Run for the Roses

I didn't watch the Derby Saturday, but Katie and I did partake in our own rose-related festivities Monday night. We attended a demo class on flower arranging at The Party Source (the same place Kevin and I took the sushi class in January), and learned how to make European hand-tied bouquets. Although we expected to glean more general tips on flower arranging, it was fun to learn how to make these pretty little bouquets that are often used in weddings (and are tres expensive). The class was supposed to be a demo, but it was very hands-on. Plus, we were served a light dinner and got to sample Bloom Reisling and Pinot Grigio, which are both yummy and come in very class-appropriate pretty flowered bottles. Katie and I both did a great job, IMHO. Here's a photo of my bouquet; Katie's was identical, except a little fuller. (The pic below it is of the amaryllis growing on my front porch. I just thought it was too beautiful not to share!)

Next up, we're doing a demo class on Sensational Seafood on May 22nd. We purchased two demo classes for the price of one, which is a great deal and gives us some girl time together.

Can't stop...

I think we are addicted to painting (or maybe it's just the fumes)! This weekend, as promised, we tackled the office. Check out these pictures, we are very happy with how it turned out. We had another whirlwind weekend that included a Cinco de Mayo party at Matt and Amanda's, a FULL day of painting, cleaning, and lawnmowing, more cleaning, decorating and a walking home tour that gave us at least three miles of exercise, and a sick puppy that I had to sleep on the couch with last night. I'd tell you more about it, but I am seriously too exhausted. So this is all you get for now. We'll fill in the details once we have recovered.
My friend Jenna, her husband Josh, and their baby boy Jacob will be stopping through town to spend the night with us Wednesday on their way to Edgerton, so we'll be getting ready for that too. I can't keep up with myself these days!!!

Bittersweet Surrender

It's with very mixed emotion that I've found a new home for Olive. Tonight we took her to the home of Damien, the owner of Arrowhead Reptile Rescue. Damien is going to turn her over to a staffer who specializes in turtle rehabilitation and has a particular affinity for three-toed box turtles like Olive.

Olive has lived with me for 7 years and, although she's always been healthy, I've never felt that she was thriving or getting very much stimulation. Her diet is supposed to consist of a variety of fruits and vegetables and 50% protein; however, I can only get her to eat sweet, brightly-colored fruits and veggies and have never been able to get her to eat protein, even bugs. Also, she's never really warmed up to me the way most turtles tend to respond to the person who provides them with food. And although I don't hibernate her (I keep her tank lights at the same temp year round), she goes through really sluggish periods and doesn't eat at all, which worries me.

For a few years, I've felt guilty for owning her at all and wanted to find her a better home (I've learned a lot of bad things about the reptile pet trade since I bought her). But all of the reptile sanctuaries I found online were out of state or just treated wild animals. And I certainly wasn't going to give her to someone who would provide her with any less quality care than I did. Sometimes I felt really guilty for wanting to find her a new home, though, too. I really do love her in an odd way.

I found out about Damien and Arrowhead through Second Chance Wildlife, which I've been a member of since I took an ailing bird to them several years ago and they tried to nurse it back to health. Damien asked lots of questions about Olive when we met with him tonight and said she looks pretty healthy. Her beak is a little long and her toenails need a trim, but otherwise, she seems fine. He said his rehabilitator will probably fall in love with her and keep her forever (the other option would be to adopt her out to a new, very carefully screened owner). That made my heart feel good. She'll get to spend time indoors and outdoors, hang out with other turtles and hopefully get some of her wild spirit back. It was also nice to see how great of care Damien was taking of other turtles, several snakes and a room full of crocodiles. I was especially sure of the decision I'd made to turn her over to Damien after his revelation that he thinks Olive is 40 to 50 years old!!! Our jaws hit the floor when he told us that. I know turtles can live to be 100, but I thought Olive was closer to 10 or 15 years old. Damien said that's probably why that hibernating instinct was kicking in, so I hope she'll get to hibernate in her new environment (it's tricky to hibernate them in captivity).

We went ahead and cleaned up Olive's tank tonight and removed all traces of her from the guest bedroom where she's been hanging out. I couldn't bear to look at her empty tank every day. I'm fairly sad tonight, but 100% sure that I made the right choice for Olive. Here's to another 50 years for my sweet little girl!

HAPPY 5/3 DAY!!!!

How many companies have their own day named after them!?! Fifth Third does, every year on 5/3. So today we were out in our "spirit wear" (oxfords and polos with the Fifth Third logo embroidered on them) and grilling hot dogs for our customers. Fortunately we had a great day for it, the weather was sunny and about 80 degrees. It's also the day that our annual salary increases take effect, so we all look forward to it with anxious anticipation.
5/3 also happens to be my Dad's birthday (it must have been "in the numbers" for me to work here)! So be sure to wish him a happy 58 on 5/3!

Subtle Changes

So this weekend we decided to tackle the dining room. We took a cue from Susan's "shades of sand" and went with a color called "Gobi Desert." To see it in pictures, you may not notice a drastic change from the white we had before, but we really love the new look (on the first try this time!). It warms up and softens the space and makes it feel a little more intimate without feeling small. We left the red wall and the two colors look great together. Amidst this Saturday project I did a little yard work and finished painting the cornhole set (I used leftovers from the original living room color to paint it).
Sunday we went to Dilly Deli for a wine and cheese tasting benefit for STAF. It was a nice casual afternoon and gave us an opportunity to talk to some of our fellow volunteers in a public social environment. Afterward we went to Babies R Us to get a gift for our friend Melissa Caruso-Saleh who is having a baby soon! That store is crazy. There is so much stuff for babies. It's a little overwhelming, but it was interesting to see all the things that are out there.
Finally, we got to round out the weekend with some vegging on the couch and watching the season finale of Lost. WOW! I can't wait to get caught up on season two, but it is going to be hard to have to take it one week at a time when we have gotten used to watching two or three episodes in a row. Nobody give away what happens until we get caught up though (Stan and Katie...).
Next weekend we tackle the office!

Blue, Take Two

So we painted the living room this weekend. Twice. Actually, four coats of paint, two separate ocassions. Although we loved the warmth of our orange and yellow living room and how cozy it made the room seem (especially on cold winter nights), that room has always been really dim. Plus, we've lived with those colors for 3 years now and thought we'd like a change. I've been grooving on blue lately and suggested that it would look nice with our dark wood furniture and amber lamps, and we quickly decided to try it. Unfortunately, picking the right shade of blue proved much harder than deciding to make the actual change.

Initially, we picked out a color that was on the very gray end of the blue spectrum. Kevin really liked it, but I wanted something a little brigher. So we bought a much brighter shade, hypothesizing that since the living room was always so dark in the evening when we spent the most time in it (it faces east), the paint color would seem much darker on the walls compared to how it looked under the flourescent lights of Home Depot. We were wrong.

Saturday we got up bright and early, took Gilmore to doggie daycare to keep him out of our way, and painted one coat of primer and two coats of Ocean View blue paint. We loved the color. For a sweater. Or a vase. Or a purse. It was just too cyan for four big living room walls. And we discovered that part of the reason the room was so dark before was that the orange and yellow paint absorbed a lot of light. The nearly cyan color reflected so much light that it was a little disconcerting even at 11:00 on Saturday night. Plus, it didn't quite pull out the blue in the fireplace as we had hoped, but rather clashed with it a bit. We agreed to live with it for a week without making any changes, though, and loaded everything back into the room.

Sunday, we decided to run errands all day and thought we might as well stop by Home Depot to look at other shades of blue paint. It was the first and last errand of the day. By 2:00 we were at home with another gallon of paint, one that fell somewhere in between the bright blue that we applied on Saturday and the gray that Kevin liked initially. Luckily, we only had to apply one coat since the colors were relatively similar, and their wasn't much trim work. While it was drying, we took a long walk with Gil to get some soft serve ice cream, re-loaded the room, grilled out and settled into version 2.0 of our newly painted living room. This time, we got it right (we hope you agree; see for yourself here). It doesn't seem like a big difference in the photos, but it just wasn't quite what we wanted the first time around (just ask Katie, who saw it mid-process).

Next up, we're re-painting the three white walls in the dining room tan, changing the office to gray (no suprise that we never liked the blue in there either), and giving the foyer and hallway a fresh coat of off-white. Hopefully, we'll only be painting those rooms once!

Garden of Whitman

Yard work has been keeping us very busy the last few weeks! It's been so nice to have warm, sunny days so early in the season to do some landscaping before the mosquitos are out in full force (they love me, no matter what I do to repel them). We've been able to tackle some long-overdue projects like replanting the area under the huge pine tree out front, edging the front the flower beds and putting in a brick border, spreading mulch (17 bags!), and relocating some plants that weren't doing so well or were outgrowing their areas. Of course, all the rain has been keeping Kevin busy mowing the lawn. He actually seems to like doing it, although that tune may change when the heat and humidity sneak up on us. The humongous oak tree it the back yard (the bane of my seasonal allergies) is constantly shedding something that we have to clean up. Mostly it's leaves, but lately it's been little fuzzy, caterpiller-looking things that clog up the drains and cause the basement to flood, plus loads of green pollen. Having such a big, heavily landscaped yard is hard work, but we enjoy it. It's amazing to see the rapid transformation from winter to spring in just a few short weeks! Here are a few photos of the fruits of our labor. (You may have to sign up for flickr to view them, but this is how we're hoping to start sharing all of our pictures with you guys. If you click on the individual photos, rather than viewing them as a slideshow, you can read captions.) More to come about our inside projects soon!

New post coming soon...

We promise! Many of you have been asking us to update you on what we have been doing.
Obviously A LOT because we haven't even had time to tell you about it.
I have to mow the lawn, give Gilmore a bath, and paint our cornhole set tonight so maybe Sarah will work on updating you on what we've been up to the past few weekends. More to come. . .

A Jam Packed Fun Weekend!

This past weekend Sarah and I had a lot going on, but all the fun stuff. Friday morning, we left for Columbus for an evening with David Sedaris, a writer and commentator for NPR. On the way up, we stopped at the Jeffersonville Outlet Mall for some shopping. Sarah and I each got a new pair of sandals for the summer, I got some new dress shirts, and Sarah got a new purse. When we got to Columbus, we checked into the hotel and relaxed for a little bit before going out to dinner. We went to a restaurant called Haiku for sushi (what else) before the show. Neither of us had heard David Sedaris live before, but we have read most of his books and listened to several of his CD's (great entertainment for road trips). While his style of humor and satire aren't for everyone, we really enjoyed him.
The next day we hit the mall for some shopping. Sarah really wanted to go to H&M and I was on the hunt for a new pair of jeans. I found exactly what I was looking for at Macy's and we headed home. On the way back, Sarah decided that she wanted to buy a pair of shoes she had seen at the outlet mall, so we stopped at Jeffersonville again. One pair of shoes turned into THREE new pair and we were back on the road.
When we got home we picked up Gilmore from A Doggie's Day Spa, where he had spent the night. He was very happy to see us but very exhausted, which was good because we had plans to go out that night as well. Our good friends Liz and Jason were coming to stay with us because we were all going the Ellery CD release party for their new album Lying Awake. Ellery is the husband and wife duo of Justin and Tasha Golden, friends of ours from Cincinnati Bible College. We had a great time at the show (which was AMAZING) and stopped by Waffle House for a late night breakfast.
Sunday morning Liz had to leave early and Jason had to take off after lunch. Needless to say Sarah and I were pretty tired, so we spent the rest of the day on the couch watching the first eight (yes, eight) episodes of Lost. Now we are hooked and can't wait for Blockbuster Online to send us the rest of the season.
All in all we had a really great weekend. We packed a lot in, which is a little unusual for us, but it was a good change! Over the next few weekends we are planning to get some around-the-house projects going. Hopefully we can get them all done "before the HOW Conference."

Nearly Sprung

I love springing forward every year. I'm so much more inspired by the extra hour of daylight. Sunday we did tons of yard work, as evidenced by the 20 giant lawn and leaf bags full of debris that we left for the garbage collector—and my aching hamstrings. Kevin got to break out his new mower since TruGreen Chemlawn is working miracles on our front yard. And I found a hole full of fuzzy, squirming little baby bunnies in the front flower bed. (Now I'm obsessed with their safety since I had cleared away practically all of the dead growth that their mother was probably using to keep them warm and safe before I discovered them.) The Canada Geese have returned to the glorified drainage ditch at work and do daily fly-bys outside my window. And once we cleared all of the leaves out of the flower beds I realized just how many flowers were already shooting up and even blooming. Here's to rainy nights and warm sunny days!