Uhh, I didn't meant to be this infrequent...

So when I titled this blog infrequent updates, I didn't mean I'd post annually. Oops. So now there is a LOT of catching up to do.

We loved our first little apartment in Oakton. It was so cute, but we decided to buy a house when we found some doctors who could answer some of my medical problems. Or so we though. We still don't have answers, but maybe we will find some soon? Also, the job market hasn't picked up much, and since we both have pretty secure jobs, we thought it would be silly to leave them and be in the last hired/first fired area. So we started our search in March of this year. We finally found a house we liked, although it was far away from my work. We closed at the end of May, getting us a tax credit for 2009, and promptly moved in. We LOVE our house. We've done some little things to improve, thanks to some major sweat equity from Dad. We've also painted and Tony has worked hard to stay on top of the goofy things that come up when you own a house. He keeps the yard gorgeous as well.

We had a great summer, with lots of quality time spent together. We went to Ohio for a week and a half to visit my family, and then had a little vacation for the two of us after. While we were in Ohio I took everybody's picture. Now it's 4 months later and I better get to editing those pictures I took so families can send them out if they'd like! I suppose that should be my mission for this week.

At the end of August, I was feeling a little strange and ridiculously exhausted. I found out that I was pregnant and felt better that at least I knew why I was feeling a little crazy! I'm now 14 weeks and feeling better every day. Food doesn't disgust me quite so much, I can eat a normal dinner, and I might even be able to eat chicken again sometime soon. We'll see. I am due May 9, and we are so excited for our new baby.

Last week we got a letter from George Mason University - Tony got accepted to their business program. We are excited for him to be able to be in school full time and to get his education completed. He is still not sure if he wants to do finance or medicine, but I am sure he will figure that out soon. With attending Mason, he will be doing ROTC so he can finish his degree without being deployed. With graduation he'll also be a higher-ranking officer. And, as far as we understand, he can choose his drill unit, which would mean he could be in the Manassas unit, and not have to leave town once a month. The only down side to that is that he may have to have a 2-week training in June, not long after the baby comes. That would be quite difficult for me to not have any help for two weeks as I'm still adjusting to baby life.

Mom is coming to visit on Friday for a few days and I am excited she will be here. It will be fun to have her at my house and we will do fun things together. I love my mom. She is great. And it will be great to have a little company while my sweet husband is being a soldier for a couple weeks.

Maybe I should work on editing those pictures now...

Sherlock always outsmarted Watson!

And today I am Sherlock. I got this email in my spam folder today. It just made me laugh. And then a little sad that people actually think it's legitimate.

Please note the ridiculous spelling and grammatical errors. Sure thing, Dr. Watson, I'll send you allllll the information you need to pretend you are me. No problem. You got it. Be looking for it around the 10th. Of what month, you ask? Oh... the 10th of NEVER!!!! Really, who falls for this stuff??? And really? You think I'm going to think an email from att.net is legit? HAHAHAH Just because you put BOA as the sender?? Silly kids....


From: Bank of America (boanyk01@att.net)
From The Desk Of: Dr.Grey Watson
Bank of America
Branch Offices New York
1680 Broadway, New York,
NY 10019, USA.
Vice Chairman on Investment Banking
Director, Credit Control Dept.
Email:boanewyork@ovi.com

Attn: The Beneficiary,

TELEGRAPHIC TRANSFER NOTICE.

We are hereby officially notify you concerning your fund telegraphic
Transfer through our bank, Bank of America, New York, to your bank
account, which has been officially approved by the management of World
Bank Swiss (WBS) to credit the sum of US$18.5 Million into your bank
account.

Note that I have started processing your payment and every thing
concerning the immediate remittance of your funds will be carried out
within the shortest possible time from the time we received your? Below
needed information.

Also be informed that the Governor of Bank in London (BL) will sign on
your payment advice and a copy of the advice will be sent to the World
Bank in Swiss for some record purposes. Meanwhile your information and
your full contact details were received from our research manager, Barr.
Paul Peterson on your behalf to FRB for immediate release of your fund.

This fund was part of the lodged Late President Saddam Hussein of Iraq
discovery fund with World Bank of Switzerland, which the Swiss Bank has
decided to distribute it generously to help few lucky individuals and the
American Government is in agreement with the Swiss Bank to distribute the
fund to 700 hundred thousand people in America, Europe & Asia in other to
help improve their businesses.

Therefore, reconfirm the aforesaid information accurately, because this
office cannot afford to be held liable for any wrong transfer of funds or
liable of any fund credited into an unknown account.

These are the information we needed to be reconfirmed by you.
1.Your Full Bank Account Details
2.Your Direct Cell or office phone to reach you
3.Your address of locations
4.Your full name

Finally, you are required to reconfirm directly to me the above
information to enable me use it to process your bill of payment.

Your quick response shall be mostly appreciated; all your response should
be directed through our alternative email address for the immediate
attention of the credit control department.

Yours Faithfully,
Dr.Grey Watson.
Vice Chairman, Director, Credit /Telex Department.

in my office...

I have the following hanging on my wall in my office. I think it's fabulous. Make sure your volume is up to get the full effect.

lookie!!!

So I am a family & consumer science teacher. It is really a lot of fun but I am forever exhausted by hearing "oh we have that at our school???" or "where's S112??!!!!" So today, as part of my teacher prep week before school starts next tuesday, I put my artsy fartsy skills to work. And lookie what I've done!




I think they are fabulously cute, and bring quite a bit of attention to my classrooms in the hallway. Nobody else has anything like this in the building, and I LOVE it. Although I have given lots of people the idea, and it is taking off. I'm not done - I'd like to decorate them a little more, add some sparkle, if you will. But the basics are there. And I love it. And I did it all freehand.

a letter to a sister.

Dear Katie,

Remember how you took a video of our house? SOoo uhh... how did that turn out? Will you share it? Please??

Love, Sara.

home improvements.

We've done a few things since family has been here to make our home a little more homey. The very first thing we did was hang a clock we got for our wedding. We love it.

Here is my husband being very manly. He likes to be very manly. When everyone was unloading stuff from the wedding reception, he carried three cases of water up two flights of stairs. All the womenfolk (and maybe some of the menfolk too) were gasping at the manliness of my husband. So Tony is putting an anchor in the wall, on which we will hang our clock.


And here is the finished product. We love it. It'd be even cooler if we put a fun color behind it. We'll work on that. Maybe one day we'll paint.

the party before the party!

So as is tradition, lovely friends (my sweet Sundee and Laura and Cristy) threw the party (who my Dad still thinks is "Sunday" because he says "Sunday" as if it were Sundee. He doesn't do that with any other day of the week. Just Sunday.). We had a little bridal shower at Sundee's home. It was fabulous and I was delighted to have some close friends there, and to spend the evening laughing our heads off. WE didn't play any dumb games (THANK YOU!!!!) (I don't care for shower games much). We just had some dinnerish and sat around and laughed and talked. It was SO MUCH FUN!!! So here are a few pictures from the evening...

(Sister H, Cristy, Sarah, Jenica)

(Cristy & Sarah)

(Laura & Jenica)

(Sundee, Alexis and Karen)

The whole group - I had a great time - thank you all for partying with me!!