Labor Day and Ernesto to boot!

Well, another year off to Southport, NC and now it's home again, home again jiggity jog. We flew into the airport at Raleigh and had to wait 3 hours for my bag to get off the plane. Matt carried on and he had his with him. There was supposedly lightning on the tarmac and they wouldn't let anyone out there to take the luggage off. Then it rained for the next 2 days and the power went out! Good thing it didn't last all the time we were there. Ernesto blew through and left the next day a bright and sunny but with wild waves. We rented mopeds for the day and drove all over Oak Island, but swimming was not an option unless we wanted to find ourselves halfway out to England. The next day we rented the mopeds again and had a grand swim in the ocean. It was lovely. Matt's dad and step-mom put us up at their lake house and we played board games every night and watched movies. Anyway, it's home again for us and to our surprise we found that it had turned Autumn while we were gone! It's been lovely ever since.

Farwell to Marina Street

Matt and I had picked out a house to buy that needed a little t.l.c. and were all set to make an offer when it was snatched away from us by some big corporation that had cash to lay down before we did. We are pretty annoyed and a little heartbroken about the whole business and I have to say that I had already assigned (in my head at least) what the rooms were going to be. I feel like I need to mourn the loss of this home to some wretched House Flipper who will come in, make a few repairs and jack up the price to something we could never afford. So please pray for us that the right house will still come our way.

Be vewy, vewy quiet. We is hunting houses.

It's either feast or famine with these posts, right? Matt and I are looking for a house to buy here in Nashville and it has not been going as well as we would hope. There are lots of homes for sale, but not many in our price range and not many that our bank will approve because of the type of loan we are applying for (mostly because we don't have a huge down payment) It's hard to leave it in God's hands when we are so very eager, but it'll work out as it should. For now, I want to let you know that we are moving our photos to Flickr.com very soon and I find it to be so much easier than creating photo albums and then publishing them on our site. It's so organized and fun! Look for the change over soon.

Dr. Wife says take 4 ibupropins and ICE IT

This weekend Matt tried very hard to get to Ohio to play air-soft with his team (the Gun Devils) and after a huge downpour, a busted radiator, and $700 dollars later, he got on the way. A great time was had by all, much manly grunting and tromping around the woods in Camo, shooting at people. Matt sprained his ankle (again, the same one he sprained not a month ago at another of these events) and spent the last day soaking up the cool summer weather (compared to here! 96 and 95% humidity-yuck) and getting sunburned. I got to play nurse when he got home, poor dear. Freckles and I had a quiet weekend and spent Saturday at the Tomato Art Festival with our friends Paul and Christy Nicholson. Christy has a great little shop online and she sold her crochet wares, t-shirts, and cool buttons with tomatoes on them at a booth at the Tomato Art Fest Bazaar.
I also have a little shop online too. I made designs that I think all my grubby hippie friends and family would like. Just for fun. Besides that, I've been playing here and there and working as the Nanny on the Go. I am spending today with a pile of kidos who are feeling a bit sicky and Matt is at home following Dr. Wife's instructions on how to care for a sprained ankle.

It's HOT and I'm tired and...humph

Hello fellow peoples. Not much to report from muggy, hot Nashville. The family is great, both Matt and mine too. Freckles is the cuteness. I swear! We are having fun hanging out with a few other couples that are really becoming our circle of friends. Who'da thought!! And that circle is adding babies to the mix, although we are not participating in that yet. If has come up a couple of times, but I (Ariana) am not ready for my body to not be my own any more. Plus I would like to take a couple of trips before we jump in the middle of that. That would be really nice. Greece, Hawaii. Just good ol' together trips, all romantic-y and stuff. But I guess I need to give the timing of all that over to someone bigger than me. Who knows what He has in mind. For some reason babysitting has dried up this month. I don't know if it's the summer or what! Not that we will starve or anything, but it has been a little stressful. Keep us in your prayers as we learn more and more about being good stewards of our moola.

News from the Slacker Blogstress

Oh dear! Where has the time gone!? We are still here and better than ever. We weathered some storms, but I know that a bunch of you folks were praying for us and we are beginning to see some sunshine this side of the darkness. Our photos are in the process of being transfered to Flicker.com and it will make it easier for us to share them with lots of folks. Please don't be intimidated by this! Change is good! I brought Freckles home from my parents after a several year stint of being a crappy dog parent and she is adjusting quite well to apartment living and I like it much better than the last time she was with me in an apartment thanks to the joys of crate training! No hidden bread loaves, no torn up papers, or chocolate chip puke hiding under rugs! She was the bane of my old roomie's existence. Matt and I go for dog walks and she likes that, but not the dog park. Heck, I'd be freaked out if people were freely sniffing my butt too!!! Thats all for now cats.
Love from Matt, Ariana and Freckles

Just Checking In...

Yes dear friends, we are still alive. I know. It gets out of control when we get going in life. No big news to report, but we just wanted to let you all know we are still here. I (Ariana) have been writing songs like a mad woman and who knows where that will go, but I love it. Tomorrow is Matt's 31'st birthday so call him and wish him a happy day.

A change in the wind

Well, it's a strange season. I (Ariana) have been making music and going to shows and writing a ton! So much to do, so little time. Thanksgiving is right around the corner and with it comes my brother's wedding. I might be able to shoot some video of it. I am trying to learn how to put video up on the net. So I am singing at his wedding too and I am still learning one of the songs. Get on the Ball!!!! I know!!!! I also have begun to be involved with 3 new things. The first is Girl Scouts. I am hoping to assist a troup soon of Juniors. I have not begun yet, but I will post more as it progresses. The second thing is a product of the first thing. I have begun to be involved with the neighborhood community center. I noticed how segregated our neighborhood was. We live in the big fat middle of a bunch of high minded liberals and for them not to be involved was just wrong. So I got on the list serves and gave them a big dish of guilt, in my usual funny and charming way, and I have gotten a ton of pledges for food for Thanksgiving to give to families in the neighborhood! It is only the beginning. Mwwaaahahaha. I love seeing change and I love being a part of it. The third thing is that I tried to make the whole quitting my job and just writing thing work for about a month and I realized that budget-wise and sanity wise, I just couldn't do it. I need to keep my hands busy! So I started my own business so I can do the things I love, yet still make some moola. I am a Temp Nanny! (Check out my site on the sidebar) I have about 20 clients who can book me for blocks of time and I show up, make like a babysitter and leave. No commitment, no strings. I have free time! I could work 50 hours a week if I really wanted to! My weekday times fill up fast and I love the change from day to day.
Oh and a 4th thing too!! I am back on Weight Watchers. Brutal scale told me that it was time. But this week I lost 4.2 lbs on the core plan! I am loving it!! I feel pretty happy these days. I know this post has been all me (blah blah me, me me blah, me me blah blah me) But who else do I know better than myself. More news will come. Don't worry!

Happy Autumn!

I, Ariana, have just returned from a trip home to Texas where I was subjected to my 10 year reunion. Which actually didn't turn out so bad. Saw a ton of people who I was not sure I knew, until I read the name tag and had to go back and look at their senior year photo to make the connection. Wow. You wouldn't think that 10 years makes some people unrecognizable, but it does. AND nearly everyone had kids!!! I am still kid-less. YAY! At least for now that is a yay. Someday soon, don't worry. I saw my squishy little niece for the first time and had a great time talking with Isabel (Emmanuel's soon to be wife) in Spanish. Man! I am rusty. But Fe' is just so delicious. I took pictures and they will be up under the family section soon. Got to hang out with my brother Jonathan and my other brother Emmanuel for a little bit. Sometimes it's weird being back home. I know a lot of people, but they really don't know me. It's like a crazy time warp of acquaintances who my parents have kept up on my current situation and so they know about me, but don't know me. On the way home Is took a travel voucher to get bumped to the next day's flight and went and saw Stephanie Sloane (my maid of honor) and Kris Daily who is by far the best noise maker on guitar I know! We had fun and laughed until we hurt over margaritas and crazy stories. Cats were involved. I swear! And my camera battery died just as I took one photo, so that's no good. So I get to use the travel voucher to go to NYC soon to visit some friends there. I can't wait for that. One has a new baby due and I just love babies. Other peoples babies.
Speaking of...I have been working as a temp Nanny a ton! Even put up a nanny site here so people can hire me, just until I find a full time job, not that keeping' these kids ain't full time. IT IS!! But I am still sending out resumes like mad, but doing shows and writing too. Ah, yes, it's a full life.
Matt has been doing really well at work, has gotten 2 awards of excellence on of which came with a cash award. Can't beat that!! He is very pumped about all that. About time too. He freakin' ROCKS at his job. He has been hanging with two new guy friends a lot and it inice because they are married and I like hanging out with their wives. He is taking me to a Predators (the Nashville Hockey Team) game tonight! Wooo Hoo! Hot date! Just kidding. It should be lots of fun.
The weather is finally turning and it is so cool and beautiful, no ugly gray days for weeks on end. Today was a beautiful 64 degrees F. with Sun and a slight wind. The perfect Fall day. Happy Autumn!!!

Gripe, Gripe, Gripe...all the time (10 year reunion coming)

Where, oh, where to begin...So this coming weekend I am going home and it looks like it will be alone. The dreaded 10 year reunion. And no moral support! Matt is suddenly on call and we already bought tickets. This SUCKS! A dinner, a picnic, a football game...all with the people who made my life hell while I was ages 14-18. What made me think that I needed to endue this self torture, and alone!! I guess it will be good to see how everyone turned out, if just for curiosity's sake. I hope they all have a zillion kids and got fat...ok, not the nice people...I don't hope that for them.
So here is the recap for me. I quit my job at the end of August to go back to writing and had a wonderfully productive month of many new songs which are being currently polished and exhibited for the first time in public at a couple of shows that I have been doing these last weeks. Let me just say that a gal cannot write all day and thought it would be nice to stay home and do this, the money issue has stuck its ugly little head up again. So it is off to work I go again, hi ho, hi ho. Sigh ho is more like. I am opting for the 'not nanny' job this time around. It always gets toooooo sticky when I take a full time, although the temp to hire stuff gets old because there is no regularity to the work. So it becomes the lesser of two weevils...I mean evils. So the 'not nanny' job, for now, means schlepping it to the Temp agency office to sit through computer testing on crazy old crap computers and why I am being tested for my knowledge of Excel and Word 97 on a computer that cannot even show graphics correctly beats the ever lovin' heck out of me! I was failing parts because the test didn't work right! How very wrong is that. Anyway. We have finally bought paint for the house and I really should take 'before' pictures so you all understand the hideousness of cream walls and BROWN trim. Oh yeah baby! Who ever thought this would be a cool fashion statement in the 80's was not a forward thinking chap, you know? I am still knitting away and there will be many projects posted AFTER Christmas because honestly, I don't know who looks at this and I wouldn't want them to see their gift, sitting there in black and white, or cream and blue as the case may be. I also asked about work in a knit shop. I know!!! Like crack for an addict!!! But maybe I'll get my 'crack' for free now, or at least employee rates... Just weekend stuff and not so bad. I would love it. SO enough about me...
Matt has been doing really well at his job and hanging out with friends lately, playing a lot of Disk Golf. There was even a day trip to Kentucky in there to test out some new courses. The Stargate series on SciFi, our Friday night fun, is having a mid season break so he is finding other things to do on Fridays, like roll playing games with some of the guys. (Don't ask me, I can't play, my brain falls out from all the math) We are talking about when it would be feasible for him to go back to school for piloting and if all goes well it could be as early as next fall!!
So Autumn is finally here and someone decorated the courtyard with ghosts and stuff. Too cute. The building is really becoming beautiful again and they are finally finishing all the work for our apartment. It is like pulling teeth around here though. They still have not fixed our bathtub, leaky tiles and liner...etc. I think they just like to paint over problems and not worry about them until they fall out of the ceiling!!! Oh well. It still is beautiful, crappy maintenance and all.
So on a final note for this post, there are two weddings in out near future. My youngest brother Emmanuel is tying the knot with his girlfriend on November the 26th. They have a little girl Fe', who there are cute, cute photos of on this site and hopefully more to come after I get to see her and she's not all purple from being born. The second wedding is Matt's sister Laura who is marrying Jessie. The wedding will be in Maine so we can't go, but I'm sure it will be beautiful.

Blurb

Well...the month sure got away from me!! We had a trip to North Carolina to see Matt's dad, we participated in a netball tournament at the last minute for the Nashville Kangaroos Netball Club and it was a blast!! We didn't get to see much of the Aussie Festival where it was, but, alas. Actually there is a lot more going on with us, but I wanted to post so you could see the recent photos. I'll post again soon.

Lost bits and bobs

Well, I am still recovering from my tonsillectomy and I can't wait for it to be all healed up. I have been knitting and knitting and we are settling quite well into the new aspects of life. Matt and I are well and happy and love where we live. I am going in to interview today for the onsite apartment management position that would give us a big break in rent. Matt is liking his new job and is still at his old job, but just as a placemarker until the new guy can be hired. He can even check into the system from home!!! That is all he has to do. And he gets paid for it!! I wish I could make a cool $500.00 a month by getting up in the morning, logging into a system and logging out. Ah the unfairness of the computer geekery world. But his real job is going great and we send each other IM's throughout the day.
On another great note. It is wonderful to see that God is still taking care of us in ways we can't even imagine. I went in for my surgery and the insurance was a mess and it turned out that our old insurance through the State of TN covered my surgery, even though we had new insurance through Web MD. It was covered 100%!!! If we had gone through the new insurance, it would have been a hefty $400.00. As it was, it cost us nothing. It was long overdue and a big blessing that we could get this done at no cost to us and that I wouldn't miss much work. (All of the families I work for are on vacation!) It is the little things that amaze me.

You are almost here!!!!

So much news!! We are on the brink, the very brink of becoming aunt and uncle again. My (Ariana's) baby brother, Emmanuel and his girlfriend Isabelle are in the hospital as I write having a little girl named Fe (Spanish for Faith). I am so excited!! I have been knitting a little stuffed bunny for her to hold and I hoped to get it there before she arrived, but she is early. Just a week. It is merciful for poor Isabelle who is TINY! I don't even think she is 5 feet tall. She looks like she has been carrying around a beach ball in her shirt. I think she might have exploded had Fe not arrived. On another note, I had my tonsils out this week and have been doped up for DAYS! I didn't hallucinate this time though. Just crazy, crazy dreams from which I could not wake because I was too drugged. Matt finally had to pray over me because I was waking up so panicked and scared from my nightmares. Then all my dreams turned into sitcoms. Which is less scary, but almost as bad. You know those ridiculous situations they are always in and if one person would speak up, or do the right thing, then it would all be over...yeah. Very annoying. So at the end of all this, I will be tonsil free and so very ready to go back to singing again. Look out world!!

A new neighborhood, a new place...mmmm

Happy 4th!! We have been moving, AGAIN!! I know, I know. But this time we think we finally found the spot. Even our first night in the new place, we both turned to each other and said, This already feels like home. Our building is the Belvedere Building and it holds 12 little flats with 2 bedrooms each. Ours is by far the coolest! But we are biased. It has a courtyard with year round sparkly lights in the trees, tall ceilings, dark wood floors, sunlight and views galore. We can't wait to fill it up with furniture!!! Which reminds me. We are saving up for a couch since the old blue faithful denim couch would not make the turn into the living room or any other room for that matter. It was dragged away and unceremoniously dumped in the basement by the maintenance guys. Alas, poor Blue, I knew him well. Soon we will begin painting and it will be so home-like we will never ever ever leave!!! Who needs to buy a house when you have this place!!? I know. I will eat my words someday.
Anyway, we spent the 4th in the park right across the street from our building, watching the downtown fireworks. They are not as impressive as when the are vibrating your internal organs, but I am rather fond of my eardrums, so we chose a less hearing damaging location this year. But we had friends from church join us on our blankets and camp chairs and it was fun. Just 2 more weeks until me tonsils have to come out and after the ER visits last month, I will be glad for it. The first visit was just precautionary because I didn't want to end up with another peri-tonsilar abscess again. (If you don't know what that is, don't ask. Totally GROSS!) But by 1 am the next morning I was dehydrated, couldn't breathe, couldn't swallow, couldn't keep anything down...Matt took me back and we were there all night and with all the tests they did and drugs they cranked into my poor bod, a nearly $3000.00 ER bill after they were done. (Thank heavens for insurance and $50 Co-Pays!!!) So then they gave me pain meds because my tonsils were still so large and I hallucinated for the next 4 days!! Apparently I don't do well on Codine of any kind. (Neither does my Mama. She talks to little green men and has conversations with people who aren't there...same as me) So it's off to have the boogers taken out and 2 more weeks of recovering and pain meds that make me feel like I am wearing a wet blanket. Oh Joy. But at least we are all moved and everything will work out with my work schedule and all. I am very excited to get on with my tonsil free life. By the way, our new address is posted. Please make a note of it!! And Please come and see us!! REALLY, WE MEAN IT!!

Life and Times

Where shall I begin?! I finally got the site up and done and posted and etc etc etc...It took an age!! We saw Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy and loved it. Not exactly like the book but fun and funny anyway. The guy who plays 'Zaphod' is 'Guy' from Galaxy quest. We had a good laugh over that. Well, it's nearly official. We have selected a new apartment (STAY PUT, WOULD YA??) I can just hear you saying that. Don't worry. Our current address and contact info will always be posted here. We can't ever escape! AAARRRRGGG!!! Not even if we wanted to. There are all kinds of photos up now, after over a year of none but the sad ole Matt and Ariana one. It's like a deluge! We have a digital camera and you will probably see photos that you might think to yourself, "why didn't they delete this??" But here you are, stuck with us. I can't quite give up the film yet, so there will always be those artsy photos in the big middle of it all. Perhaps this is my answer to why I was always so CRAP at scrap-booking. I just needed to find my medium. Because really, after I am gone, who is going to look at all that cutesy paper and think, "Wow." I just can't justify it! (They will more than likely be pitched by our children who will by then be good and sick of having a packrat for a mom, because I am sure to drive them crazy with it!!) Perhaps I am just cheap. Perhaps I just don't have the attention span for it. Who knows. So the news is we found a lovely 2 bedroom for only $525 with windows galore and lots of space for all the aforementioned junk-fest that I have going on. Honestly, I just need some shelves, if I could just have some shelves. Bookcases actually. It is in an old apartment building built in 1906, with a fallout shelter in the back! Who knows if we will need that, but it can't hurt to be prepared. We are hoping to look at it one last time next week before we lay our moo-la on the line, but I am pretty sure that its a keeper.

One year down...more to go

Matt and I have celebrated our 1st Anniversary!!! We went camping for the weekend at Mammoth Cave park and our weekend was much like the first year of marriage can be...full of trials. It rained and rained and rained, our camping mats popped, we couldn't get a fire going, the lovely spring weather turned to nearly snow, but we weathered it and learned a few lessons about camping, ourselves and token operated showers. We nearly gave up, but after a fairly strenuous 4 hour cave tour, we emerged to bright sunny spring weather and decided to stay. A trip to Wally World and we were set to weather another night in the tent. We came home and had to put all of our clothes in trash bags to launder because they smelled so strongly of burning wood. But all's well that ends well. We came home and cooked all the food we had not been able to in woods due to weather and after a 2 hour nap had a lovely Anniversary dinner at home followed by an early bed time. Campin' sure can take it out of ya! So we made it. Hooray!
On another note, a year of marriage has done crazy things to my waistline and I am back on the Weight Watchers plan. I will be posting my progress with photos on a new part of this site, coming soon.

Family Wedding!!

We've just returned from Mari-Carmen's (Ariana's younger sister) wedding and can you believe it, we drove to Texas and home!! What were we thinking. Actually, Ariana had some clearing out to do at her Mama and Papa's house,(old dolls and books and random boxes of clothing from college) and we needed the trunk room to get it all home. Now if we could just get it put away! The wedding was so beautiful, as was my sister and Matt and I helped and stayed up late getting things ready. I think I still smell of LAVENDER! Or at least my underwear drawer will for awhile with all the little packets I took home. Our drive was made very enjoyable by a wonderful book on tape called "THE 13 GUN SALUTE" By the late Patrick O'Brian. Part of a wonderful series that has been made into a film called "Master and Commander." All the swashing and buckleing a person could want!! It was so great to see family and catch up on everything. My oldest sister Shiloh has added a third to her brood, Josiah and he is a cutie. It was the first time I had seen him in person. Caleb and Faith, her other children are so talkative and have personality practically coming out of their ears!! Check out the pictures!

Happy New Year and Valentines Day...all of them later than usual. Matt and I are nearly a month into each of our new jobs and with new jobs come new stresses, but also benefits. We decided to up and move to a bigger place on the other side of town, leaving behind our old haunts in the 12th South district. Cant say that we are terribly thrilled about having to drive to our old coffee shops rather than walk, but you pay a price for 2 bedrooms...literally. Have a peak at our contact page for our new address. Now we have room for guests!!
Matt is coming up soon on his 30th birthday with a mixture of excitement and dread. Though Doc Brown thought 30 years was a nice round number...Matt is not in that camp. I still think he is fabulous and I am sure that wont change with age. (His SUPRISE PARTY went off without a hitch!! Check it out!)
So we have been exploring east Nashville and quite a few of our friends live over here, making it easier to be social. I guess there is nothing like your first place together though and so we miss it.

Happy Christmas to all!

Christmas is so weird with a husband. I got to have a room all to myself in my parents house rather than kipping on the couch. It was interesting. I thought to myself, I am sleeping with a boy! And my parents know!! B-Zar. At best. Well, a Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night. See you next year!

They say it's my birthday...in chicago...or something

Somehow 7 months have FLOWN by and it is nearly my birthday. The first big "to do" since we have been married. (maybe I am leaving something out) We took a weekend trip to Chicago to visit Matt's brother and his wife (Mike and Christine) and have a BLAST! I can't wait to go back and Matt would rather move there!
We went to the Zoo in Licoln Park and saw tons of animals, but the most impressive was the Polar Bear who I could watch for hours. He must have been bored out of his mind by the way he swam in the same pattern around his enormous glass tank, only taking a moment to pause and roar at any smaller human dressed in black who got near the glass. (It must have made him long for seals...)
Also, on Halloween night I stepped in a huge hole that was camouflaged by leaves and sprained my ankle! On the way to a costume party! So I showed up as limping hippie! The cool air was lovely though and the upside was my sweetie pushed me around in a wheelchair when we went to the Field Museum, which was so VERY amazing by the way. I got to see Sue! The city was such a very cool place. Christine and I thrift shopped and had a lovely girls day while the men folks froze their buns off playing GOLF of all things. (I think it was Matt's first time)
On a side note, I have taken up knitting and can't wait to get going with my knitting page. I love it! I could waste hours doing this stuff.