Organization

For those of you who know me well, know that I'm the queen of organization. I can't help myself. It's the only way I function. So, this weekend I completed a new organization project. My closet. I've been wanting some sort of system since we moved in two years ago. Finally, I found a nice little DIY system at Lowe's. It's nothing fancy, just Rubbermaid. But it had all of the little components that I wanted and a low price tag. Sean helped me hang the hang rails and uprights and I finished it off with the shelving, rods, drawers and bins. I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the final result.

Now if only I could get Sean to let me organize his closet!

Floating shelves

Quick word of advice to those of you who want to hang those nice "floating" shelves you see on HGTV. You know, the ones that look like they are magically not attached to anything on the wall....

Don't do it.

They don't float, they sag and then sink. And then when you try to re-attach them they rip huge holes in your drywall.

You will end up trying to convince yourself they look nice because you put 4.3 hours worth of your time trying to hang them. Then one day you will realize that you really hate them, because they look pitiful, and now you are going to have to spackle, sand, paint, repaint and paint again.

Sean.

Here He Goes Again

Sean has this need to keep perfecting the study. First, we purchased the desk that created quite a stir in our house over the deliver of said desk. Then Sean hung the shelves and re-hung the shelves. After that, he decided he didn't like the shelves and we needed to find a piece of art to hang on the wall. Yesterday we found the something that we both agreed on and now Sean has removed the shelves, spackled, and is in the process of repainting. Oh boy! Finished product pictures will be shown in the near future. Let's hope this is the true finished product.

Snow Day

A bit of a surprise this morning . . .


We were not expecting snow. Here's how much we got at our house . . .

Some folks at other ends of the county didn't see a flake. One friend got 12 inches. Very strange weather. After we shoveled the drive and sidewalk, Sean had some fun.

It is a beautiful, snowy day in our neighborhood.


(It is trash day. I hope they come and get it. We do have a recycling bin under the snow somewhere.)

Cutting Boards

Sean and I have gone through about 3 wooden cutting boards in our 4 1/2 years of marriage. Apparently an owner of a cutting is supposed to treat a wooden cutting board with utmost care (ie. rub with mineral oil, wash properly, store in upright position), and apparently we are completely clueless. Our boards tend to warp and split apart, so we toss it out and purchase another one. On a stroll through the mall today, while sipping Starbucks, we ventured into Williams-Sonoma. With the intent to simply browse, we came upon the cutting board section. Then Jen, the very knowledgeable sales woman, joined us. After a little lesson on cutting boards, we purchased a not-so-cheap cutting board from said sales woman. Turns out it's the very low maintenance sort of cutting board - knife friendly, composite material, dishwasher safe - my kind of equipment. As I type this Sean is raising a racket in the kitchen as he tries to properly store the new board. I did a quick search on the care of cutting boards and came upon this site. I liked it first for the name "Men In Aprons," and secondly for the information. For your own education, have a look. Maybe you too need to know how to properly care for your cutting board.

http://www.meninaprons.net/archives/2007/04/3_keys_to_wooden_cutting_board.html

Man (I mean..) "hobby room" complete

I have almost completed construction of our "hobby room." I have to call it this since "man room" is not politically correct around my, I mean "our" house.

For years I have dreamed of this. A room where I can record music, set up my gear and leave it out, have some space to move around. No more practice in the cold, lonely basement, or dragging my amp up and down the stairs, ugh.

I think that poor Marci has dreamed of this too, a room where she can close the door on all of my junk without having to step over miles of cables and guitar stuff. At least now our nice study downstairs will stay that way - "nice." She can use this room for all of her scrapbooking as well.

Is it weird that we now essentially have 2 rooms with full scale desk's and whatnot in our home?
At first I was bothered by this, but then I realized that I could care less what people think.
There's only two of us in this big four bedroom home, we might as well use it all.

Here are the pics. We still need to paint, but you get the idea.

Winter - ugh!

I woke up this morning to a layer of snow over everything. It continued to lightly snow for most of the morning. Then there was a blizzard when it was time for the drive home. You'd think the fact that I live in PA and have lived here my entire life would have helped me like winter. Not so much. I appreciate the beauty and briskness of snow. I appreciate a walk after the snow has muffled all sound around me. But I'm not ready for it just yet. This is what I came home to . . .


Yes, those are pumpkins on the porch and some petunias and mums in the garden. I thought it was still November and not even quite Thanksgiving. Oh well, winter has arrived.

Things aren't always as they seem...

This week I decided to reward myself with a present. Why? Just because.

So I bought Apple TV. This is a cool little device that allows you to download HD movies, stream music wirelessly from your Itunes library to your stereo, view your photos on the tv, etc, etc.
I know, I'm such a tech nerd. I love it.

Getting it set up was a pain. I had to run another HDMI cable behind the wall.
This got me thinking, that things in life are not always as they seem. For instance, take a look at
the picture of our TV (nicely installed on the wall), and then the picture of whats behind the TV.

What a mess.

Oh well!

S.

Home

We can say that our house is now our home. A year ago we became the proud owners of our first home. It's hard to believe that a year has flown by already. We love it here and often will find ourselves saying, "I love this house." It fits us perfectly. So, to show you all where this house has come from to what it looks like now, take a look.

The plot of land we couldn't wait to live on

The hole in the ground

It actually looked like a house.

Almost ready for us to move in

A year ago - August 25, 2007

Today - August 24, 2008

For some more photos and some interior shots, click here . . . Home.

Final Product

Poor Sean. He just wanted to hang a few shelves and make the study beautiful. After some trials and struggles he did just that. Here's the study during shelf hanging . . .


And after . . .

Not bad, huh?

Sunday Ramblings

I tried to hang some of those fancy "floating shelves" in our study.
This did not go according to my plan. All I ended up with was 4 holes in our drywall. :(
I felt rather ticked off after that - especially since the wall is covered in red paint and touching it up is going to be a pain. (See attached picture for details.)
It's my fault, for once I didn't read the directions and I used the wrong wall anchors to hang the shelf. Turns out they were actually a lot stronger than I thought and removing them trashed our wall.

My war with Value City has come to an unceremonious end. I managed to fix our furniture and you would never even know that it was damaged. I have decided not to drive all the way to Harrisburg to exchange it again. Now they just keep calling me to let me know that the replacement stuff is here. Oh well, I think I will let them sweat it out for a little.

We are enjoying a day at home today. Marci and I just needed a day to chill at the casa.

Did you watch the Olympic opening ceremony? Amazing. Marci loves the Olympics.
She keeps saying loudly, randomly and with great exuberance "I love the Olympics!"
This is very cute, even when it catches me totally off guard.

Have a great Sunday.

Quick update

Well, after a nicely crafted email to Value City Furniture's corporate website I got a call from a customer service rep today.

The result - Nothing.

"Sorry, I spoke to the store manager, and they wont deliver or pick up from your address"

Thats it, I am done fighting with these people.

Obviously they have no concern for customer service - even when they sell you damaged goods.

I shall return this furniture, get it replaced and go on with my life.

I make a solemn vow never to purchase anything at this company again.

I learned a very valuable statistic a long time ago.

For every satisfied customer you create, they tell at least 2 - 3 people.

For every dissatisfied customer, they tell at least 10-15 people, who then tell another 2-3 people each.

You do the math.

So Value City, I'm done with you.

Annoyed

I'm tired and grouchy tonight. Tired because I've been going non-stop for 2 days, and grouchy since I had a really bad customer service experience this week.
So, since this is America, and this is our blog, I am going to share my opinions on this matter.
We have been waiting for almost a year now to buy a nice desk for our study, I work at home when I am not in the office, and Marci being a teacher needs a place to get paperwork done.
We finally found the right desk at Value City Furniture in Harrisburg, The price was right, and it was the ideal desk for us. So, last Thursday I made the decision to buy it and bring and end to this endless search.
I went to pay for it, and the sales person informed me that "we don't deliver to your address."
"What?" I asked. This seemed odd as, they have delivered furniture to us before, and we lived further away. Not wanting to argue, I just asked to see the manager.
Out walked this man, after making me wait a little, and I informed him of my problem.
"I'm sorry" he told me, "I have to draw the line somewhere, we don't deliver to your address"
I explained how absurd this was since, they have before, and they do deliver to other places that are further from us - this was clearly marked on their map, pinned up on the wall next to the cash register. The conversation went like this:
"I cant believe you wont deliver to my address - we live 4 miles away from East Petersburg, and clearly you deliver to that location, its on your list"
"I have to draw the line"
"This is crazy"
"We'll with the price of fuel....."
To cut a long argument short - I walked out ready to use some special words on this man.
I called my wife, and she calmed me down. I agreed that we could just rent a U-haul and get the furniture ourselves. So we did this over the entire evening last night, only to get most of it home, to find it badly damaged.
That's right. Are you mad yet? Can you feel my pain!!!
So I saw another manager today, and let her know that she needs to come and get here damaged furniture since I was not renting another u-haul, only to hear the same thing.
"I'm sorry sir - we don't deliver" So, now I have to organize more transportation, and more time out of my life to return their damaged crap, which they promised was good for delivery. "it will all be inspected before you pick it up sir" I was told last week. Right.
What do I get for this: $50
That's right, the desk cost over $1300, and I get $50 for my wasted time and gas.
Nice.
So now I have a delivery for Value Sh!@#y Furniture.
You suck.

Sean.

Post vacation summary

It's been a while since I added to this blog, so here goes. Now that we are almost 3 weeks past our vacation, I have had some time to gather my thoughts and consider my observations.
1: 18 hours on a plane is about as exciting as going to a podiatrist.
2: Is it normal to be constantly saying to oneself, "hmmm, 3 weeks ago today we were......" followed by a sigh.
3: That nice relaxed feeling you have the first couple of days back to work, lasts for just that - a couple of days.
4: There is no place in the world like your own bed.

That's about it so far. At least, that is all I can think of at 10:36pm at night.

In other news, Marci and I bought a pool membership in our development. It's really nice, and after mowing the lawn in the 346 degree humidity this afternoon it was worth every penny.

I have also finally completed editing our pictures from the trip. Unfortunately the weather was against us. My dreams of a National Geographic - esque photographic envoy were not realized. This was a complete shame as Cape Town is so beautiful. We pretty much had rain the whole time. A trip out to Cape Point which has stunning natural vistas, seaside cliffs and ocean views was met by a thick fog that obscured visibility to a mere 30 feet in front of the car. The only vista I got was a picture of a stinky baboon, taken by Marci leaning out of the car window. Oh well, better luck next time I guess. I did manage to get some good shots. After weeks of editing, tweaking, adjusting and nitpicking at every picture (fellow photographers know what I mean) I have compiled a collection of my favorites. Check them out here. These are posted purely for artsy-farsty necessity and perhaps some self indulgence.
Enjoy.

Springtime

Spring is almost here.
We made it.
This winter officially goes down as one of the wettest, and windiest on record.
I'm glad its almost over. It seemed like every morning, the few steps I would take to get from our backdoor to the garage were greeted by icy cold, sharp, and stinging winds.
The kind of wind that just sucks all the warmth from your body. The kind of wind that makes you dread getting out of you nice warm car, to fill up the tank.
I've watched those warnings over and over on TV where they warn you not to get back in the car, lest the static electricity you create when returning to the pump handle could ignite and start your vehicle, and your person on fire. My answer to that? The same as everyone else at the gas station.
Screw it.
It is freezing out here, and the car is warm inside. I guess a cold winter makes me want to live on the edge of life. How invigorating.

Marci's plants are starting to emerge from the frozen tundra we now call our yard. They look nice outside. The daffodils are going to look lovely when they bloom. Our lawn is waking up from a deep slumber, just like when you wake up on a saturday morning at 8:30 and lazily stretch yourself out of bed. I can't wait to start mowing again. Marci thinks I am mad. Just for fun yesterday I pulled my mower from its dark, dormant corner in the garage and fired it up. A few pulls of the old rope and she sprung to life, as if it had been waiting all winter for my return. The grassy smell of the engine whirring brought a smile to my face (it also made my clothes stink like fumes)
I have had the Tru-Green guys pre-treat the grass for weeds. Last year, they were the bane of my existence. This year, they are all going to die.
I bought in the professionals this time. "Weed B Gone" be gone with you. Last year you did nothing for me. This year, I shall be crowned "King of the Lawn"

On Tuesday the weather tricked me into thinking I could bring my nice grill out onto the patio.
So I rolled it out, cleaned it up and positioned it in its place, ready to cook.
Two hours later, a 20 knot wind kicked up, and I was sitting at our kitchen table when I saw it rolling across the cement outside, followed by a mighty crash.
That ended up with some very special language, and a nice dent in the metal.
I can fix it, but still...

Sean's American Idol predictions:
1: The winner is going to be either David Cook, or David Archuletta
2: The final three will be those two, and the irish chick.
3: Kristy Lee Cook is going home very soon - she may be easy on the eyes, but her voice cant get any better.
4: Jason Castro is cool, but he has an average voice, he wont be around too much longer
5: The hippie girl (Brook) is going to have to step up her game if she wants to get any further
6: Watch out for Sayeesha (is that how you spell her name) She can really sing, and she looks like a star. However if she tries to sing another Whitney Houston song, its all over. This goes against cardinal rule #1 for American Idol: NEVER ATTEMPT TO SING A WHITNEY HOUSTON SONG. You will always be compared to one of the best singers that ever lived, and you will never sing as well as her.
For that matter - don't attempt any of Celine's songs as well.
7: Simon will continue to be arrogant, but right 97% of the time.
8: Paula will continue to attend the space cadet academy, and live on planet Paula.
9: Randy will continue to tell everyone who he has "worked with" in the industry.

Anyway,
Feel free to add your predictions in the comment section.

Sean.

It's Christmas Tree Time of the Year

Because of the freezing cold rain, Sean and I deviated from what I had hoped would be a tradition of going out and cutting our own Christmas tree at a local tree farm. Instead we visited Stauffers and, again because of the bone chilling drizzle, very quickly chose our tree, had the guys wrap that netting stuff around it and load it into our car. This year we were able to get a taller one because we have the space for it. So with the tip of the tree dangling out of trunk and the trunk precariously tied down, we headed home with the heater blowing full force. Once we arrived home, Sean wasn't so interested in putting on the lights, so that became my job. However, he whole-heartedly hung the ornaments. Here is the finished product.

So, the Christmas spirit has inched its way into the Steele house. The decorating is complete. Maybe now we should consider some Christmas shopping!

Painting Again

After a little hiatus from the painting, we began again. Our brilliant white walls were causing us to feel as if we lived in an institution. Sean suggested we spend this weekend painting. Here we go again. I had Friday off of work, so I managed to do the entire lower level. That includes dining room, entry way, hallway and part of the stairs. On Saturday, Sean joined in and we completed the upstairs hallway. This was a bit treacherous since the one wall is two stories tall. I made Sean take care of that. It was his idea to paint and not hire someone. I have to say, he did a good job. We finished around 4:00 Saturday afternoon. The painting prompted a decorating binge so we went out and bought a rug for the entryway and Sean created a little "area" on our landing. Next on the agenda, the red study. I can't wait.


Some snapshots of Sean . . .

My Lawn Boy

A very important purchase was necessary when we moved into our new home. The lawnmower! We never had need of one in the past, but now we had our very own lawn. Sean made his decision within 2 weeks of living here and went out to visit Sears. He came home with a lovely, orange Husqvarna. I do believe mowing the lawn is now one of his favorite past times. Creating a manicured yard has become his passion. He puts on his grass-stained sneakers and a pair of old pants and off he goes. In between lawn mowing days, he brings out the sprinkler and waters the lawn. He researches ways to do away with the lawn rust fungus that has taken over the neighborhood. Then he implements his plan. After a few days, there he goes again. Time to mow the lawn. Now, I'm not complaining in the least. You see, I haven't even touched the precious Husqvarna. I sure do love my lawn boy!

Notice orange powder on Sean's pant leg . . . that's rust.

Update

So here is the latest update on our home.
The living room is coming to completion!!! Marci is yearning to finish at least 1 room, and we are almost there. Last week, we made the plunge and installed a flat screen TV. Wow, what a difference. I have decided that there are a few things in life that are worth it. A huge tv is one of them. Installing it on the wall however, is not the easiest task. This took a few tries with Marci helping me to fish wires and cables thru the wall. The end result is worth it. Other additions include a new console under the TV, and a kitchen table.

Our lawn is not doing to well, it is covered with an orange sort of fungi called "Lawn Rust" The good news is that our entire neighborhood also has it. I have discovered through some diligent searching on the web that it is common for new lawns to be susceptible to this after a long dry season. Oh well.

Last night I read an article in National Geographic about the effects of global warming, and then I went to sleep worried and depressed. It got me thinking, is there ever any good news anymore? All you hear in the media is sad, depressing, bad news. Global warming this, Iraq war that, Hillary vs Obama, climate change, oil prices up over $80, mortgage market in turmoil, democrats hate the president, republicans don't care, Iran building nuclear bombs, radical islamist want to kill us, terrorism, blah blah blah.

On and on.

So I typed in "good news" in google this morning, and I found this website: http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/ All they report is, good, positive news, about things happening around the world. They have an article explaining how 3 million mosquito nets are being distributed around Zambia, to help save countless lives from the threat of Malaria. This is great news!!!!

I am convinced that there is more good left in humanity than bad. All I need to do to see this is look out of our front door every morning and see the gathering of moms and dads waiting with their kids for the bus. They chat, shake hands, protect their children and bring a sense of community. This is good news. I wake up in the morning, and I am healthy and live in a lovely home with a wonderful wife, this is good news.

I have a savior who has freed me from the clutches of misery, death and sin.

This is good news.

Sean.

Wildlife

Already we're attracting all manner of wildlife. Okay, not all manner, but your regular every day rodent, the mouse. Sean terminated the life of a little one the other day with the lawnmower. A complete mishap and total accident. He felt quite bad about it actually. And now we have a new inhabitant in the garage . . .

Baby bunny! He's very cute, but could pose a threat to future gardening endeavors. He took up residence behind the garbage tote on Friday. We left the door open for a few hours and now . . . no bunny. Our biggest concern was possibly running over him, but we seem to be in the clear. Sean plugged up their little burrow yesterday. Let's hope they'll be gone for good. Is that wishful thinking?