Back to Bloggin'...

After a month long hiatus, I am proud to say that I finally have a working modem and Internet access!! YEAH...has been along time coming, but things are finally back in order.

SO much has happened...I will fill in the top stories of our lives over the past month.

Dec. 1st we closed on the new house and we welcomed into this wonderful state with a blocked sewer line...yes...fun...very fun! Eric discovered this wonderful gift within the first 12 hours of our ownership...Apparently, roots from our crepe myrtle (Sp) tree fed right into the sewer line in the front yard and completely blocked any exit...of anything. Lovely. How do you find such a problem you might ask? Well...flush a toilet and then take a shower...where would your shower water go, you might ask again? Well, how about through the and over the toilet on the first floor of your home...neatly blanketing your wooden floors and seeping through your ceiling and onto your basement ceiling. You know things aren't looking too good for you when within the first 3 days of moving in when your fridge is covered with magnets of all the service businesses you had to call in 48 hours. Plumber, clean-up crew, backhoe crew...yeah...I even have lovely pics to show you that wonderful out of pocket experience. The fun part was the sewer line couldn't be fixed until the following Monday...5 days after we moved in. The previous owners denied ever having problems, but clearly from the pics you can see how difficult this is to believe. My parents came to visit just a few days after moving in and they helped me open boxes while I directed all the crews that where at our house in the first week. The appliances were removed and new ones were delivered...with a scheduled install date of 3 days later (unbeknown st to me)...so we got to know some new places to eat in the Johns Creek area!...Using the bathroom wherever we went to spare any further damage to my existing plumbing situation. God bless my parents for not turning around and heading back home!

That situation was finally taken care of and now we needed to move forward with the clean up-dry wall was removed and everything was dried out..carpet padding removed..you name it. We are still in the midst of having all the repairs made, but our home-owners insurance took pity on us and at least paid a little to help with the expenses. Thankfully.

We have spent December unpacking boxes and moving things in. I didn't' realize just how long this would take...I guess I forgot that I actually brought a moving truck full. We had been living out of a few suitcases in a hotel for so long, when the moving truck pulled up with our stuff...I was blown away at just how much we had. Note to self...have a BIGGER garage sale BEFORE you move! Only a few things were damaged and nothing to valuable, so I don't have too much to complain about.

We did have a new kitchen installed which we love...but they of course came to deliver the new counter tops on the wrong day...would you really be surprised considering how things have gone? The demo'd the backsplash and made just a few holes in the walls, but nevertheless the new counters were in and they looked good....next call-tile guy. It's funny because the day before Christmas they delivered our new Refrigerator...you guessed it...wrong one. A new one will be coming on the 13th, so we wait again.

With all that was going on, I was a little lax on the shopping thing...I did manage to pull it out in my timing as usual...picking up a few last minute things on Christmas Eve, but we managed to have a wonderful day as a family and the kids were more excited than ever. Jake got some games for his PlayStation, star wars clone wars stuff, guitar hero and some other things. Sammy got his coveted OSU helmet and football uniform-which he wore for 12 straight hours on Christmas day! He also got an American flag which he treasures and hung above his bed and some new military toys. It was a fun day-weird to not be close to my parents, but we left the next day for Ohio and had a wonderful visit through new year's.

The boys have since settled back into their school routine and I promptly got the tree packed away...proud of myself for that one. We have much to be thankful for and to look out at my backyard and see the deer that freely walk by is so peaceful (see pic). In the grand scope of things, these inconvenient happenings pale to what people are going through back home and around the world.

I should be up to date now and can continue to share what is going on...hugs to all!