Americanuck

Man it has been a while so rambling post ahead. As I mentioned last post, I’m on vacation (baby!) for the week. Technically four days of vacation tacked onto a Stat holiday but still, a week away from the office.

A needed week really. It has been t’crazy round these parts the last month or so, that is saying a lot because it has been t’crazy since my Mother broke her hip in Feb so that gives you an idea of what it has been like.

We FINALLY got my Mum’s old place cleaned out, cleaned up and relinquished back to her Landlord’s rep. HUGE accomplishment on our parts as we held a giveaway evening (where we were able to get rid of a TON of knickknacks but sadly only the dining room hutch and a couple of the living room tables. We tried to get charities to come pick up the stuff but either nobody was particularly interested, only could pick up after the end of the month (that wouldn’t do us any good) or would only take a few items. We even tried to figure out how to rent a truck and deliver it ourselves but nobody made that easy either. So we called the junkers and had to PAY to get them to removed. Sucks but oh well. I’m sure they will turn around and do something with it. We also hired a maid service to come and give the place a move out scrub down, again on our dime but WELL worth it to save us the time. We just didn’t have it what with having to work too.

One of the funnier items (at least to me) to rear its head was my collection a la Gibb in her records. No I didn’t think Barry was hot but I sure did have the hots for Andy…still wish I could find a copy of the poster online I used to have which scandalized my Mother back in the day. It was SO funny.

Next point of business was picking up some more furniture for Mum’s new place. We hit up the Ikea for a dresser and The Brick for a loveseat and a couple of chairs for the eating nook table we gave back to her. Add to that a bookshelf we gave her to place her remaining knickknacks along with a foot stool and she’s pretty much set. I just need to put together some pictures for her wall. She’s pretty please with it all and feels at home there now.

While we were at the Brick we picked up a storage ottoman to replace our ancient coffee table, as well as a new shelving unit to replace what we gave to Mum. The ottoman was delivered last week but the display shelf thingie is on back order. I’ve had a bit of a bug up my ass to redecorate this place to freshen it up. We’ve got some stuff we need to get rid of here as well. My ancient mirrored dresser, a dining room table (never let your kid change the strings of an electric guitar on your table! Not that I did but he did it anyway and it got kinda scratched up grrr) and a bunch of wobbly chairs and an elliptical (yep still have the damn thing cluttering up our space). If we have no takers on the stuff it is going to be junked as well and good riddance.

I have THE worst luck though in finding stuff I like. I mean I know what I want, I just can’t FIND it. I know what kind of rug I’m looking for as well as drapes but not to easy to actually find what I’m looking for. So we’re stuck with the boring beige rug and no drapes for now. I’m excited though that we’re finally going to get around to framing the Joe Average print. I had been bummed the place I knew before had closed down but we found a place in the local mall who can custom frame. Sadly there is a small grease stain on the print (thanks to Sean looking at it with a small crumb of potato chip stuck on his shirt, I’m not going to obsess, I’m not going to obsess, I’m not going to obsess) it is still a fave of my that needs to get on the wall and out of the cardboard sleeve. It will add a little LIFE to the room too (colour!)

One of the honeydo list items for Tom this week is to get some of the pictures/art we have around her up on the walls. I mean I’ve had the firecracker print leaning up against the wall for ages now even after I got a frame for it. I think I know where I want it to go now. Need to get my two mini movie posters framed too. Ugh.

Tom has a light schedule this week so we decided to take advantage and do a day of shopping across the line. Breakfast at the Ihop, a tradition of sorts was first on our agenda.

Above our table was a commemorative menu from the year of my birth. A stack of pancakes for 70 cents!

Of course I took pictures..duh! Here is a picture of Tom asking for my camera..

I told him playing with the white balance that even metering it everything was coming out with an orange or yellow cast in there. Here I am looking a little in between both…

Then it was SHOPPING TIME.

Ross really let us down this time which is sadly becoming more of a rule rather than an exception lately, not sure why. This time the place was so picked over but didn’t seem to have the fall/winter stuff in to replace it yet. Ah well. I did buy a few things at the mall (Macy’s some sweaters and Khols a couple of purses and a REALLY cute costume jewelry necklace/earrings combo. Jury is still out whether I can wear the earrings even though they SAY they are nickel free (allergy girl here) but everything was like 40% off so SCORE. There was also a sale at the Bath and Body works so I stocked up on my shower gels (buy three get five baby!) and picked up a few of their cute lamb accessories… lamby slippers and a lamby sleep mask…

Yeah the sleep mask is a bit crooked but this isn’t an easy selfie to do!

Oh yeah and we also picked up a new coffee maker so we can finally get rid of the cheap white one we’ve had since the last one died, finally everything in the kitchen is chrome/black. Or rather put it in storage for back up in case, cos our luck with coffee makers is that no matter how expensive they are, they will die shortly after the year is up.

Its a Mr Coffee and feels nice and sturdy, some of the pricey ones felt soooo CHEAPY plastic. I think it’s quite sharp though..

Oh before I forget..another thing that turned up in the cleaning out of Mum’s place was the discovery of the old reel to reel player. After my Dad died, I had received the old reels but I had nothing to play em on so I hadn’t ever heard them. It still WORKED too. Tom hooked it up to his ‘puter and recorded a bunch of the clips for me and is in the process of editing them and cleaning them up some..

Here is one of them.

Man I sound SO CUTE!

Phew that’s it for now.

We  interrupt the radio silence from blogland for this important announcement…

Happy Birthday to the bestestestest Husband EVAR

Tom and his Birthday Ipod touch

His birthday present (the Ipod touch) came a bit early kinda like my Kodak vid cam did for Mom’s day but hey, when you have a hankering for something and it is hard to find it is best to do the grabbin when the grabbin is good as we are heading into Xmas shopping time.

He’s been glued to the thing since he got it, he’s so cute.

Tonight was dinner out at his pick “The Keg” with the boys. Nice evening, but now my breath smells like garlic. Good thing his does too.

I got the boys to be in a photo together and smile. You know how? I told them I would keep taking pictures of them until they did. Hey it works dammit.

Happy Birthday Hon, we love youuuuuuuu!!