Did I Say I Liked Winter?!?

I am a big fat LIAR! We had snow on Tuesday during the day. Several inches. Then that night it sleeted another couple of inches. Then early, early yesterday morning (like 0300 early) everything iced over. Complete mess!! And then yesterday during the day it warmed up to almost 40 degrees. But last night it dropped down to 22. So, everything refroze. Into a huge sheet of ice.

So, anyhow, I get dressed this morning thinking I'll go to the VV for 25% off day (for the cardholders, which I am!) and I spent a good hour taking my time, doing my hair and make up, since after the VV I had to drive the 40 miles down to Will's work and get my ID card renewed and I didn't want to look like poo, which is how I am still feeling, but I digress. So, I spend an hour getting dressed and I look good and I'm feeling better and I gather all of my crap to walk outside and I almost broke my neck! The "path" from the door to my car is like an ice skating rink. I have absolutely no traction, despite my wearing ugly snow boots, and I almost broke my neck!! I mean I realize SNOW boots are meant for SNOW but come on. I thought I was being smart by wearing something made for winter weather. Hell, if I'm going to be slipping and sliding all over the place I might as well wear cute shoes.

I managed to get to my car and throw all of my stuff in the passenger side seat and then I had to trek all the way back across the front yard to drop off a package at the mail box. And then walk back over to my car. I wasn't feeling very optimistic by this point because if I couldn't even walk across the yard, how was my car going to get out of the drive way. Well, simply put, it didn't. Which is why I'm home now, on blogger, in quite the bitchy mood. See, our little drive way is basically a mud pit and it has been since the beginning of December. The snow and rain have just turned our gravel parking spots into muck and it's nasty. Will's truck was able to leave Tuesday, yesterday and today. My car has been parked since Monday and there is ice all around it. I don't think I'm going anywhere anytime soon & I'm starting to go stir crazy sitting in this house!

I was so mad a few minutes ago that I ventured outside to our back yard (another big ol sheet of ice) and I went into our shed and found a spade/hoe thingamajig and I started hacking up the back yard. You know, a path from the shed to the back door. Not the *whole* yard. I'm sure I looked like a giant idiot doing that but hey, it worked and I had traction while walking!! So, I may try to go out and do that to the front yard too and maybe around my car and maybe I'll get to leave this place this afternoon. Our driveway is in the shade though so I doubt much melting will take place and trying to hack away at ice is quite tiring!

I guess I could make good use of this time by doing Etsy related things or cleaning the house but I'd much rather be at the Value Village and Target (which, btw, is having another huge clearance sale!). Thanks for listening to my rants. I'm feeling a bit better!!

Whew!

Hey guys! I thought I'd get back into posting regularly after my visit to SC a few weeks ago but as luck would have it I came down with a horrible cold! My germ infested relatives were nice enough to share with me and now both Will and I are hacking and sneezing all over the place. I was pretty much out of commission all of last week, moving between the bed and the sofa and back to bed again. It was horrible. I'm still not 100% better although I'm not quite as sick as I was last week. Now I'm in that itchy throat, cough-until-you-gag phase and it's almost impossible to go anywhere because I never know when I'm going to have one of those coughing attacks and well, gagging in public is a bit embarrassing!

Our visit to SC was pleasant. We exchanged Christmas gifts with my side of the family, went to my nieces 2nd Birthday party, visited with relatives and came home in a timely manner! I didn't get to do any thrifting while I was down there, so that was a bit disappointing but I kind of expected that. It seems like there's never enough time to get it all done when I go back home! There's always friends I didn't get to see, places I didn't get to shop and food I didn't get to eat. lol

In other news, it looks as if we're planning a little family vacation in March and we're heading to Florida. Will, as you all know, is in the Air Force and this year (like in 2003) Disney is doing a special promotion for military families. The active duty member receives a 5-day Park Hopper pass for free and up to 5 of his dependents or friends can get 5-day Hopper passes for $99!! So, it appears as if we'll be heading to Florida in March and we're taking my parents, sister and niece with us. Oh, and our two doggies. We're looking to rent a house (hopefully with a pool!) and we'll be there for at least a week. I'm going to try to persuade Will to take me down to Sanibel Island while we're in Florida too but I'm not sure if he'll go for that. And my mom and sister have both already talked to me about their desire to spend at least one day while we're down there at thrift stores! Wooot! Thank goodness we're driving because I plan on loading up on tons of fabulous goodies should we happen to find decent thrifting spots!

So, that's about it from here in snow & ice-covered Maryland. I need to venture out today and pick up a few things for my Etsy business and maybe do some thrifting. I hope you all are doing well. And I hope I can get around and visit everyone soon. I miss my blogging friends!!

You Can Call Off the Search Party!!

Hey guys, remember me? lol Sorry I have been so out of touch lately. Things here are just crazy busy right now and I can't see it slowing down anytime soon! I've definitely missed blogging and more importantly I've missed reading all of your blogs! I need to find time to catch up with you all soon!

So, the last week of my Jackson trip was FAB! Will and I took a sleigh ride through the elk refuge, which was both thrilling and a little scary! Those animals are huge. And they have very pointy looking antlers! It was amazing seeing them that close though. I'd obviously never been on a sleigh ride and while fun, I'm very glad that is not our main source of transportation these days. It was cold!! And very bumpy! But it was a wonderful experience, something I'm not likely to do again for quite some time.







After the sleigh ride, Will and I went back down to the Gros Ventre Road where we saw all the bison during the summer. Didn't see any buffalo this time but we did see these instead:






Will and I also went snow tubing, finally. Kind of like the ghetto mini-golf experience we had last summer at Snow King, the snow tubing proved to be about the same. That was really disappointing. There were only 3 lanes and the rope tow thing was not set up very well and it was just...ugh. And the ground was pretty much a complete sheet of ice, which was nice for the ride down the tubes, but so not nice when you tried to walk. I almost broke my freaking neck, more than once, and I finally told Will that I was done! We have plenty of snow tubing here on the East Coast at resorts that are much better equipped and a lot less slippery! I did get my picture taken with the biggest snowman I've ever personally seen:

(please ignore that shadow under my nose which makes it look like I'm sporting a moustache!)




Our last night in Jackson, New Year's Eve, we went to dinner at this place that all the locals rave about - The Gun Barrel Restaurant. Personally, I thought it was just so-so. It was okay but certainly not as good as I expected it to be after all of the bragging everyone was doing. Later that night we met up with one of my internet friends that I've known for over 10 years. I keep in touch with this person a couple of times a year through emails and I just happened to check the email account we chat through the day before I left to go out to Jackson. I asked this person how their wedding went and if they were looking forward to Christmas and I mentioned that I was flying out the next day to Jackson to spend the holidays. I received an email back a few hours later telling me that he and his fiance were flying out to Jackson the following Saturday to spend a week! How freaking crazy is that?!?! I mean of all the places in the world they could've chosen to spend their vacation, they picked Jackson. And it just so happened that I was going to be there too? So, we met up with my friend and his fiance and went to the Tavern bar that night and shared a couple of pitchers of beer and caught up on the last 10 years! It was an excellent time and the band was really good.

My flight out of Jackson the following day was entirely too early! I had to be up by 5:00 but didn't get to bed until 1:30 and then I couldn't sleep. You know how it is when you know you have to be somewhere and you wake up every.thirty.minutes? Ugh! I have decided that I will never fly again unless I can get a window seat. My flight from Salt Lake back to Dulles was absolutely miserable. I was in the middle seat and couldn't get comfortable at all. I couldn't see out the window and kept getting motion sickness and thought I was going to hurl! It was horrible. Add to that the very little sleep I had the night before and I felt like I was going to DIE!

I was so glad to get home! I love Jackson but I really missed my thrift stores! I want to amend my statement that I could move there and be happy. It's beautiful and peaceful and so much fun but I definitely couldn't survive without access to better thrift stores!! I spent the majority of my day yesterday thrifting and it was quite successful! I found lots of goodies which I'll be listing in my store soon. I also went to a great yard/garage-ish sale on Saturday. I was looking up something on Google Friday night and came across an antique store in Gaithersburg, which is a good 50 miles from here, and noticed that they were having a HUGE sale the following day. Will was gone again (go figure eh) so I decided I'd drive over and check out what they had to offer. That was the best sale I'd ever been to! It certainly made up for all of the crappy yard sales I went to last summer! I asked the owner(s) if they were relocating or not and he said they were just closing their store due to their rent going up 25%. They said they'd still run their online business though.

I'm trying to be very productive today and get some items listed in my store but I have so much other stuff I need to be doing as well. Will and I (and the doggies!) leave tomorrow to drive down to SC to spend some time with my family. We'll be doing Christmas (which I have yet to shop for!) and we'll be there for my niece's 2nd birthday. I cannot believe she's 2 already. It feels like it was just yesterday that we were all at the hospital waiting for her arrival. Wasn't she adorable? This was our first picture together!!



So, that's my 2+ week update! It's been insane around here but hopefully after we're back from SC things will slow down a bit! I hope you all are doing well and enjoying 2009 so far!

Merry Christmas

Hey guys! I hope you all are having a wonderful Christmas Eve with your families and friends. Will had to work tonight so I've been keeping myself occupied watching HGTV and Food Network! He'll be off at 10:00 though and we've got plans to drive to the Town Square (which really is only 2 blocks away but it's too cold to walk!) and take some pictures of the pretty lights and the snow.

Yesterday morning after Will came home from work and caught a cat nap, we got up and headed to the DQ for some lunch and then drove up to Grand Teton park. It was deserted and simply amazing. I cannot believe how much more beautiful the park is in the winter than in the summer. I mean I thought it was absolutely breathtaking in August, but that was nothing compared to yesterday. Everything was coated in thick, powdery snow and it was just so pretty. I almost thought I'd cry! I was really hoping we'd see lots of wildlife but no such luck! We saw this guy right before we left the park though.



After the trip to the park, we came back into town and tried to find our missing package that is being held hostage at the local post office but that was pointless! After standing in line for half an hour, we got the same answer we received on Monday. Basically, our package is here at the post office, it was marked undeliverable to our hotel (this is after we called before ordering and confirmed w/ the hotel that we could have something shipped and checking to see if we had the right address!!) but the Post Office has told us that our package sits among approximately 1000 others that have been marked undeliverable and that they don't have the time to search for it. UUUUUUGH!! I hope they make time to search for it before we leave!!

Anyhow, after the Post Office fiasco, we came back to the room and rested for a while before heading to another one of our favorite restaurants, Teton Steakhouse. Our plans were to eat dinner and then head over to the Snow King tubing place but we ate so much that the snow tubing didn't happen! Our dinner was fabulous though and we'll go snow tubing later this week!

We had a nice breakfast here at the hotel this morning and then went walking around downtown. The stores are all having fabulous sales which is nice but there weren't many people out shopping. Will had to go to work at 2, so we didn't have much time to hang out downtown but in that short time we were out walking around, my face managed to get wind burned and I look like a big old lobster now! Take a look at the friend we made today down at the Town Square:



Here are a few other pictures from the Grand Teton Park that we took yesterday.

A couple of pictures!

Hey y'all! Will and I had a wonderful day here in snowy Wyoming. After breakfast and running a couple of errands, we headed out to the Gros Ventre Road that we loved traveling on last summer. It's the area we saw the most buffalo and the charming little barn on Mormon Row. We drove down the road for a couple of miles before we hit a little buffalo-jam and had to turn around! We drove down the road a couple more miles and stopped into the Grand Teton Visitor Center and took some pictures and threw some snowballs at each other! We came back to town and headed to Bubba's BBQ for a late lunch and then came back to the room and took a nap! Will is working an 8 hour shift tonight and the weather is still cold & snowy but it's so beautiful! I read earlier that another huge storm is coming this way and should arrive on Christmas Eve and stick around through Christmas Day and that night too and they're expecting a lot more snow than this storm produced! Eeeeeeeek! I am so in love!! Anyhow, here's a few pictures I was able to take today. They aren't the best quality but I hope you enjoy them anyway!!

Greetings from snowy Jackson Hole!

Hey y'all! I made it safely out here and I am having a great time. I've come to realize that I could definitely move here, even without Target and good thrift stores because it is just so beautiful here that I'd gladly sacrifice those things in exchange for seeing these views every day!

My flights were both on time yesterday, which is a miracle and I arrived out here about 12:30. Will and I went and grabbed a late lunch at one of our favorite restaurants here, Sidewinders, and then we came back to the room so I could take a much needed nap. At that point I had been awake for 30-something hours!! We ran to the grocery store last night and came back and sat in front of the fireplace and watched the snow fall.

Speaking of snow, we're supposed to get another 10-18 inches today and I am so in love! I've never seen so much snow before in my life and this place looks like a total winter wonderland. This is the best Christmas EVER!! We're heading out in a bit to run some errands and then we may drive up to the Grand Teton Park today and do a little sight seeing. I'm hoping to see a lot of animals and have lots of photos to share tonight! Here's a picture from our hotel room window yesterday of the slopes over at Snow King Resort. Add another foot (yes, foot!!) of snow and that's what it looks like today!



Hope you all had a great weekend, full of holiday festivities and time with your families!

Y'all! I leave in 2 days...

and I haven't even started packing. Keep in mind all of my bags have to be packed no later than tonight since Will is taking them with him tomorrow morning. Did I mention that I haven't even started packing? Yeah, it's going to be a busy, busy day!!

Oh, and I haven't really even started Christmas shopping either. I mean it's a little late now and I didn't want to have to take all our gifts out there and then bring them back here so I'm guessing we'll just do Christmas sometime in January. I've picked Will up a few things that I'll take with me and I'm taking some pre-lit garland and stockings to hang up so it'll feel a little more like Christmas while we're there.

I'm trying to not stress out about all of the stuff I need to get done today but I feel like I just don't have enough time. And it's my fault really, seeing how I've had ALL week to get my stuff packed. I was talking with my sister about this yesterday though and we agreed that it's just too hard to pack a week out. Especially considering that if I packed all of my clothing on Monday I wouldn't have had anything to wear all week. I'm sure it'll all work out though. In the end, I'll survive if I forget something and it it's something really important, I can buy it when I get out there.

I still can't wrap my brain around the fact that I'm going back to Wyoming and I'm finally going to see REAL SNOW on Christmas!! Wheeeee I'm really looking forward to taking the sleigh ride through the elk refuge too! I should be able to get online regularly while I'm out there and I'll have tons of pictures to share with you all too!