First Week

Andy's first week at his new job went well. It was nice that he had an off Friday during this first week.

I tried to handle all of the details with moving, renting our house, and work on our car's hail damage claim.

We've got the ball rolling with our Texas house. Repairs, cleaning, and updating to code are being done. Hopefully, once all of that is finished, it will be rented quickly.

We were thrilled that our truck was delivered this week. That allowed us to drop our car off to be assessed. I don't know how long it will take but look forward to hearing what they think.

We were shocked to learn that it costs $4-5 to wash and dry one load of laundry. Four loads later, I'm really hoping that our temporary living stuff will be delivered this week. Beyond just more clothes, we will also have coats and cooler weather items. Andy was able to comfortably wear shorts and a t-shirt one day this week. Apparently, we are supposed to see 90 sometime this week. I never imagined that this would be the case when it is 100 degrees in Texas.

THE MOVE (parts 4 & 5)

Saturday, we drove to Phoenix from Las Cruces. This drive felt like it took much longer than the previous two days.

Sunday, Andy got to take the dog for a good hike with the dog before we left for day 4 on the road. We drove the rest of the way to California today. Now, we are getting settled in at the Residence Inn by Marriott here in town. We have a 2 bedroom suite and are thankful for the extra room.

Andy will have a short drive to work tomorrow morning. He has to be there at 6:30 am. We will have to see if he needs to continue to start so early. I'll try to talk with all of our relocation people to coordinate drop off of our stuff and be armed with information for the next while.

THE MOVE (part 3)

Andy worked magic this morning getting the stuff back into the car. However, there were are few hiccups along the way. He was supposed to stop in Pecos for us to have lunch. I was buried in a book, looked up to ask about how close we were to lunch, and he told me that we passed through Peocs 30 minutes ago. Oops! Thankfully, we still had Van Horn before the long way to El Paso. I was very happy for us to have some lunch and thought things were proceeding smoothly until he slowed down and pulled off to the side of the road. At first, I thought something was wrong with the car, but we were being pulled over by a police man. He was very nice and only gave us a warning for going 88 in an 80 mph stretch. After a some construction and traffic in El Paso, we made it to Las Cruces. We were able to meet up with my great-aunt on my father's side and some of her family. It was a lovely dinner and visit! We feel quite a bit more tired this evening than yesterday so we off to bed early (we've crossed into Mountain Standard Time).

THE MOVE (part 2)

Today, I worked magic! I packed the car with an amazing amount of stuff with room for both pets and both of us. Pictures will come later.

We drove for about 5 hours from Fort Worth to Odessa. The drive was actually pretty easy. We gave the cat medicine so that he was sedated and didn't meow the entire drive. We are comfortable in our room at the TownePlace Suites by Marriott. There is plenty of room for us and our stuff.

Tomorrow, we are headed to Las Cruces.

THE MOVE (part 1)

So, we are once again moving; this time to California. We had packers come on Tuesday, and movers came Wednesday to load the truck.

Tuesday took much longer than they anticipated. The packers arrived at 10:30 am and left at 11:30 pm when the job was estimated to be 4-6 hours. We would have been finished earlier, but one of the packers didn't label the boxes with the contents that he packed. This wasn't discovered until they were doing the final paperwork. So, the boxes had to be opened and inspected so that they could be properly labeled.

We also had the car's windshield replaced on Tuesday. For those who didn't know, our car got hit pretty hard while at the DFW airport when the storms came through last Tuesday evening. We will deal with the body's damage once we get to California.

Wednesday also took longer than expected, but thankfully not as long as Tuesday. The movers disassembled the furniture and loaded everything on the truck. We were a little concerned though because we didn't know when they would arrive. They finally got to the house at about 1 pm and left at 8 pm. Andy and I tag teamed throughout the day. We both ran errands prior to the movers arrival. I got to visit Mother. Andy got to go to work one last time. The truck was picked up to be shipped to California. After the movers left, we met up with Andy's parents and grandparents for dinner. Then, we crashed!

Fabulous Food and Freezing Finds

FIND #1

We got a flier for Albertson's the other week that included some coupons. One of them was for pork loin for $0.99 per pound. Since the pieces were all quite large, I got $40 worth of meet for under $10.

FIND #2

Since there is no way that we could eat a 10 pound piece of pork even with several guests, we cut a little over half of it into several roasts to freeze. I used the remaining 4 lbs to make an apple roast pork recipe I had run across on the internet. The cooking method was nothing special; I cooked it in the oven and then shredded it. The gem of the recipe was how to freeze the leftovers!! The instructions are for freezing single portion sizes. Since I always struggle with there being way to much food for the two of us, this was the major attraction of the recipe. I sprayed a muffin tin with non-stick spray, filled the cups with the shredded meat and juice, and popped the tin in the freezer. Once frozen, the individual servings can go in a plastic bag, and Andy can pull them out whenever he likes.

FIND/THOUGHT #3

I think the muffin pan method will work well for chicken broth, among other things. As I was cleaning up in the kitchen, I realized that my mini-loaf pan would also work and be PERFECT for casseroles. Andy gets so tired of having to eat the same thing over and over because there is so much left over, even in a small pyrex pan. I can't want to put these to use again!!

To say the least, I was proud of each of my finds. By the time I'd finished, I was ecstatic!!

Soups

Andy's cousin Emily came over for a few days to help me make him some soups. I like to make a whole bunch at once so that I am able to use up all of the ingredients like carrots, celery, green onions, and herbs. I had how I only need one of two of them for a recipe and the rest go to waste. Even when I plan really carefully for the weeks meals, we aren't able to finish off the rest of the stuff. So, I make a whole bunch of soups to use up most of the leftover vegetables. I hope that sometime in the next year I will be able to find a used upright freezer for under $200 so that I don't have to play tetris when I get something from or put something in the freezer. After a week's worth of cooking and many games of tetris, he has a freezer full of soups that should last him several months. This variety should keep him happy.

Carrot Soup

Blueberry Lemonade Soup

Zucchini-Potato Soup

Creamy Cucumber Soup

Tomato & Bread Soup

Delicious Sausage Soup

Minestrone

Hearty Bean & Vegetable Soup

Chilled Avocado & Mint Soup

Remodeling our great room

Before moving back to our house, we had about two months to fix or change anything and move slowly. We made the decision that we wanted to change the flooring in our great room from carpet to laminate wood flooring. While we were at it, we switched out the baseboards for a larger and nicer design.

Since we wanted to spend less money on the project, we decided to do the work ourselves. We thought that we had tools we could borrow from others if we didn't already have them. Unfortunately, we found that many times what we had or borrowed didn't work as anticipated. So, Andy got a bunch of new tools including a table saw, reciprocating saw, (larger) nail gun, air compressor, and shop vac. Here are some pictures of his new toys that we are oh so glad that we purchased after getting over the sticker shock.

Those two were part of a package deal. He was really excited that the air compressor has a removable chest and is on wheels!

Do you see that big grin??

This buddy is my friend. I don't remember having used one but quickly found out that it was worth its weight in gold (well, maybe not at $1000+/ounce). I can't imagine our mini construction project with out it.

So, over many weekends, interrupted by other small projects, we put the floor in. I laid out the flooring pattern, Andy made the cuts, and we worked together to put in the pieces. Andy finished the quarter round and transition pieces once we moved in to the house.

Before:

During:

We removed the carpet, and Andy worked hard to rip up the carpet tacks and baseboards.

We readied the concrete foundation and laid down this black plastic with the help of friends.

Then, the foam underlayment went down and I started laying out the laminate pieces.

Finally, we are making progress!!!

However, each time we would make good progress, we would find that there was something wrong with a current or previous row. So, we'd have to remove that part to figure out what was wrong. It was two steps forward, one step back. But then finally we were finished with the flooring and moved in to the house.

Finished project:

Great room and kitchen

Living room

Dining room

And now that we've finished that project and have all of these wonderful tools, clearly, we need another project...can't you hear Andy groaning... At least the other projects on our list are smaller and are not immediately necessary.

I haven't fallen off the face of the Earth

Since February, there have been quite a few highlights. I'll dedicate individual posts to the full details and pictures, but this list will give you the gist of things.

We've packed up, moved back to our house, unpacked, and decorated.

Before moving in to the house, we changed our flooring in the great room.

We've worked on the landscaping some; unfortunately, our wildflowers didn't come up. We're planning on planting a garden in the backyard.

I've been sewing and have more to do.

Andy is now able to telecommute at least one day a week.

We've had lots of family gatherings. Meg, my sister, has even flown in a few times; we've seen each other more in the last year than probably the previous five!

I've stocked Andy up on soups for a while. There is NO room in the freezer!

I am researching homemade and natural alternatives to some household items. Hopefully, I can save us some money and help us be healthier.

And maybe the biggest winner is that our cat now goes potty outside (unless he is sick). No more kitty litter mess in the guest bathroom! No more stinky odors! Less work for Andy!

SHOES

My cousin, Beth, came down to Texas for the weekend. I met up with them in Lewisville to visit my mother. It was great to spend time with all of them. I was really excited that I wore real shoes for the first time since New Year's Eve when my toenail got flipped up. For several weeks, I've been able to wear tennis shoes, but Sunday I walked out in my black boots that have a two inch heels. While my feet were quite tired after walking through the mall, my injured toe didn't bother me at all. Yippee!!! Maybe after a few more weeks, I'll be able to go without a bandaid on my toe. That would be just in time for open toe shoe season. Here's hoping!!