Coming Soon to Pittsburgh!

Patrick is in Pittsburgh now... finishing up the last of the house stuff! Yay! then as soon as he's done - hopefully the end of this week. we'll tag team it and switch - he'll come back to SC and I'll head to PA. so as it's looking right now... like i'll probably be there "next" weekend! any of my old cohorts wanna get together for dinner??!! shoot me an email - or facebook message. i'd so love to see everyone! i'll be in town for just a couple of days to get the house all staged. and then Finally! we'll get that bad boy on the market.

it's bittersweet though... i truly miss our beautiful home.

in other news... i've got loads of new pages to share ;)

sneak peek!

geesh... what is going on with this blog? have i been away for so long that my cute blogwear is gone?? what's with this pumpkin color... that's gonna have to go! in the mean time, here are two pages from today for kits that won't release till this weekend. i love y'all so much that i'm breakin' the rules and lettin' ya see them early :)



had eye surgery last Thursday to remove 3 cysts from my left eye. went well, was more painful than expected... but things are looking and feeling far better today. most of the swelling is down and my vision is nearly back to normal.
i also keep hearing from folks that don't have our new contact info... i thought i had sent out an email, but er... maybe not. so here go :

44 Rustyred Ct.
Chapin, SC 29036
803-407-0606

i suck...

don't even say it... just head over to the Tin Can Canoe and ignore all the kit ads and check out all the pages i've been doing... and lamely NOT posting over here! should keep you busy for a while anyways. then when i do get this dark horse up and going again, you'll get to enjoy a lot of them again.

thanks for all the emails... and phone calls....
reminding me how neglectful i've been
love you all!

Tin Can Canoe Blog

"fake" virus??

my laptop has a "fake" virus on it again. i got one last month and it took The P most of the day to fix it... of course he's not here so that's a total bummer! turns out that although it's a fake virus, it's just as difficult to remove and is just as effective at shutting everything down. i somehow managed to get the desktop completely set up on my own though - so at least i've got a computer... but all my photos are saved on the laptop - so that's totally frustrating!

i just wanna hunt down the dipshit who had so much spare time on his hands to create something so ridiculous and haul his sorry ass over to the local soup kitchen or cancer ward... to give him something meaningful to do. know what i mean.

money well spent

so living out in the sticks doesn't really afford you much in the way of shopping convenience. sure there's a pretty... alright, a really nice Wal-mart about 8 miles up the road... but i love Target. the closest Target is like 15-20 miles - least ways that's what the Garmin says. and as crazy as it sounds, yesterday the boys and i decided to make the trek over to Target. it doesn't really feel like 20 miles, but since it took us a good 15/20 minutes to get over there, i suppose it actually is. hmmm. so that's super handy.

the boys and i also decided that after the enormous amount of gas we used just to get there, we really needed to make the trip worth while... so we searched around long and hard for something extra special and completely unnecessary and in the end put our investment into a snow cone maker! i of course, had my doubts - remembering how lame they were from my childhood. needless to say... i've gotten so damn old that snow cone makers have come a good long way since i was a kid. go figure! we found out they actually work for starters - what a concept! you can now use regular ice cubes (no prefreezing odd shaped cylinders that usually disappear into the depths of the freezer, never to be seen again) and the only muscle required is what you can muster to push a button instead of breaking your arm trying to crank on the manual handle. then there's the added bonus: the shaver blade is all enclosed, so there's no shredding of fingers, knuckles or tongues (hey is was all my brother's idea!!).

all in all: very sweet, lots of fun and a huge hit!

hungry for smores??

i sort of am... cuz that's about the only thing i ever really liked about camping. and right about now, things feel a lot like we are camping. sure, it beats sleeping in a tent and having the condensation dripping on your head... or being violently awakened when dear ol' Dad lets one rip and everyone in the motorhome turns a pale shade of green. but life right now is a whole lot more like camping than i'd like it to be. we're eating off paper plates and drinking from plastic cups, i'm doing laundry in the sink, the crickets and "night sounds" are keeping everyone awake and you're just sort of left waiting to leave.

nearly normal

it's been a very long time since i had to really drive anywhere. for about the last 10 years... or geesh, probably longer, we've always lived sort of in the thick of things. also known as in/or close to town. so everything was pretty much a stone throw away. in Cranberry i don't think it took more than 10 minutes to get from our house to just about anywhere, with the exception of downtown Pittsburgh.

that's so not the case here... we are sort of living out in the boonies. and it doesn't help that everything is super spread out, so it takes me 10 minutes just to get to the junction that leads to the main roads that actually take you places. from there it's at least another 10 minutes to the freeway ramp... i forsee a lot of gas stations in my future.

with that said... i've actually been out and about more in the past 5 days than i have in the last 6 months. since The P left, the boys and i have been running all over - trying to keep cool and stay out of trouble. the keeping cool part is tough. there are a lot of trees here, but i have yet to find a decent park that's both free and shaded. what a concept, right?!? we stumbled across one yesterday that was completely devoid of any trees or vegetation whatsoever and after baking in the sun for about 15 minutes even H-man had had enough. the staying out of trouble part has been much more successful. we've been gone so much during the day that H hasn't seen hide nor hair of the rabid neighbors in 5 whole days and i'm elated to report that he was nearly back to normal today. not one single hitting or pushing episode... does this mean we'll be going out everyday?? perhaps ;) i've got a few friends who make it a point to get their kids out of the house each and every day and they're not even avoiding anyone. in the past i always thought they were a bit crazy... but our living situation was a lot different then. we no longer have a huge house, private yard or secluded street to call our own... and we sort of get on each other nerves a lot faster in our current digs. so perhaps there's something to this "getting out everyday" philosophy ;)

in other news... our air condioner froze solid today. totally Loved that!! thankfully the house only got up to 87 before they got it "fixed". let's just hope this time the "fix" sticks!

missing in action...

so see there... you only thought i was slacking! i haven't actually taken a break from pages... just posting. frankly, i've just been either too busy or stressed to write. we decided totally last minute to do some upgrades to our mater bath before listing the house... which may or may not have been a mistake. but we felt it was necessary. we had already replaced all the carpets and had the hardwoods redone... everything was just looking so beautiful until you got to the master bath and then - yeesh! talk about ugly!! and with the house just across the street being listed (and in some major need of updating) we thought it best to have ours completely turn key and move in ready. the only real problem of course is that Patrick is working full time in SC and we're all moved into our little temporary house here... so there lies the snag. The P actually headed back to Pittsburgh this week to work and try to get as much done on it as he can. he's ripping out the horrifying tile and putting in bamboo flooring. then he'll install the new vanities, sinks, hardware and lighting. it's a tall order, but with any luck, he'll be able to get most of it done without me or the kids getting in his way and providing endless distractions ;)

meanwhile, the boys and i are hanging out in the Columbia area. it's nice. nice and hot. and i'm not talking sweat and heatstroke hot... i'm talking liquefying your flesh sort of hot. as in totally feucking hot, folks. the heat index tends to hover around the 115 marker... so that's fun. especially when the air conditioner went out last week and the buzzards (yes, we have real live buzzards here) began circling. the temperature upstairs got up to 96... it was so awesome.

let's see... what other kinds of fun are we having?? ahh, yes. we live on a little cul-de-sac where between the 6 houses there are about 15 kids - wow. it brings back memories of Idaho!! but one family is just moving out and with any luck we won't be far behind them. i like our little rental. it's nice and well, little. little teeny yard, little teeny kitchen, little teeny cabinets, little teeny garage. everything is teeny weeny... except the bugs. those are big and so numerous its taking a bit of getting used to. Flynner finds them high in protein and Henry simply finds them absolutely everywhere!!

Mom! Here's another one!"
"WHAT is THIS, Mom??!!"
"Oooohh! OOOohhh!! Look, Mom, Look!!"

boy oh boy... that's totally awesome as well.

oh! back to all the kids... coming from a neighborhood with like NO kids, this is taking some adjustments on my part. oh, who i'm i kidding - i'm not adjusting at all. one of these little mongrels pounds on my door and the first words out of his mouth aren't - "hey, can your kid come out and play" ... no, no, no... they're "hey! how many GUNS do you have?!! i've got EIGHT!" Auy-yep... get the fuck off my portico bucko. then there are two boys that Hen just adores... the only problem is they're like WAY too old to be playing with a four year old. one is NINE and the other is SEVEN... so like why are they coming around?? of course, Henry thinks they're soo cool. yeah, of course he does. after playing with them for less than a week - out of the clear blue sky he's begun hitting me when ever i try to correct him. yeah, you read that right. he's also suddenly taken to shoving Flynn down every chance he gets and one day last week after doing just that - he actually spit in my face when i sent him to time out. the last straw was when these "boys" younger sister wanted to come in the house to play, but TOLD me i had to put my dog away first. she's five. i, of course, kindly showed her to the door. the very next day i heard Henry tell Evai "you're a big ugly dog".... hmmm... i wonder where he got that????????? so you can just imagine how delighted i was to have her pounding on my door during nap time today - announcing that she was selling lemonade for 75 cents and that i needed to buy some. it was all i could do not to trip the little shit as she stormed off the porch. hehehe.

really, it's not so bad. aside from the nasty influence the rabid mongrels next door are proving to be... it's just different and a rental just doesn't feel like home. i greatly miss our beautiful house in Pittsburgh. i miss my friends. i miss all the gorgeous parks and the fabulous museums! i miss Pittsburgh itself... we have so many lovely memories there, it's difficult to let them go. and yes, while i'm enjoying the bone liquefying heat... i even miss the notorious Pittsburgh weather, but just a bit ;)

little buddies

look at me go... trying to get caught up all in one night. actually, i'm done now. must get off to the sleep. not much to talk about these days... just work, work, and yes, still more work. but things are shaping up nicely... if i can ever get the muthafu.... er landscaper to show up. will catch you up on all our news very soon. much love and hugs!!

forever friends

little looker

what?!