7 years ago...

This is a picture of Alex and me at the butterfly release on our wedding day.  Seven years ago today...

A lot has changed since that day.  We have a lot more stuff, a lot more responsibility and even more love.  When I look back at the pictures (terrible...our photographer sucked) I realize how fast the years have gone by.  Here's a picture with even worse quality.

This is from our first prom.  I guess it would have been in 1997.  Look how cute we were!

We have grown so much since then.  Fortunately, we grew and changed together and we have never been stronger.  We make each other better people.  We have beautiful children.  We make each other laugh.  My husband is patient, witty, brilliant, handy and hilarious.  He is a wonderful father, provider and friend.

Happy Anniversary!

Sorry for the gooey post...I'll be back with embarrassing toddler stories soon.

Delayed Update

It's been a while since we wrote to the blog.  Our computer took a permanent trip to the farm last week.  It slowly started resetting more and more often until it was too much of a pain to use.

So, we got a new family member.  Here's the pic:

She's pretty.

I also got a new lawnmower.  It's a 2003 Troybuilt, to replace my 1997 Scotts with a bad transmission.  The Troybuilt has a seized engine, so I swapped the engines.  This was a little bit of a mess since the engines weren't the same.  It's running again, but I don't have a muffler.

I also swapped television cable, telephone, and internet providers.  I had the same companies for 6 years, and they were really taking it to me.  We now have better everything for less money.  I like DirecTV, and all their HD channels.

Another new thing is that we started a budget.  I'm not the best at having a budget, but the little lady likes to have one.  I don't need a budget to help me spend money, but presumably, Lettie does.  As long as this doesn't hinder my lifestyle, I'll give it a try.

And lastly, we've changed our eating habits.  This originated from the chickens, but what we eat has been a focus lately.  One example of our change is, no more high fructose corn syrup.  Almost everything on the shelves has corn syrup for no reason other than to rot our teeth and make us obese.  I don't think the switch has been a big deal, but Lettie should tell us more details sometime later.

I think you are mostly caught up, except for the hypermiling challenge results.  I would talk about that, but the dog is in here with me and she has gas.  I need to go.  Spoiler alert, I didn't win.

Hypermiling

I've entered a hypermiling competition with a few guys, and an entire lunch is at stake. The competition consists of filling up our gas tank and driving normal for 1 week. Then fill up the gas tank and compute the normal gas mileage. Now drive with any hypermiling tactics you can deal with to save gas mileage. The winner has the biggest MPG improvement between weeks.

I filled up yesterday to complete my control week. I got 24.8 MPG. I'm not pumped about that since I don't see how to improve that number much with my 1992 S-10. Chris, the crazy neighbor, is in the competition as well. He emptied his entire car interior before starting his hypermiling week. You can see a little video of the empty car on his blog: http://diycarguy.blogspot.com/2008/07/eclipse-weight-loss.html The weight savings equates to higher MPG, and he looks really cool without unnecessary interior in his car.

Here are my tactics for this week:
1. 35 psi in all the tires (they were between 22 and 26)
2. drive 5 mph less than the speed limit
3. accelerate extremely slow
4. use neutral to an extreme. coast to a stop
5. don't let Lettie drive the car AT ALL
6. use the air conditioner when I'm hot, but no more

I've thought of plenty of other tactics, but I'm not sure of their roadworthiness. To compete with the tactics of the other crazy contenders (Eclipse weight loss, drafting behind 18 wheelers, etc), I decided to streamline the aerodynamics of the truck. Here's a picture which shows duct tape sealing door handles, the junction between the bed and cab, and the bumper (all the wind eddy current creators). I bet my truck is silent and efficient through the air tomorrow. Compete with that.


I think we should continue the competition with a week of EXTREME hypermiling. I could put bicycle tires on the truck to reduce friction. I would definitely remove the bed of the truck and any other unnecessary weight. It's also been mentioned that I should build a cone in the front and back of the truck to shape the air. Any other bright ideas?

Mourning Chickens

The chickens are in mourning. They have requested black ribbons for their chests. One of their beloved namesake has left this world for a better place.

Here's the story.

Chair mistreatment

WARNING: This post is not about the chickens!

Yes, the chickens are cute and all, but I would like for us to maintain a well-rounded blog, so today I'm going to talk about awesome decorating stuff.
Our computer chair was brought to our marriage by Alex and it has definitely been around the block. The original covering is some god-awful durable canvasy fabric in a puce color that is probably designed to hide stains. I have re-covered this chair 3 times now and it was time for the 4th recovering. Sorry I don't have any pics of the other fabrics-that was long before we documented every boring detail of our life with our camera.
The latest covering was the chicken fabric that matches our little recliner that's in the study. The fabric is very cute, but it's light and not very durable. As a result, the computer chair was looking pretty sad-it was covered in grubby toddler hand and mouth prints.
Doesn't he look sad?
I found a scrap of pretty upholstery fabric for $5 last week at Hobby Lobby. I thought I could make new couch pillows with it, but it wasn't even enough to cover 2 pillows.
So...I thought...I can take a cue from the nester and "mistreat" our computer chair.
The fabric covered the seat of the chair just fine-I used the staple gun to attach it underneath. When I got to the back of the chair, I had some difficulties. I couldn't stretch the fabric enough to tuck it in completely. I won't admit out loud how I got the fabric to stay, but I will say it involved a lot of burned fingertips.
After that, I had a seam that was in the wrong place-what's a girl to do?

Out comes a clearance yard of fuzzy fringe! I love it! He looks like a cute little lion now, or actually, kind of like a tassel. Thanks for the inspiration Nester!

Ready To Leave The Nest

Today we are completing Week 3 for the chickens. They have grown in ridiculous fashion. At this point, they have most of their feathers, but still lack a little on their necks. Their wings have grown in, and they like to flap around the box. They also fight with each other when the box walls start to feel claustrophobic. I thought fighting would focus on beak attacks, but no. These guys jump, flap their wings, and use their feet to claw at each other's head. It's really quite violent and I hope Jackson doesn't see this. It is not in my best interest to give him another tool to use during a terrible tantrum.

I worked on the coop some more this weekend. I didn't get as much done as I wanted (as usual). It's close, but still not done. I think the girls will move in as soon as I can get it finished. Here's the current picture: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexlettie/2666614080/

We've decided the coop will move throughout the yard where next year's garden is planned. Our cucumbers have been growing like crazy, and the tomatoes will be excellent if they ever ripen. I like gardens. Next year's will be dramatic.

Jackson has been talking like crazy lately. He wants to learn the right way to say his words, but most of them are still difficult to understand. Jackson is also excited about his upcoming Happy Birthday party. It's a 2.5 year party since he didn't get a 2 year party due to a little brother being hatched. Jackson expects everyone to wear birthday hats and I expect everyone to give praise to the finished chicken coop.

Weekend Update

The chickens have been doing great. They have already grown so much. Feathers are starting to show up on their wings, and they have all gotten bigger and taller. I have been amazed at the amount of food and water they consume. I am equally amazed at the amount of fertilizer that exits the chickens.

Rose has become a real pet. I placed my hand in the box this evening, and she ran over and jumped on it so she could get her petting time. The other chicks are still hesitant to jump on and go to the big world. That's ok, their jobs are to keep us in eggs. I think that will be a doable task since we used 0 eggs this weekend. I'm trying to keep up with consumed eggs so I know how many more chickens the coop needs to house.

All 4 girls had their first outside experience this weekend. They attended a picture shoot in Lucy's fence. They knew better than to stand around in the wide open so I had a difficult time taking pictures when they weren't underneath the grill. You can see close up shots of each chicken on the flickr site. For Drew, Lettie placed a description of each chicken so you can begin to learn their personality. I don't expect you to be experts on our 4 chickens just yet, their personalities are very complex and deep seeded.

Before they went to bed tonight, I adjusted the heat lamp for night time temperatures and I heard some commotion. Sophia was chirping and running around the box at break neck speeds. She had captured a moth. The other chicks didn't care, but Sophia knew she had a real treat. She just didn't know what to do with it. That Sophia, always the first.

Pop, Jackson, and I went to the airshow today. I missed Saturday's show as I waited on Jackson to wake up from his nap. He didn't wake up until after the Blue Angels started flying. Today I took him to the show before his nap and figured we would stay as long as he wanted. Jackson did fine thanks to Lettie packing lots of food. He had a picnic and vroomed his hand all over the sky with the airplanes. He got tired about the time the rain showed up. It was very unfortunate what happened when the tents blew over in the wind. The three of us were very close to the tents when they blew over as we ran to our car in the sideways rain. We knew something bad could have happened with all that pipe being flung around while the tents flipped like dominoes, but what did happen is heartbreaking.