I was going to...

I was going to do a post with pictures, but realized that the business laptop I'm using now doesn't have a card reader, and i'm not going on a hunt for the cord at 11:40 at night, when really I should be in bed, but instead I'm sitting here listening to the dog snore, and man is she snoring it up! Kind of odd, she's not usually a snorer. The cat is, but not the dog.

We had a super busy day at the tubing hill today. We had 65 for the one session (60 is the max, but the extra 5 were part of the same family that already had passes, so we just had them share tubes, they really wanted to go) and 25 for the other session. We've been having 10-20 in a whole day, so this was the first session we've maxed out. It was pretty cold so they werent' short on tubes, because most of the time there were at least 10 people inside warming up. I think it was 5 degrees when we started the day. brrr. But it was beautiful. I was very busy inside checking people in, getting forms filled out, selling concessions, and all that fun stuff. Justin was busy outside making sure everything was working right, and rebuilding the snow berms as they got messed up. The snow we have is really light and powdery, so it moves easily, not like a slightly heavier snow, which would be nice for the berms, but hey, we'll take what we have for now. We got a nice half page right up in the local paper, with pictures, so that was pretty cool, plus we did an ad with them, turned out good. You can see it online and http://www.homernews.com under "Advertisers" is our ad, just click extreme tubing. then under sports is the blip with the pictures. fun stuff. The photographer from the other Homer paper was at the hill today taking more pictures. good day for him to be there with so many people. Justin took some cool pics too, every hook on the rope toe was full this afternoon, and there were people everywhere, which is what I was going to post, but no cord, no cardreader, tired person means no photos. sorry. Maybe later. :)

Other than that, we're doing good. We're pooped but we're good. We've been working about 12-14 hour days on this, and we are TIRED! We have 10 more days to go before break is over and we go to 3 days a week at the tubing hill. I'm looking forward to sewing and scrapbooking and being home more often. I'm an at home person, I like to be home, so I'll be glad when we get to be home more.

Well, I really should try and get to bed, I wanted to stay up to get the wood stove cooking good before I went to be so it would stay warm. Its nice and toasty in here now! feels good after being on the cold hill all day. Note to self - tomorrow take fleece sweater!

Christmas stuff

Most of our Christmas stuff is on the Family Christmas Countdown blog. Rather than post everything twice, I just put the holiday stuff on that blog. So, if you want to see the holiday stuff we're up to, check it out! http://family-christmas.blogspot.com

Kind of sad

We took the goats over to the people we bought them from tonight, so that they can get bred. She'll keep them for a month, to make sure that it "takes" and they don't come into heat again. I think Justin is looking forward to them being gone, so he can sleep in a little, but I'm kind of sad. I like my goaty girls! I'm sadder about them being gone than I thought I would be. I mean, we get them back, but still, gonna miss the ladies!

EEEEEE

OK, maybe EEEEEE is a little excessive, but its close. Justin and I agreed this fall, well 2 weeks ago really, to run a local business this winter. Its for winter recreation, called Extreme Tubing. Basically its a hill, on the side of a small mountain, and its groomed to have like 5 "lanes" of snow, and we have innertube type things (only with solid bottoms) that people use to sled down the hill at a high rate of speed. Sorry, I'm not really good at explaining it. Its just extreme tubing. We're getting ready to open, since obviously it can't open unless there's snow. Although Bill, the guy we're running it for, is thinking about buying a snowmaker so we can have snow anytime and be open sooner and later in the year.

Bill recently got married, and moved full time to Seattle, but he's spent a couple years growing this business and didn't want to just throw it away. So we needed work, he needed his business managed.....and so here we are. Justin has spent the last week and a half getting the machinery fixed up, the hill groomed, the new counter built, tubes aired up......and on and on. I'm going to be helping more the end of the week, getting the candy/hot cocoa/soup cups, etc and office organized. Then I plan to be there most of the shifts to check people in and sell candy bars and such. Should keep us really busy for about half the week. We're planning to be open Friday evening, Saturday afternoon/evening, and sunday afternoon and evening. We didn't really want to be open on Sunday, we don't usually work on Sunday, but the ox is in the mire as they say, so we just have to do it. We won't open until 1 so at least we can go to Sacrament meeting, so that will be nice. Oh, check out the website, well, the old website we haven't updated it yet, but you can see what we're doing sort of. its http://www.extremetubing.com/

We're also going to be applying for a contract in January that will hopefully give us a good business/income for the next 2-7 years or longer if we do a good job. I don't want to put details on, just in case, but its going to be an intense bidding process and application time for us! Very intense. We have 2 people though that have agreed to help us with it, and with getting the machinery we will need, so that helps a tremendous amount. But there are a lot of details to work through, and its going to be hard.

Other than that, we're still getting ready for Christmas, today we got out the nativities, and made room for the tree. I think tomorrow we'll do the tree, unless we go shopping in Soldotna anyway. Then Saturday is a big Christmas open house at the church, and we're helping with that in all different shifts, plus if we get enough snow this week, then we'll open the tubing hill on saturday too for a "free ride" then open for pay on Sunday. SO MANY projects going on right now, its kind of overwhelming, but I hope we can keep everything together and all of our irons in the right fires.

Cookies

I put a couple of recipes for really good cookies that I found the other day on the family Christmas blog. I got a new Taste of Home magazine, and the cookie recipes were great! They're on the family Christmas blog at http://family-christmas.blogspot.com/ Check them out - yummy~!

Missed one

Missed the picture of the kitty enjoying the new floor.

Yay new floor!

Here's Justin taking out the extra beams. Well, maybe not so much "extra" as moveable. We had such a small living room because of the beams, and them being right in the middle of the room. So dad and Justin figured out how to strap them, and bolt them, so that we could move them, and use one instead of 3 and actually be more structurally sound. Pretty cool really. So dad and Justin cut the plate, and got the bolts, then Justin did the remodeling. Gave us TONS more room, and we could totally rearrange the living room. We'd been stuck with the same configuration since we moved in, it was the only way to get everything into the room. Now we have so much space its amazing! We're loving it.

The tired old grey carpet.

In this picture above you can see how much of a footprint that beam, and old area where the stove used to be took up. Used a lot of our space up. But no more!

Sorry for the blurry picture, that's the floor guy scraping staples after he pulled the old carpet

Its so pretty all finished! The tile and the carpet go so beautifully together. It took us 10 years to figure out what we wanted, and to be able to afford it, but hey - it looks really good now!

Birch Burl Bowl

Here's Justin's most recent bowl. Its so beautiful!