Virginia Welcomes You

Well we've made it allll the way down to Virginia Beach. Let me fill you in on the adventure so far:

Saturday we got up early and we finished up our last minute things and were out the door at the crack of 11:30! We went to deposit Jake's cheque and get gas and were on the highway by 11:45am. For some reason it took us 2 hours to get to Parry Sound. I must have been doing the speed limit or something, cuz there wasn't any traffic. We ate lunch at Wendy's and after our 45 minute stop was done,we were on our way again by 2:30pm. Just after Barrie we took a small break to change drivers, and Jake drove for an hour and a half. Unfortunatly we only got 39 kms in that time. There was a major accident on the highway in King Township and we were in stop and go traffic for EVER. Fortunately when we left the highway on the only partially marked detour in Aurora I recognized Jane Street and told Jake to take that south until we could go back to the highway. (Sidenote: When I was in highschool my friends Jeremy, Will, Kendra and some other people all went to Kendra's cottage in my parent's red Horizon. There were 6 of us in a car with 4 seat belts, and we took Jane street all the way up to Aurora or somewhere. There was a cop following us most of the way, and I was sweating bullets because I didn't know that what we were doing was okay. I thought for sure we were breaking the law, but I learned years later that as long as all the seatbelts were being used, it didn't matter how many MORE people were in the car. That law recently changed, I noticed.) ANYWAY we made it to Niagara Falls by 7:30pm or so. We stayed at Travelodge and paid $150 for a room on the ground floor, 2 blocks away from the falls. We took the kids for a walk down to see them, but as we left the busy shopping area of Clifton Hill, the air became extremely cold. We turned around and got dressed in sweaters and socks and pants, and tried again. It was getting dim, and we didn't stay long. We went back to the hotel, Jake went across the street and brought "home" Wendy's, and then I gave the kids a bath while Jake stepped out to the casino. He came back a little while later with nothing but a $2.50 chip. He couldn't find the texas hold'em table, and had played a couple rounds of BlackJack (with an ungodly $15 and $25 minimum bet!!!) We had budgeted $40 each for the casino. So it was my turn. I took my driver's licence and my $40 and the $2.50 chip and walked down. I showed my ID and entered the noisy packed hot confusing casino. I ended up finding ONE hold'em table, but it was so crowded I couldn't observe for very long. It wasn't real hold'em anyway, it was a version called "Texas Hold'em Bonus" and it's each player against the dealer only, not each other. Which means you have to totally go on chance, you can't bluff or get reads on people's hands or anything. PLUS it was also $15 minimim bet. I found a roulette-ish table where there was a wheel and a table and you placed your minimum $1 bet on either the $1 square, $2, $5, $10, $20, $40 or Jackpot squares. The $1 square paid 1-1, $2 square paid 2-1, $5 5-1 etc. I placed a dollar on $2 and one on $5. I won with the 2. I did it again and won on the 2. I did it again and won on the $5. I started putting out $2 on the 2,5, and $1 on the 10 and 20. I won once on the 10. I made money up to $55, but then I started breaking even and losing. When I got back down to my original $40 I quit, cashed out, and left. I noticed on the way out there were Texas Hold'em sit and go games but the sign said the wait was 2.5 hours. Too bad. Anyway it was fun.

The next morning we had breakfast after we found the friggin restaurant! We had coupons for a specific one from the hotel, and the signs pointing us to it were not clear. We crossed the border at about 11am and had an easy ride down to PA. Sage slept the whole way, both days. He was sick, poor guy, but at least he wasn't too crabby. We made it to Rhiannon's house by 6:30pm. We had a great few days with them, playing with her two boys and baby girl. We were originally going to stay at Jake's friend Chuck's house, but Rhi and Dave had cleaned out their family room (they only moved into that house 7 weeks ago and there were lots of boxes still in the family room downstairs) just so we would stay at their house. That was really thoughtful. I was glad Jake agreed because while I'm sure Chuck is a nice guy, I only met him once for a few minutes and I was not really looking forward to staying with him and his new wife all week last week and next.

Wednesday night Jake's poor hippy uncle Lenny came to Rhi's for supper and we decided to ask him if he wanted to go to Virginia Beach with us, since he hadn't been down here for 3 years (no car) and never gets to talk to his sister Linda (no phone). Of course he wanted to, so yesterday morning at 11am we picked him up and made our way down here. Herd of turtles indeed. By the time we left Johnstown, it was 11:30am and we arrived at Linda and Scott's at 9:30pm. With two boys and an uncle who chain smokes, every stop was sooooo long. But we made it, and Nanna and Pappy and Great Gramma were happy to see us.

It's hot down here, by the way.

We're hoping to go fly a kite at the beach tonight I think. We walked around the mall today and also hunted down pet stores to look at puppies. There was a really cute one that looked like a sheppard mix, but the clerk said we could only find out the price if we played with the puppy. I said "I could play with a puppy" and Hayden, Linda, and I went into this little change room type place and de-germed our hands and played with the little guy. The clerk started reading out his lineage and his pedegrees and his shots and his neuter certificate and his guarantees and everything and then said "He's on sale this weekend, $100 off, so $1800." ?!? What the hell? He looked like a german sheppard mix. She said he would only double in size, so be about 30 lbs at fully grown, so I guess that's what you have to pay for a tiny german sheppard. I asked if there were any puppies that weren't $1700. She said the goldendoodle was $700, including the $100 sale price. Yah. That's a lot.

Anyway we're going to Manassas to see Cybil on either Monday or Tuesday, then back to Johnstown to see more of Jake's family. Taa taa for now!

Johnstown PA

We are having a wonderful time! Wish you were here.

Will write more later.

Love
Us Husses

A-travelling we will go!

A-travelling we will go!
Hi ho the merry-o
A-travelling we will go.

Tomorrow is the day before we leave for the south and JAKE'S FAMILY!! and friends. I have a holiday, Jake's working and the kids are still going to daycare. It will be good to be alone and make my lists and pack and get things prepared. Then Saturday morning we're off like a herd of turtles driving 6 hours to Niagara Falls. We're going to stay on the Canadian side overnight, at Clifton Hill. We'll walk by the falls if it's warm enough, to see them lit up at night. We'll have supper and then one of us and the boys will go 'home' to the hotel while the other goes to the CASINO!! After an hour (or less if the money runs out), that person will come home and then the other one will get to go. We haven't decided how much we're taking yet. I personally can't wait to play with cards and chips on a real table in a real casino!

Sunday we'll drive 6 hours to Pennsylvania, and have supper at Rhiannon's. We're staying in PA until Thursday morning, when we'll leave for Viriginia Beach, 7 1/2 hours away. We'll stay at Jake's parents until Tuesday and drive 3 1/2 (or so) hours to Manassas to visit Jake's sister Cybil. We'll stay at her house that night and leave the Wednesday morning for Johnstown again (3 1/2 ish hours). A few more nights in Johnstown and then Saturday morning pack up and head back to Niagara Falls. Well, Welland Ontario, which is 20 minutes outside of Niagara. Our friend Julie lives and teaches there. We'll get in a short but sweet visit with her and then Sunday take the last leg home.

Barring any traffic jams or 4 hour slowdowns on the highway (which we encountered last time we drove back from VA Beach to Johnstown), it will be a minimum of 39 hours' driving. We have a lended DvD player for the van, and plans for loads of snacks and toys and stickers and CDs of kids' music to distract them. And hopefully we've chopped it up enough that the driving won't be unbearable by the end.

Well, off to make some lists. I may be able to blog while I'm away, but in case not, take care and see you when I get back, with LOTS of pictures!

Navy Blue Pictures

It was very sunny today, as I previously mentioned in my Dirty Pigeons post. Warm. Sunny. Beautiful. So I decided to take pictures of our van! We're leaving for a 2 week trip to visit Jake's family in it on Saturday morning. More on that later. Note our pretty blue van:

From the side:

From the rear:
And from the rear-side. You can see reflected in the window the large pontoon boat with blue saran wrap protecting it, and the white building is the front house's shed. You can see how large the yard is. It's a pristinely manicured, de-weeded, subterranian automatic sprinklers-having thing. OUR yard is weedy, rarely mowed, never watered mess. But back to the van:
Look! Round dials! And the best part: The spedometer is in KILOMETERS!! No more having to read the tiny, inaccurate inner circle of numbers! I get the big ones! YahooooO!!! (The Tracker AND the Celebrity were both American and therefore in Miles.)

Spaciousness:
More spaciousness, and part of me:
Dual sliding side doors: (note the reflection shows some of the machines that are all over the place here at our house)
This is basically the same shot, only you can see me in it (heh heh) and our hedge:
Mes Garcons (again, with no pants):

I love this picture. The outter edges of this photo are blurry, but for some reason their faces were clear! I thought maybe it was due to them moving, but the plug on the wall is not moving and is blurred also.
Acrobatic Hayden:
As encouraged by his dad:
And it's called Navy Blue Pictures because there's something navy blue in each one.

Dirty Pigeons?

I've never seen this before.

I was outside taking pictures of the van this morning (to be posted later) and I noticed all these pigeons taking a bath in the large puddle next to the driveway. It snowed on Friday and finished by Saturday AM, so there were quite a few inches blanketing everything. It was really warm today though, so it's melting everywhere. These pigeons were bathing in the ice water.

weird.

Kids

Bookshelf Kids

This picture reminds me of Alicia and Fionna pictures because Fionna often does something weird and Alicia smiles on beside her, in great boots.
I think Sage's posing just like my mom, if she were to sit on a bookshelf.
Hayden's close-up
Sage's Pirate face
Sage's Shmoo Face (with Jake hair)Sage's "What you talkin' 'bout, Willis?" face

Weather

I added a new little linky thing to the side of my blog. It tells you the weather. Whether or not you care about the weather is up to you. There's a little drop down menu also, with some important cities listed, but there were only five slots, so I apologize if your city is not listed. If you want the weather where you are, there's a city search feature you can use too.

Sadly last night Lacey escaped from her tie-out and ran to the highway and was struck and killed by a transport. The car behind the accident stopped and the guy heard me calling for her and diverted me away. Jake ran out and I was getting a blanket to wrap her to take her to the vet, but Jake came back and said she had to have died upon impact.

We are grieving our beloved pet. Kitty misses her too. She was meowing for her last night.

She was not the same bouncy, over-excited, overwhelming dog that everyone would see when they came over. She was calm and playful, and gentle with the kids, and obeyed the important commands. We miss her so much.

Five Years Ago

April 4th, 2003. Woke up that morning super hella-excited! My wedding day! Got dressed and met my parents and sister in the lobby of the hotel we were staying at down in Manassas Virginia. We drove down the road to the Cracker Barrel for a Southern Cooked Breakfast with Jake and his parents. Raced back to the hotel room for a fast shower and then Carol helped me do my hair and get dressed in my white gown. We drove to the office of the registrar general (I think) and purchased our marriage licence. Carol and Linda witnessed. While we were waiting we danced around in our beautiful dresses and suits. We took the papers over to the court house and met up with the rest of the wedding party: pregnant Rhiannon, Gage (her son), Cybil, and Bethany (friend of Rhiannon). We waited for the lady who was going to marry us. When she was ready, we all filed into her office and Jake and I stood side by side with Carol to my left and Linda to Jake's right. We said our vows. We promised to be true. We exchanged rings. We kissed. We were married! Outside the courthouse we blew bubbles and took pictures and danced around some more. We drove down the way to a park with a gazebo and a blossoming Cherry tree and Carol set up her tripod and took pictures of us all. I don't think we had lunch, but we went for supper at a restaurant where our parents bought us a bottle of champaigne but they only gave us one glass each and then didn't serve the rest of the bottle. I had boring linguini so if I did get some on my dress it wouldn't be so glaringly obvious. Jake and I stayed in the hotel that night.

April 5th 2003. My parents and sister left for the trip home. I stayed one more night at Jake's and helped him finish packing all his boxes into the Tracker.

April 6th 2003. Linda had decorated our car so in the morning we were surprised with ribbons and a beautiful "Just Married" sign and soap-writing on the windows about love and such. I loved it. Jake was not so enthused. He took most of it off right then, but we kept the ribbons on the rear-view until we sold it last fall. The tracker was packed to the gills with stuff and our honey moon was going to be the drive back to Sudbury. The weather was beautiful in Virginia. It started getting colder tho, and by the time we reached Niagara Falls NY It was freezing. We slept in a motel that was pretty scary on the American side so we could cross the border during business hours. Which we did.

April 7th 2003. It only took us 45 minutes to declare all Jake's stuff (itemized lists of all that was in each box really helped) and he received his first 3 month temporary visa. We were on our way again! The falls were beautiful covered in ice. We decided to stay in Niagara Falls Canada one more night before going back to Sudbury. The hotel was MUCH nicer, with NO hookers and NO drug dealers hanging around. We walked down Clifton Hill and by the Fallsview sidewalk. It was snowing and I only had a fleece wrap, no coat. Jake had a coat (well, let's face it, he had everything he owned with him!) and we both only wore shoes. We stopped in a souvenier shop and picked up fleecy ear/forehead flaps. They really worked! We shopped in the WWE store, played games of chance, had a good time.

April 8th 2003. We woke, repacked the tracker with our stuff, and headed off to Toronto to meet up with Mindi and go up the CN tower. We had lunch with Kim and Gloria at Lonestar Restaurant (my fav for their all you can eat fajitas) then after that we drove the rest of the way home to Sudbury.

Five years. Wow. It seems like less. Time is flying. I love you, Jake.

Developments

a) My strep throat is back. (self-diagnosed. will be assessed by doctor tomorrow.)

b) The CD player in the van has been discovered as broken. Upon consulting with the dealer, they may or may not have it repaired for free. I'm prepared to argue my "free" case seeing as it was purchased under the understanding that it was working, and that it does not matter if it's covered by the warantee or not (it's not) because it came to me previously broken. Oh the stink I will raise.

c) (speaking of stinks) Monday night the toilet backed sewage all over the bathroom floor and into the hallway and partially into Hayden's room. Towels and blankets kept the disgusting flood contained to that small area. The landlord was out of town. I called my father who suggested I call the city. The city said I had to call a plumber. The plumber said he needed $350 or so before he left. I said I'd call him back. My father said he would lend us the money and that he would come over to bring more towels and buckets and gloves. I called the plumber back and said to come over. He said he would be 30 minutes. (And then there was honking and lights flashing behind the gate at McDowel's. Again. It was pouring rain. I took an umbrella and went out to ask the guy to stop honking because it was 10pm and babies were sleeping. He was customer who had gone in when the gate was open to check on his storage stuff, and before he was done whoever had opened the gate had left, locking it behind him. With this guy inside. I was not as nice to this guy as I had been to Steve because hey. My toilet was backing up and I didn't have time to worry about this guy's problems too. I told the guy I didn't have a key, babies were sleeping, and suggested he call a cab and pick up his truck when the gate opened the next day.) My dad arrived, and provided guidance to Jake and me. The plumber arrived. He was not old and fat. He was young and trim and kind of cute. He removed the toilet from the floor and snaked out 45 feet, cleaning out the clog which he advised was caused by industrial rags, most likely from the warehouse right beside our house. Yay. That meant that we could present the $380 bill to the landlord with confidence that he would repay us (my dad). I was also pleased as punch because I had JUST put on contents insurance 2 weeks ago. I wrote a list of all the things that were damaged, and the replacement cost was only going to be $375 dollars. Our deductable is $500. Oh well. If we'd had to pay for the plumber and floors and stuff, it would have been more worth it. If only we'd kept the computer on the bathroom floor..... The McDowel Handyman is coming tomorrow morning to lay new carpeting in Hayden's room and the hallway/living room.

d) It's Jake's and my 5th year anniversary on Friday. If you would like to baby sit, please contact me.

e) That's about it for now.

f) goodnight.