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Saturday, October 14, 2006
The Spider That Just Won't Quit
For the last few months, there's been a spider living in front of our house. He's a big nasty fellow that just won't accept that he's not wanted. For the longest time, he was building webs between the railing in our front yard and Joe's van that was in the driveway. Most mornings I forgot about it and walked through the web...gross. 
Then I guess he got annoyed with having to keep rebuilding the web after I would walk through it because he started building it on the other side of the van and attaching it to a bush in our side yard. Of course, that got knocked down whenever we took the trash out or mowed the lawn. So now the spider has started building his webs between our house and the trash cans. For the most part, it's out of the way and we're not walking through them as much but it's still annoying. I guess we could try to kill it but, to be honest, the spider is pretty big and fast and I really don't want to have to deal with it. It's going to get cold here eventually so that should take care of him, I hope. This is a pic of one of his webs...it is pretty cool looking, but check out the size of him!!!
Then I guess he got annoyed with having to keep rebuilding the web after I would walk through it because he started building it on the other side of the van and attaching it to a bush in our side yard. Of course, that got knocked down whenever we took the trash out or mowed the lawn. So now the spider has started building his webs between our house and the trash cans. For the most part, it's out of the way and we're not walking through them as much but it's still annoying. I guess we could try to kill it but, to be honest, the spider is pretty big and fast and I really don't want to have to deal with it. It's going to get cold here eventually so that should take care of him, I hope. This is a pic of one of his webs...it is pretty cool looking, but check out the size of him!!!
Our House - The After Pictures
Well, I know it's been almost 6 months since we moved into our new house but here are the after pictures finally. I kept waiting until I got the house completely clean before taking them, but I've finally realized that day is still a long time coming. So you'll have to excuse some of the mess in the pictures but anyone that knows me knows that I'm not exactly the cleanest person in the world, and neither is my house! If you want to see what the house looked like originally, go back to the April 2006 postings.
Kitchen, view 1
Kitchen, view 2
Living room, view 1
Living room, view 2
Dining room
Family room, view 1
Family room, view 2
Steps to go upstairs
Bathroom, view 1
Bathroom, view 2
Ben's room, view 1
Ben's room, view 2
Master bedroom
Kitchen, view 1
Kitchen, view 2
Living room, view 1
Living room, view 2
Dining room
Family room, view 1
Family room, view 2
Steps to go upstairs
Bathroom, view 1
Bathroom, view 2
Ben's room, view 1
Ben's room, view 2
Master bedroom
Slugger
The week after Matthew was born, we went down to MD to watch his big brother Devin play in his first baseball game. Devin seemed to have fun and it gave us a chance to spend some time with Joe's family and the new baby.
Here's Devin in left field wondering why no one's hitting it his way.
Sydney showing Ben how to hold the ball with one hand.
Baby Matthew with his daddy's mom Debbie.
Devin playing catcher for the first time...he seemed a little nervous, but can you blame him?
Proud Uncle Joe and Matthew
Ben and cousin Devin looking tough in his uniform.
Mom-Mom and her 4th great-grandchild, Matthew
Devin at bat...waiting for that perfect pitch. In this league, they pitch to the kids until they hit the ball...we were waiting for a while but Devin didn't give up and finally got a hit.
Mom-Mom and Ben having some laughs.
Here's Devin in left field wondering why no one's hitting it his way.
Sydney showing Ben how to hold the ball with one hand.
Baby Matthew with his daddy's mom Debbie.
Devin playing catcher for the first time...he seemed a little nervous, but can you blame him?
Proud Uncle Joe and Matthew
Ben and cousin Devin looking tough in his uniform.
Mom-Mom and her 4th great-grandchild, Matthew
Devin at bat...waiting for that perfect pitch. In this league, they pitch to the kids until they hit the ball...we were waiting for a while but Devin didn't give up and finally got a hit.
Mom-Mom and Ben having some laughs.
New Nephew
On August 21st, Joe's sister Chrissy gave birth to Matthew Joseph Miller, Jr. I believe he was 8.5 lbs and 20 inches long. He certainly gave his mom a hard time, as he was 4 days over due and Chrissy was pretty sick most of the pregnancy. She had been walking around 95% effaced and 4.5 centemeters dialated for 2 weeks, so it was definitely a blessing when Matthew finally arrived happy and healthy in the middle of the night. Isn't he cute?!
Blues Festival
There was a Blues Festival the weekend of August 12th in Wilmington that my parents invited us to attend. It was an all day outdoor concert on the Wilmington waterfront. Joe and I took Ben and met up with my parents. We were sitting off to the side of the stage so it was hard to see the bands but the weather and music were great and we had a lot of fun. Here are some pictures I took that day: 
An Old Friend
One night in July I was looking at this blog and realized that someone had left a comment for me...which I love because it's great positive reinforcement and encouragement for keeping on top of updating it (hint...hint). Anyway, the comment was from one of my old friends from college, Jen. She said that she was going to be in DE soon and was hoping to get together. Jen and I had lost touch about a year after I graduated and it was so great to hear from her. I sent her an email and it turned out she was actually in DE that weekend visiting a friend. We ended up meeting for lunch and I got to introduce her to Ben. We had a great time catching up and I hope that we can continue to keep in touch now! Here's a pic of Jen and Ben: 
Sewer Problem
Way back on July 13, I was doing laundry and noticed that the water was not draining out of the washing machine. Then I saw that there was water backed up in our laundry tub. I called to Joe and the moment he saw it he suspected that we had a blockage in our sewer. Thus began our saga of trying to get our sewer fixed.
First, Joe tried to use an auger in our crawl space to open up the blockage. After that didn't work he called a few different plumbers and finally one came out to the house the next night. Roto Rooter tried but couldn't get anywhere because their auger was too big to fit in the crawl space and our bathroom to try to clean the pipes. Joe then made some calls to see about having someone come out and dig up the yard but the average quote was around $1400, way out of our budget.
So Joe did what he does best, he went after the problem himself and rented a machine to dig up our yard and look for the blockage himself. Here's a picture of Joe as he began the dig.
It was hard to watch him digging up our front yard since it was such a nice yard. It was one of the reasons we bought the house...really nice curb appeal. But it became an eye sore overnight!
That night I went to my parents' house with Ben so we could shower and use their plumbing. You don't realize how much you take for granted with running water: showers, using the toilet, brushing your teeth, making bottles for the baby.
The next day, I left Ben with my mom and I went up to the house with my dad to see if we could help. I ended up taking video of Joe and his dad, my dad, and Joe's friends Randy and Stuey as they found the blockage and fixed it. Unfortunately, blogger doesn't let me put up videos so I don't have any pictures of the outcome. But in the end, they had to dig about 7 feet down at the edge of where our property meets the street. It turned out that most of our sewer line had been replaced at some point except for the last few feet before meeting up with the county line. Of course that's where some roots had grown through the piping and caused the back up. Luckily though they were able to get it fixed and we were able to use our sewer again that night.
The down side though was that our front yard ended up looking like this:
Eventually we got some grass seed down and we finally have a green yard again. Although, whatever seed we bought did not actually match the existing grass so our curb appeal is still not 100%. And the new grass is growing much faster that the old grass so Joe's having to cut it more often.
Oh the joys of owning a home!!!
First, Joe tried to use an auger in our crawl space to open up the blockage. After that didn't work he called a few different plumbers and finally one came out to the house the next night. Roto Rooter tried but couldn't get anywhere because their auger was too big to fit in the crawl space and our bathroom to try to clean the pipes. Joe then made some calls to see about having someone come out and dig up the yard but the average quote was around $1400, way out of our budget.
So Joe did what he does best, he went after the problem himself and rented a machine to dig up our yard and look for the blockage himself. Here's a picture of Joe as he began the dig.
It was hard to watch him digging up our front yard since it was such a nice yard. It was one of the reasons we bought the house...really nice curb appeal. But it became an eye sore overnight!
That night I went to my parents' house with Ben so we could shower and use their plumbing. You don't realize how much you take for granted with running water: showers, using the toilet, brushing your teeth, making bottles for the baby.
The next day, I left Ben with my mom and I went up to the house with my dad to see if we could help. I ended up taking video of Joe and his dad, my dad, and Joe's friends Randy and Stuey as they found the blockage and fixed it. Unfortunately, blogger doesn't let me put up videos so I don't have any pictures of the outcome. But in the end, they had to dig about 7 feet down at the edge of where our property meets the street. It turned out that most of our sewer line had been replaced at some point except for the last few feet before meeting up with the county line. Of course that's where some roots had grown through the piping and caused the back up. Luckily though they were able to get it fixed and we were able to use our sewer again that night.
The down side though was that our front yard ended up looking like this:
Eventually we got some grass seed down and we finally have a green yard again. Although, whatever seed we bought did not actually match the existing grass so our curb appeal is still not 100%. And the new grass is growing much faster that the old grass so Joe's having to cut it more often.
Oh the joys of owning a home!!!
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