1924 House

We are remodeling and I found actual newspapers in my walls today from 1924! The first newspaper article is about the montesano crazy man that murdered a bunch of people .... special.

the first paper around I believe in the city was the Seattle Star before it became Seattle Post Intelligencer. In honor of grandma Stephens.. a bon marche ad ...... and apparently tonight I have a haunted blog because the pictures all appear sidways.... though they were not taken so. sorry..

here are some others and of course there will be more to come. I have some seriously crazy comics... click on this link for more fun http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/MyOldHouse#

Christmas

And so it was.... still people moving snow, and Coty playing High School Musical III on the Wii with a present she bought herself with one of her Target gift cards, a singing Jonas Brothers blanket! Doesn't get any better than that?

Merry Christmas......

The night before Christmas Eve night...

http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/Dec22232008#

For paddy... never assume because it snows all the "pretty" lights will be lit.... only the ghetto lights. Sorry ...

Got snow? These piles are just from shoveling sidewalk and behind my Honda.

This is a girl who has spent too much time sledding....

Oh and lets not forget... I saved the best for last. A man's idea of the "new" place to hang coats... aaah, grr?

Winter update

Gorgeous stuff today...









Bruce spent hours shoveling walks this morning but alas... for Nada!

Pretty pretty... and here's the rest - http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/Dec212008#

It's the most wonderful time... of the year!

Snow snow everywhere. I can't get enough of the stuff. It has been what, a full week of constant snow and last night we got doused with the stuff and then around 9:30 it started with freezing rain.

Shall we have a fire?

This morning I went out to take pictures and it was so crunchy. You'd take a step and crunch, and then sink in to the snow. The news stations have been having a horrible time predicting what is going to happen with our weather since last week and I think we are not through with the fun... We went to Olympia yesterday out of necessity and it was a mess. Totally frozen and tons of people that had to do Christmas shopping. On a good note, we got to have a meal at the Olive Garden.. YUMMY. We did what we had to do and got the heck out of there. Yesterday the kids went sledding and then all hung out by the fire and played Mario cart and such. All in all I think we all had some fun. Here are all the pics I took... http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/UntitledAlbum#

Dec 08... More pics

OK. It's freezing ass cold... beautiful... but COLD! Here are a few pics from last night
http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/Dec08PartII#

Dec 08

More fun in the winter today...

http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/Winter08#

Festival 08

So last night was the night of the festival of lights. Pre party at brother Dales house and even my daughter and Sara attended. Lots of good food and friends... and guess what... Jackson didn't scream when he saw me... he even cracked a smile once! The good news here is that Grandma LeAnne said he screams with her too so Bruce and i don't feel so bad now! No, but I had a new enemy this time. Little nephew Carter. Not so much a fan of mine. I never see him so I get it.. Funny. The parade was alright, I think I was the biggest hit of the whole thing. I came out of the park heading toward where everybody was at and I had my dog Jenna and everybody cheered. Quite hilarious. Bruce was behind me and didn't get as many hoorahs... he he. One of my all time favorite pics is Mindy and the hat! LOVE THAT!!! Didn't get Paddy the pics of the giant shopping cart. We thought the parade was ending because we couldn't see any more way down and left and then like 5 minutes later more stuff came but by then it was too late, we were headed home. In the link below are also some pics of my puppies in the snow this morning. It's still snowing and I hope it doesn't stop for a week!
http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/Festival08#

December

It's Tuesday eve and I'm still working on my secret project. I think I will actually accomplish it and get it to the person who will love it by Christmas. I will never be stupid enough to think I can start this kind of thing in November and work full time, be a single mom during the week, handle the house, dogs, etc and make stuff.

OMG! I'm in the middle of my second serious cold. This should not be happening to me. When I went to Dr. Shin Mom stabbed me with a flew shot before I even knew what she was doing, and I've been catching colds and been basically sick and run down since.

Rumor is we may get a bit of winter warlock this weekend and possibly snow. I'd be THRILLED as usual. You know me, bring the white stuff down and lots of it please. Cancel school, cancel work, let it snow let it snow let it snow. Hey, the'res a 6" base at Stevens Pass and at Mt. Hood Meadows. Woo hoo... not so much.

a bit of the bah humbug

Only because in all my years this is the first... I got my tree decorated and 4 days later the lights on half of the tree quit working. We replaced fuses, the works and nothing worked... sob sob... so I had to remove all decorations and lights and replace them. It was definitely not a fun job. ugh. So that was my Monday evening fun. We'll find out in a little bit if Bruce will be on strike. If so he'll be home tonight and while that is fabulous, earning absolutely no money is not.

Gobble

Well, it's Sunday and I'm working on my project. If I don't get it together it will not be a present this year. Thanksgiving was fabulous. I was sewing last night and reflecting on the way I came upon Paddy and Patrick who are my most favorite people. LOVE LOVE LOVE them... But the first meeting was a little sketchy. I accepted my first temp position from Aberdeen Express Personnel and was not happy about it. You know me, I'm anti-Harbor because there seems to never be work that pays over minimum wage. I signed up at the Olympia Express and the owner there also owns Aberdeen and sent my stuff down to the Aberdeen office. Low and behold a job comes up in Satsop and I am scheduled to interview this project manager. Well, I got dressed up-ish, high heels and drove out to Invenergy. Clearly I was so overdressed as this was a construction site. No paved roads, no nice offices... I'm instantly aware of how stupid I look and I'm nervous as hell now. SO... the project manager Chris really didn't have much to say accept that they had gone through 4 temps and all he wanted from me was a commitment to stay and finish the contract. Minutes later this shorty little silver haired guy comes out of his office with a very serious face. Oh my God I was scared of this person. He asked some random stuff but was so damn serious. Oye... So I agreed to stay on and started the next day. Within the first week I immediately really liked these two crazy characters and our friendship blossomed. I am so glad. Paddy and Patrick bring so much to my life. Needless to say, we had in my opinion a good holiday. Getting up at the crack of dawn had it's downside but pleasantly, after the game was over we realized we had the entire day to do whatever. God bless the Mimosa! I thank Patrick for helping Brucey put up Christmas lights and haul pellets, a task I wasn't looking forward to helping with. I thank my Paddy for conversation, laughter and most of all, insight!!! Okay, Christmas, bring it on!

Football

Well, as the old saying goes, somebody has to lose.... we lost to Cascade Christian today 14-35. They played and never ever imploded or gave up the entire time but this school had it seriously going on. Needless to say, they're private and you know... private schools have money and money buys recruits, high paid coaches etc. I'm proud. We made it our second year to the semi finals. Go Dogs...

Oh and on a scary but alright note... the game that was to follow ours was cancelled due to the accident linked below. http://www.komonews.com/news/35223579.html

Smowman update...

So the snowman that scared me in the house is now freaking me out - outside the house. Over the weekend we begain decorating and I put him out on the porch. Today when I was driving around the corner after dropping Coty off at school I'm all "who is that on my front porch?". Oye!

Engagement

Congratulations to Angela and Chris who became engaged over the weekend!

I think they just wanted to make sure we showed up in Colorado again sometime.... :)

Football

Tonight we won - 51-8 over Nooksack Valley - Tacoma Dome here we come.....

Well, we play Friday morning at the Tacoma Dome - at 10:00 am! A bit early for football but oh well. Go Dogs!!!

Weekend...

Well, we won Saturday night against Vashon Islans, final score 14-7. It was a nail biter for sure. We will be at Tumwater Stadium again next Saturday to take on Nooksack Valley. So for those of you who are keeping tabs, we are 11-0. Nooksack Valley is 9-1. They beat Forks last night which was supposed to be the big bad team and we were supposed to lose to them and did not. I LOVE Tumwater Stadium. Nice place to watch football for sure.

Sunday we had a log splitter and split the big tree paul bunyon cut down. I thought it would be a simple little task - NOT! It took us almost 4 hours to split and haul and stack all of the wood. I'm exhausted. We also had to mow the neighbors lawn today. I hated it. I was just too tired and didn't want to. I just finished up my dinner cleanup. I tossed a ham in the oven so we could have an easy dinner but cleanup is never fun and I forgot I promised to make a stupid apple pie. So... it's in the oven but I wasn't happy to have to do that either. You know how it is... it's 6-ish in the evening and worked a hard day... who wants to bake or cook or clean anything.. Gross. So here I am about to sign off so I can start a project I've got going in my sewing room.

Later....

Rainy days

Ugh. 5.7 inches of rain in Montesano in the last 48 hours. I got to sit in traffic this morning. Brought me back to the good old days in Everett. There was an issue with a slight mud slide on the bluff and traffic was at a stand still while the dot cleaned it all up. Blue Slough was closed due to flooding so there I sat watching it rain.... Aberdeen is a nightmare today with water everywhere so I went in to work and loaded up some work on my thumb drive and turned around for home. I sure hope this is not the prelude for what we will receive more of this winter. Last winter was definitely not a fun time at all.

Football

Monte over Castlerock 28-21. First playoff game - Saturday November 15th in Tumwater.

Snoman

I have problems, I will admit... I'll say it. I am addicted to SNOWMEN! So much so that around three weeks ago I came across a 5' one in Home Depot and I wanted it but I can't afford it. Well, it's been under my skin and every time I go to work I pass the damn home depot. Well, yesterday I gave in to my addiction and promptly purchased the giant snowman. All is well with the world... or so I thought. I get the box out to my car only to realize after many attempts that the box simply isn't going to fit in my car. Yes, my trunk folds down in to my back seat... still, no good. So I sadly turned the cart around to return it. I stood in line patiently (you know I'm so patient!) waiting for this person to return what seemed like six hundred wall electrical plugs ONE AT A TIME mind you... Patient... patient... AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGHHHH... I promptly turned in to Charlene and marched out of the line and took the giant box back to my car. In full Charlene mode now, I open the giant box and remove the giant snowman and TA-DA! It fits.. I'm so happy now! I happily drive down the road with my enormous snowman. I get home. Open the trunk, pull out the snowman. As I'm doing so, a car pulls by and almost drives off the road. I assume he thinks I'm pulling a corpse out of my car? It was hilarious. So I get (I've named him Sam) Sam into my house and stand him up by the dresser behind the front door. Holy ****! This thing is GINORMOUS! It didn't seem so big in the home depot... why is it so big now? Oh well, it's done. I'm keeping Sam. The night progresses. Sam has now become my nemesis. Out of every corner of my eye appears "something"... suddenly I'm hearing "bumps in the night".... this thing is so huge that it creeped me out because I keep thinking I'm seeing somebody in my living room... AAAGH... C-R-A-Z-Y! yes... that's me...

Bulldogs

54-0 Monte over Winlock. Next Friday we travel to Castlerock to determine the district's top seed.

Pumpkin seed recipe

2 cups unwashed pumpkin seeds
1.5 TB worcestershire sauce
1.25 Tsp season salt (Johnny's)
1.5 TBS melted butter
tobasco (however much makes you happy)

mix ingredients until well coated. spread on shallow baking sheet.

Bake at 250 for about 1.5 hours stirring several times.

They are very popular in this house. I got this recipe in 1998 from a good old Boeing employee and have been using it ever since!

Football

It's almost the end of the fabulous football season for Monte. We are undeafeated and the most points scored on the team has been 8. Here is the link to our homecoming pics http://picasaweb.google.com/liomins/Homecoming08#

I had a camera that was fabulous and took 109 photos because I could.

Friday night is our last home game and as it should be, it's on Halloween. Our drill team will be dancing to "Thriller" - again, as it should be. Looking forward to the post season. I hope we make it as far as we did last season.

GO BULLDOGS!!!!!