Thank you for always being there for me and the kids. Doing whatever you can to keep the house running smoothly

Its appreciated more than you know

–Daddy

and when I get bored, I’ll just change random things

case in point, new theme for my site. no reasoning, just thought it was cool

anyways…. on the homefront the kids are almost ready to walk. Hailey stands and wobbles, too scared to take a step though. Tyler, welllllllll, he’s a little lazy. Gonna take him longer. Getting ready for Halloween too. No hints on what the kids will be, you’re going to have to wait and find out. But they will trick or treat and I will have to, um, inspect all their haul. bwahahahaha

I just wanted to say thank you to my husband for being such a wonderful father!! I know times are hard for you right now and I am sure you are ready to take off your super dad hat…..and get back to work! but I just wanted you to know that I love you very much and appreciate everything you are doing for our family right now! The three of you are my inspiration and make me get through the day! So keeping it short and sweet I love you and our kids more than anything and I am blessed to be able to come home to you every day!

hugs & kisses,

mommy

p.s. to all the husbands and fathers who read this…even though we might be naggy sometimes….. your still our HERO!

Jen got to come home from gallbladder surgery sunday night. She’s still in a lot of discomfort, but VERY happy to be home w/ the kids again

She missed them, they missed mommy. Jen went to the dr today and he said she’s doing ok, but it will be a few weeks till most of the pain/cramping subsides. But she’s DEFINITELY a trooper, and me and the kids are glad she’s home and doing good.

Love you mommy

Dad, Hailey, & Tyler

Jen rules. I was the last one out of the house this morning, and there sat a lunch all neatly packed for me.

Subtle, yet GOOD hint that I shouldnt eat out so much

Love you baby. Thanks!

So yeah, I commute 500 miles/week.  Being on the expressway that much, you see a lot of crazy stuff.

The past 6 months I’ve had not 1, 2, but THREE trucks blow out tires next to me, a car next to me got rear-ended at about 40mph, and today, a semi truck ran against a guardrail in front of me for about 5 seconds. Dodging sparks/ raining rubber… so much fun.

Happy Tuesday morning!

So, a part of the reason we moved out of our last house, every weekend was a Home Depot weekend. There was CONSTANTLY something to fix, replace, etc, and with both of us working Mon-Fri, the weekends were our only option.

Now we’re in a new house, and I figured all that weekend warrior stuff was done. Think again. I guess you’re never actually done with your house. Last week was landscaping, this week, my oh so new favorite, DRYWALL. Man does drywalling suckkkkkkkkk. Wielding 90# sheets of gypsum, not exactly my idea of a fun weekend. But, it needed to get done. When our builder built our house, by code, they only have to drywall the walls that back to the interior of the house, and sure enough, that’s all they did. Hell, they didn’t even have an option to finish the garage at the time, otherwise I might have considered it. That left us w/ about 30 feet of undrywalled walls.  A few months ago we insulated the openings between the studs, and said later we’d come back w/ drywall.

That later happened to be yesterday. I woke up, and for some reason was feeling really ambitious, which as a sidenote, if you’re needing to do some drywall, do it on one of those days you do feel REALLY ambitious otherwise you’ll never make it. That’s some hard work. Anyway, we made our trek to pick up the drywall, brought it home and dropped it in the middle of the garage. From there we did any parts that would take full sheets, leaving the custom sections till the end. The part that really sucks is cutting. Hanging/securing the drywall to the wall isn’t all the difficult, but any cuts are a pain to say the least. Ok, so about 6 1/2 hours later, the drywall is cut/pieced/hung. It gives SUCH a different look to the garage from studs/insulation. Looks great.

Now wait, you mean I’m not done. We have to tape/mud/sand too? WTF

Well, knowing there is more work coming stinks, but there is NO WAY I would have been able to get this far w/o the help of Jen. Little did she know when I said I was gonna drywall today that it would involve her. Drywall is a two person operation, and she was soooooooooooo much help. Thanks baby. I know you’re sore too, but the rest I’ll finish and won’t bother you anymore, I promise!

I should have taken a picture of us last night. We were head to toe white from all the drywall dust. Once I get the taping/mudding underway, maybe I’ll take a few pictures.

It was definitely a learning experience for us. Luckily its a garage and I wasn’t too concerned about how it turned out. I think I’ll stick to computers though, drywalling isn’t for me!

So my daily commute consists of 80 miles of highway driving. During that time I obviously am near trucks a good portion of that time.

For the THIRD time in less than 6 months, I have had a semi blow out a tire next to me on the expressway.

Luckily today’s incident the trucks tire that blew was facing the other direction and didn’t destroy my car. But the other two times I’ve had to do evasive maneuvers to not either have the blown out tires bounce off my hood or have me drive over it.

The expressway can be a scary place, and luckily so far I’m still accident free!

So the Mercedes was nice, but stuff was just insanely expensive to fix if it broke. We had a top of the line warranty, which was up very shortly, so it was time to cut our ties with it and get something that:

1) doesn’t take premium gas

2) is more reliable

3) has another good warranty

What’s weird is Jen and I really weren’t actively looking for a new car. The thought has been tossed around after that last round of Mercedes repairs, but that’s as far as we got. Last Friday we were going out to dinner w/ the in-laws, and on the way to the restaurant, we were stopping at the Toyota dealer to pick up the new car they had just bought. While they were off signing paperwork, Jen and I took a stroll around the lot. We saw an AWESOME fully loaded double-cab Tundra. Such an awesome truck, but at about 14-18mpg, not the best option for the 2 of us that drive 800 miles a week together! So looking at Jen’s parents car, the Camry….. hmm, nice ride, and it gets what, 30+mpg… hey now! Maybe we’ll look a little harder.

So, loving the Internet as much as I do, I did my research. I searched ALL Toyota dealers w/in a 50 mile range for the car that would fit our needs (and my legs), and the 2007 Camry did. Having never driven one, I got to the dealer about 30 mins before Jen, and took a 4 cylinder and a V6 one for a ride. Both very nice cars, but you can’t beat a 268HP V6 in a passenger car. And normally when you drop a larger V6 in a car, you can just cut the mpg by about 20% over the 4 cylinder. Not so on this one. Went from 33mpg/highway to 31mpg/highway with that upgrade, making it a MUCH better option than a 16mpg Tundra for either of us.

After crunching the numbers, it’s really not going to be that much more a month for us. What we’re paying more for in monthly payment, we’ll save in gas/repairs, so it’s near a wash for us, and now we have 2 cars that are only a year/two old.

I have to admit. I’ve always been a GM man, and the Mercedes was our first foray into foreign cars. But after having driven both the Tundra and Camry, they’re both really nice cars! And if anybody is looking for a Toyota, the guy we dealt with, Dave Sosnowski @ David Bruce in Bourbonnais, IL (there’s a free plug for you Dave, do I get the next 3 oil changes free????) was a great salesman. No BS, no haggling, and any question we had, he had an answer for. The overall experience was great, and oh yeah, we have a new car out of the deal too! I was prepared for the whole "this is what you paid for the car, I’ll give you $300 over that!" argument, but it basically went down- Dave: here is what we paid for the car, here is what you pay, here is MSRP, sound good? I’m used to the whole GM deal "now wait, I KNOW that LS package is $1500, why are you charging $2000, etc’  and sit at the dealer for 5 hours haggling. This was 1- me driving the car, 2- getting the price and options for warranty 3- deciding yes/no 4- leaving with a smile

Oh by the way, click -here- for a picture of the new car! Right before it made its maiden 50 mile voyage to work (which by the way, it rode way better than the Mercedes, and had more pick-up to boot)

So every 17 years we get these bugs around here called cicadas

they’re insanely loud, big, ugly, and FEARLESS. they fly around aimlessly for about 2 months, only staying alive long enough to make your daily commute hell.

They haven’t been around my house too much, but on my way to/from work, they’re everywhere.

The whole fearless part comes in that I think they actually AIM at you. When driving to pickup my lunch, I had my drivers side window open, and BAM, I get hit in the NECK by one. and they’re not small. really gets your attention. they’ll be gone soon, and we wont see them again till I’m almost 50 years old!

good riddens you beady-eyed sob’s!

[Listening to: Seventeen - Winger]