First Weekend of Fall, 2009

It's been raining for over a week. Before it began to rain, I was worried about my boat. Our cove needs dredging and the water is very shallow at my dock. Two years ago, when we had a drought, we ended up moving the boat when the lake level dropped to 96.4. Last week, the lake level dropped to 96.3! I was calling Doug, asking him if I needed to move the boat. He was confident the boat would be fine until he arrived home to help. I wasn't so convinced.

But then the rain came! I think it started as outer bands of a Tropical storm that came up in the Gulf of Mexico. But then it rained, and rained some more. I watched Duke Power's lake levels every day (sometimes two and three times) each day last week. To my relief, the lake levels rose.

Yesterday, Saturday, it was still raining. Most of the day was misty, but we had several bursts of heavy, soaking rains. I just checked the lake level; LKN is up to 97.6! This is such great news! I was not (mentally) prepared to trailer the boat for the winter just yet. I was so hoping to be able to take it out as the leaves change color for a fall cruise or two. This week's rain will allow us to leave the boat in the water a little longer. I'm so happy!

Today, Sunday, the sun began to peek through the clouds. We squinted our eyes and commented how bright the sun is. It's funny how, when you've been covered with clouds for an extended period of time, the sun seems so much brighter than we remembered it being.

The commute to my new job takes about 45 minutes in the morning. In the afternoon, the commute takes longer as I travel through congested Mooresville. So I found another, back-road route. It takes me through a tiny little town called Catawba. And past an historic mill called Murray's Mill. This weekend, Murray's Mill held their annual Harvest Folk Festival. They've been advertising it for about 6 weeks with small road-side signs. When I took Doug for a ride along the same back roads we've never explored, he saw the signs and mentioned we should go. When I reminded him it was this weekend, he held true to his suggestion.

The day ended up being absolutely beautiful. The grounds were pretty soft and very muddy in places, but the Folk Festival was a great place to spend the first Sunday afternoon in Fall! There were horse drawn wagon rides, a petting zoo, an antique tractor parade, boy scouts demonstrating candle making, wood crafts, and even a hand made catapult. (Typing out "hand made catapult" is giving me a sense of Deja Vu... Hmmm.) Folk Singing families sang their concerts over at the mill all day long. Later in the afternoon, there was even a Civil War battle reenactment.

After Doug and I got home, we took the boat out for a cruise about the lake. There was not a lot of traffic; the wind was decent so there were a lot of sail boats out. A small helicopter hovered above the lake and we waved and the pilot and passenger waved back.

What a gorgeous day!

Fantastic Lake Weekend!

What a great weekend on the Lake!

Saturday, the lake was up to 99.8! I really wanted to discover my backyard at nearly full pond. So we ventured out and headed toward the dam. We could see no dam wall... just looked like an infinity pool. Awesome to have water in the lake!!! Then, Saturday night, the moon was so bright and big and the sky was clear; we ventured out for our first moon-lit cruise. We didn't venture far, and we went slowly, but it was so beautiful and relaxing.

Sunday morning, we got up early to beat the crowds; we wanted to take Denali out to a small island that has a little beach. Ian carried her from the boat to the shore and waded back out. He called her out into the water and she swam for the first time!!! It turns out, she really likes it! http://picasaweb.google.com/lzaras/DenaliSFirstSwim Later that morning (after we took Denali back to the house) we headed back out to our neighborhood cove and Ian tried his wakeboard again. He's really getting the hang of it. When we got back to the house, I swam in our little cove and laid out in the sun.

LOVE LIVING ON THE LAKE!!!

Teen Car Ownership ... a mini rant.

Why is it that teens today feel like they are OWED a car? They expect their parents to provide them with their own personal transportation? I only have one child, a son. He's one of those with of the mindset that he is OWED a car. We've tried to teach him differently.

When he was younger, he went through a stage where he wanted to quit everything he was involved in: baseball, soccer, playing the trumpet, boy scouts, etc. We tried to find ways to motivate him, but he's just difficult to motivate. We wouldn't let him quit trumpet (he has natural ability) or boy scouts. In order to keep him in scouts, we proposed the following, "Mommy and Daddy hope that when you turn 16, we're fortunate enough to be able to purchase a third vehicle. IF you were to make your Eagle Rank, the type of vehicle might be of YOUR choice. Otherwise, mom and dad will purchase a vehicle of our choice." This worked.

However, it took him so long to finish his Eagle, our circumstances changed. We needed to purchase a third vehicle long before he'd even thought about his project. We purchased an 11 year old, beat-up, small pick-up truck. It was relatively inexpensive. It was the family's third vehicle. Period. There was no $$ left for a fourth. We needed the truck to haul stuff while renovating the house we'd purchased. We gave him permission to drive the truck to/from school, scouts and work. Since he was driving it, we made him pay for the additional insurance (for a teen driver) and he needed to keep the tank relatively full. That's not to say his father wouldn't fill the tank when he drove it on a weekend. And his father showed him how to change the oil, so he takes care of that, too. Any other major repairs, tires, etc. are paid by us. It's still our vehicle... not his.

But the kid, still resents us. He's earned his Eagle Rank and he's p*ssed that he doesn't have a car of his own choice. He feels like we tricked him.

He just finished his first year in college. The college is 3 hours away. He lives in a dorm. We didn't let him take a vehicle to school. I needed mine. His father needed his. And we still needed the truck at home to work on the house. So he got pretty grumpy and depressed when he couldn't come home on the weekends when he wanted to. He hated asking around to bum a ride.

This summer, we are looking to replace the pick-up with a larger one. His father is planning on using it as his primary vehicle. So his car is going to be available for the son to take to college. Son is STILL looking at car advertisements; I don't understand. But he is driven by the fact that he feels like he needs his OWN vehicle. I think it's dumb. If you're given a vehicle to drive as you want, why would you want to go and spend your $$ on another vehicle???

We told him we're not helping him if that's what he wants to do. He'll need to get a better paying job. He'll have to purchase the vehicle. And insurance. And gas. And maintenance. And repairs. Once he buys a car of his OWN, it's all his responsibility. He wants it so bad, but I just don't think he's really ready; mentally or financially. Yet, he keeps looking.

Just a short note... Pet Friendly Lodging

I know! It's been WAY too long since my last post... and I'll get around to why in a few weeks, I suppose. But today I ran across something I just needed to share!

I've always been amazed at how you can wonder about something; so, you go to look it up on the web and you find something else of interest... so you follow along to that... then it leads to something else.

So, I was interested in Dog Agility Training. And before I found the information I was looking for, I was finding myself looking at schedules for the next Dog Agility Trials in my area (which just happen to be NEXT weekend!) Looking at the information for the trials, I found the place for my next Mountain Vacation. I want to bring Denali here: http://www.barkwells.com/

I can just picture it now, cool, crisp days with Denali romping across the mountainside, meeting "friends" along the way and introducing her to waterfalls and mountain paths! I'm usually more of a Beach person, but I'm thinking I REALLY want to try this place.

Denali's First Birthday

It's Denali's first birthday! She got to help mommy and daddy re-pot house plants on the back deck. Then she took a ride to the Canine Cafe (http://www.k9treat.com/,) where she took over the duties of "Welcoming Committee." She wasn't too happy wearing the birthday hat, but it was just too cute!!!

She had lots of choices for her birthday cake...

She had so much fun at the Canine Cafe, she needed a nap on the way home.

Then, later in the evening, she was able to partake of her Peanut Butter and Banana Birthday Cake. She had a very good day!

Happy Birthday, Denali!!!

Denali's First Beach Trip...

Her first trip to the beach...

This past weekend, we headed to Doug's dad's place in Charleston. Just a quick 30 minute drive to the beach from his house.

As we were crossing the bridge onto Sullivan's Island, there was a flashing sign that read something about a leash law and that dogs were only allowed on the beach between 6:00 pm to 10:00 am. There was something else, but we passed the sign too fast to see what it was.

But the policeman in the golf cart informed me what it was... Denali didn't have her "Dog Beach Tag" and he was required to write me a ticket for $10d00 for not reading the rules before we entered the beach with the dog! $1000! Then, as he explained the "Dog Tag" policy to me, he also said that City Hall was only open on Monday through Friday and I wouldn't be able to get a tag on Saturday anyway. So she would be allowed to stay on the beach until 10:00 am. Other than that, I should take her up to Isle of Palms where they don't require "Dog Tags."

Denali, the outlaw puppy can be viewed here:http://picasaweb.google.com/lzaras/DenaliSFirstBeachTrip

One Week with Wii

Last Friday, I picked up my Wii. Friday night when I got home, Doug had been busy scraping the “popcorn” off the ceiling in Ian’s bedroom. We decided on a dinner of, well, I don’t even remember what… that was a week ago!!! Anyway, I was too pre-occupied with getting my Wii set up to see how/if it worked.

OH! I remember now!!! I decided to cook some spaghetti at home so I could set up my Wii. While the sauce was heating up, I began making my Mii. When Doug came down from Ian’s room, I showed him… “It kind of looks like you.” While I cleaned up after dinner, Doug headed into the den to set up a Mii for himself… after that, we opened up the games; Wii-Sports and Mario Kart.

We were familiar with the bowling (at least I was) so we started with that. It took a little while for Doug to get the hang of it; he kicked my b*tt! I expected that. We went to the training section of the disc, he kicked my b*tt in most of the exercises except the Power throw. Somehow, I managed to get a bronze on my first go-‘round. Huh! Go figure! Then we checked out the golf. I’m not a golfer, so holding the remote seemed awkward. The other games we looked at required two remotes if we were going to play 2-player; my second remote was on backorder with Amazon as a bundle with Wii-Play. So we ejected the Wii-Sports and put in Mario Kart. Doug tried it first. Popped the remote into the little Wii wheel and off he went! Not bad. Then it was my turn. He laughed so hard at me as I crashed into walls and objects and fell off the side of the road into outer space. But I did kind of figure out how to get some power boosts and stuff that he didn’t figure out… Anyway, that’s gonna take some more practice on my part.

On Saturday, I had a class at Johnson & Wales University. They offer “Chef’s Choice” classes for people who are not regular students. This class was called “Basic Cake Decorating.” The cake was already baked for us. The Italian Buttercream frosting was already prepared for us. The marzipan was already colored and measured out for us. The chef demonstrated the procedure for cutting one (frozen) cake into three layers; brushing each layer with a simple syrup; filling and spreading seedless raspberry jam on one layer; spreading buttercream on another layer; frosting the top and sides of the cake, getting it even and smooth. Then creating the marzipan rose. I thought mine came out pretty, well, Pretty. Take a look!

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The demonstration cake was cut up and we were able to sample it! The simple syrup the chef used was infused with some rum. I think that added a nice flavor to the raspberry and buttercream. I didn’t do that with my own cake, but if I make this again at home, I will definitely do that!

We got out of class much earlier than I had expected. So I got home and rescued Doug from the scraping by cooking him some soup and grilled cheese. Then we had cake for dessert. This one is mine:

For dinner, we had to plan for dessert, so I had a salad, with fat-free dressing, at a local restaurant called Showmars. Doug had some sort of pork dinner that, as we walked into the restaurant, smelled like carnival/ or fair food. He ended up having way too much food on his plate, but he did his best to finish it all off. “Remember,” I said, “we have cake at home for dessert.” At home, we had a re-play of night one… getting further in the bowling training; getting better scores in bowling and Doug tried his hand at some more Mario Kart.

Sunday, I needed to do some laundry. Still planning out my meals to include cake, I decided to make a Weight Watchers friendly 3-Bean and Pork Chili. So I headed off to the grocery store. $58 later, I was on my way home with my ingredients. There were some ball games on this day, so we didn’t play much Wii before we headed off to bed. We mostly just used it to check out the weather and the news.

By now, I’m liking the Wii, but I haven’t become addicted. I also haven’t broken out the Wii-Fit which was the whole reason I went on the Wii-quest in the first place.

Monday evening, I tried my hand at a few games of bowling, a little bit of the training and checked out the tennis and baseball. Ugh! I s*ck! So I tried to back up and head over to the training exercises for the tennis and baseball. And just before I headed off to bed, I opened up my Wii-Fit. I had purchased a silicone cover for the balance board, so I put that on and put the batteries in. I took the instructions up to bed with me. I read through them just before I turned out my light and went to bed. The weather man was calling for 3” – 6” of snow in our area for the next morning and I was looking forward to trying out my Wii-Fit and going into work a little late.

Tuesday morning, I expected to wake up to a bright, glowing room, illuminated by the reflection off the winter wonderland outside my window. But as the alarm went off at 5:15, I realized my room was still dark. What the…? I got up and peered outside. NOTHING! I headed downstairs and bundled up to take Denali out.

She’s been funny the past couple days… the cold weather is new to her. There have been times where, when she’s squatted to do business, a strong, frigid breeze comes up across her bottom and she jumps up and runs back into the garage, “Nah, Ize donts haz t’do bizzness rite now.” To be completely honest, I was totally looking forward to spending some Doggie/Mommy snow time together.

My driveway was dry. There was just a dusting of snow along the edge where the grass and driveway meet. There was also just a little in the valleys on my car. Bummer! So, I got her back inside and gave her breakfast. I put the gate up between the den and kitchen and headed into the den to inaugurate my Wii-Fit. (Haha! Get it? “Inaugurate.” Fitting since this is the same day as President Barack Obama’s inauguration.)

So much set-up before you can get into it… 30 minutes later, I’d only done about 4 minutes of balancing exercises and the thing tells me I’m “Unbalanced.” I bet there are a lot of other people that know me better than my Wii-Fit that could have told you I was “Unbalanced.” The one good thing that did happen during my first session with my Wii-Fit… my first body test tells me that my Wii-Fit age is 30!!! I’m thinking that’s really more of a matter of beginner’s luck than anything. But I’ll take it!!!

Wednesday morning, the alarm went off at 5:15… oh, so cold. Just a little snooze. Reach over, hit a button… brain engages, “That’s not the snooze! That’s the OFF button.” But the music didn’t go off, so I try again with the correct button, the snooze button. Roll over, re-comfort myself… 75 minutes later I look at the clock. 6:30. Sleepy brain not registering… I’ll just wait for the alarm to go off… should be going off any minute… actually, any second. Where’s the music? What the…?!? I must have gotten that thing turned off somehow… That, or I slept through the music when the alarm went off again. No Wii-Fit for me this morning.

Wednesday evening, Ian calls to tell me some good news. He’s been rushing a fraternity at school. There’ve been recruitment activities for the past 1.5 weeks. He’s just been informed that he got invitation to a bid dinner on Friday night! It’s invitation only!!! Could this be? Is he receiving a bid? We’re crossing our fingers. He calls back later, “Dinner is dressy. Could you send my dress shirt, Sports Coat, and shoes? Oh, and I’ll need a tie and a belt.” So I spend a good portion of the night trying to track all this stuff down to send to him. Reminder: His bedroom is under renovations and has been completely emptied. All the contents of his room are somewhere in the upstairs spare bedroom. So finding this stuff that he needs is more difficult than it sounds. I call Doug, “Have you seen his dress shoes? How about his ties? Are they in your closet?” Doug informs me that this particular week, he’s commandeered one of Ians’s well-fitting, new dress shirts and his most classy, preppiest tie! Figures!!! Now, I hate to admit it… but as all freshmen do, Ian has put on a little weight since he started college. I find five pairs of pants, khakis and dress, that still have tags on them. They are all the same size, WWxLL. But I wonder just how much weight he’s gained. So I call Ian back, “Ian, those pants you have there at school… what is the waist size?” He states that they are the same WW as the new ones at home. I inquire about how those pants are fitting. He’s assuming that I’m bugging him to lose some weight, “I’m working on it.” I explain that I’m not trying to press him to lose weight… I just want to make sure that if I send him these pants, they’re going to fit him and make him look nice for the dinner. I begin to wonder if I need to take a trip to Raleigh on Friday to take him shopping.

So, it’s later at night before I have a chance to turn on the TV and Wii. But I do… “Oh, it’s late… Aren’t you ready for bed?” the Wii asks me. Meh. If I’m gonna do it on Wednesday, it’s gotta be late. Checked out some yoga, Hula Hoop, step aerobics and leg lifts. I like the step aerobics, but for some reason, my brain cannot comprehend the steps that are coming up. I tend to get in a groove, “up, up, down, down…” and keep going. When it’s “up, up, side, side…” I tend to mess up. Then the Wii pauses to give me some pointers… but I just want it to keep going… I’ll figure it out!!!

Thursday morning… no Wii Fit. Nor Thursday night; I had to go get some new tires put on my car… that took longer than expected. Then, Doug is home from G’ville and we’re catching up.

Friday morning, the alarm goes off at 5:15 and I’m up. Down to take Denali out and turn on the TV and Wii. It tells me, “You skipped a day… you know, you’ll get the best results if you workout EVERYDAY!!!” I work through my favorites, adding a running session and manage to get 30 minutes of Wii in (actually it’s about 42 minutes of Wii, but only 30 minutes of logged exercise time.) Then it’s off to take a shower, run to the cleaners to pick up some of Doug’s shirts (one of Ian’s is in the bunch) and head out on the road to Raleigh. Yes, I decided to make the drive up to see my boy. We had a great day! Lunch, shopping, hugs! What could be better???

The Wii Fit seems a little slow right now. I guess because we’re just starting out and just learning how to do the activities. Some of them don’t seem like they last long enough to get benefit from them. I’m hoping that as I continue, the activities will become longer in duration and I’ll feel like I’m getting some benefit. Right now, all I feel are tight, squeaky, old hips. Maybe I need to lay off the Hula Hoop until I get a little stronger.