The pumpkin mask

DJ was a pumpkin for Halloween, and one of the clearance items I found while making his costume was a pumpkin mask.  He wore it with his costume, and it has been around the house since, getting wear every once in awhile.

Today, Elektra donned said mask, and walked up to me and said, "I'm Elektra Eye Patch!!  And I'm going to get you!"

And sure enough, she GOT ME!!!!!

Then after she got me, she took off her mask, and told me that she was "...just Elektra."

She put the mask back on, and said she was going to go get Daddy!  She yelled, "I'm Elektra Eye Patch!!!", and off she went running.

For Christmas, Elektra received a treasure chest of Princess outfits to wear from the West Coast Steaks.  There were 2 full dresses, one 2 piece set, and all sorts of accessories like necklaces, rings, and slippers.  She couldn't WAIT to put them on.  And apparently, her cousins Sophia and Eleni, couldn't wait to help her!!  As you can see in the pictures below, they had a very willing live baby doll to play with!!

In October, we met Damian, Jenn, and Leo at the Gaver Tree Farm in Mt. Airy, MD.  There were tons of activities there for the kids, including a giant corn maze, slides, water duck races, straw bales for climbing, bean bag throws, and a giant pumpkin patch that required a straw ride to get to it!  

Here is a video of DJ at the water duck races.  If you can't see the video, click here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_r1o2upR_dA

And then there was Elektra trying hulahooping for the first time.  If you can't see the video, click here:

http://www.youtube.com/embed/0bMClcNjq0s

Finally, a few pictures of our little pumpkin patch romp!

Crazy Mouse

On Thursday morning, we were getting ready to leave to go to work (and take the kids to daycare).  I left the house first, went down the driveway, and off I went.  I thought Steve was right behind me, and he was... except that I got about a mile down the road when he called me.

"Did you see the crazy mouse on the driveway??" 

"What crazy mouse?"  

"This field mouse is just running in circles on our driveway!"

"Get video!"

I hear Steve disconnect the call and a few minutes later, I received the following video text (isn't technology awesome?!).

If you can't see the video, click here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3sa_mZXZHY.  (sorry for the typo in the intro)

Yep, this little guy was most certainly chasing its tail happily not caring about anything else in the world.  I don't know how Steve saw it on the driveway, but he had gotten out of the car, and was literally inches from it to take the video.  

We find it amusing that it took nearly 3 minutes for this critter to realize that Steve was even there and when it did, it stopped, eyeballed him, and then scampered off.

DJ participated in his first Christmas pageant at his school on Thursday, December 15.  Although we weren't supposed to video the event due to chapel rules (and, they had a professional videographer), Nadia and I decided to use our iPhone video cameras to film this first time event for our children.

There are a fair number of children in the 4's class... DJ and Grace are in the afternoon 4's class, which is smaller than the morning 4's class, but combined the two classes are just over 30 children.

Look for a bouncing-and-can't-stand-still DJ in the far right hand side, wearing a purple and white striped shirt, standing just underneath the pulpit.  He's just to the left of a little boy wearing a white long sleeved shirt and a sweater vest.

Grace is more in the middle - towards the left side wearing a shiny pink dress, standing just to the right of a girl in a white shirt.

They sang 4 songs, Angels We Have Heard On High, Go Tell Them On The Mountain (that Jesus Christ is born), Bells Are Ringing, and Happy Birthday (to the Lord).

I think you'll agree that this is just hilarious.

If you can't see the video, click here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB1h86nRrMs

Christmas Lights

I started to decorate the house for Christmas, and I found the lights that Brother John gave to my parents in the 1960s while they lived at Charmuth Road.

After 45+ years, THEY STILL WORK!!  Of course they do... they had lots of tender loving care, and stuff made back then was made better (right?).

But I can't bring myself to hang them.  They would be a fire hazard and would waste a metric ton of electricity.  Plus, there are bulbs missing their moisture protective rings, and I can't replace those!  Unfortunately, I missed the 2011 old light trade-in at the Gnome Despot, but I am thinking about saving them for next year.

Karma works in weird ways, though.  I attended my department's holiday party today and participated in a white elephant gift exchange.  The gift I picked was...

Yes, really.  And you know that there was no one that was going to steal this gift from me.  That was the only way I would have it!!

I'm having trouble finding these on the internet to get more.  They're just too hilarious to not try and find more of their brethren!!

Merry Flamingo Christmas!

We have a bug problem.

We have a bug problem.  Ironically, the stinkbugs were not nearly as bad as predicted, and we are only seeing them come in through our chimney flue.  But we knew they were coming, and we did various things to try and keep them out, including putting screening over the eves and the bathroom vents, as well as pulling bushes/shrubbery lining the house. 

The week after Thanksgiving 2010, I went into our basement and discovered bugs... lots of bugs.  Camel crickets, in fact.  When I couldn't just step on them to squash them because they JUMPED, I got the vacuum.  I went down 3 times a day for over a month and a half and vacuumed 7-10 a session.  I sprayed the baseboards with insecticide of some kind.  I saw a reduction, but I don't know if it was because the weather got warmer and they moved outside or because I was actually winning "the war".

An adult camel cricket, and not the biggest we've seen either!!

With the basement being redone, I thought that maybe the camel crickets would be gone since we put in new windows and doors, we well as sealing the cinderblock with drylock and framing/insulating/drywalling 90% of the basement.

Then, a couple weeks before Thanksgiving, I saw Mr. Camel Cricket.  Then I saw another one... another...and another.  Out came the vacuum, and the war began.  Again.  I was seeing the majority of them in the unfinished utility room, but they were venturing out into the new laundry room and bathroom.  

I decided to try an experiment.  I put a towel down to block the threshold between the laundry room and the utility room, I caught all of the bugs that I could find, and then laid down glue traps in the utility room.  Apparently, my experiment is working.  

I have not seen 1 camel cricket since in the laundry room or the bathroom, and my traps are filling.  Of the 4 traps I put down, 3 of the 4 are about 1/3rd full.  The 4th trap was flat out disgusting when I looked on Saturday. 

I tossed that one in the trash, and put down a fresh one.  In 24 hours, it had another 4 bugs.  Since Saturday, that trap has another 5-6 bugs on it.  

This begs the question: how/where are they getting in???  Don't know, but I seem to have them under control at this point.  The glue traps placed in strategic places are working, thankfully.

Yuck.

Laundry room floor is done!

Today the grout was installed in the hallway to the laundry room and the laundry room itself!  I helped George with the cleanup part of it... the part where you have to wipe down each tile with water and then dry it with a towel to get the sandy film off of it.

When I took this picture, the grout was still wet, so it's darker than how it will likely dry.  Ironically, we want the dry grout color to be more like the dark shade it is when it's wet.  Oh well.  It's done now so we aren't changing it!!

It should be ready for having everything permanently installed tomorrow, provided George gets out of his other job early enough.  Otherwise, it'll be done on Friday.  At minimum, the floor needs one more wipe down to get the last bit of grit, and I'll do that tomorrow evening after work.

It looks really awesome!!!!

Flooding the house

In April, May, and September, our basement flooded after very hard rains and Hurricane Irene. The water was muddy, and came from both the door and one of the windows, the one facing the back yard.

In April, the water effectively solidified our need to demolish the basement and start this never-ending project. The musty smell from the carpet could not be ignored.

In May, the water was spread with a broom and dried with a fan because although maddening, it wasn't directly damaging since the basement was empty. But it pooled in one section of the basement, apparently where the floor is lowest.  As part of the water proofing plan, I painted all of the cinder block walls with Drylock paint, too.

In July, we regraded the side yard. We also dug a drain pit, and installed a new drain at the bottom of the stairs.

By September, we had the subfloor down and the insulation and drywall installed.  Hurricane Irene hit, and the basement flooded AGAIN.  Floor fans fad to be brought in and we spread kitty litter where we saw water seeping up through the subfloor in hopes to keep the damage to a minimum.  The wood subfloor swelled in multiple places, and the insulation underneath the window facing the back yard was soaked and covered in mud.  The water on the floor that we could see (where there isn't a subfloor) was also muddy.

Side note: the home inspector that looked at the house before we bought it says that there was no evidence of water intrusion - even after Hurricane Katrina - because I asked very specifically about that.  Sooooo, we didn't have a water intrusion problem BEFORE the land owner behind us cleared his land and regraded it in April....just sayin'.

Anyway, we had to re-slurry the cinder block that was outside of our new basement door.  We also had to install a window well outside of the window facing the back yard.

In October, we regraded one more time, brought in top soil, put down grass seed, and covered it with 10 bales of straw from a local farm.

Meanwhile, we had a minor laundry mishap in early October. The washer drain wasn't actually IN the drain pipe, and I ran laundry not knowing that. Thus, the washer drained onto the floor... and it went where?  To the lowest point in the basement.  Fantastic.  How did we know?  Because that section of the wood subfloor swelled horribly.

On Saturday, Steve cut open that section of the floor, and we found water trapped underneath the moisture barrier as well as between the moisture barrier and the wood.  No wonder the wood continued to swell.  Once the floor was opened, we vacuumed it with the shop vac, and it dried within half an hour.

Otherwise, it seems that the regrades, the window well, and the work on the outside stairs seems to have worked to keep us dry from the muddy silt floods coming from the southwest.  It's just annoying that we have to patch the floor already!!

At least we don't have carpet down yet.... ?

Other house projects

Last week, the generator install was completed from an electrical perspective.




What you see in this picture is 2 (automatic) transfer switches, one for the main house and one powering the garage's circuit breaker box. Initially, we were considering just the one box, but then we remembered that the lights and ceiling fans for both the kitchen and the living rooms are wired to the circuit breaker box in the garage. Why have a whole house generator if you can't turn on the lights in the 2 rooms you use the most??

Now we have to decide what our propane source will be. We currently rent a tank, and we probably need a second tank... So do we rent or buy? We will have vendors come out to give us estimates in a few weeks.

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Tile in the laundry room

George has found some time to tile our laundry room! We bought the tile early to mid-summer, so now we are actually getting it installed!!




Since this picture, George has finished almost all of it. One more day of tiling, a day/night of drying, and then grout!!

Then we'll get to do laundry again... As we'll get a fully functioning laundry room!!


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Preventing dog pee....

Since we bought the house, we have practically gutted it and started over.   We have replaced a few pieces of major hardware, and added new pieces as needed (e.g. the water filtration system).

The first piece that was replaced and subsequently moved, was the oil tank.  We intend to eventually put a high efficiency air conditioner near it, too, but that's later down the list now because we ended up remodeling the basement this year.

With Hurricane Irene, we lost power for 5 days.  With no electricity comes no water.  We borrowed a small generator from the autocross club (I am the chairperson... so I should be able to use the equipment as needed.... it's the small perks for being a volunteer, right?!) to save our refrigerator and power the TV.  But really, the lack of water really cramps one's style, to put it mildly.

Enter stage left, a whole house generator.  When we bought this house, we had every intention of putting one of these in since the electricity goes off every time a squirrel walks on the lines.  Luckily, BGE has been fairly responsive up until now, and we've been REALLY lucky during the major snowpocolypses to not lose power, but Hurricane Irene was the first time BGE resources were stretched way beyond their capacity.  The morning after the storm, the neighbors were all outside talking around a fallen tree across the road (which was cleared by neighbors with chain saws and front loader tractors).  I asked them what the over-under was on getting power back any time soon, and every last one of them said,

"Oh, it'll be at least a week."

Because that's what happened with Hurricane Katrina.  So the bets were pretty good that the same would hold true here.  And it did.  So this pushed the whole house generator need up to the top again.

Today began the generator installation.  It's not complete yet as it's not yet hooked to the house, and I need to schedule time for my propane company to move my oil tank and install it to the generator.  But now that we have at least 2 new "appliances" outside, I decided it's time to fence it off from the dogs.

NO MORE DOG PEE ON MY NEW STUFF.

To be fair, I should have done this with the oil tank when we first got it, but I wasn't thinking straight at the time... I had a lot of other things going on at the time.  Imagine that.

Oil tank on the left, generator on the right.

Generator in the foreground, oil tank in the background.

Anyway, clearly this is a temporary solution... since i'm using baby gates.  Yes, I said baby gates.  In fact, baby gates tend to be effective as dog gates, too!  My dogs could jump these if they REALLY want to, but I think they're too lazy for that.  And actually, this needs to remain temporary until we plan out where all of the other "appliances" (air conditioner and propane tank) will be.  Then we can work through making a more permanent solution.

Or, we put up something semi-permanent knowing that we may have to start over when other hardware is moved.

I can't wait to hear my neighbors laugh when they see it tomorrow.  LOL

Halloween 2011

Halloween was full of fun for the kids this year!

DJ told Eleanor and me late last week that he wanted to be a pumpkin which had me scrambling to figure out if I could buy a costume or if I would have to make one.  When I searched online for a costume, the only thing that was sized for a boy his size was $40 shipped.  Not a chance was I buying that!  That left me the "make my own" option left.

Saturday morning, I began my journey at Target to buy pumpkin leaf bags.  Then I went to Michaels craft store to buy "accessories".  While I was there, I saw an orange tshirt, a jack-o-lantern stencil, a leaf stencil, and a few hats/masks for DJ to try.  I also bought fabric markers.  I brought it all home, and craft time began.

Meanwhile, my parents and I had seen a Tinkerbell costume that I knew Elektra would love (and she did).  Between her Tinkerbell costume and her new sparkly shoes, she was set!

During the day, DJ and Grace went to Preschool where they were scheduled to have a Halloween party, and they were supposed to wear their costumes to school.  Grace dressed as a flower this year.

The Great Pumpkin and The Flower

DJ and Grace dressed to go the prom Halloween Party.

Fun on the stairs!

DJ at his preschool party

That night, when they got home, the DJ and Elektra were SO excited to go Trick-or-Treating!!  I dressed the kids to be relatively warm, and off we went!  Daddy stayed home to give out candy to the kids coming to our house.  We saw a bunch of our neighbors, met some new ones, and one house was all decked out in Halloween decor!  The kids walked the full mile that our street is and then some (since we also walked down driveways and sidewalks!).  By the last house, the kids were done with walking and ready to go home to check out their loot.

Elektra-Bell

Elektra-Bell and The Great Pumpkin

Elektra-Bell and The Great Pumpkin

The Great Pumpkin being silly

Happy Hanoween (as Elektra says it)!!

A weekend of new stuff

This weekend, DJ and Elektra were introduced to Star Wars because Daddy broke out his Star Wars legos, and the kids were playing with them.  To give them some context, he also played the first movie of the Trilogy - Star Wars: A New Hope.  Below is a picture of DJ playing with an X-Wing Fighter and a Tie Fighter.  He's been shooting down the aliens all day today with his spaceships, sound effects and all!

Meanwhile, I took the kids to Target this morning, and hit the kids shoes section.  Sidebar: in mid-September, Yiayia and Papou had gone shopping for the kids and Yiayia was just itching to find a particular pair of shoes for Elektra.  Unfortunately, all of the local Targets were out of her size at the time.  During my run through there today, they had a pair of the shoes Yiayia had wanted to buy, and Elektra wanted them IMMEDIATELY regardless if they were in her size or not!  Luckily, they were in her size, and she held them the entire time while riding in the cart, in the car, and wanted to put them on the second we walked into the house.  She LOVES these new "sparkly shoes"!!

The Green-baru

In May 1997, my dad bought a new model car of Subaru's... a Legacy Outback.  The Legacy had been around, but the Outback version... not so much, a least not in the United States.  It had about 6 inches more ride height and a stiffer suspension than a normal Legacy.  This particular car also had the Winter Package - heated seats and mirrors!!  It took me to college for my Senior year.

In 2002, the Outback was relegated to 3rd car duty when my dad bought another car.  The Outback was well loved, though, as it was definitely driven on weekends and whenever one of us needed to "borrow" a car for some reason or another.

By 2008, it had racked up a WHOPPING 102,000 miles.  That's 108,000 in 11 years, and the car was still in great shape.  That's when it became part of the Salisbury fleet.  We replaced the spark plugs, the water pump, timing belts, and a put new tires on it.

It wasn't meant to become a daily driver, but to be our third car when cars were in service, needed a car with a GBMC sticker on it (to go to doctor appointments without having to stop at the toll booth) or needed a beater car (e.g. go to the Gnome Despot).

A 9-door car.

It took me to Rochester, NY for a conference, and it took the family to Charleston, SC.  It never complained once.

This past July, the Outback was pressed into Daily Driver Service when my WRX's engine made it crystal clear that it could not run any longer.

By that point, though, it had generated a transmission fluid and freon leak.  We filled it with transmission fluid and freon, and the car pressed on.  In August, I started to notice weirdness in the brakes.  I ignored it as long as I could, but I could tell it was getting worse.  Hard braking had become a bad idea, so I was leaving lots of room between myself and the person in front of me.  I took it to our mechanic, and it needed, pads, rotors and calipers.  Even at cost for the parts, the cost of the service was more than the car was worth.

I took it to Carmax to see what they would give me for it.  To my enormous surprise, they were willing to give me more than I paid for the brake service.  So we decided to sell it before the transmission and freon issues became mandatory fixes.  The car had 118,000 miles on it.

I took one last picture of its rear license plate before I turned it in.

You can see the pink sidewalk chalk that DJ used to color the Maryland State flag and the top right hand top of the X.  You can also see the years of registration renewal stickers in the top right hand corner of the plate.  That's a pretty thick stack of stickers.  And now that Maryland is no longer issuing that style of plate, it's sad to see it go.

Thanks for all the years of service, Green-baru!  "Love.  It's what makes a Subaru, a Subaru."

Wrightsville Beach pics

This year's Wrightsville Beach trip was sooooooooo much fun and relaxing overall.  The cousins had a total blast playing together!!  The weather was awesome, the ocean water was PERFECT, and the house we rented (same as last year) was fantastic.

DJ played in the sand while at the beach

Really cool picture of the water running over a seashell

Elektra showing us her seashell

Elektra!

Spiro showing Elektra a sand crab

Elektra boogie boarding!

Grandparents and their grandchildren

Elektra again

HIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!

Papou with Alexandra, Sophia and Eleni

Eleni and Sophia

Happy early birthday, Elektra!  From the Minneapple!

Happy Sweet 16 Alexandra!!

Z and Mama

Eleni, Sophia and Spiro (looking bored)