Christmas Memories!

Merry Christmas Everyone! Virginia and I had our first Christmas by ourselves and had an enjoyable time trying out some new ideas for traditions and unwrapping our gifts. Virginia still gets excited and has a hard time sleeping on Christmas Eve. Our Grandpa Jay provided us with a wonderful Bread Maker that we look forward to trying out. We got some new Munchkin games and some great new clothes. Thanks so much for all we received! You are all wonderful. Virginia is off to California on Wed. to meet up with her family and visit with her Grandmother for her 90th birthday. I'm headed back to work...it never ends. Here are some fun pictures. We love you all!

A Thanksgiving Surprise

Virginia and I did a little surprise vacation this last week. The Friday before Thanksgiving I arrived at work and found that my schedule would unexpectedly grant me a four day weekend. So V and I quickly plotted to use that time to make surprise visit home to see the fam's. I managed to switch to an earlier shift on Wed. and we left from the Lowe's parking lot at 3pm. We drove through the night, only stopping for gas and a short one hour break at Deadman's Pass (see blanket pic). We didn't want to arrive too early...but the pass had snow and after about 45 min the car was so cold we had to start moving again.
We arrived around 6 at the Glasmann's and asked if we were early for breakfast. After some confusion from the old parents in bed (brain matter is foggy) the confirmed excitment to see us and a few hours later we enjoyed a hearty Glasmann breakfast of bacon, sausage, cheese eggs, and coffee cake. Delicious. We then made our way over to

V's place and managed so surprise her mother too. Isn't that a classic face? The morning was beautiful.
We got to see my sprouting nephews, Kay2 was sick but still amusing. Keegan is the cutest thing.

We did the Family dinner in Salem, then spent the next day with V's Mom and Mike and Ross, played some fun card games too. Munchkin will be the family favorite before long. Saturday we headed up to V's Dad's and enjoyed an amazing lunch in a little cafe. The food was great. We'll be back for that again! We enjoyed some card games in Astoria and then had a tasty warm dinner with the fam. Sara showed up an brought Cadence and Ethan...My how they have grown. Sunday we drove back to Utah so I could open the next morning and V could get back to teaching. 2200 miles and a lot of fun! We were so glad to get back...since we are missing Christmas this just really helped us take a break and not miss everyone so much! Thanks for the great time...feel free to visit us on short notice too:)

Inventory!

So this week my Lowe's store has been doing a storewide inventory. We got five days (Sunday though Thursday) to count and recount every item in the store and then resolve discrepancies. For a large part of the actual selling floor, we had an outside inventory service come in to count things. We just didn't want to count bulk hardware and repair plumbing pieces. We had 18 people on the inventory crew and we were all scheduled for 6am-3pm shifts for the five days. Needless to say that was optimistic. Sunday I started at 6 and finished around 6:30. Quickly went home to eat and then crashed. Monday was a repeat- 6 to 6. Eat and crash. Tuesday was more 6 to 6:30, picked up Virginia and voted, ate, and crashed. But I got Wed off because we were supposed to avoid overtime and I already had 33.5 hours in three days. Enter thursday. We had to finish today- no questions about overtime. I started at 6am again...and left the store at 9:45 pm. having only had one lunch break and one 15min break. I was tired. And my legs and back were stiff as a board this morning. But I got almot 8 hours of overtime!!! yea. Virginia is just glad that I will be home and we can eat normal meals again. Anyway...there was my fun update of the week. I'll relax today and return to 4 closing shifts starting saturday.

Pumpkin Surgery

Jayme started working on our blog tonight but then lost everything right before he had to go home teaching. I figured that it was about time that my side of our story got told. In the past I have really enjoyed carving pumpkins, cut a hole in the top, get most of the guts out, chop out a few shapes that oddly resembles a face and put a candle in it. That is all I thought there was to it...until I got married. My first "real" pumpkin carving experience almost left me in tears. I tried to find the joy in making dots all over my pumpkin and then trying desperately to cut on those dots to make some sort of "cool" picture. Well, in my inexperience I had to redo my entire project because I cut too much of a angle and there were only slits on the inside of my pumpkin. The next year I got so frustrated (and so many blisters) that Jayme finished my pumpkin for me. This year I decided to go back to the old way of doing things but then gave into the peer pressure and tried a "real" design once more. I don't know if it was because it was an easier design, or if the pumpkin was thinner, or because I was more experienced, but I actually managed to finish a pumpkin all by myself. Jayme had a bit harder of a time. His pumpkin was really thick and his wizard design, while much cooler than mine, was also much more difficult. In the end we both finished and I have survived another pumpkin carving experience.

Weekend Snow

Well, the illness is finally going away, with just a nagging cough left for the time being. Where is that cough syrup of mom's when you need it? We had a little storm blow in friday night and saturday. Saturday was cold and wet and as you can see, left a little lingering precipitation. It's officially Winter/October in Utah. Have a great Sunday everybody.

Virus Update...

So the doctor says I have a virus with flu like symptoms. This was determined after two visits in three days with a fever never long staying below 100. It was also determined after a second strep test (gag) a blood drawing mono test (poke) and a flu test. The last test involve a narrow piece of plastic with a small sponge on the end being inserted 5 or so inches up you nose. This was not a pleasant experience. I recommend everyone trying it at least once. All except for Dad, he can already relate in more detail than I hope to ever have. So I will remain at home and drink fluids and hope to eat someday. Yea!

Demanding Family

It doesn't matter if your sick or overworked, when the family wants something they can get darn pushy about it. We are not picture happy people, all we do is work, but whine whine, the family wants us to post a blog so they can know what we are doing. Here's the rundown, Virginia teaches class and goes to class. I go to work. At various intervals, we get sick. Sound interesting? Hope you're happy. We don't even have a picture of us in the computer. So we'll give you Virginia's school picture. Which grade do you think it's from?