Long Day
It was quite the day. My first ever baby shower! We had all the friends and family over. Our new house is a lot bigger than anything we’ve had before, but with so many people, it sure felt pretty cozy!
We are so blessed to have so many great people in our life! We have MORE than enough baby stuff to make it through the first SEVERAL months. We should be able to muster on from there!
So now just trying to put everything back together, and find places for all the new do-dads. Can’t wait to see this little guy!
Some clean pictures!
Man, it seems like it’s taking forever to get unpacked! Close to done though in the living room and kitchen. Everything else either still has boxes or is just empty. But I can’t just leave those messy pictures from days ago up and not post a few proving that we’ve cleaned up the place!
Living Room
Andrea did a good job decorating the mantle!
The old radio gets a featured location! Bust out some vinyl, baby!
Most wouldn't, but I'm actually diggin' the retro range.
Holy crap everywhere!
All this crap is supposed to go... somewhere.
There are seriously boxes everywhere. It’s a mess but starting to come together. The kitchen is looking a lot better now than last night when I took that picture.
I think that's a fine place for the pet food bins.
One thing that is nice about this place is that the windows actually open and on the nice cool evenings we’ve been having you can open the windows up and just fill the house with fresh air. I’d never seen one before, but this house has an attic fan what really moves some air and pulls some major air into the house. The slats are kind of broken on it, but I can fix that eventually.
This will be the media room sooner or later.
Andrea’s made a lot of progress in the basement since this picture. We decided that we wanted the TV to be separate from the living room upstairs, so that we have a nice place to sit and visit or just relax without the distraction of the TV (as if we get more than one channel). So far I’m enjoying it.
The new command center.
And the computer room. Contrasting popular belief this WASN’T the first room we started on. The good news is everything is pretty much up and running. I haven’t had time to fire up Guild Wars yet, but the network is perfect, and I even think the Wi-Fi reaches a bit further without all the plaster walls we had in the old place.
All in all it’s slowly taking shape. I have some major work to do in the garage. Get some trees trimmed, get the rest of the house all put together by the weekend. That’s my goal. After posting these disaster pictures, I’m committed now to posting some nice clean pictures of the house when we’re done.
We’re In!
Need to trim some trees.
Living room... already messy.
Hey der, ho der. We’re on the move. Borrowed the van from work and loaded it to the gills. Made two trips today, which really took care of about 90% of our crap if you exclude what we need for day to day living. It’s looking pretty hollow in the current place.
If you’re worried, I’ve made sure Andrea is on light lifting duty. But she’s still been more than helpful. Like when I lifted up our first big box and the bottom busted out from under it. DVD and Game boxes went everywhere! She fix the box and got it re-packed while I was able to keep hauling out.
The new pace was pretty big when we looked at it, but now that we are starting to get our stuff in it, it’s really seeming big. It’s gonna be nice, but it’s going to take a while to figure out what to do with all the space. Amongst the most awesome features. A garage opener (only one car garage though), a work shop in the garage, a fireplace in the living room, a nice big den in the basement, and plenty of storage. It’s not perfect though. It’s got some blemishes and some of the paint was sloppily done, but we don’t need anything that’s perfect.
Right now Andrea’s plan is to make the upstairs living room TV-less. I’m all for this! A nice fire in the fireplace and no TV to distract you. And all the media stuff is going in the basement. TV, computers all that going in the den/computer room. The problem I think we’re going to run into is not enough furniture to sit in!
So the move is going smoothly so far. All the big stuff like the appliances and desks and such aren’t getting moved until Sunday as we won’t have a truck until then. But so far it’s good knowing it’s finally happening! Can’t wait to have ya’ll over and fire up the grill!
04.13.11The joys of moving
For those that don’t know, we’re moving out of Great Bend. Not too far though! Just about 10 miles down the road to the little town of Albert. So no new jobs or anything like that. Just trying to get to a little better neighborhood, and this new place should work out until we’re ready to buy a house somewhere.
The house in Albert is still an older house, but it’s definitely much larger. Larger than we really need, but our increase in rent will only be about $75 a month. Thankfully I’ve picked up some extra voice track duties at work that come with a little extra pay that should help offset the increase in rent and gas money. The old house used to be a FIVE bedroom, but the two bed rooms upstairs have been combined into one. It has a nice little fireplace in the living room and a den and a few more bedrooms in the finished basement. Only has a one car garage, but the driveway is wide enough for two cars, so I can leave the Toronado out in the driveway while Andrea parks the Cutlass in the garage and we can both still get out. Heck even if a storm rolls through I’ve already got hail dents on the Toro.
Really looking forward to getting out of this place. It’s like that feeling you get right before you’re about to go on vacation and the last day of work just drags on and on. This hasn’t been a bad place here on 10th Street for the most part. I mean until recently no one has bothered us and we’ve had everything we needed. Infact I’m really going to miss being able to walk to work. But ever since these new neighbors moved in behind us it’s just been uncomfortable. I can’t walk from my back door to the car without the neighbor sticking his head outside the door and hollering at us about something. Whether it’s to look at his “new rims”, apologize for riding his ATV through my yard, or yesterday he wanted to buy my broken dog leash. That’s of course when the cops aren’t over there which happens about every 3 – 4 weeks.
So hopefully we can rope as FEW people as possible into the move. I’ve got permission to use the van from work and a friend of Andrea’s has a box truck we can use. So all signs point to a smooth move. I’ll have plenty of pics once we’re settled in the new place. It’s gonna look pretty empty though, because we sure don’t have enough junk to fill up the place!
Lucas James Althouse
It’s a boy! At least they were pretty sure. Andrea went in for her latest sonogram on Friday and we got some new pictures. He was squirming around like crazy, and it was just so cool to see him in there just doing his own thing. Definitely the coolest thing I’ve ever been a part of!
Yup, it's a baby alright.
It was kinda creepy seeing all the bones and everything. But I was glad to know it was all there!
I don't think we got the best pictures. There were times during the exam that you could clearly see little fingers and toes and everything! Too cool.
The first of many embarrassing pictures to come.
BYOBaby
First off, I’m sorry that I haven’t kept up on the blog. No excuses. Just ma bad!
Tons have been going on. Mostly I’ve been either communication with people the ye olde fashioned way, or for the most part, just not communicating much at all.
The big news is that Andrea and I are going to be parents! Woo hoo! It’s hard to imagine and I haven’t fully grasped how my life is going to change yet. But I’ve obviously passed the point of no return.
The thing I’ve noticed is that everyone seems to want to welcome me to the club of misery. Like, “Hey, congratulations! … I hope you don’t like sleeping.” Or “Way to go! … Kiss goodbye to life for 18 years to forever“. Of course I’m naive but I just can’t imagine it being that terrible. I’m sure I’d feel differently if I this were more of a suprise, or if I weren’t ready for all the hassle and drama. But I really think Andrea and I are going to be pretty good parents. We work well together now, why wouldn’t that carry over into parenthood?
In spite of everyone’s efforts to wish doom upon us, I’m still incredibly excited and optimistic. To live in a world surrounded by idiots, it’s a very empowering feeling to know that I have the opportunity to put at least one good person out into the world. I’m excited to at least try.
So as I write this Andrea is going to be about 11 weeks along already and the doctor gave her a due date of August 4th. I have until then to enjoy all the perks of being kid-less. Any suggestions?
11.16.10Recommitted to Blogging:
Hey, I’m back! Seems like I’ve been neglecting the blog lately…. guilty. I’ve had a lot to write about as of late, but I’ll be honest, lately when I get home I just feel like being completely lazy. My time spent at home recently has been more sparse these days, and when I’m not sleeping I just want to be totally passive. Nothing really to be proud about, let alone blog about.
I’ve been looking at the blog here lately though and really want to get back into writing. I love being able to go through the archives and look over stuff I’ve posted here in the past 6 years almost. I feel like as time goes on, there’s going to be a big hole in these personal chronicles and that kinda bugs me. I’m not getting any better at remembering things as the days pass, and there’s a good chance that if it doesn’t land here, it’s going to be gone forever once I forget it.
So I’m making a 90 day commitment. I’m going to be blogging every day for the next 90 days. I can blog from my friggin’ phone now, so there’s no excuse.
Lots to talk about so hold me to it! I’ve got the new GoldenEye 007 game for Wii. Minecraft will absorb as much time as you throw at it. And work has been crazy, but rewarding.
See ya tomorrow!
I’m Kind Of A Big Deal
You’ve gotta love some of the “titles” you can earn in Guild Wars. Amongst being “Not Too Smelly”, “Slayer of All”, and a “Drunkard”. I’m also now, “Kind Of A Big Deal” (Anchorman inspired). So I’ve maxed 5 different titles. Of course there’s 40 possible titles… so there’s a lot of folks that have done a lot more than I have.
Supposedly things like this are supposed to contribute somewhat if you decide to link your Guild Wars account to the upcoming Guild Wars 2 game. The more stuff you have in your “Hall of Monuments” the better goodies you’ll get upon the launch of Guild Wars 2. To what extent it is worthwhile, remains to be seen.
For now it’s just been kinda nice to have time to play Guild Wars again. But to be honest, now that I’ve achieved KOABD… I think I’m going to get back to Final Fantasy XIII. Haha!
08.13.10The last Blazer post
Well we sold the Blazer. Took about 24 hours after Andrea advertised it at CPI. Asked for $900, got $900. Guess I should have asked for more!
We got it running and took it for a spin. And when we got back in the driveway, I looked at Andrea and said. “I think we should sell it.” She thought about it for a second, and agreed. It was simply a trust issue. We wanted to be able to head to the lake, or hit the road in it to go somewhere, and there was always going to be that nagging feeling in the back of my mind that it could leave me stranded at any time. In reality, we could say that about anybody’s car, but I just didn’t trust the Blazer.
We were honest when we sold it. Said that it had a host of electrical issues when we got it, but we fixed what we think is all of it. A ton of new parts. I really hope it treats the guy well. Said he’s going to use it for a huntin’ wagon. Should be perfect!
It did feel a little weird for a while after it was gone. I get too attached to vehicles. But now that it’s been a day or so, I’m just thinking about the next big thing! Haha. El Camino again?