Rain, Rain GO AWAY!!!

Being the unproductive housewife that I am, this rain is just killing me! Dutchess won't go outside to use the bathroom, so she follows me around everywhere I go (tripping me, of course!) Everyday the weatherman says,"clearing skies tomorrow" but I swear it feels like it's been raining non-stop for a week!!! This is a picture of my front yard or lake front property, you decide!!!

Well Jeremy has been busy working all day everyday and I keep busy running errands and studying. It's been such a big ordeal just for me to be able to register for my exam, which makes studying the last thing I want to do. Long story short, the driver's license office in Austin is running behind and it will take 6 weeks to get my new license. The Federation of State Boards of PT (in Virginia) won't let me take the test without a license unless I change my information back to Clark. The Executive Council of PT/OT (in Austin) originally said they couldn't change my info back to Clark, but later said if I mailed a letter for permission they would, then after my test I could mail another letter to change it back to Nelms (paperwork NIGHTMARE!!!). Apparently I am the first person in the history of this exam to have encountered this problem and no one really knew what to do. So, instead I am attempting to get a passport in (ridiculous that it's quicker than a license) time to test when I want, and not have to wait 6 more weeks. Told you it was a long story ;)

Paris has been good to me. It hasn't been too bad living here. I joined a boot camp-like workout program that some local military guys do. It's 4 days a week for 10 weeks. Working on my trophy-wife look so this is helping!!! Plus it's helping me other people in the area. The only bad this is that right when I leave to go workout Jeremy is getting home from work, which makes it really hard on these rainy days to stay motivated to go.

Well we are just staying busy still setting up house and studying. I just can't grasp the idea of studying everything I learned in 3 years in a month which makes getting motivated that much harder. But hearing all of our friends passing the test every week keeps me motivated so that we can join the "I passed on my first try" club. Oh and on a side note, so we got to Cabo and my camera battery was dead and I forgot the charger. When we got back home I realized that the battery just wouldn't charge. I called the company and they said the battery was faulty and sent me a new battery!!! So (eventually) I will post pictures of the house. Plus, our table should be here any day now so I want to wait to get pictures of that too :) (THANKS MOM and DAD!!!!)

Little Update!

We finally got internet yesterday at the house and I think I have been attached to my laptop ever since! We have most of the house set up. At this point, we are just lacking hanging up pictures and a dining room table. But all in all the house looks great!!! I learned in Cabo that my camera has given up on me. Not sure what's wrong, but I can't post pictures of the finished product until I do (the battery won't charge-any problem solving tips???). But the wedding was great and so was Cabo. Once I get the wedding pictures back I will post lots and lots!!! Oh and I did make a video (very Shawna and Lindsey-like) but it's on Jeremy's phone and that's as far as I have made it!

Jeremy and I have started picking up the ol' books again and studying. I get most of mine done during the day while he's at work and then he comes home and studies at night. I recently tried a local boot camp and I think I have found a new workout favorite! It's run by the local military guys and 2 days into it, I am definitely feeling it! But I mostly like that everyday we do something different, so maybe, MAYBE I won't get burned out! Well hopefully the next time I remember that I have this thing I will post pictures-of the wedding, Cabo, or the house!!!

T-minus 9 days!

We are hastily trying to get the house move-in ready before we leave for Cabo for the honeymoon- so far, so good! We had to go to Home Depot (which at this point, we should get to live there rent free for all of our money they have!) today to price the last of the small details. We were attempting to negotiate a deal and when Jeremy threw out the amount we were going to spend, I thought I was going to have a heart attack! Keep in mind, I have been trying to keep tabs on how much we have already spent this far and it's OUTRAGEOUS so to throw another mortage-like payment at them I couldn't believe it! But in the end, it will all be worth it, right? (I hope so).

So a delayed update but we have both finished school and have jobs. At least we have that to look forward to. Jeremy is going to get a temporary license and start in September working in acute care and I am holding out to pass my boards and start in rehab in October. Everything seems to be falling perfectly in place for our transition into married, working people! Oh and we applied for our marriage license. Texas is very serious about this! It was $72 to get the plain old license and wait 72 hrs before we could actually use it -OR- take an 8 hour course on marriage and get the license for $12. Since our time is worth way more than $60 at this point, we opted out for the simpler, more expensive way.

On a random note, have you ever heard of a blister bug? Well apparently they exist in East Texas and I had to learn the hard way. You can guess what my leg looked like, I will save everyone from actually seeing how disgusting it was! Anyways, we just put the sealer on our beautiful wood floors we just resurfaced. So once the floors dry I will post pics of the final project!

Update!

To say that our house has changed drastically would be an understatement! Here are some pictures over the last month or so. The top half are older and the bottom half are more recent. We have most of the paint done now and just have the wood floors left to do. We were able to pull up the carpet which I think made a HUGE difference in the way everything looks! Sorry for so many pictures...

Josh was such a great helper! If you ever need someone to paint edges...hire him!

So Jeremy had the genius idea to use his spray gun to paint the ceiling....and you see the end result!

Here is the living room....

..Dining room.....

...Bathroom....

...our bedroom....

Okay these are the important pics...they actually show the AMAZING progress we have made! Here is the front door going into the living room....

More of the living room...

This is the guest bedroom closet


Windows in the guest bedroom
This is a view of the dining room looking into the living room


More dining room (I think I am proud of the blue)...

This is the hallway going from the guest room looking into our bedroom...

Yes there are FIVE wooden windows in our room. Pretty to look at, no so pretty to paint!

Our closet in the bedroom (Jeremy's handy work)

We have double, sliding closet doors that go there, but we are holding out to put them up!


The bathroom tile that I must say I am truly impressed that Jeremy did all of it!


The toilet Jeremy is so proud of.....



...because of the flush "buttons"........yes, it has a "1" and a "2" button based on the amount of water you need. (see why he LOVES it so much)

...AND then there is the kitchen, TBD. We are planning (when we have jobs, i.e. $$$) that we will have the counter "L" to the left so we can have extra space. We are going to do bead board halfway up the walls, but the color we still aren't sure about. Cabinets are another story, but hoping we can salvage them and make them work! Whew....that took awhile!

our house!!!

so a few weeks later I finally remembered to put some pictures up! The house already looks different from these pics, but these are a good start! Jeremy is spending just about every waking moment at the house when we are in Paris and it really shows! But we still have a LONG way to go before we call it home :)

DAY 1:

The outside of the house :)

the UGLY bathroom.... wall paper isn't the funnest thing to peel off the wall

The kitchen is going to be the biggest project....that will have to wait til we have paychecks!

The dining room looks out on the the back deck/yard....Dutchess is going to LOVE the huge yard (compared to sharing the little one with Gracie, Phoebe, Gal, and Mia!)

The beautiful old windows in the living room I am working to improve!

DAY 3:

The wonderful semi-walk in closet Jeremy had to knock out 2 walls to make for me :)

ok make that 3 walls he took out! We decided sliding doors would be the way to go so that took more wall demo'ing!


The bathroom SLOWLY making improvements

And even more to come :)

ar-Kansas

Since I have been back for a few weeks now, I thought I should finally post some pics! Jodie and I made the most of Arkansas and actually had some fun! We didn't go out much but we did manage to explore a state park while we were there. Here are some pics from the day!

So you can actually walk across the waterfall but I knew I would manage to fall in so I passed on it!
We took our first attempt of geocache-ing (sp?) and actually found something! This was the treasure.....
The cache was called "where have all the trolls gone" very appropriate since Jodie found it under the bridge!

Less than 4 months away!

This is one of my favorite of the engagements pics so I thought I would share! Well today we both wrapped our last day of free labor. Tomorrow we will be "re-united" haha! It's been a long 8 weeks and we are lucky to have seen each other at all, but the last few weeks haven't made it any easier! I do believe the saying "absence makes the heart grow fonder" because we sure do miss each other! We will meet up for our short week long break in Paris so we can start working on the remodeling in OUR HOUSE! So many more pictures to be made and posted. It's definitely a work in progress to get it how we want it, but we are truly blessed that his parents are sooo kind to let us have the house (or at least borrow for a little while).

On the wedding update.....we have a band now-YAY! The band's name is South 281 and they a good Texas Country band so get your dancin boots on! If you want to hear some of their music check out their page: http://www.myspace.com/281south. But they are super nice and actually gave a deal so you can't beat that! But go to their tour page www. 281south.com to check out some of their tour dates so you can catch a show or two (we are!).

Well that's all that I have to update on. I will post pics of our home-in-progress. Hopefully all this "swine flu" business will go away so we can enjoy Cabo in August!!!