More cha - cha - changes

First of all, let me just say:

Now that I have that off of my chest, let me move on.

I finally uploaded some pictures of Audrey's baby naming ceremony from a couple of weekends ago.  We made a (not so quick) drive up to Mt Airy, MD for a Friday night stay.  If you aren't familiar with what a baby naming ceremony is, read this.

Audrey looked beautiful as ever, and Rena was sure to entertain us all, as always. :)

Here's a few pics:

We had to head home early the next day...I always hate having to leave because there's never enough time with the nieces. :/

What else has been going on with our life?

Well, Ryan finally started his new job and is making the 1 1/2 hr commute each way to Quantico.  We think his schedule is going to be working 6-2:30 which is good for avoiding traffic, but this also means he's having to leave the house at around 4:15/4:30 to make it it work on time. 4-4 is a looooong day.

Which leads me to my next point.

We had a Realtor come by our house last week and we're officially putting our house on the market. :/  It's so incredibly bittersweet because we've been in the house for exactly one year.  When we bought this house, I envisioned staying for the long haul and FINALLY being settled.   However, with me commuting about 45 minutes to work and Ryan with his long distance, it doesn't make sense for us to stay here.  I love our house and I don't want to leave.

When life throws you punches, you just gotta roll with them.  So, here we go again....this time with much more on the line with a move.   Although I don't have high hopes at all that we'll be able to sell our house quickly, I will be saying my prayers that this isn't a stressful & drawn out process.  Having a 120 pound dog that we're going to have to remove from the house every time a prospective buyer wants to take a look will become tiresome very, VERY quickly.

Where will we end up?  No clue.  Will we buy another house or rent until we know for sure where we want to live? No clue.  Will Zoe & Samson be excited to pack up?  Absolutely not.  Will this hopefully make our lives easier in the long run?  It better.

Also, I just realized the last 6 paragraphs all started with a W word.  Weird.

It's time for the Walking Dead (favorite show ever...something about survival mode really gets my heart pumping) so I will try my best to update more later.

Fall & New Beginnings

This past weekend, we planned on going camping with 2 of our couples friend's because I've been dying to go camping all summer.  We waited to book the place until the week of, and come to find out on Monday, all sites were completely booked.  We took a couple of more days to find something, but finally reserved some sites at a place in Luray, VA where we'd be able to day-drink the day away and try out Paige's campfire grilled cheese maker.  

Naturally, we check the weather on Thursday and see there's suddenly a 60% chance of rain.  Friday it moves to 80%.  Camping with tents in a thunderstorm is one of the most miserable things you can do (voluntarily), so we decide to forego the camping and just head to Kristin & Mikey's house in Reston, VA for the weekend.  We had a lot of fun even though we didn't sleep under the stars and build a campfire.

Yesterday I spent a lot of the day prepping for fall.  After all, it was the first official day of Autumn.  I gave the mailbox a makeover and took out the annual summer flowers and replaced them with mums.  Here's a peek:

We also decided a couple of weeks ago that we were going to go ahead and stain the back deck since it was looking a little old.   As you can see in the picture above, imagine that being the color of our back deck, with a lot more green ugly stuff all over it.

I forgot to take a before picture, but here's an after:

Ignore the huge yellow spots...that would be where Samson pees and is destroying our backyard.

I think the color looks good and the deck is way more inviting now than before!  In case you're wondering, we used Behr DeckOver.  It isn't a stain, but more like a tough paint made for painting decks.  I did help with the painting a bit, but can accredit most of this project to the hubs.

Speaking of the hubs, I'm pretty damn proud of him right now.  It's been a pretty low kept secret, but Ryan has been waiting on a government contract to start with a company in Quantico for a year now.  He FINALLY got the call with the go ahead for October.  If you didn't know, Ryan enjoyed the company he was working for in Richmond, but it wasn't in his line of work and was basically working everyday to get a paycheck.   I'm so excited he's going to start this great job opportunity and even more excited to have a hubby coming home from work feeling satisfied about the work he did that day. :)  Have you ever heard the saying "happy wife, happy life"?  Well, I can also attest to the saying "dissatisfied husband, unhappy wife". ;) 

Is it possible we BOTH have jobs we enjoy?????  I won't speak too soon...it hasn't happened yet!