No More Moving...For Now

Today, I'm spending my abundant free time trying to get a bit more "settled" into our apartment. For any of you who did not know, Greg and I agreed to rent this apartment after seeing only a few pictures on the internet. Turns out, we probably couldn't have done any better even if we'd come out here for a visit. Although we had moved all our belongings in and put them away, we really had not bothered to decorate or hang pictures in case we decided to switch apartments in May. This weekend we decided to go ahead and renew our lease, which will run until May 2010. If we stay in this apartment the entire time Greg is in school, it will be the longest that we have ever lived anywhere! :) So since it is rainy out today, I'm trying to hang pictures and situate things a little better. Once that is done, my plan is to start painting some again. Wish me luck with that...it's been awhile!

This weekend was pretty uneventful for us. Saturday morning started with a "homemade" haircut for Greg (aka Chia Pet!). The weather was nice, so after that we headed to the park to play tennis with Travis & Shannon. Unfortunately, the nets have not been put up yet, so we just goofed off and played with the dogs for awhile. That evening, the old movie "One Million B.C." starring Raquel Welch was playing for free at WSU. We went to watch it with some friends. It is truly amazing how far movies have come!! I don't think the movie was originally intended to be a comedy, but you never would have known that from all the laughing going on in the audience.

Sorry for the lack of pictures this week... we really just have not done anything out of the ordinary this week that seemed worth taking a picture of. Maybe this weekend will bring something a little more interesting for you all to read about!

Moscow Mountain

Sunday afternoon, we loaded Dixie up in the back of the truck, packed some snacks, and headed over to Moscow, Idaho to Moscow Mountain - the one and only mountain in this area. We were joined by Travis, Shannon & Ginny (the weiner dog) and by Ken & Nicole, who provided the directions. A word to the wise... Google directions are very questionable when backroads are involved. Luckily...we got lost. That may sound like a mistake, but we just happened to pass a couple of guys who had gotten their 2WD truck stuck. Greg to the rescue! Greg got his chain out of the back of the truck and a few short minutes later the two guys were back on their way. It could have been hours, or a long walk for those two if we hadn't gotten lost. They were trying to dig themselves out with shovels. Anyway, they were able to give us directions on how to get to the base of Moscow Mountain. We finally found it, and set out on our way. Ginny ran around for awhile, but because of all the snow that was still on the ground, her little belly got cold and wet in no time. So Shannon wrapped her in a blanket, and Ginny got a free ride for awhile so she could warm up.

She actually whined until they let her back out to walk with Dixie. I think Dixie would have liked to trade Ginny spots! The hike was basically just an access road that wound around the mountain. Nothing too extreme. We think that there was another trailhead somewhere that had better hiking and biking trails with more scenery...maybe next time. To add a little "spice" to the hike, Ken broke out an emergency heat blanket to try sliding down some of the snow banks. The sheet didn't last too long, but he and Greg got a few good runs in before it disintegrated.

Although we never really reached a summit with a view of all of Moscow, we decided to turn around up on top because it was snowing and everyone was getting hungry. The best view we had was this one from about 3/4 of the way up the mountain. This was actually before it started snowing. On the way back down, you couldn't even see this much.
Before we turned around at the top, we took a quick break to eat some of the chocolate (from the night before) and some cookies, and to take a group picture. That is Shannon (with Ginny) and Travis on the left, and Ken and Nicole on the right.

Valentine's Day on the Cheap

An article on MSN Money on Friday stated that Americans - even in the midst of our economic woes - were expected to spend approximately $14 billion on flowers, candy, and Valentine-related products by the 14th. It probably comes as no surprise that Greg and I were not part of that statistic. Saturday morning, Greg washed my filthy car, and even cleaned out the inside. Afterwards, I fixed him bacon and heart-shaped, chocolate chip pancakes.

Ta-da! Valentine's Day presents!

Dixie also gave us a hefty present, but it was NOT to be confused with chocolate or flowers!

Later that evening, we were joined by some friends for dinner (homemade) and for our own candy-making extravaganza. Using my "As Seen On TV" Chocolate Factory, we melted chocolate to pour into molds of teddy bears, heart-shaped suckers, flowers, and in Greg's case, snowmen. This is him working on his grand masterpiece. His chocolates were quite a grab bag of surprises. An almond here, a blob of peanut butter or a marshmallow there...

And here is the finished product of everyone's efforts!

Of course while we were making chocolates, Dixie was also quite busy. We took her to the park earlier in the day to play some ball. This was the first sprinting she had done in quite awhile, so she was busy recovering during all the chocolate making.

It has been one week since my last blog post. Not surprisingly...there hasn't been much of anything new to report on. The weather has been nice, in the 50s a few days this past week. Dixie and I have been holding the fort down throughout the week. It's official...we are back to our regular, old, boring selves! :)

Saturday we decided to take a drive to Lewiston, a town about 30 miles south of Pullman in Idaho. The town stunk...literally. There was some type of plant along the river that was causing quite a smell. The town was fine, a Walmart, a mall, nothing too special. The drive to get there was interesting. Huge rolling fields, and then down a steep mountain to get to the town. Here are a few pictures. The first is a view of the entire town from the overlook at the top of the mountain. The second picture is from the parking lot of one of the shopping centers. We still haven't gotten over the drastic change in scenery from West Virginia. The entire way down the mountain, there was not 1 single tree in sight. Weird.

Today (Sunday) we got some furniture. We had been checking Craigslist.com daily to try and find something to complement our "couch-in-a-box." We went to look at an armchair with a matching ottoman and discovered that there was a couch to match also. The lady agreed to throw in a coffee table and side table also, so we made the purchase. Our living room is now crammed with furniture! We went from an open, somewhat bare living room, to one that you can barely manuever through. The futon may be getting moved to the spare bedroom as soon as we do some rearranging. Here's what the living room looks like for right now.

And finally, because no post is complete without a picture of Dixie... this is Dixie getting a professional blow-out after her bath today. She's too spoiled to even stand up during the process. I think she's ready for showbiz!