good luck to Jeff with his new job in Texas!
Jeff was one of our partners in crime in Cancun, and one of Peter's partners in crime in Aruba... Needless to say, he knows far too many stories about us!
Some pics of the party...
Lots of eating (as always)
Lots of visiting...
It was SO good to catch up with some of our Vancouver friends!
L-R: Marissa K., Cody, AlyssaPeter & Tim talking Google talk... Justin & Jeff
Lots of cute kids...
Haakkin being shy - This is NOT normal! I asked if I could take his picture, and he defiantly said "NO!" and made this face. He smiled a perfect smile immediately after the camera flashed. Go figure!:-)Farewell Jeff!

I'm dreaming of a white Christmas...

And we had one! It snowed on Saturday... and stuck until today. Most has melted by tonight, but it was sure fun to have my first white Christmas!
We didn't have a "traditional" Christmas... that is, if there is such a thing! I just made a small Spaghetti meal, and Daniel joined us!
Daniel...Peter... xoxoxSpaghetti...Rolls...Salad & Banana Bread...Gram's olive dish!!! :-)
Finished product...Hope everyone had a Happy Holiday!!! Hugs!!

Weekend baking...

I baked yesterday and today!
Menu:
Butterscotch & Chocolate Sugar CookiesMini Pumpkin Bread Loaves - These turned out really cute!
Lemon & Lime Bars - Lemon is better... the Lime isn't a very strong flavor
Also, Peanut Butter Cups and White & Dark Chocolate Rice Crispy Treats (no pics)
The finished product... 5 baskets for our neighbors + lots of leftovers for visitors! :-)Something about the holiday season puts me in the baking mood! And it always makes the house smell so good! :)
Oh, and Happy Birthday, #49 to my pops!

Gram's Anniversary Gift :-)

We got yet another package in the mail the other day! This one was from G&G Clark. :-)
The past few weeks have been full of suprises!

Matching Olive ApronsOlive dish! This matches the dishes that mom bought us really well! It's darling!

Thank you Grams & Gramps!!!
Peter comes back from Seattle tomorrow, and I'm SOOOO missing him! He's been on a business trip...
I hear the coast is supposed to get 100 mph winds tonight and tomorrow... It's sure whipping around here - sounds like I'm in a wind tunnel right now! Our lights keep flickering... it's a little bit eerie!
Ok, I best get to bed before the power goes out! :-)

Anniversary #1 @ the Oregon Coast

We took Friday off work and headed out Thursday night for our weekend away. Spent Thursday night with Tom & Audrey, then headed out Friday afternoon for Lincoln City. Peter had rented a house on the beach for us to kick back in for a few days. Friday was beautiful... Saturday was a bit overcast, but we made the best of it by shopping! :-) And Sunday the sun broke through for a little bit. Typical coastal weather, but it was SO nice, and SO relaxing to have a long weekend together!!!

Mmmm... Beautiful sunset, Friday evening - Taken off our deck.
This is probably the closest he will ever come to being a cowboy! :-PMe - Same log, obviously this provided us with some entertainment for a few minutes. I love this picture! It's going to hang above the fireplace!!!Oh yes, and...

Hope everybody else had a great weekend too!!!

Ummm, I (the husband) had to add this since she (the wife)
didn't add the picture of my expression of love for her.

Happy Birthday to my Honey!!!

I made some Creme Brulee tonight for Peter's birthday. T'was my first time making it... and he ate it!! :-)
Look at that STUD!
Peter got flowers at work today from some mysterious girl, who claims to be "totally in love" with him... Hmmm...
Happy Birthday to you, my love!
And, out! Here's to another fantastic year!