Hello to New Digs!

I'm sitting on the floor of my old apartment, which is more or less empty. DS and I have never been very good at actually getting everything out of the apartment when we move, which ends up lending itself to some extra, non-planned purging. He's left to drop some random stuff off at the new place, and then he's going to bring back lunch and oven cleaner (I have to admit I don't think I've ever cleaned an oven...)

I'm surprised at how clean this place is. It gives me hope that the December mega-move to CA will be not quite so bad as we're fearing it will. I'm happy to report that we got everything (except for cleaning supplies and aforementioned riffraff) into the new place in somewhere around 10 hours. And that's with lunch and dinner breaks and only one helper! (Bless her soul, Renae is a saint.. actually, if she were drinking while reading this, I'm pretty sure milk would shoot out her nose. But still, she was our sole volunteer, and we have waaay too much stuff even after all our purging)

The cats were ANGRY that we were moving. We had to lock them into one room all day (with all needed supplies of course) because they are notorious for running out the front door at every opportunity. I also read somewhere that cats get very anxious when they see all they know of the world disappearing out the front door. I think maybe they started getting angry when we started packing and purging about a month ago, because I found a suitcase that one (or maybe both, but I really think it was Winston) had starting using for a litter box. Things like that are always a sign of either a sick animal, or one that is very upset. And since they both seem more than fine now that they're in the new place full of their stuff, my guess is someone was sending me a message...

I think we might end up fitting into our new place even better than I had planned (I have to scaled cut-outs of all my furniture, and I like to draw out apartments and arrange my stuff before we move). That's pretty exciting considering we'll be extremely lucky to have this much space after December. Though I think the more we move, the more DS and I move towards the sentiment of less is more.

Oh.. and we're tired. Extremely tired.

I can do it!

59 As a 1930s wife, I am Superior Take the test!

Apparently when DS filled out the same quiz for me, it said "very poor"... I think that means we're doing great! I am awesome!

Dr. Horrible

Quick!!!! GO! Before it's too late!! (as in sunday at midnight)

Decisions

In a recent conversation with Kimberlina, it was pointed out to me that I never shared our moving decision. Not only did he get an offer from Salt Lake City, but also from Santa Barbara, California as well. A tough choice was ahead of us: go to Salt Lake City where there are friends and realistic living expenses, or go to Santa Barbara where the research is better and live on a box on the beach...

We chose the box on the beach. You think I'm kidding about the box, but only a little. We currently have somewhere between 1000 and 1100 square feet in our apartment, and it's pretty full of stuff. With nearly double the rent, we might get a 650 square foot apartment in Santa Barbara... pretty insane if you ask me.

The plus? He's really stoked about working with this guy, and we're both intrigued by the idea of living by the ocean (Santa Barbara is only about 2 miles wide, squished in between some small-ish mountains and the ocean). I grew up in a land-locked state and didn't take my first trip to the ocean until I was a senior in high school. And I've never seen the Pacific Ocean.

So the big problem now is.. getting a job myself that pays enough that we can both move around our apartment and not starve, as well as getting rid of enough stuff that we can move around in our apartment. Thus, I have begun purging. Like crazy.

Our current lease is up at the end of this month, and this place won't let us have a short term lease that ends in the winter (jerks!). So we're moving to someplace that will, and then moving again in December. It's pretty lame, but it's giving me an excuse to get a head start on the whole packing and purging process. I'm working on going through all of my stuff and packing it in such a way that a lot of the boxes can remain boxed until we get to California. But in doing so I've realized that even with getting rid of several pieces of furniture, there's no way we could fit into anything less than 800 sq ft right now.

Hence, a second round of purging. Tackling the stuff that I didn't think I could part with, and actually parting with it. I'm reading this book called "It's All Too Much", and it's actually really helpful. Things to think on:

1. If you're hanging on to things for sentimental reasons, or because it's too important, think about where it is. If it's in a box in your cellar or closet, how can it be that important?
2. Only fill your house with things that are either useful or beautiful.
3. If you haven't used it in a year, it's not useful.

600 square feet, here I come!

Need a Painter?

Luke, of recent birthday fame, also recently bought a house.  The basement has a rec room that was ingeniously given peach accent walls and red curtains.  *shudder*  He asked for my advice on what to do with it, and I suggested we paint it to look like a pool table (there will be one down there eventually).  There are two walls separated by a fireplace that end up being less than the length of the room, which is pretty big.  So I didn't think the dark green would be too overwhelming or oppressive.

It's coming along nicely I think!

Fireworks

And now, for your enjoyment, some of the fireworks DS and I could see from our balcony.

Luke's Birthday

There's a birthday tradition between some of the people at my office to "decorate" their office space.  You may remember the balloon foray.

June 29th was Luke's birthday.  We hung large sheets of paper on one wall, and projected dinosaur images for easy drawing.

Then we spent quite a bit of time coloring in these huge beasts.

DS was there for moral, but not creative or manual, support.  To occupy himself, he made use of Luke's many small plastic toys.

Some of his little scenes were historical (though he might claim they're all historical).

The end result?  Huge success!!  Luke was scared to work, and spent the day looking over his shoulder to make sure he wasn't about to be eaten.  Watch out!

Sort of makes me want to start randomly doing things like this to everyone's offices.  Way better than plain white walls.