9.28.2007

crazy week = no posts

this week has been BUSY. we have been on the move day after day, doing this or that, accomplishing like never before.

this week we have:

- put our house up for sale.
- perpetually cleaned our house, as it must always be prepared to be viewed. (this is really difficult for a perfectionist like myself. getting ready to leave the house is like a two hour process!! it's ridiculous.)
- gone through the majority of our belongings for an upcoming garage sale (maybe next saturday?) this was a daunting task. i like to throw stuff away. justin likes his things and doesn't like to throw away. which is fine, i just really like having as few belongings as humanly possible (with the exception of shoes, hehe).
- priced almost all of those items.
- did some target shopping (actually twice)
- and the last two days have been spent watching the d.senno kids, whose mama (cathy) had some crazy hip surgery on wednesday. zach, 5, and annie and sophie, 2.5, are great kids. finn loves, LOVES to hang out with them. we look forward to spending more time with them as cathy continues to recuperate.

tomorrow justin and i get some time away. we are going out to lincoln for the husker game. woohoo! we like to go to at least one a year. and justin's wonderful boss(es) make that possible for us. i can't wait to get some of that overpriced, ballpark food. mmmmm. finn will stay with our pals justin and susie... thanks guys! and hopefully after the game, we will get some boardgaming in with j and s. and that takes us to sunday, which hopefully will be VERY restful, because we need it.

so until next week...

9.23.2007

Arrrrrr...



My pirate name is:


Dread Pirate Bonney



Like the famous Dread Pirate Roberts, you have a keen head for how to make a profit. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

9.20.2007

i wish i had her attitude.


there is a lot to be done around here.
before having a kid, getting things done was easy for me. i would have a whole day to accomplish a task, and do it right. i don't do well when i have a limited amount of time to get something done. i feel like if i can't get it done all at once, why even start?
and so that is why things have been put off. mainly - getting things ready for a garage sale. if i keep up the way i have been, things will just be sent to the goodwill. not that that would be bad, but earning a little extra cash would be nice.
so this is it. i am done procrastinating. if i can only work one hour a day, i will. i promise, to you, i CAN DO IT!
but first i have to iron some shirts for justin... THEN i'll get around to that garage sale stuff. hahaha.

9.19.2007

crabby crabster

...is what describes finn best today. actually, the last two or three days. he has this nasty runny nose, which i suspect, is from getting some teeth. that, or some random germ. who knows.

at any rate, yesterday i noticed that i hadn't scheduled his 18 mo. check up/shots yet, so i called up and had it scheduled for today. i figured, if he is going to be miserable, we may as well squeeze it all into one week. so he got his shot. which was fine, he just cried a little.

we got home, and we were hanging out on the couch. finn did some maneuver which caused him to flip off of the couch backwards and upside down, landing directly on his head. the following ten minutes were a serious cry-fest. when i heard his head meet the floor, i thought for sure this would be the first trip to the ER... but there was no blood. so we skipped that.

so it's not that finn doesn't have a reason to be crabby. he has at least three or four reasons. but the fact remains that no one likes hanging out with a crabster.

finn's stats: (for those who care, grandparents mostly)
weight - 27.1 lbs. (65th percentile) this was his exact weight three months ago!
height - 32.5 inches (51st percentile) grown 1/2 inch in three months.

9.17.2007

finn at the grand canyon

9.15.2007

passing the time...

in four hours i will wake up finn, buckle him in the car and trek down to the airport to pick up justin. we are both excited for this. in the last ten days, finn has seen justin for about ten hours. i can't wait to see him run and hug his daddy - finn loves him so much.

i have tried to keep us busy while justin has been away to make the time go faster. on thursday, we spent the entire afternoon and dinner at our friends house. on friday we went to the play place at the mall for an hour, window shopped, and got a free meal at panera from one of my old friends who works there. we also played outside for awhile. and today we went grocery shopping and cleaned the house. i even bought myself a personal digiorno pizza for dinner tonite! yum.

life hasn't been all playing with friends and shopping though. here are things that have happened since justin left that haven't been so great:
- my brother-in-law, cameron, is crushing me in fantasy baseball playoffs.
- a bug bit me right under the eye, which is now all puffy and funny looking.
- i was walking out of the bathroom and closing the door behind me, when i heard a high pitched yelp, and realized i smashed my dog's head in the door. whoops. she's okay though.
- my uncle passed away on thursday, after a long and difficult battle with cancer. pray for his family.

we can't wait for justin to be home. rudy sleeps better when he's here. and when rudy sleeps better, we all sleep better. (rudy = dog).

9.14.2007

regular, ol' finn

this is the finn you are likely to find when there is not a whole slew of new people around... a goofy, smiley child who is serious about anything on wheels.

if i were a book, i would be...

haha... this made me laugh, thanks for the link lindsay...




You're The Hobbit!
by J.R.R. Tolkien

All you wanted was a nice cup of tea when some haggard crazy old man
came into your life and told you it was time to do something with yourself. Now you're
all conflicted about whether to stick with your stay-at-home lifestyle or follow this
crazy person into the wild. While you're very short and a little furry, you seem to be
surrounded by an even greater quantity of short folks lately. Try not to lose your ring,
but keep its value in perspective!


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

9.11.2007

crazy blog

three posts down is the info on our trip... i tried to get that one to post ahead of the pictures, but my plan did not work... anyway, enjoy...

me with a funny face, and finn at the grand canyon!


zack making everyone nervous


finn


finn was loving the puddles after the rainstorm!


best pals... finn really likes uncle zacky

meteor crater, one of two in the world


the grandest canyon of them all...



finn looking out over the canyon (actually, i think he was looking for ants, but whatever...)


we're back

so i have loads of pictures to share from our trip! and there are some i will have to share later, as i am waiting to receive the pictures from my mom and brother.

so the plane trips there were not too bad! from o to dallas was fine, but the dallas/fw airport is crazy! they have these trams that take you to the different terminals - they are very fast! then the trip from dallas to phoenix went great, as the three seats across the aisle were filled with a father, his 20 month old daughter and an empty seat! we strapped finn into the empty seat next to abby and they played the whole time! it was a dream.

we gained two hours on our way to az, so friday seemed like it was extra long. my mom and brother, zack, arrived in phoenix shortly after we did. we picked up our rental car and were quickly beginning our southwestern adventure. arizona is a lot more mountainous than i was expecting! it was also fun to see all of the crazy cacti.

our first stop on the trip was sedona (pictures for this leg will come later, as i didn't take any! but mom and zack got some great shots...). we ate a little dinner, and headed over to the pink jeep tour. mom had been to sedona before and had taken one of these tours, however, at that time, they took the less extreme tour. we took the broken arrow tour which took us all over the towering red rock for some great views. i'll share more details once i get some pictures to share. the tour lasted two hours, and then we were on our way to flagstaff for sleeping!! finn went to bed just fine that night, but woke up at 4:30!! oh well.

saturday morning we went to see one of only two meteor craters on earth (i believe there is a third one on the moon...). it was a bit pricey to view this hole in the ground, but what the heck, we were on vacation! but it pretty much was, a hole in the ground. a big hole. after that we hopped in the car and traveled along route 66 (through seligman az, which is the birthplace of route 66!) to peach springs, where we went to the grand canyon caverns. we went as a family to a cavern in tennessee, so it was fun to carry on the tradition. finn even met a little friend along the way. after the caverns, we went through the hualapai indian reservation, hoping to travel down a dirt road, to the colorado river AND the bottom of the grand canyon. the ranger guarding the road mentioned that about 9 miles had been washed out the previous week. it was still okay to travel on, but as there was rain headed our way, she suggested to avoid going down. because the ground is so dense, flooding is quite typical in that area. so we were pretty sad that that whole thing didn't work out. we spent the next 30 minutes trying to find a road my brother had heard of that would take us to the grand canyon faster than going back to the freeway... we tried one road, and it ended up leading to the seligman city dump! oh well.... so we just took the freeway up to the GC. we got settled into our rooms, ate, and went to bed.

sunday we spent pretty much the whole day at the GC. it was amazing. no photo can capture the vastness and beauty of the canyon. we were able to view it from many different points, all looking similar, but unique in their own way. we even got caught in a little rain storm for about 15 minutes. and following that storm was a double rainbow, right in the canyon! it was beautiful. we ended the day with a beautiful sunset off of hopi point.

on monday we hopped back in the car and traveled south to phoenix to catch our flight. we were all supposed to fly to chicago together, and then part our separate ways from there... however, many flights had been delayed because of the huge storm in dallas. for awhile i was certain we were all staying the night in phoenix again, but mom worked her magic and got us rerouted. it ended up working better because we got on a direct flight to o. finn and i left my family at their terminal (as we were in a different one...) by the time i got my luggage checked, it was already 2:00 and finn still hadn't had lunch, AND had leaked through his diaper and shorts :( we grabbed a quick burger and off through security we went. of course, we were chosen at random for the "additional security check" and had to have everything in our bags examined carefully. i was frisked, and imagine my surprise when they asked me to hold out finn's arms so he could be frisked too!! he is EIGHTEEN months old! it was pretty funny. he did well though.

a couple of hours later we were home, and ready for bed.

this was a wonderful trip... a little stressful with a small child, but wonderful. it was great to be able to go somewhere with my family, as family vacations were on the short side when we were little because of finances... so this was a great treat. everyone should see the grand canyon... and you could easily spend 2-3 days just exploring the canyon! thanks mom and zack for making this possible, we had lots of fun!

9.06.2007

arizona, get ready!

in july my brother called up and asked if finn and i wanted to go to the grand canyon in september with him and my mom... my reaction: "well, YEAH!"
so tomorrow morning, we will leave the house at 6AM to catch our flight.
we are scheduled to do the following during our mini vaca.

- two hour jeep ride through the sedona red rock
- touring a HUGE meteor crater
- going through the grand canyon caverns and surrounding area
- visiting the grand canyon and maybe even the indian reservation which is located near the bottom of the canyon!

other than that, i hope to go swimming at the hotel pool and eat some good food.

this will be the longest flight that finn has ever been on (3.5 hours!!) and probably his last free flight, as they start charging once kids turn two. so here's hoping finn doesn't drive all of the flyers crazy.

we will be back monday night, and will get some pictures and narrative posted next tuesday! until then....

HAHA, I COULDN'T STAY AWAY! IT'S 4:35am. I JUST RECEIVED A CALL THAT OUR FLIGHT WAS CANCELLED OUT OF O TO CHICAGO (WHERE I WAS SUPPOSED TO MEET UP WITH MY FAM!!). SO NOW, INSTEAD, WE FLY TO DALLAS AND THEN PHOENIX... WHICH MEANS SHORTER FLIGHTS, BUT WITHOUT ANY FAMILY TO HELP WITH CRAZY CHILD! FINN IS RACKING UP THE TOTAL OF AIRPORTS HE HAS BEEN IN, IN HIS SHORT LIFE!


-OMAHA
-O'HARE
-NASHVILLE
-KNOXVILLE
-ST. LOUIS
AND NOW
-PHOENIX
-DALLAS!

ANYWAY, THOUGHT I'D UPDATE YOU, SEEMS LIKE AIRPLANE TRIPS NEVER GO THE WAY THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO IN MY FAMILY! AAARRRGGGHHH!

9.04.2007

ant hunting



finn really enjoyed playing with the ants yesterday...