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Sick

June 5th, 2008 · a day in the life, tina

Yesterday my web host was having server issues… so my blog was down pretty much all day.
I didn’t get the next vacation post done since the server was down. And I’m not ahead in my posts because of this Messiah project. And I’m behind in the Messiah project because I’m sick (and because I procrastinated since getting back from vacation). And I haven’t done my laundry because I have a deadline for Messiah (That deadline is tomorrow, by the way).

Its a vicious, vicious circle.

And did I mention that I’m sick?

It all started yesterday with a disgusting hacking cough. No sore throat warning. No runny nose. Just a deep yucky cough. It hurts when I cough. And I tend to cough more when I talk. So I’ve been trying really hard not to talk.

Instead I sign. (I learned ASL as part of my major in college.)

But that’s not going so well.

When I was single, living in an apartment with roommates, and I got sick – I signed all the time. I didn’t care if my roommates couldn’t understand me. But there was always someone around that could. A lot of my friends were either Deaf or also studying American Sign Language. So being sick meant a good opportunity to practice.

Now… I have a daughter who knows a handful of words in sign language. And a husband who knows even less. So when I try to sign Bridget just yells, “No mom. Talk.” And Dave usually just leaves the room – since he has no idea what I’m trying to say. So much for practice. So much for trying not to talk. The thing is, I think they would be able to understand if they tried. 🙂

Last night I signed four words to Bridget: “Cook – Spaghetti – Dinner – Help” – I had to sign one word at a time, and do it several times, but she understood well enough. And she came down to the kitchen with me to help me make dinner. The whole time she was saying, “Yea mom, I do want spaghetti.” Since then though, she has not been too excited about me trying to sign to her instead of talking. When I whisper that my throat hurts to talk she just assumes that if we both whisper – and have the whole conversation in whispers that all will be well. *sigh*

Man, I hope I feel better soon. I hate being sick.

P.S. When I’m sick I don’t talk to the dog either. I just pat my leg, shake my hand, snap my fingers, or point… she understands me. lol.

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California – Day 4

June 4th, 2008 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, family, the funniest people we know, tina

*Warning: lots of pictures… more than I promised.

Day Four (Saturday, May 10th)

Erin’s wedding.

Dave and I got to attend the sealing at the San Diego Temple together – thanks to Erin’s wonderful family for watching Bridget so we could.

Oh, and Bridget… still making friends… She played with Erin’s niece, Claire, all day! They had a great time.



The luncheon. It was at a restaurant called Roy’s. The food was great, and very well presented. Just looking at these pictures makes my mouth water. At the luncheon we learned that Bridget likes shrimp.

And the reception. In was very casual and held in the courtyard of their church house. Another presentation of amazing looking food.


After the luncheon we picked up Dave’s sister, Jenna, from the San Diego airport. She hung out with Dave and Bridget at the hotel while I was at the reception.

I got back around 8:30. And we watched the episode of LOST we’d missed on Thursday. Then off to bed. It was a much earlier evening than past nights. And it was good to get a good nights sleep!

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California – Day 3

June 3rd, 2008 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, family, tina

Day Three (Friday, May 9th)

All Day Disney!

We woke up that morning and went grocery shopping (its so nice to have a kitchen on vacation). We ate breakfast and packed sandwich’s for lunch. Then off to a jam-packed day of Disneyland.

Bridget and I on ‘Dumbo’ – she loved making it go up and down with the little lever. If you ask her what her favorite ride was at Disneyland was, she’ll say Dumbo. She’ll even try to explain how it goes up and down.

Honestly though, her favorite ride was Pirates. This is a picture of Bridget and Dave in line for Pirates. She liked that ride so much that we went on it at least twice a day each day that we were there. The record… 3 times in a row (that one was a little too much).

We stuck around for Fantasmic that night. Bridget made friends with a little girl, Taylor, that was sitting next to us. Her family was from St. George.

On the way out of the park we spotted Mickey and Minnie – all decked out in their formal wear. We had to get another picture.

Fantasmic started at 9:00. And fireworks at 9:30. By the time we got out of the park and on the road it was pretty near 11:00… which means it was nearly midnight when we rolled in to the hotel. So guess what we did when we got back? Yep, we crashed – again.

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California – Day 2

June 2nd, 2008 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, family, the funniest people we know, tina

Day Two (Thursday, May 8th)

Erin’s Bridal Portraits at Balboa Park. The park was gorgeous! I could get used to shooting portraits there. Erin looked really pretty too. I took almost 200 pictures – this is a mere sampling. Seriously great backdrops! (Erin was one of my roommates once upon a time – it was good seeing her again).

Our first day at Disneyland. We got there around 1:00p.m. (after Bridals and lunch). We learned early on that Bridget loves roller coasters. Too bad there were only a few that she was tall enough to go on.

Hangin’ out with our pal Mickey. It only took us 30 minutes of waiting in line to get this picture. lol.

Thursday night we checked into our WorldMark (timeshare) in Oceanside. By the time we got checked that night it was almost 11:00p.m. Again, we crashed.

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California – Day 1

June 1st, 2008 · a day in the life, bridget, dave, family, random, tina

I’ve started a post about our vacation about 4 times now… and I just keep deleting it and starting over. The trip was too long to try to give you a play-by-play, and we took far too many pictures to be able to just pelt you with those. So, after much contemplation (and realizing that the longer I wait the further away it will be from when we actually went on vacation) I’ve decided to simply post pictures and captions. I have to limit myself to 3-5 images per day though… or I’ll get carried away.

I’ll just do one vacation day per post. That way you can experience our vacation, as we did, one day at a time.
(Besides, it makes coming up with topics for the next 10 days pretty easy. :))
Before I begin, we just want to shout a big “thanks” to Jared for caring for our house and our dog while we were away. Thanks Jared!

Day One (Wednesday, May 7th)

At the airport. I had a sinus headache and watery eyes. Ended up spending way too much for water and pills at the airport. Bridget got crackers.

The first flight. Took off at 8:53p.m. from SLC to Phoenix.

Layover in Phoenix. Bridget made friends with a random little girl. They shared toys. Our flight was delayed for an hour, so she had lots of time to play. The kid didn’t fall asleep until half-way through the second flight.

Our plane finally landed a little after midnight (California time), and we made it to our first hotel at 1:00a.m. We crashed.

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Liz

May 31st, 2008 · family

This is my mom.

Today is her birthday. Happy Birthday Mom!
We love you!!

(This picture was from August 2006. My mom doesn’t like her picture taken – I don’t have anything more current. She looks about the same though)

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LOST – season finale

May 30th, 2008 · random

What was that?

I guess we know now how the 6 came to be the ones to get off the island, but there are still a lot of unanswered questions. What is going on with Jack and Kate? And why, really, has Jack let himself go so much? And WHY is he listening to Ben? And what’s with Kate’s nightmare about Claire? What does Sayid want with Hugo? Desmond & Penny? Is her dad really behind a lot of this? Sun met with him… common interests? Where the heck is the island? How did Ben end up in the desert? And what was Sayid doing there?
They’re not really going to go back, are they? If they do, what will that accomplish?

There are so many theories, but this show is so complex… the plot so abstract… I just don’t know what to think.

I don’t think I can wait until the fall.

Ok. That is all. I am done now.
If you watched the finale last night though, I’d be interested to hear your thoughts.

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I need your help!

May 29th, 2008 · a day in the life, random

Tina here. With Dave in school and having such a crazy schedule, you guys get me back for the summer. Fun for all of you.

My first blog post in awhile should be a little more exciting than begging for your help. . . please don’t hate me.

The past little while a good portion of my time has been focused on preparing our house to sell, and finding ways of marketing it. Many of you know we’ve been trying to sell our home so we can build. We’ve been flying “by owner” so far, and in the 6+ weeks its been for sale the interest has been mild. The past couple of days I’ve spent trying to find new ways of marketing the house without breaking the bank. I met with a Realtor on Tuesday, but didn’t want to increase the sales price of my home by a couple of grand so I could pretend to be able to afford her commission. But there is the exposure benefit that the MLS provides.

I did find a website that will do a flat fee MLS listing for $349. But, do the pros outweigh the cons?

To MLS or not to MLS? – That is the question.

PROS – More people will see the ad. More exposure usually means more calls, and hopefully more walk-through’s and a sale. Realtor’s across the state will know about our home and be able to offer it to their clients.

CONS – If a buyer comes in with an agent (even through the flat fee listing) I would still be obligated to pay the buyers agent a commission of 2-3%. Buyers agents are advocates for the buyer and will probably try to talk me down in price in addition to taking their fat commission. My brother (Realtor in another area) says that a lot of agents won’t show a home that’s only offering 2% if they can avoid it. He thinks I should try to offer 3%.

So, as of today, I have not gotten an MLS listing, but I am still considering it. What do you think I should do???
…we are anxious to build, and really don’t want to be sitting on this house for a long time.

Alas!

Ok, one more question.
In my effort to find other creative ways of marketing our house, I decided to start. . . a blog! Don’t laugh. If blogs work for individuals and small businesses, why wouldn’t they work for home owners too? In any case, its worth a try. Here it is: http://4sale-logan.blogspot.com/

So the question… will you help me advertise. Please. Pretty Please.
I need a little blog spamming action. If you will all post a little blurb about my house on your blogs and a link to the house blog (above), and if some of your friends did… oh gosh… I sound like one of these silly e-mail forwards or chain letters… I promise, there is no curse involved. Anyway, I am just hoping for a little house blog exposure here. If you are willing I sure would love it… and when we finally build we can all celebrate with a dinner party. What do you say? Will you help me?

Here is a nice little picture you can blog-lift too…

Can you tell this is stressing me out just a little bit? I know it shouldn’t be.

Sorry for all my pathetic begging.

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Back to School

May 28th, 2008 · dave

We decided about 6 months ago that I should go back to school to pick up a Masters of Business Administration. The theory: more education = more money. The 3-semester program starts in the Fall, however, in order to qualify for the program there are a number of prerequisites that I needed to complete.

There were more prerequisites than there was time available. Fortunately, Utah State University offers what they call the ABC, or the “Accelerated Business Core.” This amounts to a grueling 12-week fiasco where I can earn 13.5 credits. Classes run from either 8-12 or 1-5, roughly 10 business days each, staggered. I have never been to a 4 hour class, and so am rightfully nervous — especially since I need to simultaneously fulfill my work obligations, e.g., 40 hours. DuPont was kind and promised me that so long as I still get my hours in (days, nights, or weekends), they would allow me to leave for class time.

Tina will be basically without a husband for the next 12 weeks as I come and go trying to fulfill my 3 obligations: provide for my family, pass these courses, sleep.

We’ll just take the next 3 months 1 day at a time.

Class starts today. Wish me luck.

Class starts today. Wish Tina luck.

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Indiana Jones

May 27th, 2008 · dave

I work for a great company. It is the only company I know of that would dare take down the American Flag in favor of a pirate flag.

DuPont with a pirate flag

Although it was a unique event to do so. The company was shutting down for the morning so that all of the employees could go to the rented movie theater and see “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.” This happened during the summer of 2007.

Well, this morning, DuPont is also closed; however, there is no pirate flag to sail. DuPont is closed while all of the employees go see “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.”

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