for my mother

many of you william lovers out there are most likely asking, "what happened to the fat cat?!"

let me assure you that william still has 7 of his lives and is perfectly fine. his first meeting with ezra was anti-climatic and extremely disappointing.
william's current activities include:
greeting me right out of the shower for extra attention
sniffing grass, rocks and other organic matter in back yard
and sleeping on top of chair

additionally he has started purring. we didn't know that this was possible but apparently he's hard up for some of the attention he lost 2 weeks ago

to each their own

since dallas has been gone for a while and is coming home this weekend, ezra wanted to make sure that he wouldn't get confused with the treat jars.

thus, ezra insisted that they be labeled just in case

before we got ezra i had several people tell me that having a dog was like having kids.

today i had both a dog and a kid and let me tell you-- they are NOTHING alike, although,
i have found a few similarities:
1) both drool
2) both like taking naps (sometimes)
3) both put everything in their mouth
4) both have similar dookie bagsafter spending an afternoon babysitting i have concluded that i am very happy with only my dog and will only consider kids in maybe 5 years

we had our spaghetti party last night. getting ready for it was a bit crazy since i didn't get home from the store until noon! yikes! here are a couple pics to sum it up:

jen and i made a saying on each of the bibs. here she is modeling #25 pre-party

poor lynn drew the mixer beater

and we concluded the night with a little twister.
bobbi has mad twister skills
by the end of the night ez and i were done for

today ezra and i are busy preparing for tonight's occasion:
andi's quarter life century crisis silly spaghetti supper and twister party!

pics to come tonight

apparently to be in the PRO club at fresh paint you have to be looking at facebook on your phone and drinking some form of coca cola during lunch. if you don't this you're prolly not cool

i've been off work the last couple days as i'm trying to stay off my feet and nurse my ailing hamstring back to the point where i can at least spin for 30 min without crying in the near 2 week future. moist heat is part of my recovering therapy....

ezra is pretty keen on my recovery too and found out he LOVES laying on the heating pad. thanks for helping hold it down buddy... don't know if it would stay without you

also, happy birthday tony stewart!

for a brief moment i thought that we could be a happy family
william is a party pooperalso, i regret saying duckie is no more

this is duckie.
we got him yesterday
duckie came complete with stuffing and squeaker
today he has neither, and is also half decapitated

ezra came for good today and we couldn't be more excited!
looking at this pic it's pretty obvious that maybe william isn't too keen on family time

today was bittersweet. i didn't get to race but we did get approved for ezra! YEAH!

in celebration i iced my leg, got my leg knots kneaded out, and we went to petco in preparation for ezra. william still hasn't figured out that he's getting a "little" friend

mmmm... new waterbowl, for me?

ah, a big cushion! how thoughtful!
in the meantime dallas can't wait to play fetch with his chuck-it (with the dog) so he practiced with william, and then, with me when william thought the game was hokey and decided to roll around in the grass. in hindsight we should have bought one of these months ago to help with the little guy's BMI issue

happy birthday to me!
happy birthday to me!

i had a very spectacular big 2-5 today.
thank you everyone who called or texted or facebooked me. it was a really great day!

today's agenda:
go biking with bobbi on her first mtn bike ride back from her accident (yeah bobbi!)
eat breakfast at lucilles
get my hair highlighted and cut
eat a delicious meal compliments of my aunt cindy
come home and clean our house so we don't look like bad people and can pass tomorrow's home inspection for the dog.

here are bobbi and i after biking.
i'd post a pic of my hair but i feel kind of weird doing that

in a few short bulleted items, this week:

1) i decide to spoil myself with birthday month present #1 and get a massage. the only reason i went was for my leg i hurt in this weekend's races. i have a severely strained hamstring and can't race this weekend.

2) dallas got back in town tonight from his week long "vacation" in north dakota only to leave again next week... ironically he thinks our 68 degree house is cold

3) we went to visit ezra again. we have a home visit this saturday. yikes! i'm more nervous for this than any job interview i can think of

4) william is in for a little surprise if we pass the home inspection. watch out kitty cat your world is going to be turned upside down

so having a pulled hip flexor could possibly be the worst thing ever

lisa and i needed a little pick me upper around 10:30 this morning and it just so happened that mc donald's was across the street from the bank. i splurged just a little and only got the 3 piece chicken selects
this is a OK thing to eat because there is a cyclist on the box, right?

well hello birthday month!
yes, i celebrate all november.
are you surprised?
you shouldn't be

tomorrow i get to go meet one of my possible birthday presents to myself: Ezra. can't wait!

even though i can't wait here's william's take on getting a dog friend

i was gone a little bit earlier but it is 7:00 and no kiddos asking for candy yet.

after driving thru numerous neighborhoods for work i have decided that this house gets halloween's "overdone and creepy" award
you were probably looking at how many decorations they had in their yard, but, did you notice what's in their driveway?yes, this is a full size coffin that i'm hoping they're using for decoration. really now, who wants a coffin in their driveway? and furthermore, where do you store it in the off season?

CREEPY!

happy halloween eve!

so my mom had to send out these pics today to remind us how dorky we were when we were little.

yes, in 1989 when i was almost 6 i got to be an unicorn. it was a pretty fabulous outfit and i even got to have silver sprinkles on my face. in case you live somewhere near atwood ks and need a costume for your child this year i think the outfits are still upstairs in my parents house!

no blogging last night--- bedtime called at 8:45. 11 hrs of sleep was awesome!

today we were fortunate enough to get off work early for our last week of riding outside after work before the time change kills us. i went out to one of the best places for a quick ride by our house-- south table mountain. this is one of my favorite places to ride my cross bike for a few reasons:

1) i can whiz by mtn bikers like they are standing still and it makes me feel fast
2) it helps me work on my technical skill
3) after the loop is almost over i get to ride this:this may not look like much but it is like going on a rollercoaster on your bike. you start and can't see where you're going and by the end you want to go again and again (so i do the whole loop again just for this!)

long live the week before time change!

11:56 pm

high score 185,740
212 lines
8.62 lines/min
level 10

i'm done before midnight!

uh oh

i'm in trouble. i found my one true love and greatest addiction on the internet today and dallas keeps finding me with it....

TETRIS!

oh yes. it is one of the world's greatest games
http://www.tetrisfriends.com/

i'm warning you it is VERY addicting and i can't stop. so far my stats are:

high score 96,908 (i will get over 100,00 tonight or stay up trying!)
137 lines
8.11 lines/min
2 max combos

go try it out!

we have almost decided to make william a mexican hairless for halloween due to this:
yes, somehow he has a hairball on the ceiling fan.
and yes, it is gross
william has magical powers

fabulous friday

today was pretty awful as fridays, or any day, gets.

1) since we have a ridiculous fat cat the animal shelter won't let us adopt the dog we want. their reasoning was that the dog would literally eat the cat. we didn't see the problem in that but apparently it was an issue

2) the other day i was trying to be a good wife and clean out the fridge. there was some slimy stuff in there and i decided that it was small enough to go down the garbage disposal. 2 days later (today) the water still hadn't drained. wonderful. here is my handy dandy service man going out to snake whatever it was out. (ps, dad, he LOVES the lights you got him!)no, he really didn't need the hardhat but it was a good place to click the LED lights to so he didn't fall off the roof

3) he didn't get it out because we didn't buy the $200 industrial size snake and thus at 10:20 pm the roto-router guy just left. thankfully service calls after hours are only $30 more. all said and done it was a pretty expensive little meal that we had 3 weeks ago

4) i felt bad while dallas was out working on the snaking issue so i decided to get the grout cleaner and scrub our kitchen floor grout with an old toothbrush.

hopefully the weekend goes better!

shopping

we had a super easy day today and got done early. we decided that it would behoove us to get new painting pants at old navy. did you know that lisa is no fun to shop with? here is an example of our conversation across the changing room stalls:

lisa: oh my gosh! these pants called skinny leg jeans are almost too small. they are almost touching my thighs!

andi: well if it makes you feel any better the normal jeans for regular people who can't wear "skinny leg" jeans are like spandex across my butt and thighs!

almost 25 years later and i'm still trying to deny genetics and realize that my legs get bigger with exercise. this is the last time i go shopping with skinny people.

anyone know where you can get jeans for the small waisted, big butt-ed, massive thighs, long legged people that still look cute?

also on the forefront:
1) dallas found out today that he might be having to take an extended stay up in north dakota
2) he felt bad for me and told me that i could get a dog. tomorrow on my day off i'm going to "huge paws big dogs" adoption agency to look at a couple of great danes we found on-line tonight. the only "person" opposed is william

we got the marble columns done today. i must say that we did a pretty good job.

and since i only got the deck stained/sealed last weekend and no compost pile built, we now have a knee-high pile of leaves waiting for a new home.
also no one told us that our linden tree was on roids. this is ridiculous!

after lisa showed me how to paint marble she had a pretty good day at work.

FOR SALE!

many of you are probably thinking, "wow! it's already the end of october! i need to start Christmas shopping!" well, if you are looking for that perfect present that no one will ever forget, stop! you can pick up their present at my house.

yes, i am selling my beloved buffet that i have spent many-a-hour slaving away on in lisa's driveway with neighbors watching with an evil eye. it is a wonderful piece of furniture, but a little large for our house. if you have even the inkling of thinking about purchasing this or have questions please please call or leave a comment! i'll even be so accommodating as holding the door open while you take it out to your truck!
23"deep x 66" wide x 39" tall

buy it today and your mother will love you forever!

yesterday, after spending my 76 degree saturday locked inside at the home show i got to go see cu beat ksu at boulder with beezer (my sister) and dusty (her boyfriend). this was my first ksu game since i've graduated and i REALLY miss being in college! it was cool seeing old friends from school. on today's agenda: build compost pile, prepare deck to stain and water seal, rake leaves, ride bike, and eat more than 400 calories and stand 11 straight hours like i did yesterday

home show booth

this year we (again) have a booth at the denver home decorating and remodeling show. after all the work that has gone into it i must say that our booth is pretty spectacular.
pity lisa today and sunday, and me tomorrow as we "get" to explain our company to lookie-looos while listening to elevator music for hours upon end.

tonight i'm putting a plug in for cross racing. for those of you who are considering this sport, check out this picture of me racing. look how fun and effortless racing is. if you don't like riding bikes you don't have to-- you can run with it instead! wouldn't you like to have this much fun too?

william still loves his cardboard box that once held our wedding album. by now he has it stretched out to fit his body and considers it more of a lounge chair than secret hiding spot

weekend pic

here is teri holding saige of 8 mo. an appropriate caption for this picture would be:

"ok, so you are a tiny human. uhm, i'm supposed to do what with you?"
teri is about as good with little kids as i am

i think the saying goes "misery loves company." in my book this applies to being tired too.

after 2 hard days of nasty (but AWESOME) cold wet weather racing i'm about worthless. thankfully william stepped up to the plate and volunteered to keep me company

our great friends from kc are out to visit for a couple of days for "vacation." i love it when tony and teri "vacation" here! i go cross race and tony stays home to "vacation." it's a pretty sweet set-up. thanks for cooking tony!

also, congrads to lisa for winning the cross race today! yahoo!

even though i have no room to talk, lisa pulled a major fashion no-no today. it's probably a good thing that we were working from home!

today was pretty uneventful so i thought i'd post some "really professional" pics that i took while we were at kinosha pass the other weekend

my beautiful bike

tonight i had to make a little trip down to my wonderful aunt and uncle's house. my uncle dan for as long as i have known him, has always done a little running as it helps even out the calorie count from all the beer he drinks while playing golf. i happened to arrive at their house just after he got in from his daily run. i think that either dan has been wearing these socks since the early 90s or he just likes the way the elastic doesn't work anymore, in his mind allowing blood to freely flow to his feet and ankles. either way it is a fashion disaster.

guess what yo'ure getting for Christmas uncle dan!?!in case you need a different perspective

william has started keeping me company in the bathroom. i don't think that he really wants to keep me company as much as he wants to watch where everything goes after it flushes

yesterday after church we ate out with one-handed bobbi. here she is getting ready to eat fajitas with one hand. she did a pretty amazing job-- i'm messier than her with 2 hands. go bobbi!

i'm also scheming to steal her and jon's dog baily. as you can see this is going to be no small task.

besides drinking less coffee in the mornings, i think i have found the reason i'm so tired by the time i get to the job site. lisa has become a little less exciting and instead of listening to really upbeat music we now "jam out" to NPR

a new life...

we are getting ready for a home show at work. since we have a double booth this year we need extra furniture so i volunteered to buy a piece, re-do it and then put it in the wasted space in our kitchen. even though we aren't completely done, i must say that lisa and i did a pretty good job.

before:after:

sorry for the blogging delay. here is how exciting it's been this week:

1) after talking to our neighbors today i found out that all the leaves from their yard usually float their way over to our yard. (not thrilling)

2) i got almost all the laundry clean, folded, ironed, and put away (again, not thrilling)

3) last night william finally hacked up the hairball he's been working on for the past month. (very not thrilling)

on a really cool note, our friend bryce is an AMAZING photographer and wanted to work on his personal portfolio for a self promo deal. somehow dallas and i were lucky enough to participate. check out his blog as he's got a couple pics up from the weekend! http://bryceboyerphoto.blogspot.com/