Katie & Alex - The Married Life

[katieandalex]

The ducks. There were a ton of ducks down there and a bunch of people were sitting there feeding them. Hahn was definitely not very interested in them.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A6746ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A6748ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A72%3B7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A674%3Aot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A72%3B9ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A8652ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A6742ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A72%3B3ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

The I-74 bridge at a distance.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A72%3C2ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A8655ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A72%3C7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349693%3B59%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B5%3A8658ot1lsi

[NicksBride]

aww thanks for sharing, Hahn has gotten sooo big and he looks like he was having a blast!!!!! enjoy the warm weather:cool:

[Goin2thechapel]

Hahn Is sooo cute!!!

Thanks for all those awesome pictures! I swear I come on here daily just for the pictures..LOL

[katieandalex]

Yeah, I know. I'm a picture fanatic! LOL!

Yep, so I got a new car yesterday. I couldn't stand the Sentra anymore....and the deal worked out....and it was an awesome deal at that. So I'm now the proud owner of a 06 Chevy Cobalt SS/SC 5-speed.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B9%3B%3B%3B46ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24664ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24%3A55ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24669ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24%3A64ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24674ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3A6496%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24%3A69ot1lsi



We also grilled out last night and I have pictures of Hahn's first grill out. He was having fun catching all of the scraps Alex was losing on the deck! LOL! I'll post them up tomorrow probably.

[NicksBride]

OMG, I LOVE LOVE LOVE your car. I want it, what a fun car to drive I bet. I am jealous!!!!

[katieandalex]

OMG, I LOVE LOVE LOVE your car. I want it, what a fun car to drive I bet. I am jealous!!!!

Thanks. I love it too. Its super fun to drive. Its the closest thing I could get to my Z24...and ****, I loved that car.

[NicksBride]

I just love it. It looks like your weather is getting warmer as well, seeing grass is always a good sign. :)

[katieandalex]

Yeah, its colder today. I started raining later last night and was getting colder, today we only have a high of 45...big difference from the highs in the upper 60s lower 70s we were having this weekend. But thats Iowa for ya...

[katieandalex]

Picture time from the grill out!

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232373237343%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E2323732376977ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E2323732376979ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323732373443ot1lsi
Hahn was having fun catching all the scraps that Alex was throwing around the deck! LOL!

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E2323732373446ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232373237697%3Aot1lsi
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Me being stupid

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3496%3B9975%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E2323732376982ot1lsi
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[hummingbird521]

Hahn has gotten so big. Thanks for sharing the pics. I love your car. That is the kind my DD would love to have for graduation in a couple years.

[NicksBride]

aww I always love looking at your pictures they are so great. Hahns little face says it all when he is looking at Alex. You both look very fit and trim as well! Thanks for sharing.

[Goin2thechapel]

hehehe...Your family is soo cute!!! Thanks for sharing!

[ladymelissa]

I just love Hahn! He is such a cutie!

Wasn't it nice to enjoy some warm weather? I loved it!

[katieandalex]

Yeah too bad its colder now. :( Boo. Hahn was terrified to come out on the deck at first. Alex opened the door and he just stood in the door scared to go out, and Alex just picked him up and set him on the deck and he was fine and running in and out of the apartment the rest of the time. lol

Got our federal tax refund back...showed up in our account this morning. Yep, by the end of the week, it will be gone. I already set up the payments to pay off 2 credit cards and make a big payment on another. When we get our state refund back, we will be paying of 2 more....it will be nice to have those gone. After that, we will have pretty much no bills (other than cars and our parents).

[NicksBride]

That is fantastic! I am jealous, sounds like you guys are doing well!!!!

[katieandalex]

The apartment got a bit of a face lift today. I purchased a few new things for it today, love them! Here are some pictures.

Before
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E23236%3C7%3B76243ot1lsi

After
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E2323732%3B%3B%3A5%3A3ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E2323732%3B%3B%3A3%3B7ot1lsi

A new picture frame I've been dying to get. All the pictures in it are ones I took of our hometown.

[katieandalex]

Before
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236%3C%3A%3A54667ot1lsi

After
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323732%3B%3B%3A5%3A7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E2323732%3B%3B%3A3%3C3ot1lsi

New candle sconces. I saw ones similar to these in a friends PartyLite catalog, but I wasn't about to spend $30/each on them, when I knew I wanted 3. I was excited when I saw the set of 3 at Target for $20! I had to get them.

[katieandalex]

Finally bought a frame for our 11x14 portrait from the wedding. It came with a mat to make it 8x10, but I didn't use that, plus I didn't think I would like how a mat looked with the picture....you'd be surprised how hard it was to find a frame in the style I wanted!....you'd think it would have been easy since it was just a simple black frame, but it was so hard to find a 11x14!

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E2323732%3B%3B%3A5%3A9ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E2323732%3B%3B%3A3%3C7ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

I also purchased something that is inspiring the design I want to go with in our office.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349747397%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E2323732%3B%3B%3C2%3A%3Bot1lsi
The green and blue vase that I'm using, is actually a drinking glass from Pier 1. I saw it and fell in love with it for a vase to use as the main point in our office. I wanted to do blues and greens after we decided on the desk we wanted since it has blue glass.

I'm doing something similar to this for our shelf my dad is making for our living room.
Here is a picture of the shelf again....though ours will be smaller.
http://www.pier1.com/images/catalog/p02123952_500_500.jpg
But we are going to use candle holders like this:
http://us.st11.yimg.com/us.st.yimg.com/I/bevfabriccrafts_1937_258356147 (http://us.st11.yimg.com/us.st.yimg.com/I/bevfabriccrafts_1937_258024373)
And we are going to have the clear marbles in the bottom with a single white flower. There will be one in each opening in the shelf...I was going to do red flowers, but I remembered that we wanted to paint the walls red in our house when we buy it, so this way we don't have to switch out the flowers when we buy a house.

[NicksBride]

Very cute stuff! I love the frame and the 11x14 picture of you and Alex. It all looks very elegant.

[Twigler]

I love that picture frame! And what cute pictures of your hometown. That is a really great idea. And that is something that you will always be able to take with you anywhere you may move to.

[katieandalex]

yeah, I love our hometown. I would love living there if it expanded more to have more things to do like where we currently live. And probably in a good 5 years it will be like that because its growing so fast as it is. But I just love the downtown area...though it is starting to turn really bad with gangs and murders and drugs and such....but it doesn't change the historical part of it all...and man, that town now has 90,000 people in it, and I remember when my hometown was considered a small town in Iowa with only 30,000 people.....how times change.

So I got reading up on the housing market and how it definitely is not the time to sell...I started looking at houses in town here and we can get houses in the neighborhood we were looking at last year for about $25K less. In that price range, we would be able to buy a house...if we had a decent down payment. So we are going to try and save up as much money as possible and pay off my parents as fast as possible and try to get into a house this fall....we'll see how that works, but we can always hope....if not, there is always next spring after we get our next tax return back.

[NicksBride]

That is to bad about the downtown area getting run down. Burlington is the same way. We have SOO many homeless people and gangs that walking around at night is really just not an option. Working a probation Officer I am always amazed at the crime that Burlington has in the past few years!!
YEA on thinking about getting a house. It is always a nice thing to have. :) Good luck.

[katieandalex]

Nothing has really been going on thats very exciting lately....

Tomorrow is mine and Alex's 6 1/2 year anniversary of being together...which means that next Friday is our 6 month anniversary for be married....my my how time flies.

Hahn has been being really bad lately. Wednesday and Friday morning he pooped in the house. He has been really bad with whining and barking when he is in his cage and hes been crazy with chasing Chewy and barking at her. And everytime we take him outside now he just walks around and sniffs for like 10-15 minutes before he goes to the bathroom...even if he signals us that he needs to go out. I talked to a friend at work, Jamie, and she said that dogs sense the change in weather and it might just be affecting Hahn really differently....I mean it is the first spring that he has experienced so he might just be excited about it....he might be getting a bath with a good brushing today...we'll see.

Alex and I have pretty much no money right now because we have been working so hard with paying bills. We just want them gone and we want to get rid of my parents ASAP too. When Alex gets his bonus from work in the next couple months we are definitely paying off my mom with the money and any of the extra we will probably pay to my dad. But we are trying to get rid of the bills and save a ton of money (which is where a lot is going as well) because we would really like to try and get into a house in the fall or very beginning of winter. We are really sick of apartment living....and since our credit scores as a million times better than they were when we looked the last time, it may be easier for us....and we will also have a down payment with our savings.

Thats about it...nothing exciting, just work.

[NicksBride]

Good to hear from you. Was wondering what was going on.
Taebo is HORRIBLE lately as well, doing the same thing and he is about 11 months old. So this is his first REAL spring and sometimes I wonder the same. But he barks, whines, and scratches in his cage and has been peeing in the house. We are working on it. He is still a puppy in my eyes. So we are working on differnet things. i am sure Hahn will calm down and give you much needed peace. :)

Well it sounds like you always have a plan with your bills that is the most important part. :)

[katieandalex]

Yeah so it must be something with the spring....since Hahn is going to be 6 months in April, its probably just not knowing what is going on since its their first full spring. I'm glad to hear that its not just my dog being weird....but hopefully we get them straightened out.

Alex and I did a little craft project together last night. LOL! We painted my headlight housings on my car.....man, it took like the whole day and by the end of (we finished putting them back on the car at 9pm) we were just pooped....and he just chilled for an hour and then went to bed and both fell asleep within like 5 minutes LOL! I'll post pictures up in a bit of our success.

[katieandalex]

Well, now time for the pictures. With doing this we had to take the headlight assembly out of the car, heat it up with a hair dryer pull apart the headlight paint it and then put it all back together. We had tried this once with a different car a while back with the turn signal....and kind of f'ed it up. This time we didn't F it up so much...but one of the orange reflectors got a little disformed from the heat and there is a bit of the adhesive stuff that got into the top corner of the headlight....but other than that, everything turned out perfectly. The adhesive stuff will be covered up once we do one other thing we want to do, so no big deal there and we fixed the reflector thing a bit so it actually fit back into the assembly...but it looks great now.

Before
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3497%3A667%3A%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B9%3B%3B%3B46ot1lsi

After
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3497%3A6665%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323734999%3A44ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3497%3A6665%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23237349%3A5256ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3497%3A6665%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237349%3A5258ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

Yesterday came and went...and it was our original wedding date we had picked out. Good thing we switched our date...it rained the whole day. :( And good thing we switched our date from NYE too...because I wanted snow and there was no snow on NYE. :( Good thing we picked a good date since the weather ended up being exactly what we wanted.

[NicksBride]

ohh your car looks great!!!! Very snazzy as my nana would say. :)
Its funny to see I bet what your wedding day would have been like. I have been watching the weather forecast like a hawk for my day. Glad that your weather was nice for you and Alex. :)

[70707Bride]

Cobalt SS? Nice...don't ya just love it?! Mine is just a LT with the 3LT sport package thing. I want to take pics of it soon and then post them. Mine is black too. :) ....almost car twin! LOL.

[katieandalex]

Katy: Yeah I was like that too for our day...up until I went back home. I was checking the forecast everyday after the 10 day came up, but then I got back home the Wednesday before and completely forgot about it....

Jess: Yeah almost...mines just faster! LOL!

Tomorrow we have an appointment to take my car in for warrenty work....lol. One of my foglights is already burnt out....my friend told me on Wednesday night. I'm like "Oh hell no, I don't already have a burnt out light only after having the car a week and a half." So we are taking it in for them to replace it tomorrow.

[NicksBride]

Bummer about the car. Hope they get it fixed fast.

[70707Bride]

Katy: Yeah I was like that too for our day...up until I went back home. I was checking the forecast everyday after the 10 day came up, but then I got back home the Wednesday before and completely forgot about it....

Jess: Yeah almost...mines just faster! LOL!

Tomorrow we have an appointment to take my car in for warrenty work....lol. One of my foglights is already burnt out....my friend told me on Wednesday night. I'm like "Oh hell no, I don't already have a burnt out light only after having the car a week and a half." So we are taking it in for them to replace it tomorrow.

Lol. We drove a Cobalt SS and it was really nice and fast! Have fun!

[katieandalex]

Yep, the car got taken care of today. Everything is fine with it now.

We came home afterward and cleaned out our garage and just got back from going down to the pool. We got a letter in the mail saying we screwed up our state taxes, so we have to file an amendment and pay into our state instead of getting money back like we planned....grr...I'm so mad about it right now.

We are heading out to run some errands and then we are going to come home and start cleaning up our apartment to get rid of some ****.

[70707Bride]

I ended up owing IA money for taxes because they didn't take enough out. I hate it when they do that!

[katieandalex]

Yeah, what sucks is Alex has zero the whole year, once I started my lab job I had zero plus $10 taken out, and we still didn't pay enough in. That goodness that this year I switched my IA to zero plus $25 and Alex is going to switch his to zero plus $10, so $35 every 2 weeks extra will be taken out....hopefully that will help us break even.

[katieandalex]

today will be my first day in the Muscatine lab. I'm only doing a few hours in the morning though. My boss, Angie, called yesterday to see if the rest of this week I can go to Muscatine for a few hours and then drive up to Iowa City to finish the night off. Well, 1) she wants me to come in at 10 and I'm not supposed to be until 11 this week because I work Saturday, so yeah I'm gonna take overtime and 2) they are paying me for my time to drive from Muscatine to Iowa City, so I'm getting paid for 1/2 of my drive I would have normally made anyways, so hell yeah, I'll take the free money! But we need to get me in there training and getting the instruments up and running before I go there full time and we really need to get it set up because the doctor the lab is really there for has already started her practice and shes pissed that we don't have our stuff set up yet. Oh well.

Ugh, I really want a house. :(

[katieandalex]

Wow! Just sat down and figured out our budget with our new car payments and putting a ton of money in savings for a down payment on a house, yeah, we are on a super strict budget right now. We won't be buying much new stuff until summer probably when we get our last 2 bills paid off, but thats alright because we are more concerned with trying to get into a house this fall so we don't have to go through another winter at our apartment....we'll keep our fingers crossed.

[NicksBride]

Glad you got your car fixed, that is always a bummer. Sorry to hear about paying money, that stuff always super stresses me out. I hope you guys get it figured out.
Good luck at working at the new lab, it is never easy starting somewhere new, but it sounds like you are going to do fine and everything will work out for the better at this new plant.
Good luck with saving money, I know it is hard. but just keep a house in the back of your mind and it will be easier!!!! I will keep my fingers crossed for you!

[katieandalex]

Yeah, things at the new lab are really different....and a few people at my old lab are starting to get pissy about me moving....all I have to say, well in another week or so I don't have to deal with them anymore.

After driving there today, Alex and I really need to find a place to live on the other side of town. It took me 15 minutes to get out of town today.....it was just rediculous. I live on the east side of town and the new town I'm working in is southwest of where I live....its stupid. So if we can't buy a house, I want to at least find an apartment on that side of town to move to until we buy a house...we'll see how it turns out.

[NicksBride]

Why are they getting pissy? Because you got the better job? I hate it when people get mad at others for their success!!

[katieandalex]

Mainly thats the reason but she never said that. She was saying "Why are they taking you for that lab when we need you here?" I realize that they need the help in IC because on the 9th they are going live with the new computer system and everything so things will be crazy. And they are probably going to pull me out of IC for Mtine just before they go live. This girl wants me around there because they need the help....I'm not going to be any help because I'm not using that computer system in Mtine, so all I'll be able to do is put specimens on the machine and thats it. I can't help it that I'm needed in two labs and the lab managers are fighting over me right now. Its not my decision to make, I go where I'm told to go.

But I know that shes pissed because she was never offered the job. She was talking to one of her good friends that works with us too, Andrea. She said "You know, I feel a little left behind. Barbara is going to processing, Mark is manager now, Kara moved up to supervisor, you're moving to Micro...I just feel a little left behind." Then right after that it all came out that I was moving to Mtine. This girl has been there a bit longer than me, she started in March or April last year and I started in July. They offered me and my friend, Wendy the job first because we lived the closest to the lab. I would have been pissed if they offered the job to someone else first because of seniority......I don't know why this girl is pissed anyways, she would have never taken the job.

[NicksBride]

Maybe she is just jealous because everyone else is advancing and she is left to do the job herself. But like you said it is not your fault and in the world of working, every women for herself. That is great that you got this new job and do not let anyone make you feel otherwise!!!

[70707Bride]

I think people get mad when others leave because they know they're good and they don't want to do more work. At least that is how it is where I work! Its not like they can make you stay there anyway, you need to do what you want.

[70707Bride]

Hey, I had a question about MyPoints, since you are on there. Do you play the games on there? It is not telling me that I have to deposit money from PayPal or other to play in cash tournaments, but then it said in IA and IL it is not allowed to play for cash or something. So why would you deposit money?

[katieandalex]

I've never played the games on MyPoints. I've only just purchased things through MyPoints to get points or just went through the e-mails to get points. I don't have enough time to do anything else....

Yeah, I really don't care what she thinks...and really she is the only one that is showing that she feels this way. Everyone else has been asking questions about the new lab, what its like, how everything is going to work there...everyone seems very interested to find out information and seems very supportive of me moving there....and most of the people realize that this is more up my alley than what I'm currently doing...but this one girl, but we've never really seen eye to eye on anything before, we pretty much have a love hate relationship.

Things went much better today at the lab. I was actually out of there in under 2 hours. I went in and ran my controls for my precision checks and then ran my patients I had to run (we've been taking patient samples from IC with the results and running them in Mtine to do comparison to get the analyzers ready). And I was on my way to IC at about 11:45 or so. Everything went well and I got a few more things organized, but it would be nice if I had everything I was supposed to have...I'm still waiting on another computer, some more chairs, plus general office supplies. Once I get all of that stuff, I'll be ready to roll. Things are coming together very nicely, IMO.

But after today, I decided we have to move to the West side of town. So we really need to get looking at places since our lease is up at our current apartment in July. So I need to get looking this weekend or something for new places on that side of town, but there are also 2 other towns that I was goign to look and see if they had houses for rent or something like that available for us to get into just to cut down my drive through town.....thats whats killing me on my drive right now. It sounds like we probably won't purchase a house until next spring/summer. We have 2 more bills that we need to pay off plus my parents and we were planning on using our state tax refund to pay off the 2 so we only had my parents left, and obviously we can't do that....so we are kind of stuck. So we won't be buying until those bills are paid off....Plus we are not going to be able to put as much in savings as we were planning on because we need to get those bills paid off....grrrr. Oh well, one step at a time.

[NicksBride]

Glad things are coming together nicely at he lab. Sounds like a pretty technical job. :)

Good luck on the home search, I hope you find something that is closer and you both really like. Let us know what you find this weekend!

[katieandalex]

I talked to Alex last night about it, and we're not going to move unless whatever place we find is about the same rent as we are paying now. Its not going to cost a lot in gas for me to drive across town, it just sucks because my drive isn't much shorter than I'm doing now (shorter time-wise, its shorter mileage but I'm also driving slower). And a lot of the apartments in our town are $200/mo more than we are paying now. But if we can find something on the west side of town that is close to what we are paying now, we will be moving this summer.

[katieandalex]

I just went through the classified ads online and put together a whole list of apartments/condos/townhomes/duplexes that I can call about to ask if they accept dogs, rent costs, etc, etc. A guy Alex knows just moved into a townhome that he said was really nice. I told Alex to find out from him the information to contact the people and how much they pay for rent. I'll probably call some of these places, maybe today if I have time at work, or tomorrow.

[70707Bride]

I really hope you find something!

[katieandalex]

Grrr. Getting upset trying to find a new place to live on the west end of town. Those apartments I saw, we drove past this weekend, big no! There are some other ones I want to check out, maybe tomorrow...but I don't know. I mentioned them to Alex once before and he nixed them, so who knows. We'll probably just be stuck here for another year. :(

[70707Bride]

Aw, that stinks! I'll be wishing for a new home for you!

[NicksBride]

awww I am sorry Katie, I know how much you want to move out of the place you are in now. I will be wishing as well for a nice new home for you and your family. Keep looking, there has got to be something out there!

[katieandalex]

Yeah, we are going to go and look at a complex again. Last time we went and got information from them but we thought it was too expensive...but we never found out what all the rent included and we never looked at the apartments, so I think we are going to try and do that today.

I went home on Sunday morning and went to dinner with my family. I got talking to my mom about losing weight. I totally fell off the bandwagon and I'm doing terrible. I haven't gained any weight but its just so frustrating. She just sent me this e-mail today:


Katie,
Just wanted to drop you a note to say "today is a new day" and to remember that losing weight is not an overnight thing. I spoke to Jen this morning and she told me it has taken her from the 1st of the year to lose 10 pounds. So, lets do this together. Even if you can work at it as 1 pound a week, that is 36 pounds by Christmas. Wouldn't that be nice? Its not about giving up all you love. It is about making a consicience decision to eat less. I know that when you finally get on a reasonable shift and can eat your dinner at 6:30 it will help you. Just don't throw in the towel. Each time you give it, you probably just eat all you want which results in more pounds. Its all about doing more for yourself to feel better. I will try to be in touch with you more often to offer support for you. Have a good day. Love, Mom

I guess I'll try and start trying again. It will be much easier to eat better when I'm on days in Muscatine, but it will make it harder to workout. :(

[NicksBride]

aww, don't beat yourself up over it, it sounds like your mom is really a sweet lady. Loosing weight is perhaps the hardest thing ever! I have been a life long diet forever!!! haha. Its about changing your life and when you are ready you will do it. You are beautiful and as long as you are healthy and keeping active then the rest will follow. :)

[katieandalex]

Ugh, Hahn has been SO annoying lately, and I think its because the weather is being so weird now. Sunday night was the first night he did it, he didn't sleep through the whole night. He's slept through the whole night since the first night we got him. On Monday he woke up at 3:30am and started whining, I just ignored it, but finally by 4:15am I was annoyed by it and got up to see if he has pee'd or somethng inthe cage....nope. Well, since I went to check on him, I figured he would pee in the cage now since I was up. So i took him outside an dhe did his thing. The same thing happened on Tuesday, but it was a hour later. And then it happened last night too...but last night I just suffered through it and he'd shut up for a while and then start back up again. Ugh.

We went and looked at that other apartment complex, big no again. The price was a bit higher, but was tolerable for how nice the apartment was, but there was no way our stuff would fit in it. It was 200 sq ft smaller than our current apartment....which I think would have been fine if it was set up differently, but the living room would only have been able to hold our sofa that would have been right on top of the TV. Otherwise, it was really nice.

Driving around town, we saw some townhouses that we were going to go back and possibly look at though Alex wasn't very excited about it, he said that the neighborhood scared him. I'm thinking we are either going to be stuck where we are or if we really want to move, we are going to have to move to Bettendorf which is southeast of where we live now.

[NicksBride]

UGH, sounds like Hahn is taking lessons from our devil dog! He is terrible. Our dog does the same thing only he starts around 1, then he goes for awhile and then does it again around 6.I cannot remember the last we slept past 6. Just hang in there, it is puppy growing pains haha. It will get better!!!!

[Twigler]

I am sorry that you are having such bad problems with finding a place to live. I totally know how you feel right now. Our lease is up at the end of may, and we haven't found anything yet because we don't know how much $$ I am going to make so we don't know what we can afford. I wish you the best of luck.

Doesn't this weather suck!? Where'd that nice warm weather go?

[katieandalex]

Yeah, I know about the weather. My friend and I were just talking about it yesterday...this is fall weather, not spring weather. That was insane that we saw flurries yesterday....not right.

Gosh, with this new budget I came up with, I'm just not seeing how it looks so good on paper but it never works in reallife....arg. Well, we are paying off one of the bills this month...it was only $174 left, so we just decided to bite the bullet and pay it off. The other one is going to take 2 more months....it would just help SO much if we had my parents paid off....grrr.

[70707Bride]

I saw flurries yesterday morning! Ugh! This is April! No snow!

[katieandalex]

Exactly the way I feel as well.

As of next week, I will be in the Muscatine lab full-time. I have to come back on Tuesday to the Iowa City lab to fill in for someone, but other than that, I should be full time in Muscatine. Woo hoo. That means less drive, less gas money and getting home earlier!!!!

[katieandalex]

I re-looked at all of our bills and everything just now....we do actually have money, but I'm going to make it sound like to Alex that we still don't have any money...because if he thinks he has money, he'll find something to spend it on. LOL! I was figuring out all of our bills just off of one paycheck, but I never thought that we would have left over from the paycheck the previous week that was never spent, etc, etc. So I went through for the rest of the month and figured out, this much coming in, this much going out, and by the end of the money we would have over $1300 left over...and I thought we were going to be scrimping through the money. Either way, I transferred some money to savings (I thought we weren't going to be able to put any in savings this month), paid off our Kay's bill for our wedding bands and uped the payment to my last credit card. So after this month, we will only have 1 credit card (my Pier 1 card) plus the card we are using for gas every month that we are budgeting to pay off every month. oooh this will be so nice....Alex still thinks we will have no money though.....hehe, I like tricking him, but I'm trying to do everything so we can try and get into a house this fall.

[katieandalex]

After thinking while in the shower and talking with Alex yesterday. Alex is starting to sound more and more interested in going back to school. But we were talking about going back fall 2008, after thinking though a few things, fall 2009 would be much better. We would for sure have my parents paid off, his dad would be most of the way paid off, our cars would only have 1 year left on the loans and my current student loan I have would be paid off, so this way we would be starting fresh when going back to school. Plus, if we were going to go back to school in fall 2008, there would be no point in buying a house this fall to sell it next fall to move, so this way we can buy a house this fall and be in it for a year and a half or so before selling it and we can be much more set financially before heading back into school to have a thousands of dollars in student loans. I still haven't ran it past Alex yet because hes at work, but it sounds like a much better plan.

Alex kept saying how he could actually make money for the amount of work he does and I kept saying "If you go back to school and finish your enginnering degree, you'll make more than what we both make combined now." And then if I go back to school for what I want, I'll be working for the state and end up making what we make combined now...so we would be pretty well set.....so hopefully this flies and we can plan on going back to school fall 2009.....plus Alex's parents have been bugging him about going back.

[katieandalex]

I realized I hadn't posted any pictures of Hahn lately. Hes gotten really big...and needs to go to the vet again for more shots....I have no idea when he will be able to go, but at some point he will go again. LOL.

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349928392%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377884898%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349928392%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXROQD F%3E232377884%3A955ot1lsi

His fur is actually turning a little more biscuit colored than pure white now. Just like our **** cat...she was almost pure white when we got her, and now shes a dirty white.

And they still don't get along. They tolerate each other, if you want to say that. It got kind of bad there for a while where Hahn would just look at Chewy and she'd freak out, but now they can actually sit somewhat close to each other and be fine, as long as Hahn doesn't look a Chewy when he's close to her, she'll be fine....but they still do chase each other a lot.

[katieandalex]

I also never posted pictures of the chair my brother is going to make for us. We still need to buy the materials to do it, but I'm really excited about it. We had to stop at one of the car dealerships to take pictures and measurements of it (thats where I saw it and fell in love with it...and my brother made a couch for himself thats a very similar design).

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3499283%3A%3B%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E2323778849735ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3499283%3A%3B%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E232377884%3A969ot1lsi

Ours will be the black leather for the main chair and the chair pads for the bottom and back will be black with silver and white circles on it. We found the material at Hancock Fabrics but the one in Iowa City is going out of business so I'm waiting to see if I can get it on discount, if not, oh well. Then I'm going to have him make a black square ottoman to go with it, or we are going to buy one from Target that they have our right now.

[NicksBride]

ohhh so much has happened this weekend haha. I LOVE the pictures of Hahn of course. THe chair looks VERY comfortable and it sounds like you and Alex are doing well. I love your new avatar picture and phew I think that is it. Off to read more. :)

[katieandalex]

Going live at the lab has been crazy. Monday, I went in at 10am and didn't punch out until 10:30pm. The main managers and supervisors got in at 5-6am and didn't leave until 10:30 with most of us, an there were still some people there when we left that didn't punch out until 11:20. Everything just took so long because it was all so new....it was weird having like 30 people in the lab that late at night.

Yesterday was much better. We actually punched out at 9:15, things went a lot more smoothly yesterday. But I won't be there today....today is my official first full day in Muscatine. Hopefully that goes well, I have a lot to get done.

[NicksBride]

Wow that is a long day! i am sorry it has been so hard. HOpefully things will calm down soon!!!

[katieandalex]

Yesterday was my first full day in Muscatine. One of our analyzers is messed up and service is coming today to try and fix it. Grrr. But other than that, things went well yesterday and the day just flew by. And it was nice to be home by 6pm. We actually got to eat dinner together and watch American Idol....what the hell....anyways. Last night for dinner we had Three Cheese Tortileni (sp?) with vodka sauce....mmmm it was yummy.

[Goin2thechapel]

Aww...How awesome is it to have a nice meal together everynight.Soo who cooked?!?

[NicksBride]

aww dinner together must have been really nice! DOn't even get me started on American Idol the other night. ARGHHHHHHH!!!

[70707Bride]

Hopefully you can have dinner together more often :) .

[Panthers Bride]

Katie, because I'm feeling egocentric, I wanted to let you know we're getting married on your one year anniversary. I hope our day goes as well as yours did :D We especially want everyone to have FUN!

[katieandalex]

Of course, I cooked. I just got home and I'm starting our meal tonight...hamburger gravy with mashed potatoes...sounds gross, but its one of my favorites. Its nice to be able to make meals at home more often now, and also saves money too.

Panthers Bride: Its a great date. I'm so glad we went with the date we did because our other 2 dates that we originally wanted ended up having crappy weather but the weather on our wedding day was perfect. I hope your weddingi s just as beautiful. I can't wait to see pictures!

[NicksBride]

ohh you are becoming a regular Mrs. Susy homemaker! I am sure Alex loves it. Sounds like an interesting combination, sounds pretty good actually. :)

[katieandalex]

Yeah, Alex commented last night "This is pretty good." (we've had it before but I guess he never remembered) And then he asked what was in it and I told him and I'm like "Alex, you could even make this." And he agreed....so maybe he'll actually try and make it some night.

Katy, if you're wondering....its really simple. Just brown up a pound of ground beef with salt, pepper and onions. Once its brown, dump in a packet of brown gravy mix and a cup of water and let it simmer for a while. And then serve over mashed potatoes....super easy, and its a decent quick meal.

[NicksBride]

Thanks for the receipe Nick loves all of those things. Sounds wonderful. :)

[katieandalex]

Yesterday, Alex and I went out to the drag stirp for the first test and tune of the year with a bunch of our friends. It was a blast. It was probably the most fun we've ever had at the drag strip before. Usually when we go there are a bunch of people there that are bashing each others cars, but yesterday there wasn't. I didn't take my car out, but our friends, Evan and Dylan, said that won't let me leave the house without my car on the 27th when we go to Midnight Mayhem.

Today is an absolutely goregous day out. I think while Alex is at work, I'm going to go out and detail my car. We washed it last night and I knew it wasn't going to look so hot today since we dried it off in the dark....it looks much better than it did, but it definitely needs some more detailing.

[NicksBride]

You guys are so cute with your cars I love it. Glad you had fun at the strip and I bet your car looks awesome, I keep seeing your type of car around here and it is very hot! :) Glad you are enjoying a nice day. Supposed to snow here today. So enjoy the warm weather!!!!!!

[katieandalex]

Yeah I was outside for like 2 hours, and towards the end of the day it started getting cooler. But I got everything done I wanted to get done on my car, so I'll have to take some pictures of my work and post them up.

Last night I made this really yummy recipe. We were kind of hesitant on it at first, so we made hot dogs along with it in case it wasn't good...but Hahn ended up getting the hot dogs. LOL! It was chicken skewwers with peanut sauce. Heres the recipes.
Sauce:
1/4 c Kraft Catalina dressing
3 tbsp peanut butter
1 tbsp soy sauce

Mix sauce until smooth. Add in chicken, refridgerate 10 minutes to marinate. Place chicken on skewwers. Grills until blackened. Serve with minute rice.

[NicksBride]

You are turning into quite the cooking wife! :) That is fantastic and sounds really good. THanks for the receipe.

[70707Bride]

Mmm...that recipe sounds good!

[katieandalex]

Yeah, we were hesitant about it at first. I was going to make BBQ chicken on the grill, but I started looking through my Kraft Foods recipes and came across that one and said "Hey, I have all of that stuff. Alex we are trying something new tonight." LOL! Maybe I'll see what else I can come across tonight. I really like the Kraft Foods recipes...they are always so easy and really good. I've only ever had 1 bad one from them, and I think it was because I didn't know what I was doing.

I'm completely bored out of my mind at work. I don't have anything else to do until tomorrow, and I have another hour and a half left to kill. Grr. Ever since I got back from lunch I've been just sitting around doing stupid stuff on our company's intranet. I did take a couple pictures of my car when I got to work today, I'll have to post them up once I get home tonight.

Did anyone watch the first half of the season premier of Drive last night? I watched and was on the edge of my seat the whole time. I thought it was really good. I'm going to watch the rest of it tonight for sure. And then finish up watching "School for Scoundrals" that we started watching last night. Too funny!

[NicksBride]

Nothing worse then being bored at work. I am the same way right now. Just counting down the days until our honeymoon.
Do you have a cookbook of Kraft Receipes? They sound really good.

Can't wait to see pictures of your car, I am sure it looks great. Have a good rest of the afternoon.

[katieandalex]

No, if you go to kraftfoods.com, you can search for recipies on there and sign up for their Food & Family magazine that they send out seasonally with a ton of great recipes in it. The magazine is free too.

[NicksBride]

ohh I will have to do that. That is one thing I struggle with, living on our own and having to come up with dinner every night! hahaha

[katieandalex]

Well, I'm making a new recipe as we speak. I'll try it first before I post up the recipe. LOL! Alex won't be home tonight until after 9:30. He had to put an open to close. So I'll be eating dinner and watching Drive on my own tonight.

But I do have the pictures of my car uploaded! Bare with me, I have quite a few.

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E232377%3B%3A57397ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A5683%3Aot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E232377%3B%3A57398ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A56842ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A56843ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A57399ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E232377%3B%3A573%3A4ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A5684%3Aot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A573%3A9ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A5%3B257ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A573%3B4ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E232377%3B%3A5%3B262ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A279%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A573%3B9ot1lsi

And I hope to do something like this with the taillights in the near future. Its a really bad pictures...but you get the idea of what I'm going for.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34999%3A354%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E232377%3B%3A5%3C747ot1lsi

[NicksBride]

ugh, your car is SOO sexy I want it! hahaha. Your weather looks awesome as well. *Jealous*

[July707Bride]

Ooh....I love your car (even though by nature Dodge and Chevy owners hate each other)! FH and I actually met through our car club. I've never drag raced my car or anything because I just have a 4-cylinder. Everything I've done has been for show (except my strut bar and CAI), but I haven't had a chance to add much in the last few years. Not working and having our son hasn't left much money to buy things for my car.

Here are a couple pics of my Baby Girl (they're a couple years old though so a few things have been added since then):
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v338/SexyLiLNeon/Blinkies%20and%20Icons/babygirlfront.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v338/SexyLiLNeon/Blinkies%20and%20Icons/babygirlback.jpg

[katieandalex]

Katy: Thanks. The weather was goregous yesterday. 70 degrees and sunny the whole day. I went for a 40 minute walk on my lunch break....I didn't want to come back after lunch! LOL!

Stella: You can race a 4cyl. Geez thats pretty much all my DH and I have raced. My husband had a Sunfire that was all done up and turbo charged. Then had an Eagle Talon TSI. Now he has a Subaru WRX TR. He ran a 13.69 as his fastest at the track last weekend with the WRX. I've only raced my Cavalier and will race my Cobalt on the 27th.

[katieandalex]

Alex and I have been watching this house for sale in our town. The price keeps dropping on it, and we said that if it gets down to $100K or below, we are going to talk to my parents about getting the down payment. We didn't move on it last time when we did a walk through because we felt they were asking too much and and adding up how much they were asking and what all we would have to change, it would be way out of our price range. But if it gets down to $100K that gives us almost $40K to work with in updates. Which we would only do a few things right away and the rest would wait until next spring. Here are some pictures.

http://imageserver.katabat.com/mel/properties/RiverValley/full/86/R4081786_101.jpg
http://imageserver.katabat.com/mel/properties/RiverValley/full/86/R4081786_301.jpg
http://imageserver.katabat.com/mel/properties/RiverValley/full/86/R4081786_401.jpg
http://imageserver.katabat.com/mel/properties/RiverValley/full/86/R4081786_601.jpg

All we would have to change right away is get rid of the pool (we'd rather have a hot tub) and turn the 1 car garage into a 2 car garage, which will be easy because the overhang is part of the roof line. But it has a ton of new stuff, new windows and doors, complete tear off on the roof a few years back, new central AC/furance, new siding and gutters. Its a really nice house, there are just a lot of things we would want to change for ourselves. The fireplace would have to be redone at some point, as well as the bathroom, needs some landscaping in the front, a porch on the front and we would have to do something with the deck in the back. But its all little stuff that doesn't have to be done right away....

[NicksBride]

That house is sooo cute!!! Will keep my fingers crossed for it to get down to 100K. What a great backyard as well. Hot tub.. You guys are to funny. Good luck!

[July707Bride]

Stella: You can race a 4cyl. Geez thats pretty much all my DH and I have raced. My husband had a Sunfire that was all done up and turbo charged. Then had an Eagle Talon TSI. Now he has a Subaru WRX TR. He ran a 13.69 as his fastest at the track last weekend with the WRX. I've only raced my Cavalier and will race my Cobalt on the 27th.

Awesome....FH wants a WRX something bad. He drives a daddy-mobile now (2004 Saturn Vue), but still modded that a bit. Sounds like your DH ran a pretty good time with his WRX. I do really love your Cobalt though...I was looking at them at the auto show before they were in production and they're very nice. I'm hoping, once we're more financially stable and in a home of our own, to get an orange Nissan Murano (mommy-mobile) and keep my Neon as my toy to work on. I know you can race a 4cyl....a lot of people in my club race their Neons. I just don't plan on racing mine if it stays stock because I know a lot of people who have done a lot of work on their's (plus there are all those turbo-charged SRT-4s to compete with) so I wouldn't have a chance against them. But it's okay, I'm more into show rather than go anyways. ;)

[katieandalex]

Show is always fun too. We used to go to car shows every summer. It was a blast to see what everyone else had done to their cars and gets another persons take on something. My DH had been wanting a WRX for a long time, and we finally had enough money to buy one, so he was really excited that I let him buy one. Even though he wanted the STi and we didn't have enough money for it, he's still happy. He keeps saying in 5 years when we trade our cars off again, hes going to get an STi. I really love the Murano's too. They are great looking SUVs. I just think they are a little overpriced for what they are. I have a lot of ideas in mind for what my car in 5 years will be, but a lot can change in 5 years with design and something I like now, I may completely hate in 5 years.

Today at work was crazy. We were busy and one of the phlebotomists called in because her daughter was sick, so I had to help draw people. Ugh. I hate that. Plus I don't have much practice at it because my job in Iowa City, I didn't have to draw hardly ever. My first 2 patients weren't very good and I had to have Mel redraw them, but the rest of the people I started feeling more comfortable with.

A little vent from the drive home. I stopped to get gas and I pulled out onto the street from the gas station behind this Mercades. We could turn right on red, but she didn't....and I figured it was because of the traffic. Well the light turned green and she sat there. I started honking, she pulled forward a bit and then stopped and sat there. I started honking again and just kept on it until she started driving. She was fiddling around in her car trying to find her sunglasses (the funny part, are we turned the sun would have been to our backs). So we turned and of course, me having terrible road rage, I floored it around her. She pulled up behind me at the next light. The light turned green and everyone started going. I looked in my rear view mirror after a was a bit passed the intersection, shes still sitting there. Terrible drivers shouldn't be given drivers licenses.

I got home and Alex and I got into a bit of a fight about money. Who knows if we will ever be able to buy that house. Arg. He just really pisses me off with buying parts for his car....

[NicksBride]

I HATE bad drivers argh! I have horrible road rage as well and it always gets me into trouble. haha. People drive me insane.
Sorry you had a fight about money, Nick and I do that all the time. It is a never ending cycle. I hope it all works out though.
Sounds like your work life is getting busier, makes the days go by faster anyway right?

[katieandalex]

Yeah, I've been kind of just sitting around today too. Not much to do until our shipments come in later today and I have a conference call later this afternoon.

I'm really itching to go back to school. I'm thinking about talking to Alex about taking a course or two the next couple semesters (not this coming fall, but next spring) until we decide to move to both go back to school. I'm planning on doing a double major with a minor, so if I take a couple courses now, it will help cut down how long I'm in school. Alex has exactly 3 years left, and I'd like to be done right around the same time as him. There is a community college in Muscatine, where I work and in Davenport, where I live. They are both part of the same system, so I could possibly take a night course at one of those, depending on whats offered where. It will be cheaper and will end up transferring with the rest of my credits I have from my last degree. We'll see. It will definitely be after we buy a house though. I just really wish we could move now to go back to school and just buy a house in that town instead...but Alex wouldn't have a job right now....I just would rather not have to buy a house now and then sell in a year and half to buy a new house in a new town.

[NicksBride]

I think taking classes is a great idea. Just taking some night classes or something like you said and if you decide to move you are just one step ahead to going back to your other school where you would move. It wouldn't hurt and you could do something that you enjoy in school.
Let us know how it goes.

[katieandalex]

Gosh, I really want that house. :( I talked to our realtor and she said that its been on the market for quite a while, and the people have already moved out, so they are probably paying on 2 mortgages right now. She said that we can always offer them what we want to pay and see if they take it, if not, just wait. But I e-mailed my mom about possibly helping us with the down payment and we'll pay them back for it because we really want to get into this house, but I haven't heard from her yet. If they can't help us, then chances are, we probably won't get into thise house. But the more I look at the pictures, the more I want to get into it. :( Its only a little bigger than our apartment right now sq ft-wise, but everything is about the same size except BR 2 and 3. The 2nd BR is a bit smaller than our currently 2nd BR, but its made up with the 3rd BR and the finished basement. I just have so many plans for that house that I would hate to miss out on it. :(

[NicksBride]

ohh I hope that you can figure out a way to get it. To get a house would be so wonderful adn you can put money into a mortgage and fixing up a house rather then paying rent. Good luck!!! Keep us updated on the progress. It sounds like a really nice house.

[katieandalex]

Yeah I have a whole plan of putting up white railings on the front porch and putting in a big flower bed across the entire front of the house. Then we would turn the garage into a 2 car garage, get rid of the pool and fix up the deck to get rid of the stairs to the pool. Eventually get a hot tub...lol. We would redo the fireplace to get rid of the stupid cubbies that are in it right now, and put a stone front fireplace with a mantel (which it doesnt' have now) and get our LCD TV to hang over it...lol. Repaint the whole thing house. Reside the garage to match the house. Get a new refridgerator and stove (new fridge first). So many things I want to do...and I don't even have the house yet! LOL!

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/34897%3A983%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E23236474%3B%3C676ot1lsi


Gosh, I just looked back at these pictures of Hahn....gosh, hes huge now in comparison. Its funny how you rarely notice a change in something until you see the before picture. Hes definitely grown into his face a lot more now and hes just enormous!

And as I got thinking about it....decided I'd post up a new after picture...and I got 2 super funny ones of him! LOL!

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3499%3B74%3C%3B%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E2323782568%3A7%3Bot1lsi
^I love this picture...too bad I can't ever find Hahn sitting down so I can get a good comparison shot....
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3499%3B74%3C%3B%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E2323782568%3A79ot1lsi
^This one he kind of looks like a white Pom to me.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3499%3B74%3C%3B%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237825679%3C2ot1lsi
^One of the funny ones. He can never control his tongue...it just flys around all the time. And this one also reminds me of that laughing hyena (sp?) in Lion King.

[katieandalex]

And last but not least the best picture I took tonight, and proves again he can't control his tongue.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/3499%3B74%3C%3B%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237825679%3C4ot1lsi

[mariaandmanish]

That last one is hysterical!!! Pets are always great for a laugh!!

[NicksBride]

Its always fun to dream up what you want your house to look like. We did that even before we bought our house too.
It is amazing how fast dogs grow up isn't? He was sooo tiny, now look. He is really cute though! That last picture is to funny.

[katieandalex]

Ok, I'm so about ready to just leave right now from the lab. Ugh. I'm bored out of my mind! I came back from lunch, did a few things and then I had 2 things left on my to do list...I made those 2 calls and since then I've been sitting around, for probably the last hour and a half at least. This week has gone by SO slow. But next week we are telling our offices that we can start doing testing, and we know after do that we are going to be bombarded with testing...so at least I'll have something to do then. Plus my computer is right in front of the window and I'm looking out it saying "Ugh, it looks SO beautiful outside...I want to be out there!"

[mariaandmanish]

Just keep reminding yourself that it's friday!!! THat's what I do when I'm completely exhausted with work and can't wait to leave!! And, enjoy the calm before the business of next week, too!

[katieandalex]

Its just such a huge change for me because the Iowa City lab you were running around the entire day and you never really realized you were there for 10 hours, but here, at least right now, its really slow and you just keep looking at the clock and it feels like the 8 hours takes forever.

[katieandalex]

Ugh, I'm pissed right now, and so is Alex. Ok, Alex and I have plans this coming Friday, we are going to the midnight drags at the drag strip and won't be home until who knows what time in the morning. Anyways, so Alex took Saturday off because he didn't want to go in early. Last week, he gets a call from one of his employees, "I need Friday and Saturday off because my wife is coming home and I want to spend time with her." And Alex is like "Umm I have plans, so thats not going to work. Why didn't you write it on the calender? And now I have to work 7 days that week." Well Alex said that he would close for him on Saturday night but he has to work on Friday night. Well the guy being "Mr. Nice Guy" said he would work for Alex today because he had to work for him this coming Saturday. So Alex and I made plans for today, this morning the phone rings, its the guy "I'm sick and I can't work." So now Alex just left to go to work because this ******* called in sick. Alex said hes going to be really pissed if he does the same thing on Friday. But I guess this guy told Alex "If you make me work Friday and Saturday, I'm putting in my 2 weeks notice." Alex said at this point he doesn't care because in 2 weeks he won't need him anymore. So now I'm hanging out until who knows when waiting for Alex to get off and we can't do what we were going to do today. :( Alex siad he was going to call the guy who is closing to see if he can come in early today so Alex doesn't have to be there too long, but who knows if that will happen. Ugh....the joys of living with a manager.

Hey but perfect timing for me to throw in, "If you went back to school you wouldn't have to worry about employees...you'd just build stuff and then be done with it."

[katieandalex]

Yay, I finally have pictures of my lab. Nothing spectacular and WAY smaller than my old lab in Iowa City, but I still like it. It feels more homey than Iowa City.

North-east corner (the spare computer/trash corner....my stupid Chemistry analyzer on the left)
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3A69277%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323783%3B89%3B%3B6ot1lsi

The entryway and processing area
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3A69277%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E2323783%3B89%3B%3B%3Bot1lsi

The sink and area where I do urines and serology testing, and part of my desk.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3A69277%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323783%3B88%3A88ot1lsi

More of my desk and the hematology analyzer.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3A69277%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323783%3B89%3B%3C5ot1lsi

I love all the windows I have.

[katieandalex]

And the straight-on shot on my desk area.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3A69277%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DXRO QDF%3E2323783%3B88%3A85ot1lsi

[70707Bride]

I like the office, it looks like you have a lot of room.

[katieandalex]

Yeah, almost too much room for just me! LOL!

[hummingbird521]

What a pain that guy is causing. I hope it all works out for you. I love the lab. reminds me of my days in the hospital. looks like it is large as well.

[katieandalex]

Alex and I got into a little arguement last night. I was talking to a girl at work who has lived in Davenport (where I live) for like 10 years and she was telling me about how you buy a house in a decent neighborhood and then the ghetto just slowly starts rolling in and eventually you need to up and leave and move again and the same thing happens. I told Alex, I don't want to buy a house in a town where that may happened. Our town is really, these 2 blocks are ok, but go out of that and its ghetto. I said that I just wanted to move and Alex is like "Well, I'll move anywhere between here and Muscatine." Oh great, so we have the option of Blue Grass and Muscatine and I don't really want to live in either place. I just want to move to Ames to go back to school or move out of state.

I told Alex when we moved here that we were going to end up getting stuck, and thats exactly what happened. And what did Alex say "Suck it up and drive a bit longer and we can move to Bettendorf" (the better of the Quad Cities to the east of where we live now...which will mean my drive will no longer be 50 minutes, it will turn into the hour or so I was driving to Iowa City). And I said, "Why is it that I have to drive? You drove for 6 months from Dubuque to Davenport while I was in clinicals and you freaked out about it and I'm going to have been driving for a year in 2 months and I'm expected to keep driving because you don't want to leave?" He said that hes worked hard to get where he is now and he doesn't want to ruin that. How is saying to your district manager, "I want to move to a different district" going to ruin the career you have. They can't fire you because you say you want to transfer. And he says that there is only 1 position open and its in Peoria, IL...guess what, no LabCorp there. I got on his corporate website and found a big list of manager opens across the US. At work today I'm going to go through and see how far away a LabCorp is from each of those positions and propose that to him tonight. Arg....

[Goin2thechapel]

Fights just plain out suck...Sorry about the argument...You'll work things out soon. Moving and finding a new location is extremely stressful!

Best of luck hun!

[katieandalex]

Who knows what we are going to do. I looked up where all the manager positions were, none of them had labs in the town....so pretty much if I want to stay with this company, we are going to be screwed and one of us is going to have to leave. Alex said that he would probably move to GA. Hes just worried that if he transfers that they are not going to give him a pay of living increase in his salary......we'll see.

[NicksBride]

oh Katie I am sorry! fights are just horrible espically when they are about places to live. :( I hope something works out for you guys!

[Goin2thechapel]

Katie that must be sooo stressful for you two. I'm def. a control freak and couldn't have the patience that you do. Hang in there hun. :hug:

[katieandalex]

Well, I think we are going to talk with a couple banks and see what a mortgage payment would run for us. We are interested again in that last house I posted about. Its been on the market for a while, so we are thinking, if we can afford the mortgage payment, to go ahead and try to offer them less on it and see if they take it.

I think this fall I'm going to take a couple online courses at the community college in Moline. I'm going to take a couple classes that I know I don't want to take at a 4 year university, like comp. II and then a few gen ed things. It will be a lot cheaper there....its only $88/credit than like $600/credit at the state school. LOL! So I'm sending in my application tomorrow. Plus, I can probably get reimbursed with the tuituin repayment plan from my work....if its going towards a degree that will help me in the field they will pay and I just have to sign a contract saying that I will say on 6 months after the end of the course....so that may help as well.

[hummingbird521]

sounds like a real winner to me. i think you are being very smart in taking whatever is cheapest on you and then getting work to reimburse it.

[katieandalex]

Well, its official, Alex approved and I'm going to start taking a few classes a semester this fall! Eeee! I'm so excited....yeah, ask me again at the end of August. LOL! I'm going to take 2 online courses this fall (it will be easier with my work schedule right now), I plan to take Composition II and Music Appreciation. Get my comp out of the way at a community college because I'm terrible at writing and get my elective of music appreciation out of the way because it will be an easy A for me! LOL!

[NicksBride]

Wow congratulations that is so exciting to get back to taking classes again. Let us know how it goes! That is always exciting and scary at the same time.
Good luck on the house as well, its a tough thing trying to buy a house, but in the end it is really worth it. We just bought our first house and lemme tell ya.. it was a long haul. But it sounds like you guys are doing well and I will be keep my fingers crossed for you guys!

[katieandalex]

Sorry that I haven't been on much lately. I've been really busy with stuff at work and with trying to get everything ready to go back to school....filing my FAFSA today. Life's been kind of crazy....plus last night Hahn had a really huge accident in his cage when I got home from work so that took a good 45 minutes to clean up, then we left to pick up a couple things and came home and Hahn had thrown up water all over his cage (Alex said he was none stop drinking water when he was in the bath tub from his first accident), so we had to give him another bath and clean up the cage again...he ended up getting 3 baths yesterday.

[NicksBride]

Oh the joys of having a dog. haha, it must be hard keeping him clean as well with his white fur, poor thing.
Hope your day goes better today!! Enjoy the nice weather!

[Goin2thechapel]

I hope your dog feels better soon :( It's no fun with a sick dog at home :(

[katieandalex]

He didn't have any problems yesterday, we think the culprit was his treats...so no more treats for him other than Greenies and rawhide.

Yesterday was a good day...we were slow at work so I went through the patient files and organized...woo hoo. I cleaned up the sheets so they weren't all crinkled and such as well as put them all back in alphabetical order.....since they definitely were not! LOL!

[NicksBride]

Sounds like you did a great job!!! I love it when things can get organized. :)
Greenies are great for dogs, Taebo LOVES them. They are realyl good for their teeth and for the digestive track. Taebo gets really sick with rawhide, I tell ya the things we do for animals. :)

Glad to hear things are going well...

[katieandalex]

Yeah I'v eheard that rawhide isn't the greatest for dogs, but I've never had a problem with it before.

I'm feeling a little tipsy right now. I just had a 27oz margarita at dinner at an early Cinco de Mayo party at a Mexican restuarant......I'm starting to bog down now though....I barely have enough energy to type this correctly.

[NicksBride]

haha you are so funny!!! Hope you woke without a hangover!!! haha

[katieandalex]

Yeah I've never gotten a hangover from drinking before. There was one day that I was drunk that night and woke up still drunk the whole next day....but I've never had a hangover. Now ask me that again after my 22nd birthday. Alex and one of our friends is taking me out for my 22nd birthday because I never had a good 21st birthday and they said that they are going to get me totally plowed.....great, can't wait. I'm betting I may have a hangover from that one.

Alex and I got into a bit of a fight yesterday and I almost up and left and drove to Dubuque for the weekend. He wanted to go out to the drag strip for this thing they had going on. Ok fine....but he wanted to race, and I didn't want him to race. We got into a big fight about it, but we ended up going out and he didn't race. We just watched everyone and we went out with a friend who did race and brought his 2 year old daughter, Caden, with. We kind of watched over her while he was up staging and racing. Oh my gosh, total baby fever ALL day. She was the greatest little girl (why I want a girl....I think I do better with them than I do boys). She was sitting on my lap and holding my hand when we were walking around. We taught her how to say "Subaru" and "fart". LOL! Her dad came back up from racing and she ran over and sat on his lap and said "I farted." He cracked up laughing! Then her dad went down to race and she didn't want him to go and started crying, she end up crawling up into my lap and crying herself to sleep. She slept on my lap for a good hour and then I carried her down to her dad's car once he was down racing.

But Alex and I are not having kids anytime soon........but animals on the other hand. We are itching for another car and another dog. So we've been searching on pet finder. Here are the puppies we've come up with. We said it had to be female.
http://photos.petfinder.com/fotos/IL115/IL115.7816764-2-pn.jpg (javascript:void(window.open('http://www.petfinder.com/photoView/photoView.cgi?petid=7816764','Photo1','height=560, width=768,left=20,top=100,screenx=200,screeny=100, scrollbars=yes')))
Corgi/Chihuahua mix named Foxy
http://photos.petfinder.com/fotos/IL292/IL292.8218963-1-pn.jpg (javascript:void(window.open('http://www.petfinder.com/photoView/photoView.cgi?petid=8218963','Photo1','height=560, width=768,left=20,top=100,screenx=200,screeny=100, scrollbars=yes')))
Purebred Husky named Milly
http://photos.petfinder.com/fotos/IL409/IL409.7669778-2-pn.jpg (javascript:void(window.open('http://www.petfinder.com/photoView/photoView.cgi?petid=7669778','Photo1','height=560, width=768,left=20,top=100,screenx=200,screeny=100, scrollbars=yes')))
American Eskimo named Blanca (Alex is like, how would we tell them apart?)
http://www.icanimalcenter.org/adoption/animals/Roxy053265_2.jpg
And both of these chihuahua's. The left is Dora who is 5 months and the right is Roxy who is 9 years.

[NicksBride]

aww sorry you guys had a fight, they are never easy. But I am glad you guys got it resolved and your 22nd birthday sounds like a BLAST! I always thought you were older then that!!!!!
The dogs you picked out are sooo cute. I am partial to Chihuahuas as I have the BEST one! he is the best chi and is sooo sweet. but they are adorable as well.
baby fever? I know it well, she sounds like a princess. "I farted" hehe so cute. Sounds like you had a nice day even with a fight. :)

[katieandalex]

yeah my first dog growing up was a chihuahua...I loved that thing.

Yeah, she was so adorable. She knows how to give high-5s and pounds too....so cute! LOL!

Nope, I'm a youngin...everyone always says "****! You're only 21? I would have never guessed."


So today was a great overcast day to take pictures of my car....so thats what I did to kill some time. I have a ton of pictures.....so beware. I have a few mods that will be coming in the near future....just trying to decide what I want to do first! LOL!

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7474%3A%3A%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7473244ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7474%3A%3B7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7478353ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A7474%3A%3C5ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747835%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7474%3B32ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7478369ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A7474%3B37ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A7474%3B4%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A747838%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479555ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A74783%3B3ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747955%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A74783%3B%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479565ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A74783%3C8ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747956%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7478433ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479577ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7478439ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479586ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7478445ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479593ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B952ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A747959%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B95%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A74795%3A6ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B96%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A74795%3B7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B984ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B993ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A74795%3C4ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B9%3A7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A74795%3C8ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B9%3B%3Aot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479632ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B9%3C%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479635ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B%3A37ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7479638ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B%3A46ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A858%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A747963%3Bot1lsi

[katieandalex]

And now a few of mine and my husband's cars together from a few days ago. And the reason why I love overcast days for pictures.

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A8%3C%3A%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A74745%3C%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A8%3C%3A%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D3 27%3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A747526%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A8%3C%3A%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A7475273ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B6%3A8%3C%3A%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A7475277ot1lsi

[July707Bride]

Nice pics...I love your car, and I just love love love spoilers/wings (as long as they look right with the car). You're making me want to go out and do some more to my car now, lol. My cousin and her husband had a Neon like mine and it got totaled a few months ago. They had ground effects for it but one of the bumpers got wrecked when the car got totaled (a snowplow rammed their car cleaning a parking lot). Anyways, they just contacted me to offer me their remaining bumper so I'm planning on picking it up. I don't know if I'll use it or not though. If I do, I'll have to paint it since their car was silver and mine's blue.

[NicksBride]

ohh I love your pictures. Your car is sooo sexy I just love it. Those pictures should be sold to your local dealership, they are really great!!!!!! Looks like it was a great day for your car to model. TFS!

[katieandalex]

Yeah, I got a lot of plans for the car. Alex and I made a list of all the stuff we want to do to the cars down the road. My plans for it include: tint, eyelids, lowering, exhaust, painted interior parts, painted taillights....then someday down the road a different spoiler (though I love the one I have) and a different hood.


Good news! Alex and I are going to meet with a mortgage broker today at 4pm at the credit union. We are going to see if we can get pre-approved for the loan for the house we want. We are keeping our fingers crossed and we are really hoping for it. We drove past the house again last night and talked about stuff for it, and we are really excited about it....we just hope we can get pre-approved for 100% financing....but the good thing, one of our cars is financed through them and according to their website, the finance rate we got on the car is in the catagory of A+ credit....which hopefully will help us! Keep your fingers crossed for us!

[July707Bride]

Good luck with everything! I hope you get approved.

Painting your interior is easy and cheap, just time consuming. FH and I did it to my car a couple years ago. I painted my A-beams (which were beige and the rest of the interior was dark grey) to a red/blue color changing paint. Then I painted other interior parts silver....I love it, but the arm rests are chipping now and I have to repaint them. We just used cans of $2 engine paint and it worked great. It's all the masking and waiting for the coats to dry that takes forever (plus we did mine in Dec/Jan...I don't know what we were thinking...it was cold out!).

[NicksBride]

oooohhh good luck!!! My fingers are crossed, let us know what happens!

[katieandalex]

Yeah, Stella, I painted the interior on my Cavalier to purple. It was my first time painting anything and it turned out great. I just used Krylon Indoor/Outdoor paint and it worked great. I'm planning on painting my interior with the red metalcast paint.....should look sharp. We used it on my valve cover on my engine already and that looked great.

[NicksBride]

Man, your car is going to look great when you get it done. I never thought about painting a car.... Hmm.....
If you decide to do it I wanna see pictures

[katieandalex]

I'm sure I'll post pictures. Here is a picture of what my Cavalier's interior looked like after I painted it.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B7%3B352%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A7%3A73798ot1lsi

Talked to the mortgage officer. We filled out all the paper work but their credit system was down. So she is going to run everything right away once it comes back up and give us a call and let us know how it all turns out.

[katieandalex]

Yeah when we talked to the lady about the mortgage, Alex is like "oooh, I don't know if we can afford that." And I'm like "No, we can afford that, it just means that you have to quit buying stuff for your car for a while until we get my parents paid off." The principal and interest is the same as our rent right now, its just the added costs of insurance and that sort of thing.

She is going to run it in both of our names first and see if it will approve us, if it doesn't she is going to run it in just my name. Alex has a bankrupcy on him and she said that tehy like to have it discharged 2 years before they will give a mortgage out, but its been a year and a half and his credit is immaculate now, so she said they may approve both, if not, they should be able to approve it in just my name. So we are still hoping. Hopefully we can find out tomorrow, and if we are approved, maybe we can go through a walk-through on the house again this weekend and put in a bid on it.

I would love to be in this house by July 4th if possible....if not by the end of July (our lease is up at the end of July)....I'm sure these people are going to want to rush along the closing process since they have been sitting on it for a while and they are currently making 2 mortgage payments.....we can hope, right?

They are asking $110K right now (was $140K) and we are going to go in and offer $95K and see if they bite, if not, we are going to work our way up to $100K. But bringing it to $95K brings the monthly principal and interest under our current rent, so we are going to try and shoot for that.

[NicksBride]

That purple is interesting, really makes the car stand out. Good job on it though, I wouldn't have a the patience to paint something like that. :)
i really hope you get into a house, I know that is something you both really want. I will keep my fingers crossed! Good luck

[katieandalex]

A week and a half ago, I took my car into the dealership (not my choice dealership, but the dealership in the town I work...more conveinent that way) because my dash lights would shut off, but the headlights would stay on. They fixed that problem, but a week later (this past Friday) I ran into a new problem. My dash lights would stay on, but the headlights would turn off. Umm, I would like to know when my headlights are on or off with the auto on headlights (I wish there was just a little symbol that lit up on the dash telling you, but there isn't).

So I took it in today to have them look at that. The guy just called me, "Well, I'm not understanding the problem. You do know that it has auto on/off headlights right?" I told him, yeah I know that....but this is the problem, and explained it again. And hes like, well when it was in last time they programmed it to do it that way. And I'm like, well program it so all the lights are on or all the lights are off because I want to know when my headlights are on or off. I don't want to be driving on the highway at night or something and my headlights aren't on, but I think they are because my dash lights are on.....

What an idiot? Who doesn't want to know their headlights are on? And why would I want all of my dash lights on when my headlights aren't on? Its obviously not dark enough to have my headlights on, so that would make it not dark enough to need dash lights.....ugh, some freakin dumb people....

sorry for the vent, but it really pissed me off....thats why I don't like to go to this dealer.

[katieandalex]

With the house, I haven't head from the mortgage lady yet...which means the system hasn't come up yet. She said that she would call as soon as she has it all finished, whether its good or bad. She said we were first in line to be ran, so hopefully the system will come up sometime today so we can at least get an answer today, yes or no....I just really want to know.

[NicksBride]

Geez, I swear people at dearlerships have no concept of what is even wrong with cars. They just fix what they think is the problem and go from there. I tell ya. I hope they get it fixed for you.
Their credit machine is broken? That is kinda silly. Well I hope they give you an answer REALLY soon!

[katieandalex]

yeah, their credit system was down or something like that.

I just got a call from her. She couldn't get it to go through with both me and Alex on the loan because of Alex's previous bankrupcy. But she could get it to go through with just me. She said that the interest rate is slightly higher because my credit score isn't as good as Alex's (how weird is that...but I haven't done much to rebuild my credit since screwing it over) but she can get it approved. So she is sending me out the paperwork to fill out to be pre-qualified and then take the next step to get pre-approved for a certain amount. ****, its such a long process....but sounds like we will be going through them because the other place we were checking with hasn't called us to set up an appointment yet....terrible customer service.

But either way, if we get a slightly higher interest rate, in a year we could always refinance with Alex's name on the house as well and get a lower interest rate...and having a mortgage in my name that we pay well on will definitely help my credit score! So we are still doing a lot of finger crossing for now.

[70707Bride]

I still love your car... LOL! Oh, have you heard whether or not they are making clear covers for the back lights? I'm not sure what they're called but Chris has them on his truck. We will get them when they come out.

[NicksBride]

Well that is still good that you can get financed yourself. There is nothing wrong with that. Nick had to get financed himself as I had bad credit as well. At least it is moving forward and you can see where to go from here.
It is a long process, but worth it in the end!!!

[katieandalex]

Jess: I havent' heard anything. I know they make altezza style and LED style taillights for the Cobalts.
Here are the altezza style....not much different from stock, but it doesn't have the reflector in the housing.
http://images.andale.com/f2/101/100/13900293/2007/1/3/LTL_CCBT05R_JY.jpg

And the LED taillights...which I love, but I have other plans.
http://www.wooddashexperts.com//images/LED-lights/IC-LEDT-350C.jpg



As for the mortgage, the lady called Alex back and said that my credit score was 2 points too low to get into the program we needed, so pretty much now, we are at square one. :( A girl I work with, Rhiannon, said that tehy had the same problem when they financed their new house and they got it through this certain place and shes supposed to bring me the lady's business card today so I can contact her. So we are not done with trying yet.

[NicksBride]

Those lights would look great on your car next to the black!!
Oh bummer about your credit score. There are soo many banks outt here, just call around its kinda like bartering. If you tell them one bank wouldn't give it to you then try another. Someone will want your money and will be able to get you into a house!!!! Keep shopping

[70707Bride]

Those lights are cool! I'll have to show Chris and see what he says.

[katieandalex]

Yeah, I found out about the painting I want to do on my car, and I'm thinking about doing it this weekend. It depends on what this weekends brings, but hopefully I'll be able to get around to doing it.

[Goin2thechapel]

I love the purple in your car..Too cute!

[NicksBride]

oh!!! Take pictures when you are done. Hopefully the weather is good for you to get it done this weekend!

[katieandalex]

I think I decided that I'm going to do the interior this weekend and wait on the taillights.....that takes a lot of time and patience and we are planning on going back to Dubuque on Sunday with my car, so I don't want to be rushed.

[NicksBride]

GOod luck! Have a nice weekend

[katieandalex]

Last night we went out and bought a Dyson! We bought this one:
http://www.dyson.com/range/images/dc07_front.jpg (http://www.dyson.com/range/feature_frame.asp?model=DC07-ANIMAL&sinavtype=pagelink)
The DC07. We were comparing 3 different vacuums trying to decide which one to get in the store, and we liked te Dyson the best. We came home and vacuumed.....ewww disgusting! It definitely works!


I'm in the process of painting my interior pieces right now. :)

[katieandalex]

Last night when we were at Target buying the vacuum we were walking through the store, and I have to have this duvet cover. It goes perfectly with out theme in the bedroom and even is the same flowers we have in our little flower arrangement.
http://g-ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/41TD7BC10ML._SS384_.jpg


As for the mortgage. I put though information online at another place and they called Alex. They for some reason didn't get any of my information across from it, but they could get Alex approve for the amount we would need (worst case...what the house is on the market for right now), at a full percent lower interest rate than the other place that denied us and the payment is almost $100 less/month! So I'm going to call this guy back on Monday and set up an appointment for Alex and I to go in together and he can put it in in both of our names and see what comes up and we may be moving forward with our house! :ura1:

[katieandalex]

Ok, I'm sad now. I just searched for the house we wanted to buy, its not listed online anymore. I'm going to e-mail our realtor and see if she can find out any information on if it was sold or taken off the market or what.

[katieandalex]

I found a few more houses that I think Alex and I are going to drive by today, just in case the other is officially off the market for some reason....hopefully now that it seems the mortgage stuff is working out, we can actually get into a house this summer.

My interior stuff is done. It was super easy. Alex had a hard time taking the parts out of the car last night, but other than that....really easy. The after pictures don't have the dash fully put together because Alex needs to do that when he gets home from work, but you get the idea.

In the process of being painted:

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A%3B5%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A%3B64ot1lsi

Hahn chilling with me while painting.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A965ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A96%3Bot1lsi
Hahn was being such a weirdo while I was painting. He was being really good and not bothering me, so I gave him a treat. He just laid around for 45 minutes with the treat in his mouth. He finally ate it like an hour after I gave it to him! LOL!

[katieandalex]

Before
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C24%3A%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23236%3C%3B%3A24674ot1lsi

After
I love how it turned out!
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A977ot1lsi
Ok my camera must have went all weird on this picture:
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A%3B6%3Bot1lsi
Most people paint the strip in between the radio and the HVAC knobs, but I wanted it to be consistant across the center.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3B%3B%3C248%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A95%3B%3A985ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

Sorry for the millions of posts today...but I have an update on the house/mortgage thing.

My realtor called me. I guess the house we were looking at, the listing expired with their realtor so she was able to call the owners of the house directly. They don't know if they are going to list again with that realtor again or not. But she mentioned that she had a very interested buyer and that she could be their realtor as well if they just paid her a commission and we could just do this whole thing off the market now. She informed him that we were interested and that we were working on financing and checking on flood insurance (flood insurance I guess is required on that house because I guess its in the flood plain for some reason...though there is no body of water anywhere near it...LOL!). I'm going to call the place we are probably going to go through for our mortgage on Monday as well as get a quote on flood insurance on Monday. And call our realtor back and let her know what the status is. Hopefully we can get moving on this house. But it could still be ours! We drove past it again today and we really want this house. And we really want to do another walkthrough of it because its been a while and we would like to refresh our memory on how its all laid out.

So, so far so good. Lets hope things go well on Monday!

[NicksBride]

Ohhhh good luck! That is odd about Flood insurance! But let us know what happens!!!!!

[katieandalex]

I called about insurance. I think its pretty affordable. $60/mo for home-owners insurance and $40/mo for flood insurance. The flood insurance covers the entire cost of the mortgage, so I guess for $40/mo if we do get flooded, its a good deal. Whats everyone's take on those costs?

I left a message for the mortgage guy to call back. It was towards the end of the business day, so he will probably call me tomorrow. We are going to try and set up an appointment to go in Monday or Tuesday evening after work (I would leave early). I would have liked to of done it this week, but tomorrow is obviously too quick, Wednesday one of the girls is only working a half day, Thursday I'm coming in late already (I have a dentist appointment in the morning) and Friday one of the girls is off. So looks like we are trying next week.

[NicksBride]

Well, sounds like you are really doing your research. That is awesome!!!! Good for you!

I am still keeping my fingers crossed!

[Panthers Bride]

I called about insurance. I think its pretty affordable. $60/mo for home-owners insurance and $40/mo for flood insurance. The flood insurance covers the entire cost of the mortgage, so I guess for $40/mo if we do get flooded, its a good deal. Whats everyone's take on those costs?

I left a message for the mortgage guy to call back. It was towards the end of the business day, so he will probably call me tomorrow. We are going to try and set up an appointment to go in Monday or Tuesday evening after work (I would leave early). I would have liked to of done it this week, but tomorrow is obviously too quick, Wednesday one of the girls is only working a half day, Thursday I'm coming in late already (I have a dentist appointment in the morning) and Friday one of the girls is off. So looks like we are trying next week.

I'd check the flood insurance thing. I worked in insurance for a couple of years and also had flood insurance (I lived in a 100,000 yr flood plain so had to get it to get a mortgage). Flood insurance is issued by the gov't through insurance companies, so is highly regulated. Normally flood insurance will ONLY cover the (replacement) cost of the buildings and the land. So if say your house gets flooded and you owe 100,000 on your mortgage. If it cost (or the insurance company says it would cost) $80,000 to rebuild (and you decide not to), you will only get the $80K not the full value of the mortgage. In case of a flood, the homeowners insurance would cover all personal property but not any of the value of the property, so they wouldn't pick up any 'gap' between insurances. Now it's been a few years since I've read any flood insurance/regular insurance policies - but this is they way it was when I bought my house. Just make sure you read the fine print and get clarification. I would also get an appraisal done and make sure the appraisal value is at least as much as the mortgage if not more -- then if anything happened you'd be covered for the amount you would owe.

[katieandalex]

Yeah, our lender we are planning on going through does an apprasial of the house....but for some reason I'm guessing that its worth more than we are going to pay since they keep dropping the price...there are 2 big things that are holding back the selling of this house, but both of those we don't really care about.

I asked our insurance company about how flood insurance works because I've never dealt with it before and they said that theirs covers the entire cost of the mortgage. So if we buy the house for $110K and it floods 2 weeks later, they would give us $110K.

The **** lender we've been trying to set up and appt. with hasn't been returning my phone calls. So I told Alex to call and set up the appt because the guy had talked with him and not me (they didn't have any of my information) so maybe he doesn't know who I am so hes not calling back....*shrugs* So Alex is suppsoed to try and call today and try to set up an appt for Monday afternoon.

[katieandalex]

Alex is going to try and get ahold of our lender again today. I've been trying him all week and haven't gotten ahold of him....hes always busy with another client and we really want to go in and meet with him on Monday afternoon....I would just like to get the ball rolling with all of this.

[NicksBride]

That is always frusturating trying to get ahold of someone and they are never there. It sounds like you are doing the right thing by calling and calling. So I hope you get ahold of him today or tomorrow. If not can you find someone else who is more avaliable?

[tiffany.marlene]

I called about insurance. I think its pretty affordable. $60/mo for home-owners insurance and $40/mo for flood insurance. The flood insurance covers the entire cost of the mortgage, so I guess for $40/mo if we do get flooded, its a good deal. Whats everyone's take on those costs?

I left a message for the mortgage guy to call back. It was towards the end of the business day, so he will probably call me tomorrow. We are going to try and set up an appointment to go in Monday or Tuesday evening after work (I would leave early). I would have liked to of done it this week, but tomorrow is obviously too quick, Wednesday one of the girls is only working a half day, Thursday I'm coming in late already (I have a dentist appointment in the morning) and Friday one of the girls is off. So looks like we are trying next week.

The cost of homeowners insurance where I live is roughly $333 a month, and that doesn't even include flood insurance! I think you're getting a great deal. :-)

[katieandalex]

Well, Alex couldn't get ahold of that guy. He left a message again today. Tomorrow we are going to call him again and call someone else and see if we can get together with SOMEONE. We HAVE to get out of this apartment. We just got the information asking if we want to renew our lease. HELL NO! Our current rent we pay right now total is $635. Well they want to raise our total rent to $720! Are you freakin' kidding me? If you ask me, thats a good way to get rid of some tenants.

A good thing though....one of our friends has to move out of his place at the end of this month...long story....but we said that if he didn't have a place to live that he could stay at or house (in the bedroom in the basement or even just take over the basement) for $200/month until he found a place of his own and got on his feet. So that will be nice for us to get on our feet in the house as well.....but I think with $720/month rent that we might as well just bite the bullet, be a little poor for a few months and just go for the house no matter what the cost.

[NicksBride]

As I said in general chat, I am so sorry this is happening. I would just try somewhere else or someone else. Can you go into the place and do a face to face asking for someone new? That way you can just say you are not leaving until you speak with someone as this is crazy!!! That is what I would do if you can. Otherwise take your business else where. Good luck sweetie!

[katieandalex]

Well Alex called today. He said that he would call and call until he talked to the guy. He got ahold of him and we have an appt at 2pm on Thursday. We are both taking Thursday and Friday off for a little vacation...we need it....so we are going to go in and talk with them and hopefully leave with a pre-approval letter.

[NicksBride]

I will be keeping my fingers crossed for you! Good luck.

[lize566]

I keep my fingers crossed, too!! Buying a house is so exciting and and scary all at the same time!! Hope it all works out for you!

[katieandalex]

Yeah our friend said that he would definitely move in for a while for a couple hundred dollars a month. But he said "One thing, I'm going to build a bar." And we were like "We were already planning on it....tiki hut!" He thought it was sweet. We are much bigger drinkers now that we both have stressful sucky jobs! LOL!

[katieandalex]

Whew...I have a lot to post up today....so be prepared.

I went out today and ended up buying the duvet set that I wanted a new set of sheets that will fit our super thick mattress better. It was something I wanted and Alex didn't really, so I'm using my travel money from work for it. I love it! Eventually we will need to buy a new down comforter for in the duvet...but that can come later. We just used our nasty green one for now.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B6%3A%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3C9%3C3ot1lsi

Last night I made an awesome dinner and I thought that I would share it with everyone. It was a recipe in the Kraft Food & Family magazine...but I altered it a bit.

*this is writen to feed 1 normal appetite and 1 large appetite! LOL!*
Ingredients
1 large boneless skinless chicken breast
3 servings of tri-color rotini noodles, cooked & drained
1 medium tomato
1/2 cup shredded motzarella cheese
4 tbsp of Kraft Sun-dried Tomato dressing
1 tsp of dried basil

Directions
-Boil water and cook rotini noodles
-Cut up chicken breast into small cubes
-Place chicken into a zip-lock bag with 2 tbsp of dressing, marinate 5-10 minutes
-Pour everything from the bag into a small skillet and cook until all of the dressing has been absorbed
-Dice tomato into small chunks, add shredded cheese, the rest of the dressing & the basil to the tomatos
-Drain the noodles
-Mix everything together in the noodle pan
-Simmer for 5 minutes
-Serve with french bread.

A picture of the final product.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B6%3A%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D3 27%3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A6%3B%3A2ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

Today I went out and took some pictures of my freshly lowered car today. Love it! Picture time.
Before
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A65%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A7479577ot1lsi
After
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A99%3B97ot1lsi

And another before and after.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3A235ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A65%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A747%3B%3A46ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A99%3B%3A7ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A99%3B%3B2ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3B57%3Bot1lsi
YAY! My passanger side headlights is fixed and no longer fogged up! I'm so excited!
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A99%3B%3B7ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3B584ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A99%3B%3C3ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3B588ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3A232ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3B589ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3B58%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3B594ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3A53%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A9%3A243ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

Then while I was out taking pictures of my car, I ended up taking some other pictures while I was at it.

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A6664ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp6%3A%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A53%3A%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp68%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A666%3Aot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp65%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A53%3B8ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A6675ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A9283ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp6%3C%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327 %3DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A66%3A%3Bot1lsi
Some creepy sculpture....thought I'd take a picture to show it.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A9274ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A66%3A5ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A9263ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp63%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A6694ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp69%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A5447ot1lsi

[katieandalex]

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A5435ot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C7%3C%3B36%7Ffp67%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B%3A%3A6686ot1lsi


Ok, thats all for now. Time to go clean up the apartment a bit.

[katieandalex]

Oh and I forgot...a couple pictures of us lowering my car.
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C777%3B9%7Ffp64%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B948877ot1lsi

http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C777%3B9%7Ffp66%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3DX ROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B948%3A8%3Bot1lsi
http://images.photo.walgreens.com/349%3C777%3B9%7Ffp6%3B%3Dot%3E232%3C%3D357%3D327%3 DXROQDF%3E23237%3A%3B948%3A92ot1lsi
Wow! I rarely get this dirty when working on a car...LOL!

[NicksBride]

Your pictures were really nice. I love how your car looks lowered!!!
Your other pictures are gorgeous, I love dasies!!!!!!!!

You got dirty.. ewww. hahaha just kidding.

[katieandalex]

Yeah I was freaking out and Alex is like "I've GOT to take a picture of this!" Yeah my goal today is to go out and find some nice pictures of flowers. I want to take some b&w pictures of flowers to hang in a frame in our dining room at our house. We've pretty much just started calling it our house because we ARE going to get it. Last night we were watching this show on TLC called "My First House." At the end of the one episode when the people signed the paperwork, I'm like "I don't know if I can do that!" Its just such a commitment....And Alex said the same thing, we don't like to be tied down. But its a step we have to make.

[blueeyedbride]

Bill and I bought our first house at the end of Feb.we were very excited about it and then a couple weeks after we had moved in Bill was a down in the dumps becasue all he kept thinking about was the commitment and what is this happened or that..... WE don't regret it at all its fun now beacuse we are trting to landscape the outside, and we have our tiffs about some things wanting it this way or that but hey thats life.... WE have just made our 3rd payment on this house.. I need to post some pics. , but anyway think of all the money u r throwing a way by renting this way u have something to show for it... Good luck and I hope u get u'r house... Just stay patient there will be a lot of good and bad things in the process but it all works out in the end....

AMy

[katieandalex]

Yeah, we are just worried because the first few months we will be pretty poor. We will have my mom paid off in a few months and after that things will be fine money-wise. But for a while we are going to be pretty poor...and we don't like feeling that way. But we've made it works many times in the past, so I think we can do it this time. And it will be worth it because we already decided we were going to be the party house on the block! LOL! We have so many ideas for this house already that we will be really excited once we get into it and we can actually do stuff. Probably the only thing we will do this year though is re-paint the interior and possibly start on some landscaping....other than that, everything will be waiting for a while.

[70707Bride]

I love the pics of the outdoors! When I see pics like that it makes me wish I had gone into photography.

[katieandalex]

yeah I'm debating on taking a lot of photography courses when I go back to school....it would help my criminolistics degree as well...but I'd love to learn more about photography anyways.

[NicksBride]

I think thats wonderful that you want to get into photography. I took one class and loved it. You really have an eye for things!

[katieandalex]

Well, update on the house. We are going to meet with the financing Thursday at 2pm. Tomorrow I'm going to fax over all of the information that he needs (W2's, paystubs, etc) so he has that and can have everything ready for us. We are going to look at the house on Friday at noon. Our realtor is going to come prepared for us to make an offer if we want to that day. But I'm saddened right now. Someone else just put in an offer...but there is a contingency on it...which our realtor said usually means they have a house that needs to sell first...so if we come in and say "We'll give you this much and move in next month" they may jump on that and it may look more appealing to them.....we are hoping so. Keep your fingers crossed! :)

[shawnsgirl]

:goodluck: I have my fingers crossed for you!! I really hope you two get this house!!

[katieandalex]

Thanks Jonelle. I really hope so too. We need to get out of this apartment and that house is perfect for us. I'm getting really excited for Friday. We are going to tell them, we will move in whenever you want us to. We only have a $200 deposit on the place we are at now, so if it means breaking the last 2 months of our lease and losing our deposit for them to give us the house over the other people, we're all for it.

[NicksBride]

We were in the same boat as you guys. The house we really wanted had another offer in but they had a contigency that stated they wanted A B and C done before they would move in. We offered them asking price with no contingencys and they accepted the offer that day. So just go in there knowing that the house will need work etc. But that is the fun of it and if yu can get it in your price range and still do work on it, jump on it!
I am really hoping this works out for you guys! Good luck!!!!:D

[katieandalex]

Yeah Im really hoping for this. They have been sitting on this house for a while now and I know they want to get rid of it. If we are go in there and say "Here is what we will offer you and take it as is asap." We are hoping they jump on it over the first offer.

My dad is taking the day off work to come down on Friday and walk through the house. He knows what to look for with this that will need to be fixed/replaced down the road and how much it will cost and all of that. Hes as good as any house inspector. He walked through my sisters first house and pointed out stuff and then they had a home inspector go through and he had already picked out everything he said......so I hope he has good things to say.

[NicksBride]

oh thats nice that your dad is coming, always nice to have another set of eyes. We will be thinking of you guys while you do that walk through! I am really hoping for great news.

[katieandalex]

Our realtor called us this morning to tell us to get a copy of the Good Faith letter that states all of the closing costs and such. She said she called our lender to get a copy and he wouldn't give it to her, so she asked that if we got a copy she could look it over and see if everything looks alright. She said that some lenders charge a title insurance, when in Iowa you don't need that and its like an extra $500 on closing costs. She said that she just closed a deal yesterday where the people didn't research into it and they ended up paying over $5K in closing costs....so she wants to look out for us so we don't get screwed. She just bought a house a year ago and she had the same credit problems we have, so she has been really helpful with helping us find the best deal for us and not get screwed....it helps to have someone who has been through it.

I'm really excited and nervous at the same time. I know everything will work out in the end....I'm just afraid that if we don't get this house that we are going to have to do some fast moving on other houses, which means taking days off work to go and walk through houses to find something that will work for us. So I'm really hoping for this house. We asked Hahn last night if he wanted a backyard and he got all excited! LOL! Not like he can understand what we are saying, but still...Hahn will like it too.

My dad and Alex's dad are bought going to be coming down to look at the house tomorrow with us, so that will be nice to get different opinions on the house. I don't really trust Alex's dad's judgement though because they've never bought a house. They lived in an apartment until they built their house and they are still in that same house. They were fighting with Alex last night on the phone about stuff....you need this, and you need this, and Alex is like, no we don't....thats only when you build a house. His parents always think they know everything...and they don't. I trust my dad's opinion because they bought a trailer, then bought a house, gutted it and refurbished everything and then sold and bought another house, which they are currently in.....plus my dad had helped with the buying of my sister's 2 homes and my brothers 1 home...so he knows what he is doing. I just hope he has good things to say about the house.

[NicksBride]

So exciting! i can't wait to hear. I look everyday hoping for good news on the house. So far everything sounds great!!

Your hair looks AMAZING on your avatar picture. did you dye it yourself? Its cut too right? It look soo good, very flattering. :) Good luck tomorrow with the walk through!

[mlm063007]

I really like your hair in your avatar, Looks great!!!!

I hope that everything works out for you, so that you can get in your house!! YAY!:goodluck:

[katieandalex]

Nope, I haven't dyed or cut my hair in forever. Its just been growing out and the color is just my faded dye job from before. In the summer my hair lightens A LOT and one of my friends said she liked the color, so I stayed with it....its alright IMO. LOL!

Good news! We are pre-appoved for our mortgage! And its super affordable....its like $150 more /month than if we stayed in our apartment another year....we'd be stupid not to buy. So tomorrow we do our walk through and put in our offer....wish us luck!

[NicksBride]

Well your hair looks great for a house walk through! Good luck sweetie I know how much you want this!!! best of luck to you and Alex tomorrow. Please let us know how it goes!!!

[mlm063007]

That is such good news! GOOD LUCK! And make sure to let us know how it goes!!!!:grinhappy:

[katieandalex]

Well we are getting ready right now. We have some errands to run and we have to go wash my car for the races tonight. Our dads are meeting us at our apartment at 11:30 and we are heading over there. Then tonight we are leaving at 4:45 to head out to the drag strip to spend the night out there until 4am. I hope we put in our offer and we hear back soon on it. The house is listed at $110K right now, we are going to offer them $110K but the seller pays down payment and closing costs....so the seller ends up netting $104.5K. I hope that they take it. It saves them from it going back on the market. If they want to net more, we have some room to increase the buying price of the house to $111K or something so they net a bit more, but we hope they just take our first offer. If they take that, our full monthly mortgage payment would be $938/month....we were going to end up paying over $740/month in rent at our current apartment....so its dumb not to buy a house. Eeee! I'm getting excited. We are going to try and remember to bring our digi-cam with and take a ton of pictures of the place....if we remember it, I'll post the pics up.

[NicksBride]

ohh that is soo awesome. I can't wait to hear back. That is just fantastic!!! I really want to see the house as well. Have fun tonight, that sounds like a blast. I bet you guys have some really fun times out there. Take some pictures at that as well!!!

[shawnsgirl]

Yeah!! I hope they accept your offer!!! With the housing market today and the amount of time they stay on the market these days they would be fullish to not accept!!! I'm so happy for you guys!! I know it's still a long road to travel yet but I'm rooting for ya!!

[Kacie_bride]

I hope they accept your offer! That sounds really great. Good luck and have fun tonight!

[katieandalex]

We didn't end up putting in an offer today, but we are going to put it in on Tuesday. There was a lot more wrong with the house than we anticipated there would be. We didn't look good enough at the house when we did the open house a while back, but it still has potential. Our realtor left and we talked to our dad's about it, and we decided that our new offer would be $90K with the seller paying closing costs and down payment. There is a lot that needs to be done; the driveway needs to be repaved (a good $15K job), the garage pretty much needs to be redone, it will need a new water heater in a year or so, the bathrooms need to be redone, new faucets in the kitchen and bathroom, new flooring in the kitchen, dining room and bathrooms, need washer and dryer, new stove and refridgerator at some point, need to replace the deck and the fireplace needs to be dealt with.....most things aren't that bad and we can live with for a while, but some of it needs to be dealt with right away....which includes a lot of money and work......so we can only hope for the best.

[katieandalex]

I got pictures from the drag strip...not many, but I have some. We didn't stay all night and it actually wasn't that fun. The test & tune earlier in the night was fun, but then the Midnight Mayhem sucked because it kept raining. A car broke towards the end of t&t, so they had to clean the track....by the time they got that done it started raining, so they waited for that to stopped, dried the 1/8 mile, ran some cars, it started raining again....finally at 2am Alex and I said screw it and left. My fastest time was 15.060, which is my fastest yet in the car...but I know it can do better......

I'll post pictures later.

[mj512]

I just wanted to say congrats on getting pre-appoved for your mortgage!

Have fun in the home search, I hope everything goes will with the bid you put in!

[katieandalex]

.......................

[NicksBride]

Hey Katie!
You had repeated posts of ...... so I had to delete some so as not to jam up your journal. Still waiting to hear how the house thing went!!!!

[katieandalex]

Well, I had pictures of the house, but Alex got pissed and said that I can't post them up, blah blah blah....he's being retarded lately.....

Anyways, the house thing went ok. There was a lot more wrong with the house than we thought, but we looked at some other houses in our price range, not good neighborhoods. So we decided to put in an offer on the house, but for $20K less than we were originally planning. We are meeting with our realtor today to sign the offer and we are hoping that we hear back soon and they accept the offer. We are willing to move some on the house, but not a whole lot because there are some big ticket items that will have to be fixed in the next year or so....like the driveway needs to be repaved...which is a good $15-20K job.

So we are still hoping for it....and we want to close on the house at the end of June....so that may be appealing to the sellers.

[katieandalex]

Our realtor just left after us signing all of our paperwork to put in our offer. We put on our offer that we wanted to know by 5pm on Wednesday....lets keep our fingers crossed.