The Painted House

The house painting is complete. Not that you can really tell a difference from far away. But it really is nice up close. The trim really needed to be freshened up and a lot of the house did as well. It looks "newer" now, which is nice. It was looking kind of dingy.

Here's Eric surveying the property... (in his bare feet) You can see here how clean and neat the paint job is.

We had the painters paint the big wall in the living room while they were here. It was too high for me to even want to attempt to paint it. It really is a huge change. And a lot more bold than any color I've ever picked! (Click to see it bigger.)

I will say I like it a lot better in person than in these photos. It looks much yellower in the photos and more "mustard" color in person. It really gives the room a nice feel. It's a lot warmer than I thought it would be. Click here for the actual color we chose, this is more like what it looks like in person. It's called Anjou Pear.

This is the "before" photo. (Which should probably have come before the "after" photo, but I didn't feel like switching them around.)

Tuesday Tidbits

It's only Tuesday? Boy, this week seems long! I've really got nothing to blog about. Work is busy, home is busy. But nothing seems very blog-worthy to me. But... here are a few thoughts:

1. The house painting is coming along nicely. They said 2 days... I'm thinking at least another one. Plus (bonus!) they're painting the giant wall in the living room, so there's another few hours. I can't wait to have that done. It's going to be bright and bold! Stay tuned for before/after photos. The house itself won't be that dramatic as we're painting it the same color, but the living room will be pretty drastic.

2. Guess what's coming up on Friday?? It's our 1-year anniversary! This year has gone by quickly (with the exception of this week, which is dragging on forever... ) We're planning on having a nice dinner out at the same place we had our "wedding lunch". On Saturday we're planning on a fun day-trip... details after they happen! (We haven't decided which day-trip to take yet, we have several in mind...)

3. Alex is going to NH for the rest of the summer. He leaves Friday morning. I will miss him!! But he'll have a blast staying with his grandparents, and getting to spend lots of time with his dad and his uncle. Maybe he'll send me photos of the fun he is having and I can share his adventures on the blog. (I just realized I never posted photos from his trip out west last summer. Oops!)

4. Jenny is an alpha dog. I've been doing some research on how to deal with an alpha dog. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I've seen a few minor breakthroughs, especially tonight when she officially met the neighbors dog, Bailey. She did not try to kill him. That was big. (She did sniff his rear-end and growled a tiny bit, but no biting or fighting.) But then she tried to chase a poor woman who was jogging down the street. So I think I have a lot more work to do!

5. Yep. I got hooked into watching the Bachelorette this season. I'm glad it's over and I'm happy that Jillian picked Ed! They're very cute, although he really needs to get some new swimming trunks. Those green Richard Simmons shorts have got to go! Hopefully Jillian will help him with his wardrobe now.

Busy Weekend

We had a very busy weekend. Saturday we went to the Arts and Crafts Festival. I enjoy going to this festival... I always get inspired to be creative. Or at least inspired to want to be creative, whether I will actually do anything about it, is another question! I did find one idea that I'd like to try, but I'll blog about that another day... (And aren't the above paintings adorable??)

We can't seem to resist taking self-portraits wherever we go. (And what is it they say about couples who are together for awhile... they start dressing alike?? I think we're wearing the same color shirt... totally an accident... I swear.)

More art for sale. Cute sunflower lawn ornaments.

This morning we went to the Regional Market Flea market. We bought a couple of things, one of which is a "Chip n Putt", a little golf putter game. (We ended up having to buy a putter too, which we tried to get a the Flea Market, but failed...)

More flea market items for sale...

Another treasure we found at the flea market was a tree-trimmer. We bought it for $12. And came in quite handy today! We really needed one too. Tomorrow the house painters start painting the house (if it stops raining) so we needed to trim the trees away from the house. (And I mean "we" as in "Eric".) I did help clean up the branches though...

He cut this tree back pretty well. It was a mean, evil tree. We both got cuts and thorn pricks all over our arms and legs... But we did it! Then we trimmed a few other smaller (less mean) bushes around the house.

Some other highlights and thoughts of the weekend include:

1. De-flooding the basement during/after a major downpour.

2. Keeping the weekly food bill around $50. (And most of the food was bought at Aldi!)

3. The Sunday paper started arriving in our mailbox today! No more having to go out and get it.

4. BBQing twice and almost getting to eat on the deck twice. (We were lucky to get the 2nd BBQ done before the skies opened up!)

5. I've written about this family before, but lately I've been following them on Twitter. They're going through a difficult time with their little boy, he's in the hospital and not doing well. Please send thoughts and prayers to them...

Twitter-nator

So I've been on Twitter for a few weeks now, and I'm following a few "celebrities", including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. He posted this photo today, and I thought it was hysterical! Isn't the Terminator robot statue behind him a riot?? He's being all serious with his budget meetings, and all I saw was the Terminator robot... heh heh...

Thursday Thoughts

The tomatoes are growing nicely.

We have tons of these little flags all over our yard... electric flags, gas flags, water flags... all over the yard.

Apparently they're putting in FIOS in our neighborhood. They've been installing it for weeks now. These flags are everywhere... I wish they'd hurry up and be done with it!

The weekend is approaching. There are a few festivals around town. We're definitely going to get to the Arts & Crafts Festival. We usually always go to that and enjoy it. There's also the Jazz & Wine Festival to go along with it. That sounds interesting as well. I hope the weather is nice! Anyone else doing anything fun this weekend??

One Giant Leap

40 Years Ago... this is where I sat with my brother and watched Neil Armstrong take his first steps on the Moon. (Not that I remember it... but I thank my mom for taking this photo! The image on the TV isn't that great... but you can sort of make it out.) Where did you watch the Moon Landing? Were you even born yet?

Post-Vacation Depression

Well, we're back. And in that usual state of "I wish I were still on vacation" and "I can't believe I have to go back to work tomorrow..." But such is life. All we can do is look back at our photos and remember the fun, and then go online and look for the perfect house for next summer!

Speaking of houses, I never showed you all the inside of our fun rental house. This is the kitchen. It was all very recently updated and modern. I loved it!

Another kitchen view.

The living room... with cable and wifi.

This was the downstairs bedroom. (The one with the air conditioning, aka: our room!)

The bathroom. (We really need more than one of these next time!!)

Upstairs bedroom. Sleeps 4, but only Alex slept in here. (In the pink bed. Heh heh.)

This was Kelsey's room. There was also a nice couch and dressing table on the other side of the room.

So tomorrow we go back to work and Alex has another week of summer camp. It feels like summer is winding down, but it just got here. My next day off isn't until Labor Day. So it's kind of over for me. But that's ok, the weather is nice in the evenings, we can still go on long walks and we still have the weekends of sun and fun to look forward to... and of course there's always the search for next summers vacation place to keep me occupied!

The Cape, Day 7

This has been such a fantastic week. We've had beautiful weather every day, great company and lots of fun. Eric found this on the Sandwich Boardwalk this morning... Life's Good. Yes, indeed it is.

Another view of the Boardwalk.

Isn't it so cool??

Today Greg (Eric's brother) and his daughter Emily stopped by for a quick visit. They did some shopping in town and then joined us (me, Alex and Kelsey) at the beach for a bit.

It was another perfectly sunny day. Alex and Kelsey had fun in the ocean. The water was much warmer today than it was the first day we got here. Must be all that sunshine! Alex relaxed on his boogie board and Kelsey caught minnows in a bucket...

Bird fight! We gave them some Cape Cod Potato Chips. They seemed to like them... it caused quite a ruckus.

This photo is for Paula... she won't be able to see it until she gets back from her vacation next week, but I promised to post it to the blog tonight. We borrowed Sheila's Lexus for the trip. It's been fantastic! We were kind of lazy though... and left the Burger on the top of the car all week... aren't we such tacky tourists?? It was sure easy to find the car in parking lots though!

The last and final "Chowdah" test of 2009 took place at the British Beer Company tonight. I'd have to say it was my 2nd favorite of the week. Last time we were here, we ate at a place in Chatham that had my most favorite ever... but we didn't get to Chatham this trip. So it looks like "Hemisphere" won the honors of favorite chowdah.

Alex was crowned the "King of Foosball" tonight. The final tournament of the week was held tonight... he won.

Look what I found! The Cape Cod Potato Chip Factory photo from 2005... you really should click on the above photo and see just how much the kids have changed in 4 years. We think it's kind of funny!

Thanks everyone for following our fun vacation! I've heard there are some new readers to the blog this week. I hope you've enjoyed our trip! It's really going to be hard going home tomorrow and falling back to the old routine...

The Cape, Day 6

It was yet another wonderful day on the Cape. There were clouds, and even a few raindrops at one point, but mostly it was a great day weather-wise. Eric and I went to the Heritage Museum in Sandwich this morning. (The kids opted to stay home... ) It was a fun outing!

It's quite an interesting museum. There are several museums among the most beautiful gardens and outdoor displays. The first museum we visited on the site was the Antique Car Museum.

One of the antique cars was a Ford Model A. According to the sign, it cost $530 in 1930 and the average annual income was $1425...

This is the "Old East Windmill", originally located in Orleans, MA and brought to the museum.

The grounds of the museum were covered in Day Lilies, they were gorgeous.

We even came across a Croquet Club match... I thought it was neat. I'd never seen one in person before!

The museum also has an old Carousel that you can ride. Eric and I decided we should try it out... then we decided to take a picture of ourselves while riding the Carousel...

It amused us and proved to be very difficult to get a photo with the horses going up and down!

After the museum, we stopped at an old cemetery... we walked around and took photos. Most of the old gravestones were from the mid 1800's.

It was very neat.... in a creepy old cemetery kind of way.

After that, we picked up the kids and went to the Cape Cod Potato Chip factory. We went 4 years ago while we were here and took the same photo with the kids. When we get home, I'll have to find the other photo and compare it to this one... the kids have changed quite a bit in 4 years!

Tonight we went to dinner at "Hemisphere". This restaurant is right across the road from our rental house. So we walked... We were very impressed with the atmosphere and the views as well as the food. Everything we had was excellent!

And the clam chowder got 3 thumbs up (by me, Kelsey and Alex) and was voted "best chowdah" of the week!

The Cape, Day 5

This is the official post card I'm sending out to all our friends and family... we're saving on postage this year... or maybe we just got lazy. Mostly we just got lazy. So enjoy our "Greetings from Cape Cod" post card, from us... to you. (This photo was taken this afternoon from beautiful Town Neck Beach in Sandwich, not a cloud in the sky...)

Today was another gorgeous day. And we decided to go shopping. What? No beach?? Well, we have to hit the stores sometime! We went to the Cape Cod Mall in Hyannis. The kids were thrilled to go to all the stores they could easily go to at home... but with no sales tax on clothes. (At least there was a plus side to spending a beautiful sunny afternoon at the mall!)

Eric and I took a great walk this afternoon. We walked down the beach to the Cape Cod Canal and over to the Sandwich Marina.

Here he poses next to an old Coast Guard Buoy, circa 1986. (It had a date on the bell.)

Here's the main building for the U.S. Coast Guard. Right on the Cape Cod Canal.

And here is a picture of my boat. It's "Lady A"... out of NY. I think I should have at least gotten a ride on the boat...

We saw "Patrick" the starfish on our evening walk.... You never know what you're going to see on the beach... So we've had 5 perfectly beautiful days here at the Cape. Can't wait to see what tomorrow brings!