Please explain this to me....

We go to our bank to make a deposit (YEAH!) and I see this van parked with the tail end hanging out over the driveway. Now how does this happen? There's plenty of space. Is she (yes, it is a woman because I saw her getting back in to her van) leaving plenty of room for...? Is she completely unware that she's blocking the driveway....? I mean, she has her pick of places to park and she does this? Is it rude? Or is it just totally unware?

The Ladies

We must admit that being lineal thinkers, accountants, we have little to no design ability. But lucky for us, The Ladies do! We would like to introduce you to Sarah and Yvonne, aka The Ladies. They have a way of putting it all together without offending us for our lack of design ability.

They take our stuff, listen to how we live, and then make it look fabulous. Plus they have become our friends too.

We just can not figure out how they do it, but they move this here and that there, and it looks so much better than how we had it. And we really haven't purchased much, it's just making our stuff look better.

Cashless Society

We pulled in to the Bernal Shell to fill up and it was deserted, which is very unusual. When we pulled up to the pump, there was a sign taped over the credit card area.

Fortunately Edie had a stash of cash, otherwise we would have left. She went in to the store to pay, and there were several younger people trying to buy stuff with a credit/debit card, even though the sign said it wouldn't work! Let's just say the cashiers didn't have much to do...other than telling people that Hurricane Ike had shut down Shell operations, which is based in Houston.

As soon as we figure out our home safe, we may need to get more cash!

We're Home!

Sorry we haven't blogged lately. We've been busy unpacking all of our stuff. And yes, you can have too much stuff.

Last night in the Apartment

It's been a really nice place to stay for almost 10 months. The location is perfect, the management is outstanding, and it's a very nice apartment. And the best part is the killer laundry room! But this is the final night, we'll be in our home tomorrow night.

We have our new desks, which are really nice, phone service (although the voice mail still isn't fully functional), and the internet is set up. It's a totally new way for us to work. After three decades, we're hoping we can make the transition to the new digs. Dave set up the closet organizer in the office and it's going to work out really great for us. We're finally going to make full use of this new technology of digital records. We will no longer be tree murderers.

Our kitchen is so spectacular. The oak tree, which is a center of the Arterburn family photos, feels like it's right in the kitchen. The view is amazing. We may even enjoy washing dishes.

We're still experiencing snubbing from the neighbors (clothesline haters) but we're expecting this to pass. It's just not good for their physical or emotional health to carry around that much hate. Edie continues to pray daily for reconciliation, Dave not so much.

Today was Sally's last day. She will be greatly missed. She's been a daily part of our lives for so many years and we'll miss her. But we're pretty sure Fred has plenty planned for her time. Plus they're in the middle of their own kitchen remodel, and we hear the bathrooms are next.

Our plan is to be pretty much settled in the next week. Then Edie can begin working in Jessica's classroom. Our sweet daughter can have one day on the job where her long-time ardent defender will be backing her up and taking orders from her. Well, we'll see how that taking orders works out.

So our house is done and we still love our contractor, who knew? Just ask and we'll tell you what a great job they did. Better yet, just ask and we'll show you.

It's getting closer....

This is the last Tuesday in our apartment. Dave made a great meal, but we ate with little forks. We can hardly wait until we have our plates and flatware. This adventure has lost luster and we're ready to move up the hill.

If we had it to do all over, we would have tossed out all our stuff instead of storing it, and then buy all new stuff. Here we are, two people that milk the last use out of anything, and we're just ready to walk away from everything and buy new stuff. New stuff is so cheap and easier than packing the old stuff away and paying to store it for months. We can barely remember what it is we have in storage. And the stuff we can remember, we're thinking won't even fit in our new home! We are not sure if we've moved beyond stuff, or we're just tired of all this moving.

Now our office, the only constant in our lives, is totally torn up. We've switched our e-mail from DSL (which is not available on the hill) to Comcast (which now has a business level service). Our phone service was moved today and we switched from our long time reliable Custom Communications voice mail. The service is attached to the house, but not completely wired through the house to our new office phones. For now, we're not really certain where our calls are going. And we're not calling to ask, because Edie spent over 3 hours arranging for our home AT&T service to transfer from the apartment to the hill. And she was not her sweet self after all this time on the phone.

But we now have 7 door mats that are perfect for the house and were found by Sarah at Target at an extremely low price. Does it get any better than that?

Casbah Baby Shower

Saturday was Dave's first baby shower. It wasn't a typical baby shower, more like a family gathering. The stated purpose was a baby shower for Ashley & Spencer's baby, Lexi Rose. They're the daughter and SIL of our very good friends, Sabrina & Michael. Ashley's big sister, Jessica, was the hostess and she is the hostess with the mostess. She goes overboard and we are the lucky ones to have all the fun.