Life in Stayton

We made it to Stayton, OR in one piece. The house we're living in for 2 months is super crowded with the owners' stuff, so there's pretty much no room for ours. The drawers are full, the closets are full, etc. So we're trying to figure out how to not live out of suitcases for 2 months. I guess the next house we're living in for 7 months is a lot bigger, so that will be nice. 

Other news: the school that I was applying for the teaching job at doesn't have enough money to hire me full time, unfortunately. So I'm still looking for a job, either in Stayton or Salem. We'll see what I can find. If you would pray for that, we would appreciate it. Andy's job is just 3/4 time until July, so he's not making enough to pay our bills. Then he'll get a raise this July and next July until he's back up to where he was at our old church. I think then we'll talk about starting a family, but until then I have to work full time as well. That will be interesting.

Jeffrey likes our house a lot, there's no fence in the back yard so we got a cable around the tree to tie him out there. It's working out okay, but a fence is always preferred. 

If any of you would like to come visit us, please give me a call, we love friends! We got new cell phone numbers too, so don't try our old ones. My new one will be on my facebook page.

Moving Day!

Yesterday was spent packing up our mountain of belongings (how did we accumulate so much stuff??), packing the cars, and cleaning our house. I'm just glad we were able to sell our big furniture so we don't have to move it. Last night we stayed at my parents' house in Grenada, and today we are driving up to Portland, then Stayton. Portland first because we are housesitting for 9 months at two fully furnished houses and don't need things like our bed, dresser and kitchen tools, so we're storing them at Andy's parents' house in the meantime.

I am very tired. And I have to drive all that way (about 6 or 7 hours total) by myself. We have a total of 3 cars and a big truck pulling a trailer. But I'm very excited about moving! My parents and Andy's mom are all helping us, and they were a HUGE help yesterday. What would we do without parents? It's kind of strange moving to Stayton, neither of our families are there, and we've always lived very close to at least one of our families. I will be an adventure.

My exciting day

7am Wake up... wait, it's too early. Try to fall back asleep and fail miserably. Sit up and read by Bible in 2 Kings - exciting.

7:45 Get up and make omelets for Andy and I for breakfast (with heirloom tomatoes and avocados)

8:15 Wake up Andy with breakfast in bed and eat quick

8:30 Shower

8:50 Be nervous

9:00 Phone interview with the principal of Stayton Christian School for a PE/Music teacher position (plus some office work because they can't afford to pay the teacher full time)

9:50 Finish the interview with a sigh of relief - I'll hear back in the next day or so

10:15 Take our giant pile of laundry to the laundromat - we sold our washer and dryer at our yard sale

10:20 Realize that I don't have enough quarters to wash the whole giant pile (it cost $10!), so I look in my wallet and see a $5! Get change for my $5 at the little machine

10:30 Finish starting the laundry

10:35 Head to the bank for more quarters - get a $10 roll

10:45 Wait at the laundromat... luckily I brought my knitting

11:00 Switch the laundry from the washer to the dryer (it only costs $2 to dry everything!)

11:05 Head to the Lawnmower Man to pick up our lawn mower, pay him $20 for fixing our pull cord which was chewed off by my parents' dog

11:15 See a little boy selling pink lemonade on the side of the street, buy 2 cups for $1, cute little boy

11:20 Arrive at home to drop off the lawnmower and surprise Andy with lemonade - he's not there :(

11:25 Head back to the laundromat and wait for the drying to finish

11:30 Check the drying, and it's not quite dry, add another quarter

11:45 Finish the laundry and get out of there as fast as humanly possible

11:55 Grocery shop for some produce

12:10 Crash at home and nap for a while

1:30 Get awoken by Andy coming home

That's all so far, the rest of my day will be taken up by:

-Making Harvest Apple Galette for Ryan Freudenburg, one of our high schoolers whose leaving for college tomorrow

-Folding the laundry

-Packing as much as possible

-at 5:00 heading to my Mom's for dinner

-6:30 Jr. High Youth Group

-8:00 Home

-8:30 Ryan Freudenburg coming over for dessert

-9:30 A little Olympics

-10:30 Bed

How can my day be so filled with nothing??

My cute niece and nephew

Here are my niece and nephew being hat models for me. I stole them to take these pictures last night when their family was down for a visit. Quin is 3 1/2 (today) and Lia is almost 15 months. They sure are cute.

Yard Sale!

We had our moving/yard sale yesterday. We got up at 5:15am to get everything ready by 8. People around here have a problem: If a yard sale is advertised to start at 8, they come at 7:15 to try to get in on the stuff first or to get a good deal or something. I think it's extremely rude and annoying. So we kept shooing people away and we started at 8. We had a huge morning crowd when it was cool outside, then it ended up being one of the hottest days of the summer so far. So we sat in the shade and a few people came in the afternoon. I should have taken pictures, because we sold a TON of stuff and only had 3 boxes of it left at the end. And the best news: we sold our furniture and our washer and dryer! So now we don't have couches, an entertainment center, coffee table, or any way to clean our clothes except the sink. It's nice that my mom lives close by. We did, however, make off with... over $450!! Yay for moving money!

My awesome husband

I've been really sad that our TV doesn't get NBC, therefore no Olympics. I love the Olympics. So Andy decided to move the TV and the antenna around, and voila! The Olympics!! Now I don't have to be sad and I can knit (and pack) with something to watch. Although I do think that some of the events are terribly boring, I like most of them. Especially gymnastics, swimming, volleyball, and some of the track and field events. YAY!

Massageness

I got a massage today. Andy bid on it at our Mexico auction for me and he won. It was LOVELY! My back has been in knots, and it was so nice to have them worked on. This was my third massage ever, one from my volleyball team last year, and one a few years ago when I was having more shoulder problems. My doctor said that I need them weekly in order to work out my shoulder knots, like I can afford that. If only I had amazing health insurance that would cover things like massages...

My 4 Things

I found this on someone's blog and thought it was fun. Plus I'm a little bored.

4 Jobs I've Held
Nanny

Sales Associate

Office Assistant

Gym monitor (yay...)

4 Movies I Watch Over and Over
Pride and Prejudice (BBC version)

Pride and Prejudice (New version)

Best in Show - it's hilarious

The Little Mermaid (lately)

4 Places I've Been
Brussels

Uganda

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

New York City

4 Places I've Lived
Northern California

Portland, OR

Vancouver, WA

Lake Oswego, OR

4 TV Shows I Watch
Seinfeld

The Office

Scrubs

Lost

4 People Who E-mail Me Regularly
Andy

Mom

My blog - with comments

Facebook

4 Favorite Foods
Sprouted grain bread

Chocolate

Green lemonade (it's really yummy)

Peaches

4 Places I Would Rather Be
Anywhere in Europe

Portland

Disneyland

Hiking somewhere

4 Things I'm Looking Forward To
Paying off our school/car debt

Buying our first house

Birthing our first child (planned for approximately 3 years into the future)

Moving to Stayton

Crochet market bag

For those of you who don't like to knit, I have the pattern for a crochet market bag that is very similar. Yay for patterns on the internet!

Bag pattern

Here's the link to the pattern I used for my market bag. I tweaked it  a little bit: I used size 4 needles for the bottom, 11 for the middle, and then size 8 for the top and handle instead of continuing on 11's. I also made it a little longer and the handle longer than the pattern said. I like how it turned out better. It's a fantastic bag.

Finished bag and Jeffrey's salad

Jeffrey had a salad today. We had left over lettuce and it wasn't enough to keep for anything, so I fed it to Jeffrey. Here's what happened:

He ate it! Well, lots of it. And then the rest of it was strewn around the floor for a while. It was very cute and healthy. I also gave him an olive which he didn't like. One of the first foods I've found that he didn't like.

I finally finished my market bag today. I finished it the other day with a double handle and it looked horrible. So I undid a big part of it and redid it with a single handle which I like a lot better. Here it is with a bunch of yarn in it. Sorry about the bad quality pictures, I didn't feel like turning lights on, it's too hot.

Here it is without anything in it. It compacts rather nicely when empty.

And here it is layed out to show the pattern more. If you recognize the couch, yes, it is from Memorial Dorm before they redid the upstairs furniture. Andy grabbed them when they were hauling them out to the dumpster. They're still in great shape, but we're selling them as we will have no storage for the next 9 months and we're house sitting for some nice people in Stayton.

Yay for visiting friends!

Our friends Jake and Cassie and their baby Elizabeth came down to visit us for the weekend. It was a blast and very nice to have friends here for once. We played lots of games, went to our county fair, went hiking up to a gorgeous lake, and they came to church with us. I don't have any pictures, but it was very nice to have them here. We're excited to get to hang out with more friends now that we're moving closer to most of them!

My cute boys

Knitting

A while ago, I was inspired by my friend Emily to pick up knitting again. It had been a while, and I have two old unfinished projects. I decided to get some yarn and needles, and knit a hat. My first hat turned out great, and I have since made 7 more I have yet to finish my unfinished projects (one's a baby blanket for my 1-year-old niece started when she was in the womb, and the other is a black felted bag that I am very excited to use once I get the guts to go ahead with the felting). I used to buy all my yarn and needles at Wal-mart because that's the only place around here to get supplies. I have since become a knitting snob and won't knit with acryllic or metal needles anymore. I've moved on to 100% cotton, wool/mohair/angora/silk, etc. and bamboo knitting needles (my soul mates). My latest project is a farmer's market bag out of cotton and linen. I'll post a terrible picture of my bag as it sits now. Not much to look at, but it will be once it's done!