Afscheid 2012!

Time seems to have flown, especially since the movers will be coming next month to pick up our household items, then we'll be flying back to the States the following month. It's kind of crazy to me that it's already the end of the year, not to mention, our time in Belgium is almost up! 

Here's some memorable events from 2012: 

In January, I got to go to my first TNA Wrestling event with Eric over in Brussels. I mean, we traveled to London the year before, but Eric went to that event on his own while I chilled out at the hotel and got pampered at the spa. Hard life, right? Anyway, it was pretty cool to see in person, especially since the place wasn't super super packed and we got to sit fairly close to the ring :) 

In April, Eric went to Non-Commissioned Officers Academy and graduated! He was gone for a total of six weeks and he learned to be extra responsible, lol. I was (and still am) EXTREMELY proud of him! AND, he smiled willingly! VICTORY!

In June, I had a fabulous "girls trip" to Poland to do some more pottery shopping. We ended up staying at a place called "Palac Brunow" and it was absolutely AWESOME! 

In July, Eric and I celebrated our FIFTH wedding anniversary!! Oh my goodness! It feels like we just got married yesterday. It's rather crazy how much time has flown and all the things we've experienced together. Obviously, I'm looking forward to many...many more years together :D

In August, I got to see the last Flower Tapestry in Brussels for quite a long...long time. Hopefully Eric and I can come back for our ten year anniversary or something to see it again :) 

Oh, and we welcomed Grimm to the family in August :) He's a standard sized Wirehair Dachshund with a massive personality. Since his arrival, he's brought loads of entertainment, laughs and snuggles to our lives...he's definitely a perfect fit for our family.

In November, I got to spend my 30th birthday with Eric in Rome! We stayed at a fantastic B&B, got to see some amazing sites, and made some wonderful memories :)

Also in November, Eric, myself & a group of gals went to Poland to do our last round of shopping. I realize when I went in June, I said it was gonna be my last one...but obviously I couldn't stay away from the place. Not to mention, Eric was really wanting to go since he was jonsing for some Polish food. 

In December, we started the process of buying our first home! I'm SO excited!! I'm looking forward to having a place that's OURS rather than renting a place or living on base. Decorating ideas have been running through my mind non stop in addition to finding lots of things I can do in our soon to be new city. 

Hopefully, everyone will have a very Happy New year and start off 2013 on the right foot :)

Tomorrow, is the first blank page of a 365 page book.

 Write a good one.

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Guest Room Galore!

Now that I know we officially have a home waiting for us, all sorts of ideas are popping into my head. As you saw in a previous post, I talked about what I wanted to paint in the living room, how I wanted to make our stairs look like massive books, along with a variety of other things. 

We'll have a guest room available for people to stay in while visiting. Of course, I have ideas in terms of that room and the "theme" I want to go with... 

If you know me, it really shouldn't surprise you that I want to have an aviation themed space in the house. I grew up with my Dad taking me to airshows in addition to teaching me about WWI and WWII  planes, medals, events..basically anything and everything under the sun. I think that's why I have such an interest in antique / historical things. As I've been hunting online for ideas and inspirations, I came across this really cool planked picture on several design sites, but it was never really listed as to how much it cost or where to get it: 

Turns out, it's actually from Pottery Barn. And it's $300. Errrmmm...that's a little rich for my blood, especially since I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to validate to Eric the price tag. Vintage furniture? Sure. But some planks of wood with an image on it? Nah unh. After looking over the item description, it pretty much dawned on me that I could totally do this myself. 

Here's some images I found and altered which I can use to make the impression print. I realize the one that Pottery Barn used looks like a vintage airliner...I prefer the super cool planes like a P-51 Mustang:

With this image, I'd have to resketch it out so I can get just the lines and make it flush with the horizon:

I can pick up the wood pieces from Home Depot for somewhere around $30, I already have white primer paint as well as sandpaper to make it look aged...then it shouldn't cost that much to get a print made of the plane so I can mod podge it to the boards. In total, I'm probably looking at $50 to make it, if that. 

Then for the rest of the room, I'm going to incorporate some airplane models my Dad has built over the years, repaint a dresser to look more vintage in addition to getting some brushed steel accents for around the room. I'm hoping I can pull it all together so it has that 1930's -1940's feel. Maybe I can sweet talk my Dad into giving up his badass wood propeller he has laying around...

I'm gonna try to find an old wood footlocker and make it look like it fell out of WWII with various markings in order for it to look like it's seen some action. It'll hang out at the foot of the bed:

...or even the wood trunk I picked up near Brussels: 

Of course, we'll need an old school globe:

Annnnd I think I wanna get an old aviator cap, flight goggles and a spiffy scarf so I can have it look like they were just hung up after a long day of flying. Of course, I'll use reproduction ones since I'm sure my Dad would twitch himself into a fit knowing that I'm using real, historical pieces as decor that'll just hang around a room:

Yes, Dad. I know this is a British issued flight cap...stop twitching....

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Ramping Up

GAH! So much is going on!

I'm trying to keep track of all the stuff we're counting down to. Next month is going to be a complete whirl wind since I'll be going on a trip, packing to move, shipping to move, then twiddling my thumbs till it's time for us to leave. 

Like I mentioned, I'm going on a trip...to Scotland to be specific. I'm rather excited to get over there since I really REALLY wanna check out the castles. Plus, it's a gorgeous country. I mean, who wouldn't want to go there? 

Over the last week, we've been busy with appointments in order for us to get everything set up for the move. OH my gosh. There's SO much to get done, it's a little overwhelming. I still need to plow through my office to get it all organized for the movers. Not to mention, there's a lot of 220v we need to sell off since we obviously have no use for it when we're back in the States. I have a funny feeling that the movers are going to pack some of that stuff anyway because they'll literally pack anything / everything (including garbage). If any of those 220v items happen to hitch a ride to the US, at least we're going to a massive base where the odds of someone else moving to Europe is pretty high and we can still get rid of them...I'd just prefer not to deal with them at all, lol. 

THEN, I gotta ship off my beloved Xterra. That's going to be a little hard for me since she's my baby and I'm rather fond of having my independence. The last time we had to ship her off, the place where we dropped her off were jerks to me...wasn't exactly a good experience (in my eyes). Oh well, at least Eric and I will make the best of it since we'll be over by the French border and venture around there for a little bit...

Our flight has already been arranged to fly back to the States. I'm very...VERY sad about leaving Belgium. Well, Europe in general, but we're very very fond of our little Belgie. Luckily, the people in charge of our traveling managed to get us a straight shot to our destination since we're concerned about our fur babies enduring multiple layovers, especially since we'll be in transit when it's still fairly cold every where. 

Of course, once we're back in the States and get our bearings together just a smidge, Eric and I will be heading over to New Mexico to finish up all the paperwork required to get our home! I'm SO excited about having a place of our own! I've been corresponding with our Realtor ever since we found out where we were moving to ...finally found *the one* in terms of a home earlier this month and have been signing whatever we can. Luckily, a friend of mine was able to do a walk through on our behalf with the Realtor to make sure the house was on the "up & up"...gave us the lowdown and ultimately gave us the thumbs up. Like I said, I'm VERY excited to get our own place :) 

The fun part is the whole "waiting game" in terms of our stuff showing up. The guy in charge of the movers told us it'd take about 55 days for our household stuff to show up in New Mexico, and the same thing goes for my Xterra. What we'll probably end up doing is that I'll stay behind in California for a little bit in order to catch up with friends and family while Eric & John stick around in New Mexico since John needs to get back into school. My truck is actually being sent to California, so when that arrives, I'll be able to pick her up, hang out for a few days till Eric is able to meet up with me and then we'll tag team the drive back to New Mexico. LOTS and lots of work ahead of us...it's kind of crazy. I'm thinking that there really isn't going to be any sort of "relaxing" done until..hmmm...June. 

Aye aye aye..

PS: Like my new signature? I was fiddling with an app on my iPad and I was able to bust out with the way I actually sign my name. Now I'm all super legit..WOOT! 

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Decorating Dreams

As I've mentioned in a few posts, we'll be moving to New Mexico at the beginning of 2013. The upside to the whole thing is that we're working on getting our own home. OUR OWN HOME! OURS! Not the Air Forces...not a rental...OURS! I'm over the moon about the whole things considering I'd FINALLY get to decorate my house the way I'd want to. When you live in base housing, you pay out the wazoo to fix things (like a smudge on the carpet, or a pin hole in the wall from hanging a picture)...and landlords can be jerk offs when it comes down to you changing wall colors and, again, pesky holes from pictures. 

In my current house, I only have a total of eight things on the walls...it's a little depressing. And I was only able to do that because the holes were existing. If you didn't know any better, you'd think we hated family pictures or something. SO, first thing in our new home is that ALLLLL the fun family pictures we've taken over the years will go up! Yippy! 

One thing that I'd love to do is paint our stairs to look like iconic books. This is a FABULOUS example of what I'm talking about! We're all book nerds, so this would be very appropriate for us:

There's a closet right off to the side when you come in the front door. I'm thinking about making it like a "coat rack" sort of area where Eric can hang all of his junk, in addition to an area where I can hang my purse so it's not taking up space on the counter. I'm torn between the two different ways it can be done, but I'm sort of digging the first option:

Of course, I want to install roll out shelves in the closets for bath towels and various bedding things..

When it comes to the kitchen, I want to do something sort of like this (but in a toned down color) by using a flat paint then doing designs in the same color, but with a gloss finish. I think it'd really pick up the scroll designs on the kitchen table as well as the hutch we have: 

The main project I'm going to do is going to be awesome. Time consuming, but very awesome. I've wanted to do a family tree painting for quite some time, but since we're never allowed to paint on walls that didn't belong to us, I had to sit and bide my time. Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

Well, now that we'll have our own house, I can actually do the mural!!! After searching for a while in terms of something that tickled my fancy, I finally stumbled across a very colorful tree picture that would be *perfect* as a family tree for our families:

Now I just gotta do the footwork to get old pictures from when various family members were kids, or when they got married to add to the mix. I'm rather stoked to start that project once we're all settled in. Eric's pretty excited about it himself because he wants to see how OUR home is going to turn out once we're finished with it. 

Of course, there's lots and lots of other stuff I wanna do, especially since I'll still have a fair amount of free time on my hands till I manage to find some sort of job to pass my time. I'm already working on getting stuff set up for John in terms of a school...that should be fun!

At this time, we're still in the works for the house, but we've put an offer down, it was countered and we've settled on it. Actually, I just got an email while I'm writing this that the offer was accepted, so YAY! Still lots of stuff to do, but it's inching ever so closer to obtaining a home for us to...well..come home to when we move! 

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

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Last Ditch Trip!

I can't believe how fast time is flying by! Mentally, I'm wanting to just plant my feet in the ground and say "NO! You're not gonna make me move! I belong in Europe!"...alas, the Air Force is a thing you can't really argue with. 

Le sigh. 

With that being said, I'm going on a last ditch trip before we officially move back to the states. I'm going to Scotland, baby! YEAH! 

Actually...I think the landscape is gonna look like this more or less since I'll be going in January: 

Either way, I'm just thrilled to have the chance to even go there! Unfortunately, Eric won't be able to come since he'll be busy with work and doing all the important stuff he's gotta get handled in order for us to move. Being the awesome man he is, he told me go ahead and go since I'll end up kicking myself for passing it up. 

Ya see, an old friend of mine lives over in Montrose, which is about two hours from Edinburgh. He extended the invite for me to come over and visit for a bit because 1). We got lots to catch up on 2). He knows I've been wanting to go to Scotland 3). IT'S SCOTLAND! 

I'm actually rather excited to be in that town because I really...REALLY miss living near the ocean. Plus I can venture around a place I'm not really familiar with aside from checking out the typical tourist places. Of course, I want to check out Edinburgh and all it has to offer, possibly check out Balmoral Castle near Aberdeen..aghhhh..too many choices! Luckily, I'll be there for a week, so hopefully my friend is understanding and I'm gonna be on the move non stop to see all the things :D

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Grimmy Snow Time!

Actually meant to post this last week, but I've been a little side tracked with other things...

Alrighty, so a week ago, we started getting some snow! YAY! I remember when Piper experienced her first time with it, she was in heaven! Sadly, I wasn't able to get it on video then, but this time around, I managed to get Grimms first experience on my handy dandy iPad!

I wish I could get this excited over the little things, lol. Unfortunately,the snow melted off the same day...and ever since, it's been raining on and off. The weather forecast is calling for some more snow this week, but we'll see how that goes. I just want some more Belgian winter weather before we roll out to the desert! 

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Animal Party!

As you all know, we're dog people. Hell, we better be considering we have five oh so rambunctious ankle biters! From time to time, co workers of Eric, or friends of friends, like to come by with their fur baby either to have us puppy sit for them, or just help with socializing...even though some of our dogs are rather bratty (Macie, to be specific)..so it makes life interesting in the house. Either way, it leads to entertainment..

On that note, let me introduce you to Doc:

He's a super sweet American Stafford who is like a XL version of Grimm..and he's about as stubborn as a brick wall. We're watching after him for the next week since his Daddy is back in the States to get married to his beautiful fiancee'. 

Doc is about eleven months old while Grimm is just hitting around seven months..so those two have been playing NON STOP. I'll hear random things crashing throughout the house, skidder skattering around corners, yipping and growling..all sorts of mayhem. LOTS of mayhem. Their favorite thing to do is play around my kitchen table. Ehhhh wellllll...play isn't the word. Grimm uses it for hiding purposes from Doc in order to get some sort of relief from the constant stompings and smushings:

For the most part, they play together rather well even though Doc is still learning that he's a lot larger than Grimm.  In the midst of playing, he can get a little carried away and pins Grimm to the floor then proceeds to lay all over him. Who helps to keep him in check when he gets a little too skitzo? Macie, of course! I think she takes over with baby sitting Doc when I'm either worn out from chasing him, or when I actually need to attend to my house and work on things. Eric refers to her as "The Protector of the House"...and she's definitely a force to be reckoned with!

I'll tell you what, I'm seriously shocked as to how "sturdy" this dog is! I realize Staffords are a beefy breed, but this guy is SOLID muscle, and his head is like a ....I dunno how to describe it. I can totally see why they're used as guard dogs, intimidation and all that other manly crap. When he yawns or gets a treat, the noise his mouth makes when he snaps it shut reminds me of an alligator..that large hollow "snap" sound. Then whenever he rests his head on me, you can just feel the weight and how solid his skull is...MUCH different than what I'm used to with my little Dachshunds. But...aside from all of that, he's a complete love bug (as the breed is in general) and it's rather disheartening that the mass has such a bad reputation. When in doubt, cookies get them to behave...

So, there you have it. I'll definitely be kept busy for the next week whilst I wrangle a super wiggly Doc, attempt to make progress on prepping for the movers next month, trolling for a home in New Mexico and trying to squeeze in a nap at some point. 

Whhheeeeeeeeee!!

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