Bad Blogger Award

Image found here.

Ok, so no tricks are up my sleeve, but things have been so busy around here!  Moving internationally has been no joke.  Here's a quick update on what's been going on, and hopefully after our stuff has been shipped and we are chillin' in a hotel, I can resume regular blog posts.

- We sold our house!  We passed inspection, and are just waiting on the final walk through and closing, which we will do in two weeks.  The movers are scheduled to come next week, so we will be homeless after that.  It will take about three months to get our stuff, so can I get a big "boo" for temporary government furniture?

- We sold both of our cars!  I hand over the keys to mine this weekend, and I am very sad about it.  I love my car, and she has been fabulous to me.  Hardly any issues outside of scheduled maintenance.  I will miss her and our adventures.  I've had her longer than I've known Joel!

Joel's parents actually want to but his car.  We gave them a sweet deal, so they will come by a few days before we fly out to see us, and then they will drop us off at the airport and make their way back to Oregon.  Crazy, but I am so thankful to them.

- We have orders!  And plane tickets!  Without saying exactly when, we have less than one month before we fly to Japan.  So much to be happening in so little time.

- I put in my resignation at work, and have a job interview for a teaching position on base in Japan this week.  I hope it goes well.  With the 14 hour time difference, it might be at 3am, which is when I got the call informing me they wanted to interview me.

- Pugsley is 100% vaccinated, chipped, rabies free, and ready to fly when he's allowed in November.  I'm not sure if I mentioned this, but pugs are forbidden to fly until after 30 September.  I am going to miss my stinkers, but I found a lovely foster to take care of them in the meantime.  Gomez should be good, but the base vet "lost" his medical file, and his information is loaded on his US chip, vice his international one.  We are in the process of figuring out how to change it.  I may lose it at the vet's office in the meantime.  Our vet is fantastic, but Joel just had to get this done on base instead.  Lesson learned.

Jaeger is supposed to be allowed to fly with us, so we have to call and make reservations for him to fly on the plane.  This whole process with the pets is so ridiculous, and has been the worst part of this PCS.  I am about to lose it over all the conflicting and, oftentimes, wrong information that we have received.  Why can't they fly on the plane in a seat?  Hell, buying them a seat is cheaper then shipping them later.  And they'd be much better behaved than some of the hellions I've flown with.

Weekend Update

Happy Monday!  Well, maybe it's a happy Monday.  I haven't decided yet.  Gomez, who has been fully crate trained since he was 5 months old (so for almost three years), has decided that sleeping in the crate isn't what he wants to do anymore.  So, for the past three weeks, he has decided it would be fun to bark from about midnight until we let him out of his crate.  We tried the "cry it out" method (didn't work) and the "we'll let him sleep in bed just tonight" method (also failed).  I don't know what to do.  He doesn't have to go to the bathroom, he didn't miss dinner, and the vet said there's nothing physically wrong with him.  But there will be, if I don't get some sleep soon...  Any advice?

Anyway, moving on.  Friday night, Joel and I went to go see Sheryl Crow and Rascal Flatts in concert.  It was at an outdoor theater, and since a cold spell decided to hit the Midwest, we had quite the chilly night.  It was a great show, although s little short for RF.  Their last concert was at least an hour longer.

Gloves, scarf, and jacket...check!  And also a blanket.

Sheryl Crow.  Crappy phone pic, but we had great seats!

Rewind tour!

Saturday we went to the Belleville Art Show which, believe it or not, is actually rated #2 in the country.  It was still kind of cool out, but it was a really beautiful, sunny day.  We had such a blast.  I'm not really one for art museums, but I love me some art fairs.

Sunday, we had a house showing, which means taking the dogs to the dog park for an hour.  The people that toured the house really liked it, but they found a newer home that they wanted, more.  The realtor did say if the other house fell through they were interested, so fingers crossed that something works out.  It makes me sad that we've had so many showings, and no real interest yet.  I love our house, and we put a lot of sweat equity into it.

Anyways, the boys had a blast at the park.  I think our foster appreciates it the most.  He's such an easygoing boy.

Pets are people, too!

I couldn't resist linking up for this, and I will leave you with one picture that indeed proves that pets are people, too: a sneak peek at our dogs' 2014Halloween costumes.

Christmas Recap

Gosh, this has to be one of the best Christmases on record.  We were sans family this year, who we miss, but it made everything so relaxing because everything was on our schedule (and we barely had one) and full of cookies, naps, and pug cuddles.  It was fantastic!

We started off Christmas with a bang!  We went and saw the Trans Siberia Orchestra on Monday night, and it was quite the show!  I had never been before, and didn't really know what to expect, but I figured this was our last chance to go for some time, so we took a chance.  There's a small story involved, which was kind of weak and didn't make a whole lot of sense with the music.  There was a lot of ling hair Rock N Roll and some incredible singing, and a whole lot of crazy lights.  All in all it was a good night, but it was also a long night.  They went on for three hours!!

Christmas Eve is when our family had most of our Christmas celebrations, since we have German heritage,  We opened our gifts and I cooked a massive Thanksgiving dinner for two (we still have leftovers)!  I didn't take pictures of our gifts, but I got a gorgeous set of earrings, a case for my autographed Dan Marino helmet, and a lot of other little stuff.  It was perfect!  We couldn't stay awake for midnight Mass, so we went on Christmas Day.  That was followed by Joel's family tradition of eating bagels with various cream cheeses, meats, and regular cheeses.

It was a great and relaxing holiday.  We had Thursday off, too, but are back to work today.  Then we get another two whole days off!  I must say that this Christmas may have been one of the most relaxing ones, yet.  We even had the boys in their holiday sweaters until they tuckered out.

You know you want it....a way too late Halloween post.

I'm going to make this quick, but I couldn't not share.  I'm sick as all get out (cough, sore throat, the whole shebang), I just took a four hour exam, and I have a ton of school work to do in the next three weeks before that fateful day comes when I finally get to say "au revoir" to grad school.  Thanks for sticking with me, by the way.  I'll be back to normal blogging shortly.

Anyways, for Halloween, a good friend had a banging karaoke party like she's had in the past, and Joel and I knew we couldn't resist.  She had a costume party, and I love making homemade costumes.  Want to know what we went as?  Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke.  Probably not how you expected, though...

Joel, as Miley

Me, as Robin

The Duo in action

Even the pugs got in on some costume action!

Weekend Update

So, it's becoming more and more common for me to do these updates on Tuesday versus Monday.  I tell myself I'm going to knock it out before work on Monday, but I never do.  Blogger problems...am I right?

Anyways, this weekend was a good , albeit a quick one.  I started out the weekend seeing a throwback favorite in concert...Richard Marx!  The man is still insanely talented, and pretty hilarious to boot, so it was a great experience.  It was at a local casino in St. Louis, the River City Casino, and Joel and I had never been before.  We went to the buffet for dinner (shocker...he and his family are all about the buffets), played about $5 in the penny slots, and went to see the show.  Afterwards, I even got a head shot with his autograph.  It was a fabulous night!!

The casino.

Apparently I eat like a child at buffets.

Joel's loot.

The best part of buffets...the dessert!

Us waiting for the show to start.

The man himself.

Fun graphics.

My heart be still...he rocked it!

The rest of the weekend was fairly uneventful.  The closet in our spare bedroom that holds our random stuff (coats, miscellaneous military uniform items, dresses, etc.) came crashing down due to the previous owners of our house not caring when they installed it.  It was drilled straight into the drywall.  So, we decided to re-do my closet (the smallest walk-in in the world) and then put my old closet stuff into the spare room.  Joel did a great job, and it was nice to re-vamp my closet.  It desperately needed a makeover.

The before.

The solution,

Joel's handiwork.

All done!

A tie rack for my tank tops...brilliant idea.

Then we spent the remainder of the evening doing a puzzle (what are we...80?) and catching up on the DVR.  Obviously, Pugsley was bored with this.

I am super excited for this week to come to a close already.  We have a musical and a concert this weekend, and then we jet off to Portland, OR to visit with Joel's family.  This is only my second time going, so if anyone has any must-sees that they could recommend, that'd be great!