Home inspection: check!

The house passed with flying colors at the home inspection today. Here’s to smooth sailing for the rest …

Don't you just want to come visit?

 

prettiest green granite counters and plenty of them!

 

(That's my future office.)

In other news, Thommy was stranded in Cincinnati last night, after that FAA glitch that was in the news. He didn’t make it to Canada for the lest leg of his trip, but did manage to make it home safe this morning just in time for the inspection.

Heading to Blairsville EARLY tomorrow (Sat.) to visit with the Smiths and the Rosses, with a trip to Hyndman to see Mom and Grandma. Can’t believe it’s been a full year since we’ve been to Western PA.

Hope everyone has a fantastic Thanksgiving full of family and friends and most importantly, turkey, stuffing, and jello salad!

Blog ya later!

 

Some weekends you just buy groceries. Some weekends, you go buy a house!!

Crazy! True! We found a fantastic house on Saturday, put in an offer, and came to an agreement Sunday afternoon! It’s a beautiful colonial style house tucked in to a wooded neighborhood in Groton. Outside, it’s a grey-stained clapboard with white trim, and inside it’s a cozy little house with a coupla fireplaces, a 3-season porch, amazing kitchen, and a master bedroom with a loft.

Can’t wait to move in!

Home-made Pho

How hard is it to make Pho? It’s really not that difficult, but I would certainly do things differently next time. Here’s a basic recipe:

Really good broth, a lot of it. (Next time I’m in the mood, I will make a stock from scratch not from the store)

Meat: I used pork, which I braised. But I would also use chicken (maybe parts of the chicken that I roast to make stock)

Veg: It’s important to keep these crisp. I choose red pepper, carrot, and snow peas. I sliced them in to thin strips and added to the broth JUST before we were ready to eat.

Noodle: You need to cook the noodles separately from the broth. Very thin rice noodles (vermicelli, even though that word is decidedly not Thai) dropped in to rapidly boiling water for about 3 minutes.

In the end, grab a big deep bowl, add some noodles to the bottom of the bowl and then cover with veggies, meat and lots of broth.

Top with cilantro, thai basil, very thinly sliced onion, maybe some bean sprouts and maybe some hot sauce.

We’re officially house hunting!

We started in earnest last weekend, spending Saturday morning touring around with our new Realtor. (Yes, I’m capitalizing Realtor…everyone at Network understands, I’m sure).  We saw a handful of houese, only one of which really stood out. I’m fairly sure they consulted my subconscious when they painted the rooms, because the colors are exactly right for me. Anyhoo, we’re heading out again next weekend for more tours. It’s stressful to think we may be moving (again) during the holidays (again!), but we just may be able to strike a great deal with a seller that wants out of the market before the holidays. So we’ll see…

On a related note, it’s been a full year since we flew up to Massachusetts for the weekend, driving around and trying to decide if we wanted to live here. What a huge move to make, it seems like it was just the other day!

The next few weeks will include lots of traveling and seeing friends and fam…I can’t wait! Thanksgiving week in PA, a trip to Baltimore ..ending with a New Year’s Eve trip to Rohobeth Beach to ring in the new year with some great old friends.

 

 

MTH to BWI

Heading to Baltimore today for a quick work trip. My work trips are always crazy, fast, and super hectic. Can’t wait to hang out with Mrs. Reid tomorrow evening.  On the aJENda, “rock and roll all night and party every day.” Also on my to do list before I leave, locating specific animal-shaped surprises for a certain trio of tiny people…who’s last name starts with an H…. who have curly-q hair….any guesses…..

One last thing to leave you with today…chop stick kitty:

My fancy drink was so fancy

Last week I met some new friends, Molly and Lori, for lunch at Lemon Tree, which is a really great Thai place. (Molly and Lori work in Thommy’s office. Actually, they are the designers in Thommy’s office.) I ordered a Thai ice tea, which arrived with this perfectly folded little crane sitting atop my straw. How cute.

More idyllic countryside coming right up

On Sunday, we went to the Fruitlands Museum in Havard, Mass. I swear, I did not photoshop these images…the colors are just that amazing. We took Sam and then had to fight off the ticks (note: never walk dog through woods during height of tick season again). It was a great outing after such a rainy nasty Saturday.

Fall in New England

Each season this year has been a new experience for us…It’s been exciting to see our new home under snow, thawing out, full of green trees, and now turning back in to the colorful crisp New England we visited this time last year as we thought about making the move here. It’s hard to believe it’s almost been a full year!

These pics are all from our day at Walden Pond with Val and Charlie!

Val and Charlie come to Mass.!

We had a great weekend with Val and Charlie, who hopped on the Megabus on Thursday to visit for the weekend.

On Friday, we went in to Boston to take a walk and have lunch in the North End, which is like a little italy. Charlie had some recommendations from friends, and they were spot on. We had a great lunch followed by some fantastic cannolis. (stay tuned for pics).

Saturday turned out to be a beautiful fall day. We drove up to New Hampshire and had brunch at Parkers Maple Barn, did some shopping at L.L. Bean and then came back to Mass to take a walk around Walden Pond.

What? It was a pretty background.

Later that evening we went out for lobster. You’ll have to wait until Val sends me pics of that adventure (Hint: It was Charlie’s first lobster)

Catching up

My mom wants to know why I only blog once a week. If I blog more, she says, she wouldn’t have to call me all the time. And that would probably make us both happy. #facetiousness

So here’s what I’ve been doing lately.

1. Last week I tried a power vinyasa yoga class. Vinyasa = flow. Power = well, power. As in, “power up those thigh muscles…hold it…hold it (5 minute time lapse)….and back to down dog.”  It was a heated class, although not a “hot yoga” session…the room was about 75 to 80 degrees and let me tell you somefin, I was drenched in sweat within minutes. It was a great class and I will definitely be going back. But not this week, because….

2. My sewing class starts this week. I’m going to make this Amy Butler Weekender Bag. Off to Joann’s tonight to pick up a few things I need like super duper stabilizer and fabric for the lining.

Also,

This past weekend was Grandma Kipp’s birthday and Ellie Skepton’s birthday. Happy 94th birthday and happy 2nd birthday, respectively! Today is Robby’s birthday, so happy day to her too!

Annnnnndddd…. we did some house hunting this weekend. Went to a few open houses yesterday. Overall, we didn’t visit many we liked, but one did stand out. It’s a cute little cottage in the woods, it abuts conservation land and there’s a path to the pond from the back yard. It has a big open kitchen next to an open family room with huge windows and a big fireplace. Three bedrooms upstairs and a separate office space downstairs in it’s own semi-private section of the house. It’s kinda perfect. It’s also kinda over our price range. We’re going to keep an eye on it to see if it comes down in price.