Hi there!

This is Jen & Me

Can I make her crazy, like me?

YES I CAN!

Jen is going to be taking my place at work, while I take September & October off. The Switzerland thing has been postponed to October and it is uncertain whether or not it will actually happen. If it does — I’ll be off work through January of next year and Jen will be taking my place while I’m gone. At least for the September thru mid-November time-frame. Haven’t figured out the rest until Switz is a definite.

Right now I am training her and it has been fun. She is a good friend of mine so we are having some good times!!!

On my time off, I will be focusing on my photography biz and selling our house.

We will be putting the house officially on the market next week!! YAY!

My parent’s are divorced.

I see my mom a lot. She lives near where I work, and since my niece also lives with her — I get to see them pretty frequently.

My dad, however, lives further away and it’s difficult to make the trek all they way there frequently and our schedules are pretty crazy. We do manage to see each other for birthday’s, which are almost every other month it seems, and for certain holidays.

Every summer my dad has a little get together with me and my sisters at his house. It has been difficult finding time when me and all my sisters can be in one place at the same time. Both my sisters work odd hours. One is a nurse that works nights and the other works for our hometown police department with shifty hours too.

My younger sister and I were available this weekend to meet with my dad and his wife and her daughter. We also brought our niece with us.

Here are some photos that TH took (so he’s not in any *sad face*).

The first 3 are of my dad and his grand-daughter (my niece).

The next two are of my younger sis (in red), me and our dad.
He is our biological father, believe it or not.
We are 1/2 Japanese (mom’s side) and 1/2 northern-Italian (dad)

Through the years I’ve been to my share of weddings and I’ve noticed different states have different rules of etiquette.

For example – in New Jersey (North/Central) – it is common to give a gift of $$ to the couple. Generally enough to cover the cost of each plate for each guest invited.
Weddings these days are pretty darn expensive – and I can’t even imagine how much people spend anymore I just know that TH and I spent a fortune. Literally. TH and I gift people what they gift us – for example: If a friend gave us $300 as a gift … when they get married, we’ll give them $300. This is also what my parents do – what their friends gave us on our wedding day, they give the same gift to their friend’s kids on their day.

How would you feel if you go to a wedding of a close family member and the bride/groom of that cousin doesn’t say hi or even acknowledge that you or your spouse are there?

Do you just brush it off thinking– he/she is preoccupied with their day, it’s understandable. Or do you feel snubbed?

Now what if they don’t acknowledge you or your spouse but say hello to everyone else at the same table as you while you are sitting there… how would you feel?

Thought I’d post an entry (or two or three) to catch up with some stuff we’ve been doing.

Last week TH, me and some other family members went to the Drum Corp competition in Clifton, NJ.

My mom (Blue Stars – colorguard) and sister (Skyliners – colorguard ) and cousin (Raiders – F Horn) used to march in the Drum Corps.

Here are some photos from that event:

My husband and my niece

Me & my niece (SMILE!!!)

Peace

Low Brass – and The Pit

Color Guard throwing Rifles

Color Guard with pretty flaggies!

We took a lot more photos and plenty of videos – especially of The Cadets who got top score that night!

I marched in high school and played the Alto Sax. I remember my very first year at band camp, it was like boot camp. We won our division that year and competed on the field at Giant’s Stadium! It was amazing. Sadly, after that year, our band director was let go. It was such a pity and due to the typical political crap – and so the 4 years that I was HS I had 5 different band teachers. Even though the music program went to sh!t, I was voted class musician and managed to graduate and go on to study music for a short time.

This is from my Junior Year (‘97). Looking back I have to laugh, this is such a funny pic! I am the 2nd from the left on the top row. My younger sis is all the way on the right in the bottom row.
We look so young and dorky

that’s me, but the photo background is by Graphisme

There really is no reason for this photo.

It’s all kinds of awkward, and I don’t know why I did it — but I did, so there it is.

You see how lack of sleep affects me??

I’m really good at giving advice. At least I like to think I am. However, I rarely if ever, take my own advice.

For instance, all this tiredness — what’s the answer? Sleep! Go to sleep at a decent hour. Eat right. Think happy thoughts — relax — meditate. I’m sure one of those things is the answer!

So why can’t I sleep?

B/c my mind is on overdrive — I feel like the only way to turn it off, is to complete every task in it. Like — this blog post. I have photos of so many things that I want to share and archive for my own reference. Colorado — I posted about just getting there. There were 3-4 days of cool shit involved and I haven’t gotten to those. Someday… yes, some–day I’ll wish upon a star and wake up where the clouds are far behiiiiind meeeeee.

I should just relax and meditate. Meditating is cool — only problem is — our new neighbor bought a subwoofer and has been blasting beats into our side of the residence and it’s driving me mad. BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM I’M GOING CRAAAZY

Ever try reading while listening to music — it’s like I can only read a word when there is a down beat of some sort. It-makes-me-read-really-slow. Same thing happens to me when I’m chewing and reading. Ugh. Anyway…

I’m sure the actual music is good, but all i hear is the Boom Boom — maybe she is making Boom Boom in the potty and doesn’t want anyone to hear? Or maybe she is doing Boom Boom with her man — come to think of it, I haven’t seen a man over there, or a woman for that matter. No, I’m not a nosy neighbor, and I have never used the term Boom-Boom for anything I mentioned above. I think I might start though. I like how vastly it can be interpreted. Oooooh Aaaaaah.

This post is going nowhere. Maybe I should take some Dimetap and just be done with it. I do not like to resort to drugs if I don’t have to. But I’m suddenly craving faux-grape sugary goodness.

Oh — I saw Dinner for Schmucks tonight — and it was pretty schmucky — interpret that how you will. I give it a thumbs down for having been totally over-hyped in the previews. I expected more from you, Steve. I really did. So now I will lay eggs in your brain.

Going through this process of ‘simplifying’ our house has been quite an ordeal. It really makes you look at every single item and it’s value to you. We found things we didn’t even know we had and others we didn’t want to let go of b/c even though they serve no purpose in our life — we felt someday they might.

For example. The 100 (or so) VHS tapes TH had. It was difficult to part with them. I know it. Maybe it was just because as soon as I ‘discovered’ them I threatened to throw them all out. I know he hasn’t watched any in about 6 years, but his validation was — but what if someday I want to. You never know. It’s not easy, so I give him credit for getting rid of most of them — well, after I had already put them in a garbage bag.

I spoke to my Viola teacher who just so happens to not really believe that DVDs are a better technology and prefers VHS tapes. She actually uses them and records a lot on them, so we will freecycle these to her. It feels good.

There is something that has been very difficult for me to part with, and that is my wedding bouquet, from almost 2 years ago. It has fully dried out and it’s been hanging around in our dining room in a plant pot looking old and blah. It even still has the tissue I hid in it (b/c I didn’t have pockets in my wedding dress). Kinda gross, but it was never used.

Here is TH, all happy that it’s finally going in the trash…

It’s time to let go. Goodbye dear bouquet.

We managed to get that crazy corner organized. Alas, there are still some things we need to ‘hide’. Like, the set of doggie steps, the bin of doggie toys, the CONE vacuum (that really sucks b/c it doesn’t suck), and the gray weather clock thing we never look at…

I hoping we can keep the tray tables and sub-woofer out. Oh yeah, and I’d like to keep the lil’white doggie too.

Oooh and just because I’m so proud of how far we’ve come in this ’1′ day… here’s a photo of the boxes we filled that TH gets the honor or relocating to the garage . I <3 U, TH!

Right now, at this very moment, I’m happy. Very happy.

We are moving.

We didn’t sell the house yet and we didn’t buy a new house. We haven’t had the Switzerland thing confirmed yet. But we are moving… one of these days.

Tonight TH started working on the entertainment center, remember that thing?

Here is the before (just last night):

Here is the after:

Yay! Progress!!!

AAAAAAAAND he even managed to clear out the cubby holes!! I wish I had a picture of the before b/c there were like 100 VHS tapes, a whole bunch of cassette tapes and all these video game cases. It was quite insane.

Check out the emptiness — it’s beautiful.

It’s a bit dusty (well, more than a bit) — but, ONE STEP AT A TIME!!!!

I’m also soooo happy to come and home and have TH tell me that he threw out all the Rachel Ray cookbooks we had… No sarcasm there, her recipes are HORRIBLE!!!

I didn’t really contribute, except put out what my expectations were for tonight’s attempt at simplification. I had a viola lesson that I had to make up right after work. Ugh.

I would also like to thank my mama for having her company save tons of boxes for us and then break them all down for me to completely load my car with and bring home… I have pics but can’t seem to get them off my phone. argh!

Man, I am so tired lately. Maybe it’s because of all the running around going on in my brain.

I’m used to going to bed around 1:30am, but come 10pm, my eyes start to shut. Right now I literally have to keep rubbing my eyes just to keep them open.

I just wanted to write about what’s going on.

I found someone to work in my place for the time I will be away, therefore I will have my job back when I come back… most likely. LOL I guess nothing is every 100%.

TH will be leaving in August for Switzerland and I will be following in early September. That way I can finish up some things here like training the new person at work and then working on finishing up the house and things like that. I feel a lot more at ease now, knowing I have a little extra time.

Now, talking about this Switzerland thing, it’s not even 100% either. We will find out more hopefully this weekend or early next. But we are planning as if it is actually happening. That’s the killer. What if it doesn’t happen?

Right now it’s helping to kick our butts in gear with prepping the house. Which is actually becoming exciting. Imagine we sell while we are away! HA!!! In a perfect world, I know — one can hope.

Trying to get rid of the little things and simplify is harder than cleaning…

For example, here’s a photo of our entertainment center in our den at it’s present state:

You can see how busy it all looks. Not just DVDs and cook books, but stuffed animals, random knick-knacks we pickup on our vacations, storage bins, multiple electronic stations and wires galore. This is how we see it almost everyday, and we are used to it. It’s amazing to think how we can even focus on the TV when it’s on. But we do. Also, around this entertainment center is a GINORMOUS gray wall that goes up about 20-25 feet. So maybe that helps take away some of the busyness.

Here’s the portion UNDER the TV:

The good and bad about this entertainment center, is that there are TONS of cubby holes for storage. There are even covered cubby’s on the sides — I honestly think I’ve only looked in those once or twice. That should be fun to go through.

And here is what is to the left of the TV stuff… it’s a corner, so guess what happens over there…

This corner has become the music/ rockband / camera equipment / doggy toy storage area. Along with a place to put our subwoofer and tray tables.

Really, I never play that keyboard, but my niece does — so we leave it out to be accessible. I need the stand for when I practice viola… the dogs toy bin is empty b/c EVERY TOY is somewhere else in the house. We fill it up with their toys and literally minutes later they are all over the place.

The backpack belongs to my camera. I guess I could shove that in a closet… but I don’t have the space there either (that’ll be another fun photo post ha!!!)

This post is mainly about our den, and well, not even the entire room, just the ONE WALL! We are meeting with our Realtor on Tuesday and hope to have the house ‘simplified’ by then. Almost everything will be going in a box. Since we don’t have a place for it. LOL //

We live in a condo — we have a basement and 3 floors above that (main floor, bedroom floor and a loft). 2BR’s w/walk in closets and 2.5 Baths. How the hell do we not have room?! NO CLUE!!!