Everything is breaking!

So have you ever noticed that bad things happen in threes? Well, in my world, it seems to be happening more frequently. Just within the past 2 weeks we have had our washing machine, dish washer, kitchen sink, both laptops and camera break. That's not even including our continuously breaking garage door. That's what I like to call a crap storm of bad luck!
Luckily, we have a home warranty and the kitchen sink and washing machine were a related problem so that was fixed in one visit (after both decided to overflow and make our kitchen a wading pool) but now we have to wait for another order to be put in for someone to come fix the dish washer. We must have really upset the household appliance gods.
The computers on the other hand, well, they have decided to not hold a charge AT ALL any more. Mine has been dying for a while, but all of the sudden, Brian's battery pooped out and on top of that our power cord likes to pick and choose when its going to work. And then, Brian's wireless internet thingy broke within his computer so we have to sit on the floor, in the guest bedroom, attached to the darn router.
Now my camera is another story, and partially a human error which is easily fixed, but a problem nonetheless (and I won't go in to for the fact that I will embarass myself, but bare with me on new pictures because it might take a while.)

Let's hope its just a bunch of bad stuff getting out of its system before the New Year and we can be problem free for a while.

There's a party in our chimney ...

And only squirrels are invited.

So as most of you already know, we have had quite the run-in with squirrels since moving into our house. The squirrels have always liked to sit in the tree or on the roof tourmenting our dogs.

Then the squirrels found a way to get into the attic. That resulted in it making its way into our garage and Roxy, who loathes squirrels, acting as our rodent exterminator.

Fast forward a couple months and another squirrel finds its way into our attic. Well just repeat the previous scenario but in our back yard this time. Roxy is earning her suppers around here, and Mack on her heels helping any way he can.

Then, again, lets go forward a few more months to a couple weeks ago. This time things played out a little different. Instead of going into our attic, the squirrel decides to fall down the chimney and get stuck on top of the flue. This leads to Roxy freaking out and trying to get into the fire place ... running inside and outside to the fireplace chute.

We are assuming at some point it found its way out, but Roxy wasn't satisfied. After listening to Roxy sniff at the chute for hours on end, I decided to open the chute to show her there is nothing in it ... well I went back inside to return a few minutes later to this:

She dug her way into the chute and wedged herself in as deep as she could go ... absolutely covered in sut.

After hosing her and the patio down, I thought we were done with the squirrel issues. Boy was I wrong. A day or two later, I hear strange noises in the chimney again, and this time its loud and clear. Well this little squirrels buddy was on the roof making lots of noise. But no noise was louder than when that squirrel fell down the chimney itself and a squirrel fight broke out on top of our flue. I was home alone, and positive that these things were going to fall through into the house.

As soon as Brian gets home, the noises stop, but I am positive that they are still in there so we think that we can open the flue with a plastic bag under it and catch the squirrels...well nothing falls through and we haven't heard the noise since. Finally...our squirrel issue is over.

Until today ... when I start smelling something funny. Could it be? No...the squirrel couldn't have died in there could it? Hopefully Brian is in a good mood when he gets home today because he will be playing chimney investigator.

... to be continued

Dear House,

I would really appreciate it if you quit changing shapes and sizes! As soon as the weather changes you feel the need to swell or shrink. I would rather not have to body-slam the back door to get it to close because one of these times I am going to go straight through the glass. I enjoy the rain but obviously it is causing you to bloat and making our lives more difficult. When its hot you shrink, when its humid you swell ... will it ever be win-win with you? I'd appreciate some cooperation.

Sincerely,
Your homeowners

(For those of you who don't know ... the soil in Texas is clay and absolutely ridiculous. The slightest change in weather wreaks havic on the foundation and makes it do very crazy things. When it's hot, you have to water the foundation to keep it from shrinking, but when it gets too much water it swells and changes the shape of the door frames and such.)

A little retail therapy

To help us cure our post-wedding day blues, we headed out to the mall last weekend for a little retail therapy. We had gift cards burning holes in our pockets so we thought we might as well go look and see what we could find. Much to our surprise, we found a lot that we both actually agreed on! (Brian and I have very different decorating styles). We have found a store that is great for our marriage because its a perfect blend of traditional (Brian) and a little more modern (me). The store is West Elm. It's a California store that is making its way around the country and there is even one in Portland, Or. Well... it might be good for our marriage but bad for our bank account. We bought this great duvet there...

and then we made our way over to Macy's where lots of damage was to be done. We bought new Martha Stewart sheets (my pick... the 4th one down, the bright ones)

and new cutlery (Brian's pick).

We were so excited to get a few new things but didn't even get close to using all of our gift cards. We also bought a wine decanter and some lamp shades to go with our great lamps that Steve and Tonia Larsen bought us.

But what should we get next? Any ideas?

Now that the wedding is over...

We can't use that excuse as to why we have been slacking around the house lately. For the past year we have put a lot of yard work and house projects on hold, but no longer! We spent a good 8 hours in the front yard this weekend, and for those of you who have seen it... you know it needs much more time than that. But... we did make some great progress and I am so excited to finally see it coming together. Now we just need to get that big ol' tree taken down and get some grass put in. Take a look at what a little time and effort can do.

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After