And the storm continues...

Okay, on the left is Monday Dec 15, and on the right is Monday Dec 22. What a differance a week makes!

And yes, at this moment, it is still snowing.

I even took the opportunity to make a Dr Pepper snowcone! I know, only kids eat snow...but I couldn't resist!

I took another walk to the temple. (I just love that I can do that!) They were trying to clear as much of the parking lot and sidewalks as they could, but the snow kept coming down. They hadn't gotten to the sidewalks when I was there, so in order to get some of the photos, I was tromping thru over a foot of snow. It was up to the middle of my shins.

Christmas Miracle

Merry Christmas! This year I had resigned myself to the fact that I was not going to have a Christmas tree. First of all, I can't afford to go buy one. Then, I didn't want to have to lug the thing upstairs and set it all up by myself. My parents generously offered to buy me a tree, but I really didn't want to deal with it.

Okay, yep, that is a Christmas tree. Somehow, I entered myself in a contest on KOIN 6 news. (Yeah, not really sure how that happened) Anyhoo, somehow I won. (Editors' note, I normally never win contests, whether I purposely enter them or not.) This beautiful tree is a 10 foot Douglas Fir. Since it is so big, I had severe difficulty in making it stand up straight. So, I called in the cavalry. Abby and Alyssa, my best friends mom and sister came over to help me get all set up.

Finally! I pulled out all my tree decorations, of which I have many, and get the tree all decked out. Thank goodness for the 20 foot ceilings in our apartment. There just won't be any presents under this tree, cuz I have to leave them all unwrapped since I have am flying to Boise, ID for a late Christmas with my entire family.

Now that the tree is up, it makes the rest of the decorations we have up fit in better. Until tonight, these lights were all we had.

Yep, that is a real fireplace! No, we haven't built any fires yet. Jessie went and bought stocking hangers, so "the stockings are hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that St. Nicholas would give more than their share!"

And last, but certainly not least, our kitchen counter. Seeing is not believing, Believing is Seeing! Apartment 2018 BELIEVES!!!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night!

Winter Wonderland Part 2 - the day in between the storms

This is our swimming pool at our apt complex. With snow all around it, I wouldn't even imagine going swimming, especially since there is ice all across the top!

The wind came up after the snow fell, and what leaves were left on the trees ended up on top of the beautiful white snow!

This is the road leading to the Portland Temple. It was absolutely beautiful!

And once again, the really awesome red bushes.

Winter Wonderland

Winter has finally come to Portland! I woke up this morning to snow, actual snow on the ground. And there was about 1 1/2 inches already. It was beautiful. So I decided to take a walk.

It was beautiful! There were quite a few people out enjoying the snow.

When I left my house, it wasn't snowing that much. But, as the walk went on, it started coming down faster.

The trees were absolutely amazing.

My walk took me by the temple. The road directly outside the temple is a little hill, and there were kids sledding down it. They looked like they were having fun.

The temple grounds were gorgeous, but the gates were locked, so I could only get shots from outside the fence.

And finally, this is how our deck looked tonite. It is so pretty with the christmas lights and the snow. Too bad Jessie isn't here to enjoy it with me!

6 weeks later...

Frankie is fixed! And she is home! Yay! I was so excited when the auto body shop called and said she was finished. She looks just like she did before the eejit ran into me, with the exception of the license plate, which was bent at a 90 degree angle, and they had to straighten it out. So, it is all scraped up. She drives really well too. 6 weeks in a rental car sure made me appreciate Frankie even more.

Here we go again!

So, a lot has happened since last month. First and foremost, I got fired! Yep, you read that right. Apparently, it took work 26 months to decide that I don't fit. Hmm, interesting. Anyhoo, so now I am looking for something else.

Frankie is still in the auto body shop. It took 2 weeks for the insurance adjuster to look at her, and then he left about half of the repairs off! He told me he had approved all the repairs, and that he had left a check at the repair shop, and all I had to do was sign it when I picked Frankie up. Well, then the awesome repair shop called me, and said that they noticed he didn't really approve ALL the repairs. So, they filed for a re-inspesction. Thankfully, that happened the very next day, and this time, they did include everything. Now we are just waiting for the parts to come in, and then I will get her back. That means I won't be driving my own little car until the middle of december. Aaaagh! a total of 6 weeks in this rental car.

On the headache front, still have a headache. Surprise, Surprise. I have been working with my dr's doing all sorts of not fun tests...CT Scan, MRI, a ton of blood work, several different meds, and finally a spinal tap (well, 2 of those). The current result is that I don't have any tumors, brain bleeds, serious infections, or any other major disease. As my neurologist put it...it's just a headache, albeit a bad one. But now we can treat it as such, without worrying that we are missing something big.

So that is me now. Not much fun, but it is my life.

Rear-ended!

Yep, I got rearended tonite on the way home from work. Sitting on 217, at a complete stop, and some eejit runs into the back of me! Poor Frankie...now she has to go to the dr to get fixed. At least it all goes onto the other guys insurance. I am over the royally ticked off phase, and am now in the just mad phase.

On a happier note, my amazing niece and nephew are eating real food, and are still growing like weeds.

Aren't they cute?