Kitchen Spruce-Up

I've been wanting to spruce up the kitchen in the Omaha Street house for over 10 years now....and finally I have a week to do it. Unfortunately, my back isn't cooperating with my will, and I have to do everything very slowly and rest lots inbetween. But here's where we start today - and I'm just cleaning lots:
























I am taking off the doors and sanding before refinishing them with a new paint color. The same color will go on the woodwork. I am going to leave the plaster walls and ceiling white, I think, just freshen the paint, but honestly I haven't decided yet.

I decided to have a professional do the floor - had a guy measure for an estimate yesterday for marmoleum, which looks like a nice old-fashioned product. My back just won't support me doing any floor work right now.

Thank You Note

Recently our friend Tom Kayser turned 18. Tom is the son of Anne & Jeff Kayser. He had several birthday parties this year and we were invited to one of them. We brought Tom the movie "Oh Brother Where Art Thou?" which he hadn't seen. And then we all enjoyed chocolate birthday cake. Anne didn't want to have cake left lying around, so she had me take home the cake.

This week we received a thank you note from Tom. It said the following:

Hockey - My New Favorite Sport

One night a few weeks ago David and I had the chance to see our friends' son Kyle play hockey at Valley Ice in Beaverton. We were impressed! Beth sent us pictures of us sitting in the stands in the arena - to prove we actually went. Hockey, even in the high school league Kyle belongs to, is incredibly physical and violent. Yes! Loved it! But I found myself saying things like "Watch out Kyle!" whenever I saw these guys come slamming at him with their pads and sticks.

Economic Downturn

I spied this funny on a blog recently: the caption reads "the economic downturn has gotten so bad we may have to lay off Andre"

Emergency!

Last night I came home about 7:00 from a long day of work to greet my lovely family.

My little dog had a slightly swollen face. I asked David about it and he hadn't noticed at all. As I sat there and watched, her face grew in front of me, her nose growing in size by the second. I panicked! I called Dove/Lewis Hospital and they said to bring her in.

Evidently she got into something that disagreed with her. We'll never know what the culprit was, but she was having an acute allergic reaction. They think she either ate/got bit by/or otherwise ingested a spider or ant or some other critter that she wasn't used to and her system reacted. After a bit of benadryl and some steroid, the swelling started to dissipate, but she went to bed last night a little lumpy-jawed. She's just a little swollen this morning, but her appetite has not changed. She chowed down her food this morning like normal. Thanks to the excellent service at the emergency room at Dove/Lewis for taking good care of Fergie!

For a virtual tour of Dove/Lewis, click here

Merry Christmas

We are having clam chowder tonight, along with a nice assortment of cheese and crackers for our Christmas Eve supper. Later, we will have a competitive game of scrabble. Other than that, sleep perhaps perchance to dream of a "green" Christmas, like the ones we used to know. Oh, mud. Ah, rain. We miss you so....

Snow, anyone?

This just isn't going to stop, is it? It's snowing hard this morning and we got about 5" overnight...David is staying home today with me....he's been really good about shoveling a path for us to walk up and down our driveway (a guy from South Dakota has snow manners!). He's going to have to do it again today...