Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a little girl who lived a happy life.  (She was little in stature and but not age.)  The little girl had many wonderful friends, a great church, loved her job and even loved to go to graduate school.  Life was good.  Life was so good that one day she decided to buy a house.  Her Dad was not happy.  He thought that home ownership would be too hard on the little girl, but she was very stubborn and determined.

Fortunately for her the economy started to go bad just when she started looking, so houses became affordable.  After looking at many, many houses, the little girl found the perfect house.  It was cute, affordable and small – just big enough for her to live comfortably.  She made an offer on the house but the bank frowned and said “this is going to take a while”.  So the little girl decided to wait.

And wait.

And wait.

Finally, after much patience (the little girl had a lot of patience) and waiting, the little girl decided that she couldn’t wait any more.  Fortunately the owner of the house had an idea and said, “hey, why don’t you just move in and live there while you are waiting!”  The little girl was once again very happy.  And once again her Dad was not.  “I’m not sure you want to do this!”, he said, but of course the little girl was still very stubborn and decided to do it anyway.

So she moved in.

And life was good once again.

Until.

Until she came home from visiting friends and discovered a lake in her basement.  “See there!”, said her Dad.  “I knew this wasn’t a great idea!”  But the little girl just smiled and thought to herself, “Be quiet, Dad.  You’re not helping matters much.”  (She was too polite to say this to her Dad.)

As it turned out, water had started coming into the basement from the drain pipe and no one could figure out why.  It wasn’t nasty water, thank goodness, but it was cold and wet.  The plumber man that came out to the house ran a snake down the drain and said that there was a blockage 45 feet down the line, but he didn’t know why.  So the plumber man was going to go back the next day and run a camera down the drain to see what the blockage was.  That is good.  Meanwhile, water is still coming up the drain, which is bad.  But the owners of the house decided to stay and make sure that water got pumped out, which is good.

Meanwhile, the little girl had to move out of her house.  There was no hot water because the hot water heater broke in the flood, and the toilet couldn’t be flushed because that caused the water to come up faster even though the water in the basement wasn’t nasty water.

All-in-all the little girl was okay.  The owners of the house were taking responsibility.  The house was getting fixed.  And the little girl was safe and warm.

–to be continued.

Not last night but the night before
Two good friends came knocking on my door.
Karla and Jackie wanted to see the new house
And because I don’t have TV it was quiet as a mouse.

Karla and Jackie walked around inspecting
And exlaimed: “This is exactly what we were expecting!
It is small and cute and exactly what you need,
Hey, you need to show us around – take us, you lead!”

We walked to the kitchen and on to the bath
Karla took measurements and did some math.
We went into the basement and saw the octopus
Jackie exlaimed, “Ak! That thing is bigger than us!”

Then we went into the office where I store all my books
And all my yarn and needles and hooks.
Karla proclaimed “My, you must really like to read,
But we should get rid of the things you don’t need.”

Then they said good bye and I let them out the door
And when I turned around the it wouldn’t open any more.
So I walked around the house trying to get in
When I discovered a window that wasn’t quite pinned.

The moral of the story is: don’t close the door behind
because you may get locked out and feel a bit maligned.
So here’s a bit of advice, and it is really prfound,
Always, always, always have a spare key lying around!

Now that my second final is over (turned it in at 9AM this morning, thank you very much) I can once again join life in real time.  So how am I spending it, you might wonder?  By updating you, of course, my faithful readers.  I have some eye candy for you today.

Aparently during last weekend when I really, really needed to focus my time and energy on studying, I finished two projects.  First up, the faithful mittens, seen here on one of my lovely new dining room chairs.

Aren’t they cute?  Very colorful and fun.  The thumbs are a little squared but I should say that my first attempt at kitchener stitch as very successful.  It was actually very easy, much easier than I had expected.  Kate emailed me some directions and I watched a video and it all made complete sense.  For those of you non knitting people, kitchener stitch is where you join 2 pieces of knitted material so that it looks like one completely knitted piece.  Which means that you have to weave some yarn in and out of the loops of the 2 pieces in such a way that it mimics actual knitting.  Cool, eh?

Now for the surprise.  I found these lurking in my new china cabinet.  May I present some chunky socks?

Very warm and fuzzy.  Great bed socks.  These were knit in practically no time at all on size 13 needles.  (My first real pair of socks that I finished a few months ago were knit on size 2 needles, just for comparison.)

Now I just need to find a new knitting project. Hm….what shall I do? 

Oh, and I need to show you the first two lovely housewarming gifts that I have received.  First up is Jane’s little suprise.  She came over and presented me with the lovely 6-piece place setting of dishes and a wonderful glass 3-tiered display thing.

Seen here modelled on my new lovely buffet. And here is Kristin’s gift of some soup bowls and some different soups, pictured again on my new buffet.

I love that wooden spoon and have become quite attached to it.  I now use it to make oatmeal or grits in the morning.  THANK YOU JANE AND KRIS!

Those of you who know me well know how absolutely stressed I get at the end of a semester.  Papers and finals are tough on me.  This semester is no different.  Not only do I have to stay on top of my greek class (learning a language requires constant attention), but I had a paper due in my other class that I didn’t start until this last weekend.  Add to all of this the move into a house and you can well imagine how absolutely exhausted I am. 

So last night, after working on my paper from 4-11 PM, I went home and crashed.  I simply ran. out. of. gas.  The sleep was extremely welcome because I also happen to be prone to insomnia when in a highly stressed out state.  I only slept for 7.5 hours, but they were pure bliss.  I woke up this morning feeling very refreshed and energized (and relieved to discover that my trash was actually picked up, but that is another story).

I was also relieved to get home to a warm house last night, as the overnight low was something like -5463125 degrees.  That octopus really knows how to keep a house warm.  I also think that Camille has been very happy to have her own house, a place that will protect her from the extreme cold, wind and snow.  As I was sitting in my car this morning warming her up a little she started making some wierd noises.  I assumed they were just protest to the -522138 degrees outside and thought nothing more.

So on my way to work I called my dad and was talking with him when Camille just. died.  At a stop sign.  With cars behind me.  So I hung up with dad and started to panick about Camille.  Now realistically, she is 17 years old, which has got to be something like 261 human years, so you know her time is coming.  I’ve been aware of this for quite some time, but as she doesn’t seem to show too many signs of slowing down, I just keep on chugging away with her.  Luckily she started right back up and I was able to go on my way.

So I called my dad back and his first question: “Did you run out of gas?”  To which I thought: “Gas?  HOLY (*&(*^&%!  Gas!” 

Yes.  I ran. out. of. gas.

Camille’s tank holds 16 gallons – I put in 16.3.  Thank goodness that I was able to make it to a gas station before she completely ran out, because walking to a gas station in    -54324 degrees with the wind howling would not have been fun.

In an attempt to become financially sound, I have worked hard to pay off all my credit debt – which as of last month I did.  Or so I thought.  I missed the balance of my BOA card by 82 cents.  So I received a bill this month in my online bill pay thing for 82 cents.  Except that when I went to pay it, I was not allowed to pay less than $1.  So I paid the $1 and now the credit card owes me 18 cents.  Now that is ka-razy I tell you, just crazy.

In other news, my garage is working fine.  I decided to start parking in the garage after last week’s little “dusting” of snow which surprised me last Friday morning.  And while I was out there brusing off my car and warming it up, I thought “why am I doing this when I have a garage?”.  So now I am totally prepared for the 4-6 inches the weathermen up here think we’re going to get tomorrow night.

And in still other news, I had my first “official” house guest on Saturday.  Jane stopped by and brought me a little gift – wasn’t that sweet of her?  I’ll post a picture of it tomorrow, but she bought a 6-piece place setting for me – dinner plates, salad plates and bowls to match, along with a nice glass 3-tiered display thingie that is looking really good on the buffet in my kitchen holding fruit.  Except that I should be eating the fruit and not looking at it, but at least I have the fruit, right?

And in other, other, other news I am about to have a crazy-busy 2 weeks trying to finish both classes.  Between now and Dec. 17 here is my task list for school: quiz in greek tomorrow, 1-page summary paper due in greek tomorrow, 12-page personal doctrinal statement due in Polity, last review homework for greek, greek final and Polity final.  Plus normal work and hopefully at some point in there I would like to sleep.  So, aside from the picture tomorrow, I’m not sure how much I’ll be blogging.  Sorry.

Toodledo!

Before proper introductions can be made with the New House, I have a few pics of the family I need to show.  The weekend before Thanksgiving I took a trip to Atlanta because my niece Gabby was baptized/dedicated/christened.  Here is Olivia and Gabby.

Olivia and Gabby

(On a side note, Olivia “called” me yesterday to see if I was going to have a Christmas tree…so I asked her if she would come and chop it down for me and she said “NO!”.  So I asked her if she would come and help me decorate it, and she said “No, you have to do it yourself…”.  That’s how much my niece loves me!)

Me and Olivia

And here is one my my Mom, Dad and Gabby.

Gabby's Christening

And now….drum roll please……here is the Octopus!

House Front

It has a cute little screened in 3-seasonal porch, which will be perfect for reading in the Spring, Summer and Fall.

Front Porch

I also have a “real” dining room.

Dining Room

Kitchen

And the kitchen, which is a little small….

and finally, what you have all been waiting to see, the OCTOPUS!

Yup, that is a real, working Gravity Heater, aka, an Octopus Heater.  And it is soon to be mine.  Happy Friday!

My, my, my, oh how time flies.  It has been several event-filled weeks since my last confessional blog entry.  And not all of them good so I’ll pass over the bad things.

My youngest niece was Christened/Baptized/Dedicated the weekend before Thanksgiving, so I went down to Atlanta for that.  It was an all too brief trip, but a good one.  Jude’s parents and oldest sister were there as well and we all celebrated Thanksgiving dinner together on the Sunday before Thanksgiving.  Gabby is 15 months old and seriously wants to do everything that Olivia does…much to the annoyance of the older sister (I totally know how that feels!), but they get along okay so far.  Perhaps a little jealousy on Olivia’s part for having to share people with Gabby, but that is to be expected.

Following that wonderful weekend I moved into…wait for it…my house.  Yes – the abode that will eventually fall under my complete ownership.  It is a lovely little one-story house that was built in 1929.  All hard wood floors (except kitchen and bath), a full and partially finished basement, and a detached garage.  It comes with all needed appliances (new fridge and stove, ancient washer and dryer, but at least they still work), and even a snow blower thrown in.   The really cool thing about the house is the furnace: it is a gravity furnace and it looks like an octopus.  (Now you know why I’ve been calling it the Octopus House).  It works on the simple principle that hot air rises and cool air falls, and lets just say that it works like a charm.  On the day in which the house officially becomes mine, I will christen it with a name, one that will hopefully reflect the octopus in the basement.  I’ve tried to think of some fictional octopus characters but am coming up with nothing.  Any ideas?  Name suggestions?

I’m sure that I don’t have to tell any of you this, but moving is tough.  The day that we moved all the furniture and boxes I was completely exhausted.  And in the days following I still haven’t caught my breath.  I do, however, now have a dining room set, thanks to Michael and Lori.  I now have a table with 6 chairs, a china cabinet (now if I had some china to put in it), a buffet that is nicely situated in the kitchen and providing some much needed surface area, and lastly a “serving table” on rollers that is my make-believe-movable-and-expandable kitchen island.  Only about half of the boxes are unpacked and will probably stay this way until after finals.  (My only wish is to find my wooden spoons, but that is another story.)

Living in a house is going to take some getting used to.  There are all sorts of creaks and pops and noises that are foreign to me.  There is also the silence factor – not having a TV or working radio (at the moment), the house is completely silent, which is a nice change.  I’m just not used to all the quiet…and I’ve actually gotten some much needed studying done.

I’ve already made one minor improvement.  The bathroom has a nice full-sized window replete with full window frame and everything.  The previous (current) owner made a curtain out of a shower curtain (it fits my color scheme nicely, btw), but it was getting in my way.  The tub is a little too narrow for my taste, but the problem was that the window curtain was getting stuck to me every time I moved while taking a shower.  So I nailed it down.  Problem solved!

Now I just have to deal with the neighbor’s dogs pooping in my yard…don’t want to cause a rukus my first month there…but seriously, I also hate stepping in dog poop.