December 2015 - Where I've been

Good-bye 2015 and Hello to a New Year!

I haven’t written in a month and I needed that time off to focus on us and getting the house back in order after the construction completed.  Seems like it’s all I’ve talked about recently but we really accomplished a lot of small and not so small jobs around the house this last year.   It feels great to finally get some of these things done.

 Our first project was redoing the basement bathroom

Then we moved on to flooring

 We also repainted and added cabinets to this room

 We hired a contractor to redo this half of the basement and stairwell

Finished and furnished - new living room

So December was full of fun.  We returned from California late on Sunday after Thanksgiving and Don had to get on a plane the next morning for Houston.  I took the time to dig out the decorations so I was ready when Don got home that weekend to go pick out our tree.  I am like a kid in the candy shop on a shopping spree giddy about getting the tree.  If we do nothing else I just want a Christmas tree and the ability to decorate it and the house while listening to Christmas music.  Don is less interested because live trees are heavy but he does it for me every year (and I tell him every year he must really love me!).  I do look every year for a fake tree that I like without being a pre-lit tree but to no avail.  While I’d still probably get a small live tree, I have to admit having a fake one in the garage would be great. 

 This is now our dining room all decorated for Christmas

Ok, so the tree is home and set up, we have 12 days until Christmas.  Then we planned a gaming party for the Monday and Tuesday before Christmas.  As I’ve mentioned before Construction leaves a huge amount of dust and it just keeps coming even after cleaning up so I asked Don to help clean the kitchen walls, ceiling etc.  He went up to the kitchen and said you know if we’re clearing out the kitchen to deep clean, we may as well repaint and replace the temporary cabinet we put in 12 years ago.  Now if he is up to paint, I’m all for it so I jumped at it.  He made his way to the big box store on Tuesday while I began clearing everything from the kitchen. He picked out the paint which is something I normally do and he chose well.  It’s a sort of cranberry color which goes well with the other accessories in the kitchen and our floor is grey so we painted the ceiling grey instead of white.  It sounds quick and easy on paper but it’s a kitchen.  The walls were cleaned twice, as well as sanded down and wiped down again and they were still resisting the paint. We should have had it done in a couple days but I finally finished putting the kitchen back together on Sunday night at 10pm. Our guests were due to arrive around noon the following day.  Whew! At least it got done.

 new cabinets and kitchen color

The game day holiday party we hosted was a lot of fun.  We played every expansion of Talisman (hence the 2 days and we still didn’t finish it before people had to head home). Our friends from up north just stayed over and a good thing too since it snowed all afternoon and evening. We were supposed to have a white Christmas this year but it happened a few days early.  Our yard is great to sled in when it snows but we didn’t get enough on the ground.

 Talisman game

snowing 

Christmas day was great! My mom was able to come which is something I’d worried she wouldn’t be able to do.  She was released from the Hospital the 2^nd week of December but I was worried about her not being able to sit for very long.  They did leave shortly after dessert though since they’d stopped and saw my grandma for a few hours before coming up here. I’m just glad she is on the mend and getting better every day.

my mom showing me the blouse I got her as one of her Christmas presents

our nephew showing off his new shoes

So that’s pretty much the December review.  Not much else happened after Christmas except making homemade Donuts the day after Christmas. Our nephew ( the one pictured above) had surgery today to remove a tumor from his foot and luckily it was benign, yesterday they thought it was cancer after looking at his MRI. So ya seriously over 2015!  We stayed in for New Years Eve this year which was great. 

 Happy New Year!

I’m seriously glad 2015 is over.  It was a rough year but it’s made my resolve all that more strong. 

We have a trip coming up in a few days and I can’t wait to get someplace warmer for a few days. 

Here's hoping for a great year for all of us in 2016.

Thanksgiving trip 2015

Every year we go home to visit for Thanksgiving.  It can seem complicated but we’ve gotten used it.  We drive down and stop at our friend’s place in the Sacramento area and stay the night then the following day with his family and in-laws (although not this year, we'd stay on our way home).  We always enjoy that and the dogs love playing with his son and running around the back yard. We then leave (usually) on Sunday morning and head to our hotel where we unload the car and then head over to his parent’s house.  We usually eat dinner and hang out for a couple hours then head back to our hotel for the night.

Monday usually has us spending the entire day with his parents.  We go over for breakfast and talk, hang out, eat dinner and watch a movie or two.  Tuesday and Wednesday are usually my family days.  Each year is a bit different based on when my aunt isn’t in school.  This year though, I went to spend a few hours with my dad on Monday while Don took his parents to the mall so his mom could get a new cell phone. My dad had a stroke in October and I needed to see how he was doing. I’ve been extremely worried about him since I found out but he didn’t want me to come down to help out.  I’m so glad to say he is coming along although nowhere near 80%+ but improving daily. He can sign his name and has a leg brace to help him walk and stay upright so I’m happy to see him improving and pretty quickly. Monday is also the day I found out my mom entered Kidney failure due to the massively strong antibiotics they’ve had her on for MRSA (antibiotic resistant staph infection) after her back surgery back in October.  I guess you could say October was a bad month for me.  Mom is going on two weeks in the hospital but will hopefully be home (although still on an IV with antibiotics) by this weekend.  When we spoke today she’d had dialysis and was in pretty good spirits, as good as you can be; that is when the whole right side of your body is bruised and sore from head to toe on one side and you’re still recovering from a fusion of your spinal cord.

So Tuesday had us going to his parents for breakfast and then meeting my dad and aunt for dinner.  We went to Outback and enjoyed dinner and the company.  Our visits with them are always so short.  I wish they were available all day but between work and school it isn’t possible.  We got to spend about 4 ½ hours hanging out together.  I did talk to them every day we were there though.

Wednesday was breakfast at his parents then we went to see my mom’s brother.  This year we went out to Mexican instead of doing a BBQ which was really good.  We went back to his place after dinner for lots of pinball and music and Don and he had a cigar. The only time Don has anything like that is the one time a year we go visit my uncle, it’s their tradition in the back yard or open garage. We met a neighbor of his and stayed way longer than we normally do but we were having a great time talking and competing for high score of the night.

Don playing my Uncle's Southpark pinball game 

Thursday we were going to try and have breakfast with my dad and aunt but it didn’t work out and instead got a phone call for us to come to Don’s parents. So we ended up at their place 4 hours early so Don set up their new printer and showed his mom how to do things with her new phone.  Later his uncle and his long time girlfriend arrived.  We would go to a restaurant late that afternoon for dinner.   I have to say it was a lot of food, good eats, and a great price per person for the quality. His uncle and girlfriend left for the couple hour drive home from the restaurant and we went back to his parent’s house for a couple hours. We called it fairly early that night so we could all get a good amount of rest.

Come Friday morning we were headed to meet up with a CA co-worker of Don’s for lunch in Irvine and a tour of Blizzard Entertainment.  Come to find out her husband works there and when he offered the tour we jumped at the chance.  We were able to find a Petsmart hotel close by to the restaurant and we made an appointment for the dogs to go to daycare while we went to lunch and did the campus tour.

I have to say I wasn’t 100% sure what we’d see outside the Orc statue out front with the flags and a bunch of buildings where people work.  We were pleasantly surprised all the statues were in place and well lit so we could take pictures. We got to see the library and holy cow so amazing! So many games, books, and other cool things to check out if you work there. I’d spend a lot of time in there playing games in the evenings if I worked there. We also saw an office from outside as we entered a building and we thought it was the store.  Nope, someone’s office with so many cool things we just wanted it to be a store (they don’t have a physical store only online). The control room was cool to see but no pictures allowed then we moved on to the timeline of Blizzard and the games they released.  It needs to be updated for the last couple years but still nifty to see all of them in one chart. The museum was cool to see, they have original art work, statues, the armor they give to long time employees, a display case of items given out each Christmas to employees and also fan art. We then got a tour of where he works.  Really cool IT dept. which is saying something.  After the tour we talked a bit then headed back to pick up the dogs from daycare.

 Welcome to Blizzard

One the core values placed around the statue

one section of the library

Only 6 hours and 14 freeways later we’d arrive back at our friend’s place for the night.  We got in fairly late but were staying the next day.  Saturday was pretty chill (and chilly!); we played World of Warcraft, watched a movie, and then played Talisman.  His son was able to have us help with addons he wanted for WoW and we had a lot of fun together playing games. 

Sunday was a 5am wake up so we could get ready, pack the car and leave for home. It would be an extremely long and cold day. I don’t think the temp from CA to WA ever got above 36 degrees.  In fact it was 28 degrees when we left Sacramento and 25 degrees when we got home to our place in WA. What was supposed to be an 11 ½ hour drive turned into 14 ½ one and we concluded we’re never leaving on Sunday again.  Thank goodness we made it to Oregon in time to listen to the football game on the radio to break up the monotony of the drive. Although the commentator’s were blah and we couldn’t really hear what was going on half the time (goodness guys take a breath you don’t have to keep talking over every play about whatever) it was a good game to listen to.

All of us were so glad to finally be back home, even if it was much later than we expected.  The cats were thrilled to see us and we them. Our brother in law took great care of them and the house while we were gone.  Hopefully next year we have a child to show off to the family during our trip down.

Here’s some pictures of our Blizzard tour and trip down south for Thanksgiving:

 Pets are allowed at work so this section of grass has been set aside for human use

 My happy boys!Dad turned on the compressor so we went to the car for a few minutes

 The internal safety poster mascot is Medimurk the Murloc

Couldn't resist taking a picture of this Diablo sign

                                                 

 Tyrael

 Tracer

 The one and only Horde Chopper

 Don with Grommash

 Sword is 5 years with Blizzard and Shield is 10 years (Arthas mask is 20 years)

 one piece of the fan art in the museum

My guys all snoozing after a long day

Our Yearly Vacation to Atlanta

Dragon con was a blast this year! It’s always fun to go and hang out with friend’s but this year we both dressed up both Friday and Saturday and while HOT, especially Friday’s costumes, was a lot of fun.  Don and I had planned on the Wreck it Ralph and Vanellope Von Shweetz costumes for Friday. We even ran into a Fix it Felix. Lara and someone else we know were going to the Archer shoot as Kreiger and Kreiger's virtual girlfriend so Lara met us in our room for us to all go to the shoot together.

While shopping on Saturday I decided I’d go ahead and buy things for the steampunk costume for next year. Don was taking a large box back to our room so I headed off with our friend’s Corey and

Carol to look around.  Corey was looking for a few things for his costume while Carol waited with me to try on Corset’s.  The second one was perfect, so now to find the rest of the outfit, which I did at the fourth shop minus the hat.  I didn’t have time to pick up a bunch of accessories after the hat shop so I figured it was ok because I was going to wear my Nightmare Before Christmas dress that night anyway.  That idea didn’t last long as Carol and Katrina talked me into using the steampunk stuff anyway.  As we were talking Don mentioned he didn’t have a costume for the night and our friend’s said hey we have 2 cloaks you should be Red Riding Hood and he could use my black wig from the Vanellope costume, and then they dared him to do it. Corey and Don went back into the shopping area in search for a t-shirt that would work for the costume. They came back with a perfect one. We went back to our separate hotels to change and Don went into the store there looking for a basket.  He got lucky and borrowed a picnic basket which had been used in a display.

 pictured with another Red Riding Hood

It was time to get me into the corset, which sounds simple but for people who’ve never done it, it was a bit tougher.  Thankfully You Tube had videos on how to lace your corset by yourself.   Don redid the corset and then we went to our friend’s hotel to meet up and get Don and Kevin their cloaks. Four of our friend’s were at the same hotel so we took pictures in the courtyard before going out to get dinner and head off to the hotels. We had planned on getting Lara or someone else to take our picture together but by the time we met up it was all but forgotten.  We went to the Marriott Marquis and outside it was a giant dance party which was a blast. I figured out who the guys were walking around with the speakers on their shoulders and it was Future Beat.  After a while we left and 5 of us went to get food while the other 4 went back to their rooms.

  Selfie with Lara unicorn

 Waiting in line for a midnight show

Sunday was rough for all of us.  We stayed out way too late so it was rough having to get up, pack, and check out.  We still had 4 hours to kill before going to the airport so we met up for lunch with everyone to say good-bye. After Lunch we split up Corey and Carol went back to their room, Kevin and Don went shopping, Lara and Shannon went to her group photo shoot, and Chris, Katrina, and I went to the autograph room.

Say Hi to Richard Hatch

Now here’s the fun part – Landing in Seattle 6 hours later only to realize I had left stuff in the drawer of the bedside table, like the car and house keys and my headphones. OUCH! I’ve never ever done something like that but here we were and we had to figure out what to do.  Our Brother in law drove out and brought us keys. We are lucky that our friend’s stayed through Monday so they could swing by and get my stuff, which is now being overnight shipped to me.  Moral of the story, ALWAYS check the drawers before leaving (which we normally do but for some reason didn’t this time).

Outside that snafu we had a fantastic time and are planning to meet up with everyone again next year, maybe even extending the trip to a full week. Can't wait to see what costumes everyone does. 

What exactly is Dragon Con and why do you go?

As stated by the official website Dragon Con is “We are the largest multi-media, popular culture convention focusing on science fiction & fantasy, gaming, comics, literature, art, music, and film in the universe.” To us it’s so much more.

Yes, it is those things but also history, technology, science, engineering and the most important factor is Friends! We have friends all over the country and a good portion of them live in the south.  So every year we get together in Atlanta for Dragon Con if they can make it, even for a day (Don and I are there at least 4 days, having flown cross-country). Our friends drive in from Atlanta, Tennessee, and Alabama. We have a friend in Florida but they've never been able to make it. Dragon Con spans 6 hotels over downtown Atlanta and so the events are usually grouped into one hotel for the duration such as Doctor Who panels in the Hyatt or Star Trek related panels, contests, etc in the Weston. They also feature shopping for everything imagined and then some in the Americas Mart.  I really can’t wait to share Dragon con with our child and have them know all our friends. 

 

So cute posing with Captain America while her dad took pictures - Hoping that is us soon!

We absolutely love Dragon Con.  In fact our friends from Alabama were the first to tell us about it and upon finding out we had to plan to go the following year. WOW so much to do, we didn't make many panels that first year but we had fun shopping and watching the Cos-players and meeting up with our friends on Saturday. That first year was simply amazing for us as the one panel we did make (Farscape) led us to the autograph room where we had a great conversation with Gigi Edgley (wish we'd gotten pictures that first year instead of just autographs) and some of the cast who were on the panel.  What I like is the stars aren't usually pretentious and will have normal conversations about their work; granted the super-stars are pretty hard to get to due to the one hour of signatures and done so good luck!, better wake up at 6 and get in line by 7 for a 2 o’clock autograph session. I wanted Patrick Stewart last year and the line was around 3 blocks long (think New York city blocks) for a one hour session, um ya OK, off to do something else and I will have to live without meeting him. Last year we were thrilled to meet and talk with a few actors we really wanted to chat with and they were amazing and so are their upcoming projects (or past ones in some cases).   It sounds like we spend a lot of time fanning over the actors but actually we hit the autograph room once, usually Saturday unless someone we want to see is only available on Friday. We try to figure out the best time to go and hit the room and hope everyone we want to talk with is there, sometimes we aren't that lucky. The other must Hall to visit is the Art Hall where we usually meet up and chat with a friend of Don’s who sells her work during Dragon Con. So many different artists and kinds of art work from paintings to sculptures to metal work. The art hall is also where you’ll find the comics.

What else is great about Dragon con is the cos-play. One of my best friends (Lara Cupcake) is a cos-player and although considered amateur we think she does a fantastic job on her costumes from the design to re-imagining some of the characters. She been actively doing cos-play for cons’ for about a year and a half. Last year when we all went together and shared a room she had 4 costumes and the amount of work she puts into not just making those costumes but actually dressing in them for the day is phenomenal! Really cos-players do so much for fan support as they enjoy bringing a favorite character to life for everyone to enjoy seeing as they go from panels to contests and photo shoots or just walk about the streets in downtown. I don’t usually dress in anything except shorts and some tee from a show (Like Doctor Who, Firefly or Nightmare before Christmas). Next year that changes as I found a really fun steam punk inspired dress that I’ll be wearing on Saturday, as for the rest of the time I’m unsure if what I’d like to do with our friends as a group will work out. One thing to consider is just what you are cos-playing, Don did a Murloc one day last year and was super hoarse after making the sound all day/night.  That was one thing we all talked about as for our costumes this year was what we needed to be comfortable because it is Atlanta at the end of summer.

 Lara, me in the back, and Don on the way to the Convention

Saturday night is the night we all gather together and people watch.  We have a blast as the cos-players come and go.  It’s the night we take the most pictures of us with cos-players or each other being silly. A lot of times we all want to do different panels, signings, etc during the day so it’s our chance to just set aside time to all compare notes on the con events or things we've bought or saw.

Friends!

yep, Don photo bombed us - LOL.

Unikitty is AWESOME!

 Last year we were all staying out at an airport hotel but this year we actually managed to get hotel rooms downtown so that’s going to be a huge bonus over taking MARTA back to the airport, then a shuttle to the hotel, and having to carry all our stuff around all day. That makes us actually more into dressing up this year since we can always go change if we want to.   Also this year our friend Kevin from California is flying up here then the following day we will all fly to Atlanta.  I think he’s going to have a great time.  He’s never gone and he finally said yes, he’d love to go this year. I imagine we’ll actually play games in the game area this year; we talked about it last year but never actually went, and the year before we just walked around watching others play games. Don might even go do the midnight drumming as well since we don’t have to worry about catching the last train of the night back to the hotel. 

I sincerely hope this is our year our child finds us and would be thrilled! if we got to attend Dragon Con as a family.