The Striegels-es

OH, hey, it's you again...

2011-08-23T14:01:00.004-05:00

Yes, it's me again.

Wonderful trip to San Francisco. Great to get Austin's mind off work for a few days and get a little wine in as well. ;)

Such a great wedding ceremony, about 50 people in attendance, very closeknit and lovely. Plus the giant balloons were awesome, as well as the mustache flags and exclamation flags, great touches! :)

Now I just wish we could all get together more often!

Amazing places around San Francisco:

Cha Cha Cha (tapas restaurant)

Trattoria Contadina (amazing quaint Italian restaurant, place of reception)

Trattoria Pinocchio (another amazing Italian restaurant)

Fang (fancy Chinese restaurant)

Cline Cellars (amazing winery in Sonoma, thank you Al for the recommendation!)

Fang was quite the place! We waited for our table, were seated and sat there for a while. A man came over and asked if we were ready and when we told him we haven't received menus yet, he brashly told a waitress in Chinese to get us some (he's obviously the owner). After a while, he came back over and asked if there were any food allergies (kristen can't have much gluten), then told us "I'm chef, You can trust me", grabbed our menus and walked away. Threw us off, but after a while once the food started coming, it was quite delicious! Just another one for the storybooks! :)

2010-12-30T13:18:00.002-06:00

Well, so much for the road trip post! Sorry about that! At any rate we had a great time and Niagara Falls is a very cool place to visit, although Niagara-on-the-Lake was even better for a more relaxing time.

It's amazing that 2011 is almost upon us! So far this winter we've had the 5th largest snowstorm in Minnesota history which came with the state's highest wind speeds for the day down here in Rochester at 44mph that night. Now it's finally 40 degrees outside which is helping to get rid of all that snow so we have a place to put it when more comes, ha!

Christmas down in Iowa was alright, it would have been much better had I not been the sick one this year, but a big thank you to all of Austin's family who put up with me coughing and blowing my nose constantly. I really hope I didn't get any of the kids sick! I'm still trying to kick it to the curb, so hopefully that will happen in the next day or two. I think Austin's getting tired of me coughing all night.. He eventually went downstairs last night, but I was still awake from about 3:30 - 5 just coughing and not sleeping. I have to admit I have one amazing husband for putting up with me and taking care of me through this! Especially since I've probably gotten him sick already from it.

ROAD TRIP!

2010-09-04T21:41:00.003-05:00

Day 1 of our road trip had Austin and I leaving Rochester at about 9:30 or so a.m. and finally getting into our hotel room around 4:30ish I believe. We spent about 2 hours in traffic just getting to the loop in Chicago. So last night was basically getting into our hotel room, finding dinner which was at the Italian Village just down the street which had AMAZING tiramisu!!!, and then walking off that tiramisu along Michigan Ave.
Day 2 brought us to the Willis (forever in all our hearts as Sears, I'm sure) Tower and up to the Skydeck where I was incredibly freaked out on the Sky Ledge. What is this sky ledge, you may ask? Well, it's four platforms that some insane sadistic engineering team dreamed up that project out from the tower. Read some facts about it here --> http://www.theskydeck.com/the-tower/facts-about-the-ledge
I actually did go out onto the ledge with a bit of "coaxing" from Austin and he then made me look down....yeah, not a great idea for someone with a fear of heights. We actually did go over to the one that was reserved just for tourist pictures and had our photo taken. This time I did not allow myself to look down! (We ended up buying said photo, so I can scan that when I get home to share). The rest of our day was spent exploring the Lincoln Square area north of downtown Chicago where I also was able to visit one of my favorite etsy stores at their fairly new brick and mortar store (etsy store & actual website) and also visited lots of other great boutique stores. Completed the day with quite a bit of walking around the water tower plaza area and then down Michigan Avenue and dinner at Giardanos!
Day 3 - LOTS of driving to come! We will be driving from Chicago to Niagara Falls! Stay tuned....

He's alive! and here's proof

2010-07-19T07:55:00.004-05:00

Austin made it to Japan and I've been able to talk to him on Skype the past two days.
Here are a few pictures he has sent me.

Mt. Fuji

Railway station near Enoshima Island

panorama of the bay from Enoshima

Austin is in Fujisawa, but he and one of his coworkers from Rochester took a little time yesterday to take a train and then walk to this island/peninsula (?) Enoshima to look around. His coworker lived over in Japan for a while, so he's able to show Austin some of the sights around the area and help him out while he's there.
I got him a new camera for his birthday, and he's able to take panorama photos with it which seems to be a pretty nice feature, hence the last photo :)

Busy times!

2010-07-15T15:33:00.002-05:00

Quite the busy week and week coming up here!
Monday was my birthday, Tuesday mom's hip went out, Thursday (today) she's having/had surgery, lots of packing up for Austin, Saturday he leaves for Japan for 2 weeks, Monday I am picking up Pat and Katie at the airport and then beyond there we'll see what else there is to do!

Our garden has absolutely exploded, the wind knocked over our tomatos last night and I am using string to hold the tomato cages upright since they don't seem to want to do that anymore. The broccoli is overshadowing the peppers. The peas are climbing, but that's all I really see on them, no buds or peas or anything. The beans all have buds and will soon be giving me delicious green beans and the carrots are definitely coming along too! Oh, and the lettuce I'm sure is ready to pick, I just haven't yet...How do you know when lettuce is done? Size of the leaves?

Updates

2010-05-04T12:36:00.002-05:00

Spring is in bloom and new plantings are in the ground! Soon we will be getting some dirt to put in our new garden bed as well.

The plantings from this past weekend:

2 Gaillardia

1 poppy (and a new poppy from mom that will go in today, thanks mom!!!)

2 dahlias

2 african daisies

4 plants for the front planter (1 decorative grass, 3 others I can't remember at the moment)

3 plants for the other front planter

Hopefully we'll soon get our garden planted, but like I said we need to get some dirt first.

Another surprise is that all the lilies we though we had pulled out to put the maple tree in last year, some seem to be coming through! Quite a surprise since we pulled up so many bulbs and thought we pulled them all out. I guess there are worse things to grow back!

We're back!

2010-03-21T20:25:00.003-05:00

After a bit of an unintentional blogging hiatus, we're baaack! (well, I (Alli) am since all Austin does on this blog is read it occasionally and tell me I really need to update it).
Anyway, so what's been going on with us...Well, at the end of february Austin's van made the decision for us and told us to get a new car. So, sadly, we said goodbye to the van and now have a brand new Ford Edge which we are loving.
I quit my previous part time job and am now working at the winery part time which has made me much happier, Austin is happy to definitely see an improvement in my attitude lately.
After a few weeks of calling Charter I'm hoping to finally be able to get the new website design up on another domain for testing before we put it up on the official domain name. I keep getting told different things each time I call, but I have a feeling this is the week! (lets hope that feeling is correct!)

And finally, our lovely adventure today, the ceiling fan adventure.
Austin and I had been planning on replacing the ceiling fan in the upper living room for quite some time and we finally did it. We got one that will match all the other lights in the house and has a larger diameter for better air movement as well! So, Austin and I (mainly Austin) put the ceiling fan up yesterday as instructed according to the directions and using the hardware provided. Everything was fine and dandy and good to go.
Fast forward to this morning. We were both in different areas of the house and the cats were farting around and we heard this big crash. I was praying that the cats had knocked something over and ran out of my office and unfortunately the cats had done nothing, which meant that the ceiling fan had indeed fallen. Thank goodness we didn't put a light kit on otherwise there probably would have been shattered glass all over. What we surmise is that the 3" screws provided were only actually in the stud in the ceiling about a half inch, so since there were only two of them, the weight of the fan pulled the screws out.
After much consideration we decided that we still wanted the same type of fan, so we returned the broken one to Lowes and got a new one, bought 4" screws and used them instead of the ones provided and now it seems much more secure!
So here's hoping the new fan actually stays on the ceiling!!

Valentine's Day

2010-02-16T13:28:00.003-06:00

Austin and I shared a great Valentine's meal together! We collaborated on some mashed potatoes and Austin cooked some wonderful steaks as well as shared a great bottle of Shiraz.

Pictured below is the top of an infused salt that I got from Zzest for Austin to try. Why does it say warning? Well....it is salt infused with ghost peppers, ha! He put some on his steak and at one point a bit too much and said it packs quite a punch. I on the other hand am most likely not going to every try this, hehe

For dessert I made a few molten chocolate cakes. They are amazingly easy to make and were quite delicious as well.

In addition to the salt, I had also gotten Austin a new winter coat. He is in the process of making me a few picture frames out of walnut that we worked on together on Sunday. I will post those as soon as they are complete!

Little known fact

2010-02-01T15:27:00.002-06:00

I have my dad's chin! :)

Too cold in our house?

2010-02-01T14:04:00.002-06:00

Not sure, but this seems to be Linus' new favorite spot. Maybe we keep it too cold, hehe. :)

2010-01-26T09:27:00.002-06:00

We just had an appraiser come to our house and it went pretty well! He said we've taken 10 years off the age of the house with the changes we've done, so yay! Hopefully we'll get the amount we need to refinance!!

2010-01-25T16:36:00.002-06:00

Sorry it's been a while, but it's quite hard to write about stuff when there's nothing to write about! I have the backing and binding fabric for Donnie's quilt and now just need to figure out how I want to quilt it...it's hard to start when you're afraid of ruining it! :)

Donald Robert Falconer

2009-12-15T17:56:00.004-06:00

At 4:57 this morning after 4 hours of labor, our new nephew was born!! His name is Donald Robert Falconer or "Donnie". He is named after Alex and my grandfather Donald and Erica's dad Robert.

October snow and fall colors

2009-12-04T15:26:00.005-06:00

These photos were taken back in october and then maybe a week or so after the snowfall, it's definitely been an interesting fall, no?

Our Rock sporting a frosty grass toupee

The sun shining through our neighbor's trees, definitely enhances the fall color!

yay for privacy!

2009-12-04T15:18:00.004-06:00

I received the blinds for our front bay window today!! I'm so excited because now we can have a little more privacy in our kitchen! Plus the floors have already been bleached out a bit by the sun near the windows, so hopefully this will help stop it a bit.

I had wanted roman shades, but had a hard time finding any that weren't way expensive (plus I wanted top down bottom up, which adds some cost). Finally I went to BlindsChalet and found that they had some woven bamboo shades, so I looked at it and they were fairly affordable, in comparison to fabric ones anyway. so I ordered some and I'm so happy! I have to put another one up over the kitchen sink, but first I have to figure out how to take the old one down.....

Before (don't mind the messy counters please) ;)

After!

Close Up

We chose the black ones to go with the counters and the stools we have in the kitchen. Very pleased with the result!

Photo Updates

2009-11-30T22:26:00.002-06:00

Here are the pictures I owe:

The frame Austin made for the print I gave him for our anniversary. It's print of a painting we saw at the Honolulu Art Academy "Torchlight Fishermen".

He made it out of some inexpensive cherry wood we got at the Winona ReStore. That's turning out to be a great place!! :)

A photo of the finished $5 headboard from the ReStore. I'd put up a before, but I can't find the cord for my camera and accidentally took it when there was no card in the camera.

A few photos we took of each other at the last home Iowa State game. Thankfully they won!

Thanksgiving and a funny kitty

2009-11-26T22:00:00.003-06:00

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving today at mom and dad's house getting to see the grandparents and Laura and Emma, Judy and Charlie, and all the Pladsons!
A wonderful meal was had and getting to see Elsie and Emma together was quite cute, they're both getting so big!!

When we got home from the feast and relaxed a bit we got to see this...
How we love this kitty, he always manages to make us smile. We have your "dino-kitty" pose in which he folds his front arms under and then extends his neck out fully and then there is this pose, currently unnamed in which he has his head buried face down into the chair. :) Oh how he entertains us so!

soon...

2009-11-19T09:40:00.001-06:00

Upcoming pictures (this will make sure I actually put them up!)

• The frame Austin MADE for a print I got him for our anniversary

• Our $5 headboard from the Winona ReStore that now resides in the guest room

• A couple pictures from the Iowa State game.

Be back soon!

Lovin it!

2009-11-17T15:15:00.002-06:00

Just gotta say I'm loving the weather lately! It's nice to have a bit of fall before the snow. :)

Terry Kirk

2009-11-10T16:42:00.002-06:00

I got news today from one of my friends from college that one of our professors from Rome passed away last month after apparently committing suicide. He was so enthusiastic about the history of Rome and about art history that it's very surprising something like this happened. It just goes to prove that there are two sides to people; what they express outwardly to others and what's going on internally. It's hard to think that a man that enthusiastic about his surroundings was in such turmoil. When I think of my time in Rome, his face and voice and mannerisms are always at the forefront because of what a character he was! You can see his picture on the post and see why his face itself was so memorable! :) I'll never forget his thin mustache and dancing on the Spanish Steps and how he walked with so much presence in St. Peter's in a cape so it was just billowing behind him. I really didn.t know him personally, but he was quite the professor!

Here's a video someone posted on youtube of him. This would have been shortly before he talked about the shifting axes of the Spanish Steps and how if you follow them it forces a movement and shifting as you walk up them, thus leading into his dancing up and down the steps.

Happy Halloween!

2009-10-31T22:52:00.002-05:00

We had about 75 trick or treaters this year, down 20 or so from last year. Colder weather may have had something to do with it, but who knows. The most interesting were 4 boys maybe in 8th grade or so, who rang the doorbell and as soon as I opened it started singing "We wish you a merry christmas". Kind of those "Okay....." moments, hehe.
It's also quite hilarious, especially so on Halloween, to have a cat that is scared of the doorbell. Ever time the doorbell rang, Linus would run up the stairs and hide in our room. After 5 minutes or so he'd creep back down until the next group came up and rang the doorbell and off he'd go again. It made quite a few kids smile since they could see him streaking up the stairs.
Another favorite tonight was a little girl maybe 2-3 years old who was dressed as a monkey. Her siblings had already gotten their treats and she came up, he mom told her "what do you say?" and she looked up at me all proud and said "I'm a Monkey!" Very cute and also reminded me of Elsie. :)
I hope everyone else had a wonderful Halloween!

Darth the Conductor!

2009-10-30T18:25:00.000-05:00

Alex and Eric,
You both will appreciate this one I'm sure :)

a little bit of work!

2009-10-25T23:26:00.001-05:00

I recently came across a small freelance project and have something architecture-like to work on! It's been a challenge actually getting used to AutoCAD again, but mostly because it's not all set up like it was at my old job, now I actually have to set everything up myself which is a bit of a time waster. Ah well, it's something!

Chicago Picture Overload!

2009-10-17T10:36:00.005-05:00

Our Hotel, the Sofitel

Sunset from our room the first night

Obligatory Bean photo with Andrew awkwardly staring at us on the right....

Millenium Park Pritzker Pavilion

One of the new buildings near Lakeshore Drive designed by Xi Yang, I'm actually really loving this one!

The new modern wing at the Art Institute

Newest addition to the Austin Contemplation Series

Nemo's dad and Dori together again!

Sarah and I enamored with the penguins

Out at dinner the night before the race with Phil and Andrew at Cafe Bionda, definitely a great italian restaurant!!

After waiting for 20-30 minutes, we finally spotted Phil and Andrew at mile 11! Phil would have been just to the left, he was a bit to quick to catch on camera!

Phil and Andrew stayed together pretty much the whole race and crossed the finish line at the exact same time! 3:42:17

Taking a moment from their pain to eek out a smile for the camera.

We weren't able to get up to it this time around, but if you look on the left side of the building near the top you can see three of the four glass cubes projected out from the building.

To see all the pictures from our trip here's the link to the facebook album for them:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2336098&id=16904437&l=2891d47525

Backpack project

2009-10-16T23:06:00.005-05:00

Before I get to the Chicago pictures, I thought I'd toss these in since Elsie has now received her backpack. I saw a tutorial online for a simple toddler backpack and made a few modifications of my own. As you can see below, Lucy tried on the backpack because she was jealous of watching all the school kids walking by the window, so this way she felt a little more included. On the right side of the picture you can see that Linus was then getting jealous of Lucy, so then he got to try it on as well. :)

I feel I should include the original pattern on here so it gets some credit :)

http://indietutes.blogspot.com/2009/10/toddler-backpack-pattern.html

Chicago

2009-10-12T22:26:00.002-05:00

We're back! We had a great weekend trip and really could have stayed a few days longer, but Austin must keep working! :) We got in Friday finally after sitting in traffic for a few hours, checked into our hotel, and went to meet friends at Giordano's for a little chicago style pizza and then went to have a few drinks and talk for a bit with them for a while.

The next day Austin and I met up with Phil and Andrew for breakfast at the West Egg Cafe so they could do a bit more carb-loading for the big race :) I had some great "Strawnana" pancakes and fresh squeezed orange juice. It was a bit of a wait, but definitely delicious! From there we headed down to Millenium Park and the Art Institute since I really wanted to see the new wing which I think was a great decision to add on for a modern wing, very airy and lots of natural light.

A little later we met up with Phil and Andrew again and our friends Tom and Sarah at the Shedd Aquarium to go visit some of the underwater creature type, crazy ugly creatures. We had a great time seeing all the different sorts of fish, sharks, of course penguins!, and the dolphins. There also were some very creepy looking things, not a fan of the moray eels and of the african turtle, it looked like that thing hadn't evolved since prehistoric times.

Phil made us reservations at Cafe Bionda, and Italian restaurant where they could load up on some pasta and it was delicious!! Probably some of the best alfredo I've had for quite some time.

Race day! Austin and I were able to make it over to the 11 mile marker to try and see Phil and Andrew. We got there as the 3:30 pace crew was going by, so we thought we'd still get to see them and after a half hour or so of careful watching, we finally spotted them after the 3:50 pace crew went by. We thankfully were on the same side of the course that they were running closest to so they were able to hear and see us cheering for them. After we headed down to the finish line after checking out of our hotel and were actually able to see them heading into the finish line! I know that Phil ended with a time of 3:42:17 and Andrew would have been at about the same time since they ran together. We were able to fit in lunch with them after catching a cab, thankfully close by since they could barely walk, and had some lunch at the Cheesecake Factory at the base of the Hancock building before heading out.

It was a busy trip, but great to see everyone and we're proud Andrew and Phil were able to finish the race as they wanted to and with very respectable times!

Pictures are to come soon....

Brrr

2009-10-04T23:02:00.003-05:00

It's that time of year again! I kicked on our heat today, it was 61 when I got home today and a little too chilly for me so I turned on the heat. Granted we're not turning it above 65 yet. So, as I type, I'm sitting here fully clothed with slippers and my bathrobe on. Even so my "Alli thermometer" is still dark purple (my birthmark on my right hand for those of you not familiar). :D

Only 5 day until Chicago! Yay for mini trips! :)

Milestone & Projects

2009-09-12T18:28:00.005-05:00

The Camry hit 200,000 this past week! Yes, you can see the check engine light is on, but it's been checked and it's not a huge problem, just a very costly one if we choose to fix it, thus we probably won't. :P

Austin and I are going to a baby shower tomorrow and I sewed up a few baby bibs today for the new little guy who is due in november I believe. The one on the right is the first one I made and I decided to add a little flare with the one on the left by adding a little tie to it. Look below for a fun (or maybe mean) photo of Linus. ;)

We tried with Lucy as well, but she wasn't as willing. Linus wasn't either, but it was still fun to try, hehe.

hmph

2009-09-10T16:02:00.001-05:00

The ball on my Mighty Mouse no longer lets me scroll down. I got it to work almost like new last week, but that apparently isn't going to work again. Pretty frustrating since I'm so used to using it!

Anniversary Weekend!

2009-09-07T15:50:00.003-05:00

Yesterday marked our 1st anniversary! We made it one year and I think we'll stick it out and do a few more. :)

We were travelling quite a bit, but we still managed to have a great day. We had gone down to Cedar Rapids, IA for Austin's cousin's wedding on Saturday, so yesterday morning was the brunch and then we headed back to Rochester, but decided to drive over to Ames first and walk around the ISU campus and have dinner at Hickory Park (gotta love it!). It's amazing what changes in a few years! Both the College of Design and Coover, our respective "homes" for our college years have been added onto and there are also at least 2 other new buildings that are in the works in that area as well. We both were a bit jealous at the upgrade of amenities that the students in our majors now have. Austin's especially was a big change since the labs where he said he would have spent the majority of his time in now have views to the outdoors! The old labs were basically in the core of a building.

When we got back home I had to put my leftovers from Hickory Park in the fridge and lo and behold Austin had finally managed to successfully surprise me! I have a short track record of ruining his surprises, so he was happy he finally got me and I was happy I finally didn't ruin it! Anywho, Austin (with the help of mom) got me a cake from Hanisch Bakery that looked just like the top of our wedding cake, although it of course said "Happy Anniversary" on top :) It was definitely a wonderful surprise and we got to have a few bites before we went to bed, but there's still plenty more that we can spread out into the week :) This is one sweet that will be staying at our house and not shared with Austin's coworkers as is the usual tradition when we have a larger amount of baked goods in the house ;)

Anyway, I was definitely surprised and he was soooo happy to finally have gotten me!

So, Happy Anniversary Honey, I LOVE YOU!!!!

Projects

2009-08-31T22:50:00.003-05:00

Well, we have had many projects going on to keep me busy in my spare time, but the one we just completed is refinishing a dresser that we bought in Oronoco for $30!

Before

After!

We completely stripped it, sanded it, put on a few coats of new stain and a bit of polyurethane, plus some new drawer pulls and there you have it! When we thought of buying an old dresser and refinishing it, I had thought we might paint it, but as soon as we started stripping this dresser wer really noticed that the wood was actually quite pretty! As you can see above the drawers have some great grain in them.

Coming soon... Our freshly painted stained glass windows!

Let's Hear It For the 29 Year Old!!

2009-08-30T11:50:00.004-05:00

Happy Birthday Big Brother!!! May your day be full of Renaissance fun and blueberries :)

Happy Birthday Mom!

2009-08-26T10:17:00.004-05:00

Happy Birthday to my wonderful mother!! I love you!

5 minute fan meets the Striegels

2009-08-22T20:24:00.003-05:00

So... today was full of ceiling fan issues. Austin and I got a ceiling fan for mom and dad to replace the globe that has been in their kitchen for, oh, maybe since the house was built? Not sure, anyway, I thought it would be fairly simple to put it up, especially since it's called "The 5 Minute Fan." Well, maybe in new homes that would be true, however, when we got to the step that says to drill through the holes in the outlet box into the support stud above....hmm, funny thing, no support stud! So, after two trips to the attic (boy do I have an AMAZING husband!!!!!) he located a stud two inches off the outlet box that we could hang the fan from. Then comes the third trip to Menards to pick up a ceiling medallion to cover the exposed outlet box, Austin connecting the wiring and hooray! mom and dad now have a ceiling fan!!

So, note to others...5 minute ceiling fan applies only to newer construction, otherwise you get a 5 HOUR ceiling fan.

At least mom and dad are pleased :) HAPPY 35TH ANNIVERSARY!!!! Love you guys!!!

Happy Early Anniversary!

2009-08-15T15:54:00.003-05:00

After getting a little more rest from our cat adventure, Austin and I got up and headed out to the Oronoco Gold Rush Days. If you are an antiquer or flea market type person, this is the place for you! So many booths and such that it was hard for me to remember where places we had just visited actually were. Austin and I were on a hunt for a dresser to put in our guest room, unfortunately furniture was not inexpensive, however, we did manage to score a nice dresser just as we were getting to the last few booths ( I think they were the last ones anyway, way too many to know for sure!). Plus we got it for only $30!! It needs a little work, but it will look tip top in no time!

What you can see on top of the dresser is part of our other purchase! I loved these two that were being sold as a pair since they remind me of Mackintosh and his roses. They were an amazing price too ($150 for the pair)!! You can see all their various windows on their website, well, actually a portion of them all! www.paynesstainedglass.com . Austin bought them for me as an early anniversary present. My plan for them is to repaint the frames and hang them over the bed in our guest room.

Early Morning Wakeup!

2009-08-15T15:45:00.004-05:00

Well, today has been a very interesting day! It started off not so great with a nice early morning wakeup from the kitties. It's hard really to describe the sound, but think of two cats that maybe start hissing and then go completely crazy at each other yowling and just plain nuts. Austin and I got up quickly and yelled at them which scared them downstairs, but Austin was afraid that maybe someone had tried to break into the house or something, so he turned on the outside light at our front door and lo and behold a cat was at the window staring up at him. My guess is that one of them saw the cat (most likely Linus) and started hissing at it, then Lucy came up behind him, and knowing how skittish and jumpy Linus can be, scared the crap out of him, but then they both went crazy at the cat outside. So we got them calmed down and went back to bed, but Austin was concerned that maybe there was a knife on the counter and didn't want them to get hurt if they went crazy again (they've knocked sharp knives off the counter before, so his thoughts are justified). Well, there was no knife, but he said it looked like there was water all over the floor. This was soon to be discovered that the cats had actually just sprayed everywhere. It looked like they had been running from window to window with the pattern of it all! So we got to clean that all up and finally got back to bed again.

oops

2009-07-14T22:18:00.002-05:00

One more I forgot to mention,

According to her paperwork, our little Lucy will be turning 1 on July 18! Do they make cakes for cats....? Oh well, maybe she'll get a new toy :)

July Birthdays

2009-07-03T08:23:00.003-05:00

Once again, the slew of July Birthdays are here!

July 1 - Happy Birthday to Grandma!

July 2 - Happy Birthday to Terry Striegel!

July 3 - Happy Birthday to my main man, Austin Striegel!! The big 2-5!!

July 7 - Happy Birthday to Aaron Striegel!

July 9 - Happy Birthday to Grandpa!

July 12 - Happy Birthday to ME!! :)

Pictures are here!

2009-05-13T16:30:00.004-05:00

above is a picture I took when we were first looking at the house, you can see the conglomeration of various plants which became taken over by weeds since we didn't take exactly great care of it all last year. This was helped along by the fact that the bark mulch was put directly on the dirt. Thank you to dad who has instilled the importance of landscaping fabric to me! :)

Triumphant Austin after the defeat of the steel post that can be seen in the first picture. All it took was a couple hours with an angle grinder.... Thanks to Al for Austin's new nickname of "Sparky". Very fitting after this experience. Austin can also attest to the pain that comes from a spark going into your ear. Shortly after this picture, our next door neighbor came out and said "Thank you, thank you, thank you! I've been looking at that post for 19 years and I'm so happy it's gone!" We are too Mary Lou!

Progress! Got the new mulch on over all the landscape fabric and some additional geraniums. We are now down to only a few original plants remaining: the decorative grasses, the sedum, a couple lily plants and a couple rose bushes. I think also some black eyed susans.

Now with a Crimson Red Maple tree and a half ton blue basalt boulder, plus some additional mulch we are pretty much complete on this section! We may need some additional plants around the bottom of the tree to spruce it up a bit, but I'm not sure when that will happen.

In the backgroun to the left of the shed you can see our next work in progress. Another area that had been taken over by weeds. Austin got out all the weeds and now I need to put down som landscape fabric and some mulch and probably a few more plants here as well and we'll call it good!

A close up of our half ton blue basalt boulder from Sargent's Nursery, all the colors are amazing, we love it! And we're fairly thankful that there is still a bit of the post in the ground with a large footing under it. This boulder shouldn't be sinking at all. :)

A big pat on the back!

2009-05-08T14:07:00.005-05:00

I'm so glad spring is finally here. I forget how great it is to see all our plants budding out and the grass getting green and thunderstorms, gotta love thunderstorms!

Lately Austin and I have been doing some yard work in our backyard. We have sort of a dog-bone shape flower bed that we recently de-weeded and de-cluttered. The original owners of the house had one of those ginormous satellite dishes way back when those were necessary for satellite tv, so they had a metal post in the ground filled with concrete embedded in probably a 2'x2'x3' deep concrete footer. Well, we weren't able to get the footer out of course, but Austin did take an angle grinder to the post and it has now disappeared! It's amazing how much wider that area looks without having that distraction in the middle! Our neighbor (Mary-Lou) came out and said, "Thank you, thank you, thank you! I've been looking at that for 19 years and I'm so glad it's gone!" Believe me, we are too! Only drawback to doing that was it took an hour or two of Austin grinding away at the steel while sparks were flying around. He managed to get one down into his ear as well, ouch! I put some landscaping fabric down so those pesky weeds should have a harder time of taking over again and I also planted a few geraniums to add some color and then finally we put down some mulch on top of that! I must say, it looks great! I'll add pictures when I get around to it :)

Life of the Unemployed

2009-04-15T19:30:00.003-05:00

Well, this is the first full week of unemployment and it's starting to feel ok. I did go back in to TSP to get a few more things and say hi to a few people.
Since I have been spending time at home I'm gradually finding things to do to fill my time. I had started looking on weddingbee.com when getting everything ready for our wedding and I have stayed up to date on it and also put my services on there as help for designing wedding invitations. This week I have started working with one couple on doing their invitations and it's been fun! I almost have their save to date done and then I'll start going on the invitations.
Other projects I have on my plate:
finish baby quilt for a friend
lino block print (hopefully it works out) nothing too special, just a little saying one of my friends always said to me at school :)

and then there's the cats. oh the cats.
we are taking care of Al and Erica's cat Legolas while they are gone and so far it is....interesting. Lucy in particular does not like him at all. She never gets closer than a few feet from him, but boy does she hiss and growl at him! Linus just does it to himself and keeps following Legolas around the house wherever he goes and then does some weird yowl at him that seems to be a "don't come any closer" type thing because he seems able to trap Legolas in a room when he does that. It seems to be getting a bit better since Lucy and Linus don't seem to be seeking him out and instigating anything, but that is for the time being anyway. I'm hoping in a couple days they'll all be friends. I hope.

WOOHOOO!!

2009-03-16T17:03:00.003-05:00

What a load off! Today I took my LEED AP test and I am happy to say that I passed it! I am now a LEED AP (Accredited Professional). All my studying paid off and I am now able to enjoy the beautiful day that is today. I just opened the windows in the kitchen and dining room and turned off the heat, oh happy day!

I'm full of excitement if you can't tell :)

update: Austin took me out to dinner to Applebees, then we got to watch new Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother (our must watches for the week), then we went to the gym where I found out I won a $10 gift certificate toward any purchases or services there, so great day! The only negative today was I found my headphones on the table had been chewed through by one of the cats (my bet is on Linus since he already chewed through the Wii sensor bar wires before). So I got a new pair of headphone today too! :) Overall pretty good.

It's been how long?

2009-03-04T12:39:00.003-06:00

Yep, today marks 4 years since my first date with Austin. :) and it's actually almost 6 months since we got married, so that's pretty good too ;) Since we were up in the cities already this past weekend, we went to Ruth's Chris Steakhouse to celebrate. We first had it in Hawaii, so I can sense this may become a special thing for us. It's pretty expensive, but definitely amazing steak, so I'd say it's pretty worth it.
----

On another note, you may notice on the side that I have a link to etsy. I have decided to see if anyone else likes some of my photographs enough to buy them. I only have three up right now, but I will be adding more soon. Etsy charges $0.20 per item listed and then takes a 3.5% fee from the sold price, but I figure it's worth a shot to see if anything can come of these. I have $20 for an 8x10, does that seem appropriate?
----

And another note yet, little Lucy gets declawed tomorrow. We arent' supposed to feed her past 6:00, so I'm sure tomorrow morning will be difficult since they already are outside our door yowling at 6 am even if we feed them the night before. We might have to put Linus in a room by himself so he can get a little bite, but I'm sure Lucy will be crazy tomorrow! She's definitely been a scratcher of the furniture and has also taken up clawing at the curtains. I'm just hoping it all goes smoothly and she doesn't end up with a "kitty cast" like Linus did.

Facebook 25 things about you.

2009-02-08T10:00:00.002-06:00

So this whole thing has been going around on Facebook, that someone sends 25 things about themselves and then you write 25 things and then pass it on. I was kind of annoyed with them at first, but after reading other people's it's kind of interesting the things you can find out about them, so I just did it. Below is the list I made:

1. I married my best friend on Sept. 6, 2008. I can't imagine my life without him and I get upset at the possibility that something terrible might happen to him one day. (So I try to not think about that).

2. I love our cats, but our youngest one Lucy drives me nuts right now. Hopefully she'll grow out of that.

3. I miss having a dog, but I can't imagine having one right now. Plus, I would do a terrible job of training it.

4. Even though our house is in good shape, I have a list of things I would love to do on our house: redo both bathrooms, drywall the walls in the basement, buy more furniture, I wish I could take out all the yellowy oak trim and doors and replace them all!. However, the money and time isn't there right now.

5. I miss art class from high school because of all the equipment that was right there to use. I wish I had a silk screening setup so badly!

6. The Minnesota senate race makes me angry, compounded by the fact that I'm watching Norm Coleman talk on the news right now. Ugh. (*changing channel now)

7. I love my grandparents so much and it's hard to see them getting older. I'm afraid every day of hearing bad news about them.

8. I love watching my niece and am fascinated with how much a 1 year old enjoys life.

9. Going along with 8, it has been amazing seeing how great my brother is as a dad.

10. I cry easily. I remember watching Homeward Bound in 3rd grade and crying so hard I had to leave the classroom. I think one of our dogs had died around that time, so that didn't help with that either.

11. When I was younger, I wanted to be a potter just like my dad and "make plates, and spoons, and forks, and things" Clearly I was confused. Honestly though, I had always thought I would take over the stoneware from him and I took it pretty hard when he sold it. I had even planned (at age 8 or so) to get and art major and business minor in college to do so. I understand now why he had to do it and am so grateful to have parents who care so much about my brother and I.

12. Finding a good pair of jeans is the bane of my existence.

13. I think I was fascinated with buildings always, but I credit my brother giving me a girders and panels set with really getting me going on my true fascination with architecture.

14. I am still bitter about one studio project in college and still wish I had gone a different way on it.

15. I love ice cream and am glad Austin keeps me from buying it on every grocery trip. :P

16. My favorite shows are Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother and I am annoyed each time it's not a new episode. I still watch the repeats though.

17. I love giving gifts. Even more than receiving them. (additional note: this is proven by the fact that I already gave Austin his Valentine's Day/Wedding(what I really had wanted to get him)/Dateiversary (5 years together on March 4) present a week before I was going to) :P

18. I can tell you about my dad's wine, but don't try asking me about any others. I don't know much about other wines.

19. I love traveling and wish I could share the places I have been with Austin and experience new places with him.

20. Scotland is probably one of my favorite places in the world. The accent is a big factor in that.

21. There are many other places I would love to live, but I would hate being far from my family.

22. I recently decided I enjoy making quilts after making one for my new niece. I may take it up as a hobby even though saying it makes me sound like an old lady....

23. I love photography and really need to get myself out more and take more photos.

24.I have some amazing friends that are very important to me.

25. I have a great family: immediate, extended, and in-laws.

26. I barely notice the winestain birthmark on my right middle finger and freak out when people ask me "oh my gosh, what did you do to your finger?!" It takes me a minute of looking at my hand trying to find something wrong with it before I realize they're talking about my birthmark. It also turns dark purple when I get cold, Austin calls it the Alli thermometer.

Obamafied

2009-01-19T18:57:00.003-06:00

I found a website through a blog I read called Obamiconme

On it, you can upload a picture and adjust some colors to make it like the Obama Hope posters by Shepard Fairey.

Here are two I did, one of Linus and one of my niece Elsie

2009

2009-01-01T12:34:00.004-06:00

Happy New Year everyone!

Time to start a new calendar and make a few resolutions for the new year.

Writing them here will make me feel more accountable, so here we go:

1. Finally stop biting my nails. For some reason I've picked the habit up again the past couple weeks and I just need to stop it!

2. Lose weight. We're going to join a gym tomorrow and honestly I'm really excited about it! They have pretty much everything there and we're going to take advantage of it all. Especially if we're paying a fee we ARE going to make it worth the money. Austin told me last night that he knows I can do it this year and that just made me feel like I really can.

3. I'm stealing this one from Austin, but I want to read more too. I have a few books I want to dive into, but I just haven't yet.

4. Be better at staying in touch with my friends. I've been terrible at just picking up the phone and giving friends a call, so I'm going to try and fix that!

That's my list so far.

We'll have to wait until 2010 to see how I do at getting all these goals, but we'll check the progress along the way too :)

Happy New Years Everyone!

Merry Christmas

2008-12-27T13:00:00.003-06:00

Merry Christmas Everyone!

We got back yesterday from a wonderful time in Iowa with Austin's family, today is a get together with some college friends at our house and tomorrow is heading on up to Red Wing for Christmas with my family! It extends the holiday season quite a bit with having so many get togethers, but I couldn't ask for anything else. We also still have two more celebrations with my extended family which will occur in January so that stretches it out even more!

Mom got me a new spritz cookie press of my own, so I brought that down to Iowa with us and impressed everyone with my mad cookie making skills. ;) They turned out pretty well I must say and it was fun to make them as well. And tomorrow we get to make even more at mom and dad's house, yipee! Gotta love sugar highs on the holidays. Maybe that's why everyone is so cheery....

2008-12-18T20:53:00.004-06:00

It's a sad day when 20 degrees means it's a warm day. Oh how I love Minnesota! :)
At least watching the girl in the car behind me at the stop light rockin out in her car put a smile on my face after a long day. :)

I changed up the look a little bit and added a bit of spring to brighten the day of anyone reading. Enjoy!

Happy Birthdays!

2008-12-12T16:40:00.002-06:00

First of all, a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY! to the now 1 year old Elsie!!! It's hard to believe that she's already a year old! It will be so great to see her at her 1st birthday party tomorrow :) We'll see if she takes a header into the cake or not :)

Next, congratulations to Aaron, Megan, and Hunter who have welcomed Hayden Elizabeth Striegel to the family this morning at 4 am! So Happy Birthday to Hayden!
Stats: 7 lbs 10 oz. 20.5"

2008-11-30T16:49:00.003-06:00

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving here on Thursday, great food, great family, can't ask for more!

The spread of food shown above, we had already started carving the turkey, hence the mangled-ness you see in the top of the picture! :) Amazingly, it was edible, and good besides! I'm surprised we managed to do it :)

Elsie was very enamored with the duplo legos, moreso putting them away in the box than anything! What manners!

And finally, Lucy the next day, must have been exhausted because she slept pretty much the entire day!

It's Turkey Day!

2008-11-27T08:47:00.001-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! Our 21 lb turkey is in the oven, so now we just hope that id doesn't get overcooked/undercooked/burnt. No problem, right? :)

Monty Python YouTube Channel

2008-11-21T00:08:00.002-06:00

If anyone loves Monty Python or at least a little dose here and there. They have created their own YouTube channel to combat illegal uploads of their content.

http://www.youtube.com/user/MontyPython

2008-11-20T23:51:00.002-06:00

Lucy is driving me nuts. She's pretty much the opposite of Linus' personality and right now I like his much better. She's so attention needy and is constantly meowing and climbing all over me (the cause of my annoyance at the moment). Any time I sit and try to do something she's trying to jump up my leg and digs her little kitten claws in in the process. OUCH!! I have the marks to prove it...

Other thoughts on my mind. I miss art class in high school. I miss having all those tools at my disposal right there for me. In particular, silkscreening. I have been obsessed with the site etsy.com lately and for those of you who are not familiar with it, it's basically a place for people who are crafty to market their goods for a little extra money. They charge a nominal fee to post items (20 cents for 4 months per item) and you get space to basically have a little online store. Going through these makes me want to be artistic/crafty again. I would love to have a silkscreening setup so I could make prints and such, but cost is a factor and also, I'm afraid I'd lose interest in it and thus money spent on the supplies. There are just so many great ideas on that site that make me want to do stuff!

I just finished knitting a new blanket for the cats to lay on in front of the fireplace and that really got to my hands, so I think knitting anything else is out for a while. I've been working on quilting a christmas stocking and have a few hiccups to figure out, but otherwise that one's going fairly well. I get frustrated because sometimes I just don't know what to do with myself (Austin can attest to this!) and I think lately it's a combination of wanting to do things, but not having the resources, and having other things to do. So it's not for the lack of ideas, I think there are just too many floating around in my head. (For some reason I think this could be a family curse) ;)

In the meantime I have another project that is winding down (which will be revealed at Christmastime to a few family members) and we have Thanksgiving to prepare for. I apologize in advance for any food that may turn out inedible....

Argh!

2008-11-13T08:43:00.004-06:00

The most worthless error message ever. One of the many reasons I highly dislike PC's....

HE DID IT!!!

2008-11-04T23:35:00.001-06:00

Barack Obama is our next president and it's hard for me to express how happy I am about that, it's also such a relief after what we've gone through the past 8 years. I'm so excited to see what the future has in store for us with this great man as the president of our country.

Meet Lucy!

2008-10-19T20:57:00.006-05:00

We have been thinking about getting a second cat for a little while now and after visiting Petsmart yesterday, we saw this little one and couldn't resist. We figure Lucy goes hand in hand with Linus, so that's the name she will have. :)

She is extremely cuddly and purrs on contact.

Linus isn't exactly too sure what to think just yet. We're trying to introduce them slowly, but he's definitely curious about this new little one. He got this far from her when we first introduced her to the guest room (her home for the next couple days while they both adapt).

She's a climber for sure, she was going all over Austin, purring nonstop.

No, this is not the same picture as above, this is Linus about 5-10 minutes later in the exact same spot, exact same position.

Lucy was playing fetch with us too! We'd toss the ball up the stairs and she'd play with it a bit and then bring it back to us. The entire time Linus was watching from the top of the stairs with what I call his "yoda pose". (As seen in above image) :)

And finally, a picture of Austin eating a sandwich. why? well....because I can. :)

Hawaii Pics

2008-09-17T22:33:00.010-05:00

It's probably about time I try to give a little explanation to a few of these pics :)

When we got to our room, we found what's shown above, a bottle of champagne with two champagne glasses and a gift basket that was given to us courtesy of my mom and dad, thanks!! Fresh pineapple is always welcome in my book. :)

The "partial ocean" view from our hotel balcony.

A new addition to the "Austin Contemplation Series" at the Byodo In Temple.

Al and Erica aren't you glad your pond doesn't look like this? :)

Luana Hills Golf Course where Austin went to play a round and I got to drive the cart a few times :)

The 3rd hole where Austin lost 3 balls in the brush below.

Windy day by the ocean.

Aoki's Shave Ice store in Haleiwa on the North Shore

A long parade that closed down the street in front of our hotel. Very elaborate decoration on the horses. Above is the Queen of the Aloha Festivals. Each Island had their own princess to represent it.

Some shave ice I got from a place on the beach. Oddly enough, raspberry and pineapple weren't too bad together!

The results of above shave ice.

The lei from the Polynesian Cultural Center lu'au. Lots and lots of orchids. Austin blames them for the cold he got a day later.

Fire dancers representing Samoa in the Cultural center's night show. Very cool!

Obligatory shot of surf boards.

Our last shot of the trip with our view behind us.

:)

2008-09-06T11:27:00.001-05:00

I'M GETTING MARRIED TODAY!!!!

Yay

2008-08-29T07:41:00.004-05:00

Let's keep it like this!

2008-08-28T19:46:00.003-05:00

Just about a week until the wedding! It's really crazy how time flies. I have now realized also that I have to be up in Red Wing on Thursday morning and that we will also be up there saturday through monday, which means I hvea tuesday and wednesday to get everything down here that we need to organized and also to pack an entire week and a half of clothes for HAWAII!!

Along with a few other events down here things have been a bit stressful, but I'm just glad that soon I will have a husband and then we'll be relaxing on the beach next to the ocean.

Another aspect I'm looking forward is seeing all my friends and family together in one place, it's going to be such a great celebration!

Now it's time to start weather stalking....

Let's keep believing that the 30 % will keep going down to 0%!

Less than a month and counting!

2008-08-09T17:15:00.002-05:00

The wedding is less than a month away now, whoa! Where has the time gone?! Everything is falling into place and there are just a few details we need to pull together and a few things to get started on that are required closer to the wedding (favors, programs, etc.).

Last night I had another wedding related dream. I've had a couple in the past now, but last night they struck again. This one involved me being freaked out about the St. James for some reason and what if something were to happen and we'd be out a reception hall and guests would be out a hotel. Well...I don't know how a brick building could be reduced to ashes, but that's just what happened in my dream, go figure. So I freaked out about that and then woke up. Well, I remember thinking wow, it was all a dream! Then things started to go wrong again, I don't remember exactly what, but then I woke up, this time for real!

Haha, yep, that's right, I had a dream within a dream! As Austin pointed out, it probably had to do with the first shirt I grabbed out of the closet to wear to bed which was my "Allison: Bride To Be!" shirt that Susan made for the shower she threw me. Darn subconscious!! :)

Ah well, as long as the St. James doesn't burn to the ground, we should be okay.

Today is my birthday! Happy birthday to me!

2008-07-12T13:32:00.002-05:00

I am 24 today! I got to sleep in until 11 when Linus started to jump at the corner of the room and maybe try climbing the wall? not quite sure what that little kitty brain is thinking sometimes. I got a new set of earbuds (the right earpiece died on my old set) from Austin as well as a Ritter chocolate bar ( I loved them in Europe) and an iTunes gift card, so that is all very exciting! :) He also took me to lunch at Chipotle whih I rarely get because he doesn't like it, and then later we're going up to Red Wing to see the family and to watch a concert at the winery that's being put on especially for my birthday...well, maybe not, but I like to think so ;)

Our lilies are blooming outside , nice yellow, red, and orange ones. Because the rabbits loved to eat them, the previous owners put a littl fence around all the lilies, but I think they're a bit crowded in there now, so we may have to split them apart next year. I'm pretty sure I didn't plant the basil correctly in the window boxes because one of them they are all completely dead now (probably from a lack of me watering them as well....oops).

And it's a gorgeous day outside!! what more could I ask for!?

Spring has sprung!

2008-05-23T23:13:00.004-05:00

Here are some pictures of the gorgeous tree in our front yard and of the hostas underneath it! It's great to discover what plants we have this spring since we moved in December we never really got to see what it looks like at this time of year.

The hostas starting to open

Just a few days later they really exploded into this!

Another picture of the tree, it even smells amazing!!

Update

2008-05-13T22:17:00.002-05:00

Linus has his kitty cast off now and is back to his old, crazy self again! It's nice to not have to lock him in Austin's office over night as well, he's free to wander the house to his heart's content and to snuggle up with us again.

Also, we got a light fixture up in our bathroom. Actually I should say Austin did I guess....
I knew the paint I chose for there had a bit of a purplish tint to it (the name is "Chelsea Mauve"), but it looks even more purple-y with the new lights up. Oh well, we're definitely not going to repaint now! What's done is done!

new paint and disabled kitten

2008-05-06T17:17:00.004-05:00

After getting his claws taken out on Thursday, Linus developed a little infection in a couple of his "fingers" (not really sure what else to call them!), so Austin took him to the vet and we now have an unhappy Linus with a kitty cast (it's really just yellow tape, but I like kitty cast better).

He'll get it off tomorrow, but in the meantime he hobbles around basically on 3 legs with that one tucked under him as much as possible.

Also, last weekend we finally got the bathroom painted! We have now painted every room in our house, yayyyyy!!!!

I had tried to do a before picture, but it didn't work, so you'll just have to imagine it with yellow, blue, and green wallpaper and then look at the lovliness it is now! (minus the ugly cabinets and floor tile).

2008-05-03T15:37:00.003-05:00

After a crappy week at work it's finally Saturday!! Thankfully the sun is shining and you can see the lush green grass (unlike in Rapid City where our fellow TSP office had to close down for the day yesterday due to 30" of snow!!!). So this grass is getting greener and longer, so we went out today and bought a lawn mower! We opted for an electric one, unfortunately it has a cord though, but that definitely beats smelling like gas after mowing and having to go get/pay for gas! Austin's out giving it a run and it seems to be working great! The price was right at Lowe's so we couldn't resist.

Other news, our poor Linus got his claws removed on Thursday. They say to keep them from jumping for 5 days, but I can't see how that's even possible! Earlier he decided on his own to jump down from the upper level down to the dining room (over 4') and since then has been jumping around various places and is now limping and not walking well on his front right paw. It has started bleeding a bit, but hopefully he'll keep sleeping and stop jumping!

We also, now have all rooms painted in our house. We finished the upstairs bathroom a couple days ago and it looks great! We were pretty unsure of the wall texture before we did it, but now that we did we are very pleasantly surprised with how well it turned out. We just bought a new light fixture for in there and toilet paper holder and other bathroom stuff, so it's almost done! I'm so happy I don't have to look at the blue tape lining the edges of the room and mirror just begging for me to finish painting the walls, they are finally done!

Now I'm off to enjoy the rest of my day!

Finally!

2008-04-13T22:19:00.002-05:00

After a week of pretty crappy weather, we finally had a decent day today! I went out and did a little raking in the yard and then Austin and I went on a walk and down to the grocery store to get a couple things. I really love the fact that we can walk 5-10 minutes down to the grocery store! Granted we can't do our usual shopping trip down there since we'd have to steal a cart to get everything back, but for small things like today it works out great!
Also, Austin and I just got a couple stools to put at our kitchen island, so we now officially have an eat-in kitchen like we intended!
Other news, I just witnessed our sweet kitten Linus falling from the upper level down to our basement while he was playing around the railing rungs, it's at least an 8' drop. He recovered quite quickly and is now curled up in my lap, so I think it just gave him a bit of a shock! I must admit it was pretty hilarious to see.

Elsie :)

2008-03-19T19:16:00.004-05:00

Here's a picture, courtesy of Al & Erica's blog, of me with my adorable little niece, Elsie!! She's getting so big and gets cuter every day! If you want to see more pictures go to al & erica's blog at: www.alexanderica.blogspot.com

2008-03-14T13:46:00.002-05:00

This is a fundraiser one of my friends from back in high school just started a few days ago, I think it's pretty inspiring and I hope it turns out well for him. I just saw an update which said he has had 27 pairs signed up for already!

Please read below for his mission statement:

A pair a day for peace.It is my goal to start a not-for-profit company which designs and makes simple/comfortable/sustainable clothing and distributes the revenues to clothe and educate the needy.Clothing is a basic necessity in life which has been taken to extremes in the fashion industry. I hope that a clothing company concerned more about human values than the dollar value can make a difference in how we wear and buy clothes. The basic essentials: food, clothing, and shelter are the material building blocks of human comfort and peace.

Mission:
So I designed a pair of pants. (I've sewn like four things in my life). Don't let that scare you. They are really comfy, really universal, really stylish. I think that most anyone would enjoy wearing a pair - so I want to share.Here's the plan:I intend to make one (1) pair a day for one (1) year, while at college, selling them to fundraise to start a not-for-profit company with which I intend to make these and other articles of simple/comfortable/sustainable clothes for a good cause.Here's where the fun begins. The first day, which was yesterday, the pants were priced at one (1) dollar. Day two, which is today, the pair is priced at (2) dollars. For day three, the pair is priced at three (3) dollars. Get the picture? I increase the price one (1) dollar per day. I intend to do this up to one (1) year, or for as long as people stay interested.The added bonus is that if you can't afford to donate dollars, I will accept pants. 1 pair = 1 dollar. And if two or more people want a pair on a single day, the more pants bid wins out. All pants will be donated to Goodwill.We'll see how it goes.

If things get out of hand, I reserve the right to halt the process and donate the revenues to one or more of the following charities:Sharing and caring hands (.org)Dress for success (.org)I hope many get interested and involved!
insha'Allah.
Peace,Lewis

Products:
one peace pantsSimple, comfortable pants based on a Thai fisheman's design. They are very economic to construct and have a couple unique features you won't easily find anywhere else.

Flowers!

2008-03-05T18:03:00.001-06:00

I thought I'd post the lovely flowers Austin got me for our Anniversary. So spring-y!

Our Crazy Little Guy

2008-03-05T17:39:00.007-06:00

So I know there are a lot of pictures here, but I needed them to illustrate the craziness that is our little Linus. Sometimes he is the sweetest and will curl up and fall fast asleep in your lap. Other times are illustrated below:

he went absolutely bonkers over a little piece of yarn I gave him one night and started being a little acrobat on my red chair.

This is an occurrence we witnessed just today during lunch. Linus has an incredibly long skinny tail and loves to chase it sometimes, but this is an extreme!

what's that on the banister? no...it couldn't be...oh yes, it's Linus, Daredevil Kitty!

(keep in mind there's at least a 5' drop to hardwood floors if he falls, amazingly he didn't)

So adamant to get his tail that he curled himself entirely around the railing

Such a wonderful source of entertainment for us!

3 years?!

2008-03-04T20:41:00.002-06:00

Well,

today marks 3 years since our first date! Austin and I have been together for that long and we've known each other for 6 years, time really flies!

He got me a wonderful bouquet of flowers: daisies, lilies, tulips, and a few others I'm not exactly sure of. :)

What did I get him? Well, I'm going to make him some scotcharoos tonight. His favorite presents from me since we've been together are scotcharoos and that bucket of assorted cookies I had sent to him on Valentine's day when I was in Rome and he was in Ames. Huge hit! He still talks about how great they were...

I got some new paper samples in today and I think we have a winner for our invitation scheme. One more thing to cross off the list. We have 186 days to go people!

Still to do:

find a florist

find an officiant (kind of a big one, no?)

cake tasting

meal tasting (appointment scheduled)

dress alterations

find shoes!

tuxes

programs

and i'm sure there are so many i'm forgetting, ha!

Time to go watch a movie and try to relax.

It's never too early...

2008-02-19T22:39:00.002-06:00

I was in Target today wandering around after picking up a few things I needed and was in an aisle, just about to get to the main aisle when I heard a guy coming closer saying "See, there are many alternatives that are still environmentally friendly..."
My first thought without even seeing him is that it's nice to hear people having these types of conversations. As he passed I saw a man with a possibly 4 month old in the basket of his cart, no one else was with him.
Seeing that just gave me a smile.
It's never too early to be passing on the knowledge that could help our planet!

2008-02-04T08:39:00.000-06:00

http://yeswecansong.com

Linus!

2008-02-01T17:32:00.000-06:00

Below are some of my latest pictures of Linus. Currently as I'm typing this he's sitting next to my keyboard, purring, and licking my fingers. Boy does he love the petting! The moment you set a single finger on him he begins to purr. He has really gotten quite comfortable here and we can't blame him, cuz we're great! :)

Sleeping on my lap while I'm on the computer

Cute little guy

This seems to be his more mischievious look.

He loves playing, but I haven't gotten any pictures of that yet, plenty to come I'm sure!

New addition to our household!!!

2008-01-26T14:07:00.000-06:00

So, we now have our very own first pet!!

Introducing....

Linus!!!

We got him at adoption days at PetsMart today and he hid under the bed in the guest room for a bit, but now he's out checking us out and purring away! They guestimate his birthday to be around September 25, 2007, so he's still a kitten, but they've had him with other cats and plenty of other people, so he's not too skittish. His given name was Semper Fi, but Austin chose Linus to be his name (there's some logic behind it...think Linux, if you know that then you might get it). :)

Who should really change their name in this relationship?

2008-01-24T17:39:00.000-06:00

So, with the wedding coming up I've been thinking about how odd it will be to change my name. I am pretty sure I have decided to change it, but I still love my name right now! maybe hyphenate? I don't know.

But! In the mail today we received something that maybe gave another option:

So what do you think? It has a certain ring to it, no? :) hehehe. Oh I'm keeping at least one of these forever, I love it.

And We're Back!

2008-01-24T17:29:00.000-06:00

Touché Erica :)

I know it's been a while, so it's time to do some updatin'!

Our biggest news is that the kitchen is done!!

So, now it's time for a little comparison to prove to ourselves that we made a good decision :)

So, here's before with after directly below it:

We have cherry cabinets, bamboo flooring, and Mesabi black granite countertops. We love it! Even moreso since now the water and oven are turned back on! For a whlie we were getting pretty sick of microwaveable food, but now it's back to the meals again.

With this cold snap lately, we have found out where the drafty spots in the house are, and unfortunately they all seem to be downstairs, so it gets pretty chilly down there! We wrapped the windows and that has seemed to help a bit, or at least we have convinced ourselves of that, but with plenty of blankets it can get cozy enough.

Oh, and in other big news, this weekend we're getting a cat!! (maybe two?) You'll just have to wait and find out....Maybe curling up with he/she will help with the chilly house :)

2008!

2008-01-01T21:36:00.003-06:00

Happy New Year everyone!

This year has started off to a great start with Austin and I fully moved into our new home. We are moved in, however, that by no means equates to being fully unpacked! :) We still have stuff all over and my office currently has my old architecture trunk as a desk, but we're moving along. It has been great to see so many people over break and hearing about their lives so far. Kristi, Kristen, Sarah and her friend Kaci, Phil, Adam and Alaina, Andrew, Amanda and Tarun (CONGRATS by the way!!!! they are newly engaged), Dave, Jake, then all of the family as well.

Christmas at Christy and Chris' house was great, especially since this year Pat, Nate, and Katie surprised Grandma and Grandpa with a visit to see us all from Montana, so it was wonderful to have them with us for this Christmas. Christy and Chris did an amazing job on the dinner, turkey and everything! Very gracious to let us all use their house this year for the festivities!

Austin and I are excited that we are getting married THIS year and it's hard to believe there are only 9 months until the wedding, which means we have been engaged for an entire year now! Time really is flying by.

Tomorrow it's back to work, but with all the activity it seems like it's been about a month since I've been to work, so I'm looking forward to going back.

I wish everyone the very best with this upcoming year. I hope it brings everyone good tidings!

Peace and Love,

Alli & Austin

20081

2008-01-01T21:36:00.001-06:00

Before & After

2007-12-15T22:45:00.001-06:00

Before

After

The top picture is during the day and bottom is at night, so that makes the bottom seem darker than it was before, but it's definitely not!
Thanks to some amazing help from Liz, we have almost all of the living room painted and we also have the first coat up in the kitchen and entry! Tomorrow we need to pick up a bit more paint and then we'll be able to finish the trim in the living room and get the second coats up in the areas needed!
The blue in the entry and kitchen just really updated it all and makes everything a bit cleaner. We are both very pleased with how it's all looking so far and in just a couple weeks we'll hopefully be all moved in!
Also, we took down the crooked quilt hanger! Same as with the small coat hanger in the bedroom upstairs, whoever hung them completely missed the wall anchor which resulted in the crookedness. Thankfully it came down without a hitch and now that wall looks huge!
It's all coming together!!!!!

New Floors!!

2007-12-13T12:35:00.001-06:00

With the exception of the kitchen bay window where they ran slightly short of the wood, our new floors are in!!
Here's the dining room bay and its bay window, it looks so different than with the carpet!!! I love it!

I'll get some before and after pictures at night when the light will be the same as the other pictures :)

Elizabeth Erica Falconer "Elsie"

2007-12-11T20:34:00.000-06:00

Yesterday at 2:00 pm, my brother and his wife Erica welcomed a little girl to this world!
Elizabeth Erica Falconer, "Elsie" was 7 lbs 5 oz and 19.5 in. long.
Everyone is doing well and the parents are extremely proud, as they should be! She is adorable!

2007-12-06T17:29:00.000-06:00

I put another coat on the bathroom last night and then we painted Austin's office and we were able to get two coats in there as well, so that means two more rooms done! It' such a huge improvement just with those two since there are no longer any really noticeable little girl's rooms with bright fuscia and purple and smiling flowers on a wallpaper border, oh so wonderful! :)
Our next goal now is to tackle the kitchen and get that ready since our new floors are getting put in there next Wednesday!
Moving along smoothly... now we have to keep it at this pace and we should be able to move in fully around christmas.

another one down!

2007-12-02T19:55:00.000-06:00

We primed Austin's office today and the bathroom downstairs and then I painted the bathroom! So that's one more room done(needs a second coat, but not much).
We're on our way!

2007-12-01T21:41:00.001-06:00

I forgot to add the new light fixture Austin put up today in the bathroom downstairs. It took him an hour and a half to get it up because the previous owners put in the junction box in a not normal fashion.

2007-12-01T20:18:00.000-06:00

Our latest progress report, we've been spending the past few weekends removing wallpaper and now we're on to priming and painting! We have one room done and are ready to move on to the next ones!

Top to bottom:
Guest room before
Guest room after with my new favorite paint color! Our first room done!
My office infested
Removing the queen bug
Austin having some fun
Bugs are gone!!! (wallpaper is now ALL removed)

New addition to the extended family!

2007-11-28T18:09:00.000-06:00

Congratulations to Laura and Matt who now have a new baby girl!
Emma Jacqueline Trudeau
Nov. 27, 2007
7 lbs.

Here are some pictures Matt shared with us:

Stay tuned and in a few weeks maybe we'll have photos of Al & Erica's little one!

OUR NEW HOME!

2007-10-31T23:05:00.000-05:00

Today at noon we finalized everything, signed all the papers, got the keys, and now it is ours, all ours!!!!
After work we went and got Halloween candy, a papa murphy's pizza, and picked out a movie and we headed over to the house. As soon as we got there, we had our first trick-or-treaters. It definitely makes one feel older being the person handing out the candy rather than getting it! :) there was everything from decked out two year olds to high schoolers with sweatshirts and sweatpants and a santa hat (he definitely worked very hard on that one). We tried picking out paint colors or at least trying to figure out what we want for rooms, but with so many options, that didn't last long. Maybe another day we'll get to it again.
I'm just really excited we get to start working on it now!

Excitement

2007-10-05T18:33:00.000-05:00

So, we just have to sign the papers and then close Oct. 31, but this is our new house!!
Hopefully everyone will get to visit us and enjoy it too!

houseyhousehousehousehouse

2007-10-04T17:36:00.000-05:00

So! clearly I couldn't think of a title here, so that wins, haha :)
Anyway, we made an offer on the blue house!
Our offer was fairly low, so we expected a counter offer and sure enough they have. They haven't told us the counter offer yet since they've been working and haven't gotten back to their agent with the number, but they did tell her that they will for sure counteroffer. So, that's the progress so far!
Wish us luck!

House Hunting Round 2!

2007-09-24T21:20:00.000-05:00

After our failure of house hunting last weekend, we were able to make another go of it this evening!
We saw 6 or 7 houses today and we think it is now down to 2 of those! We are going to hve the agent send us the papers for them and see what we can find in those that might make us lean one way or another.

So, here are the two that we are trying to decide between!

This blue house is a very nice multi-level that needs some work on the kitchen cabinets as well as in the bathrooms, but overall is nicely laid out with a gas fireplace on the lower level, 4 bedrooms, 2 full bathrooms, gas stove, nicely landscaped backyard that also has a little gardening shed. All the carpet looks new, so all that would need to be done is some painting since the downstairs bedroom are a lovely bright pink and purple. There's even a cat door on the door that goes to the basement, it's all ready for us! ;)

This one is a split level that the owners had fun with the selling process by putting little cards around the house that were hilarious such as: "there are 19 places for storage, can you find them all?" "can you find the door to the side yard? hint: laundry room." "built ins! cool!"
They gave us a nice chuckle as we were walking around. There definitely is a ton of storage in this house! Each room has a full closet in it that spans a wall of the room pretty much.
The bathrooms could use some updating as well as some work in the kitchen, but what house doesn't need work when moving into it?

2007-09-11T20:15:00.001-05:00

It is officially less than one year until we get married!
It is less than one day until the project I am currently working on is done!
It is only a few months until Austin and I become homeowners!
We met with a real estate agent today to give him thoughts on what we are looking for in a house and a price range and such, so now the hunt begins! He said he'll have the first few to look at in the next couple days. He is going to send us the first few in an email and we can get a look at them and decide to visit them or not.
Here's the criteria we gave him:
2+ bedrooms
2+ bathrooms
attached 2 car garage
preferrably a finished basement, however that's a negotiable one
some sort of a yard
located in northwest rochester, northeast would be ok
preferrably in a more established neighborhood with more character than the new neighborhoods (more established would also have full grown trees!) :)

we have a few months before our lease is up, but i'm excited to start looking!

2007-08-29T22:57:00.000-05:00

Work has been interesting the past few days. Since the main office switched over to a new server system that serves all 5 or 6 or so offices, there have been little glitches here and there "until they can get all the bugs out." Well, it was working just fine until yesterday, someone in Sioux Falls "inadvertantly erased Rochester's profile off the server." Which meant we couldn't receive or send email, autocad was all screwed up and still hasn't gotten back to normal and we had to restart and redirect everything on our computers. What a pain.

Then last night as our in-office tech guy was going around to fix the computers, he goes to one of our administrative lady's computer (she's currently on vacation) to fix it so it will hopefully be back to normal by the time she gets back. Well, he sits down at her desk and goes to turn on the tower, but wait....there's no tower to turn on. Her computer tower has mysteriously disappeared! and yes, only the tower, and this is not a new computer either, it's probably a 4-5 year old Dell, so not even anything worth anything! So yeah, that's the mystery of the office this week.

Other than that, work is going alright. The project I'm working on has a deadline for this friday, so hopefully we will be able to meet that. It's already been pushed past two deadlines, so i really want to make this one!

Other news: I ordered my wedding dress yesterday and that will take about 4-6 months before Mestad's will even receive it from the company.

So, what we have done now is:
Ceremony site: Falconer Vineyards
Reception site: Summit room of St. James Hotel
Wedding dress: ordered!
Bridesmaid dresses: picked out, but ordering in February probably
bridesmaids: Susan, Erica, Kristen, Jackie, Veronica
personal attendants: Kristi, Katie, Sarah
groomsmen: i think they're pretty much decided on, he just hasn't asked anyone for some reason unknown to me ( the slacker gene probably, hehe )
Photographer: Michelle Huber huberportraits.com
invitations: pretty much designed, now searching for affordable ways to print them
fiance: yep, definitely got a good one there ;)

basically we have everything to reserve the date, now it's the larger details that need to be set into place. We're coming closer to the 1 year mark until the wedding!

2007-08-16T18:12:00.001-05:00

It's been a while since I updated and actually didn't finish the blog about our road trip, but it was a great time and we have a majority of our photos in an album now.
On the more recent front, there hasnt' been a whole lot new. Work has been busy for both me and Austin. We just passed a deadline we didn't meet, so now we really need to kick in overdrive to get all the plans and documents done.

On a more exciting front, last weekend I found my wedding dress! I love it and I think it fits the style I wanted more than any of the others I tried on. Now we just need to find the bridesmaid dresses. There are a few options I've found, the hard part will be to find the right green for them.

Other plans are going well, we have the ceremony site of course! then we also have the reception hall (the summit room of the st. james hotel), I have the invitations pretty much designed but now need to find a way to print them somewhat affordably. But now we only have a little over a year left, how are we going to get everything done in time?! hahah, yeah.... :D

Anyway, we get free dinner here tonight from the apartment management, so we're off!
ta-ta

Road Trip!!

2007-05-21T13:43:00.000-05:00

Well, I graduated a few weeks ago and we have all gone our separate ways, but Austin and I decided to take a road trip while we had the time to do so. So, Westward bound we go!!!
I'll take a little time to expand on our trip which turned out to be a 4744.8 mile trip!
day 1, leave from Rochester headed on I-90 toward South Dakota. We got to South Dakota in time to go see Mount Rushmore, but not in time to see Crazy Horse. another trip maybe. We stayed at Sylvan Lake in Custer State Park which is a favorite of my family's. Thanks to Al and Erica we had a delicious dinner at the Sylvan Lake Lodge where, yep, you guessed it, I had salmon! whoa! Alli eating fish you may ask? Well, since it was money given to us by Al and Erica, I felt it only appropriate to do so. It was amazing with a breaded crust on the outside of the fillets with rosemary infused into it and with a rosemary cream sauce. Austin had an amazing pork chop , not sure what the sauce was, but it was very good as well! So thank you to Al and Erica!!!

day 2, headed west further to Missoula, Montana. We stopped at Devil's Tower on our way out which is apparently the first national monument declared by the U.S. It was crazy seeing the climbers making their way up the shear sides of it, no clue how they are able to do it. We drove across Montana which wasn't the most exciting place, but once we got toward the mountains it became a bit more exciting. I drove about 3 or 4 hours to Missoula and in the windy roads got a little motion sick and did a little white knuckle driving, but we made it there by 7! Aunt Pat had dinner for us and we got to hang out with her and Katie and Greg. Katie is 13 years old and already taller than me!! can we say unfair? hahaha. Even though we were there only until the next morning it was great to see them and they sent us off with plenty of food to last us the rest of the trip, thank you Hintzes!

I'll let you read these and Day 3 will be coming soon.... :) stay tuned, heheh

2007-04-30T09:57:00.000-05:00

My 5 years of college will be coming to an end on Saturday when I GRADUATE!!!!! This is such a surreal feeling. It's going to be difficult to say goodbye to people, but I'm sure I'll stay in contact with many. I sure hope I will anyway.

It's been especially gorgeous here the past few days, all the flooding has gone down I believe (we got 5 inches of rain over 2-3 days and the banks of the Skunk river breached by 2 feet) this didn't effect us of course, but all the rain coming down just got old after a while. Now it's extremely sunny and in the high 70's to 80's.

Soon I'll be back in Minnesota!

spring has sprung

2007-04-15T20:41:00.000-05:00

Finally it's getting a little warmer! I'm actually starting to enjoy the walk to class again, when the sun's out anyway :)

I'm still waiting to hear from the firm I interviewed with, but they told me they still have more interviews to do and the last one isn't until May 11, so I probably won't know until after then. So, I will most likely be looking for other places as backup.

It's so hard to believe that in just a few weeks, my five years of college will come to an end. It'll be difficult to say goodbye to Ames and to the many friends I've made here. I probably won't realize that I'm not coming back until fall when I won't once again pack up my stuff to move back down to Ames. Until then, I guess I need to enjoy what's around me. One of these days I'm going to go around campus and take some photos, but I think I might wait until the leaves come out more. I haven't really done that since freshman year!

Two things

2007-04-03T19:15:00.000-05:00

First of all, I had my interview today and it went very well!! So, I just need to wait now and see what they think. Everything went well and had a lot to talk about and I was there for 2 1/2 hours, so it's not like they wanted to kick me out on the street. I have a really good feeling about it. I also met one of the principals of the Chicago office and was able to talk with him for a bit as well, so yay! Hopefully soon I will hear from them and let you all know if I have a job or not!

On a completely other note, I did not know him at all, but my thoughts go out to the family and friends of Abel Bolamos. He had been missing since Saturday and they have now released information that they have found a body in Lake Laverne. It's such a sad time when anything like this happens.

The Final Countdown

2007-04-01T21:42:00.000-05:00

Wow, it is April, which means that I have a month plus 5 days. Whoa. Crazy. I have a second interview with Holabird & Root on Tuesday, so I'm really hoping this goes well. Second interviews are usually a good sign, and I'm hoping this goes the same for me.
Once again I have developed a cold. This is the second one this school year, which is fairly unusual for me. Usually it's only one. I'm really hoping it will be gone by Tuesday though!
I'll definitely write how it went though once I know. :)