a better view

well it looks as if the search is over!
3545 lipan street denver colorado seem to be our newest address!!!

i still have a few more hoops to jump through but it seems to be in the bag.

yesterday was inspection day.
i hung out with the inspector brothers -ron and craige- super great guys! they said the property will last us another one hundred and thirteen years.
i also had a sewer inspection to check out the pipes - pipes got an A as well.

infact noreen (my agent) told me last night that she was suprised how little was wrong with the place. we are going to ask for a new garage door and door opener, the current door is flimsy cracked plastic and the opener only gets the door two feet off the ground.

i really have to thank the jesuits for beings so kind to the house. they put a lot of love and energy into fixing up the place. and brother al especially for all of his hard work on the grounds. he planted lilacs, chinese cherry trees, iris, roses, snap dragons, tulips, too many things to name. i will have some great established plants come spring time.

brother al







court yard - just you wait and see what gio and i do here!






dad/guest house


noreen




thanks agian to the jesuits! i have a washer/dryer again!!!


home sweet home

dc boys party

i wish i had gotten a photo of rick.....

gio had a gig last friday. the only thing he knew about it is that it was a christmas party and it was in a studio. recording studio? design studio?

all of the above sounded good to me. sam was a little nervous at first because of the xmass party theme - sam's a teacher and all the christmas parties he's supposed to attend really suck it.
lame suburban women that have nothing good to say other than how much they all love bush.

back to the party:
well it turns out that i knew the host. the host is a customer from st marks that i've chatted with. his name is rick and he's from dc. infact he used to work the door and other duties and none other than the 930club. uh, what about that? he was the youngest person to work there. super cool!

the party was in his work loft above rock island. the band (gio with josh novak) sounded great. rick has letter presses and off set presses that he does some of his work off of.

photos follow. i got my camera back!!!!

my interest peaked

last thursday and friday i went out with noreen to look at investment properties. there was only one house that i liked but i didn't get to see the whole house....here are the pictures i took on friday.





the nieghbors look nice. a library and a church




this is the first apartment and my favorite one








this is the side entery for the upstairs apartment










over all this house has parts to it that i am looking for but. and i am feeling if there are any buts about it i should pass and keep on looking! wish me more luck! there is some property at 34th and franklin that i am going to look at this week so far. fixer upper. hummmm my dad will be here in late january? maybe i will have a big project for us to work on!!!!!

the first steps making my tummy ache

today was the first day of house hunting.

noreen - my agent - and i saw five place today.

1. the 1950's two level ranch. it had the amount of space inside that i would like. it had a one car garage and a huge yard. but 1950's? no character no charm. and a little out of our price range. huge yard!!!

2. 1895 victorian. well this was more like it. it has three units. two one bedrooms and a studio. small yard. no garage.

garage is so important to me. an in-law suite for dad. studio for me or gio. it's that extra room off the house that can be so cool fix into a new part of the house. no car shall be parked in my garage!!!

3. i don't even know what year the structure was built. the place looked as noreen said like a garage. i want a garage but not as my house.

4. 1890's victorian. super cute first and second level. basement is set up as seperate apartment. ugly! low ceilings no windows it's a dungeon for rent! but the rest of the house had huge closets. there is a garage but the back yard had been cemented into a large sloping parking lot. gio did think this super cool for his rc cars. but that would be the only good aspect of it.

5. early 1900's on firth ct. nasty is the only word for it! there was even a dead fly stuck to the inside of the door jam as we entered....water stained indoor outdoor gray carpet. grungy shower stall. all the walls were dripping some brown fluid. ohhhhhyucky. we didn't go past the first two rooms. fixer upper this was not. oh did i mention that they put vinyl siding up over brick? super yuck!

well tomarrow i am going to see four more properties. i figure that i will probably be looking for atleast three months. finding investment properties takes awhile there are a ton listed right now.... wish me luck!

thanksgiving and life around

my camera is still away to be fixed. no photo.

thanksgiving. it turned out great but what a whirlwind.

we started off planning the party for my house and a friend, erin, that has a larger house and a big turkey and a dish washing machine invited all of us to go to his place and join him.

erin is a southern boy from mississippi and very gracious. the table was full of hot steaming delicious food. everyone pitched in and brought plenty of food, wine and dessert!!

ooooh, i tried something new this year for dessert. i want to do the pumpkin classic but with a new twist: pumkin custard triffel with orange-crandberry marmalade soaked in dark rum and it turned out to be unbelievable! i should have made it a day ahead to soak more.....rumalishish

then for buy nothing day (friday) sam, eric and i took a trip up to hot sulfur springs to soak a bit. the drive was beautiful it was full of snow from berthound pass on passed winter park. it wasn't snowing on us at hot sulfur but the temperature didn't get over 22 degress/-5c. oh sooooo cold switching pools!!! we tried the newest pool with a little water fall, the water fall was hot but the pool was cooler and shallow! so we stayed put for hours in the big water fall pool. so relaxing.

as for denver.
it hasn't gotten over 27 degress in the past three days and the snow is stil coming. there have been rock/snow slides all around the state, the largest one happened inbetween vail to glenwood. the slide sent boulders down that took out one side of the highway and sent all traffic for the first day up 40. but denver looks so good under the blanket of snow that has fallen.

as for me!
i have been approved for a house loan! so the search begins!!!! i want to find a house that has been split into apartments. here comes the commune!!! i have so many ideas running around in my head for the place, well the back yard for now.....hot tub, wood burning sauna, in law suite, studio for upholstery even.......hopefully in the next few months i will be able to post a photo of my new house!!!!! let me ground my self .....aahhhhh

cold cold cold.....my toes are cold. i'm going to get back under the covers with a hot cup of tea.

see photos of thanksgiving on gio's site.

new boots and no camera!!!

tuesday was the day
i found the boots that i've been searching for
black
sleek
tall
no heels
hard to find
super cool
no photo

so i drew a picture....not actual size



alas my camera has a malfunction and has to be sent back to the manufacture for repairs....that's a whole other stupid problem.

if any one reading this knows me very well you should understand i've had the problem often and i never seem to change.

never remember where the "special place" is for my important things.
i have very many "special places". this time the special place was the box the camera came in with a special folder that the sales person stapled the receipt in......i didn't find it until yesterday.
i even had a duplicate receipt made by the store. it took a week to receive it.

well, no i have all my ducks in a row and i need to send off the camera to see if they will fix it............

i just can't sleep

november is here.
halloween is over.
four more years.

yesterday hands down was the saddest day that i've worked at st.marks.
people were coming in with puffy eyes from crying and long faces with deep sighs - i was one of them.
ohio.
ohio was the state that turned the tide to the republicans.
i hate ohio.
i think i hate most of america for being the red states. even colorado!!! we were red!!!!

what i don't understand is that we could all vote for renewable energy but we couldn't get all our asses in gear and elect someone other than bush?

i think i will not be able to sleep for awhile about this matter.

kerry? what a putts for conceding so quickly. should've been edwards as the candidate.
i yelled with others about this all day at work yesterday. i got home with a large bottle of wine to share with my roommates and proceeded to bitch and moan some more. and here i am at six thirty in the morning whining !!! i haven't even had a cup of tea yet....... ok enough.....

HALLOWEEN
the friday of halloween weekend a gang of us halloweeners went to a party hosted by the lovely bartendress of the thin man miss stephanie.
good lord did she have a lot of guests and liquor!
it was quite a good show of fellow costumed attendees at the party.

jocky men = fisher man gear, football players and some times dressed as ugly woman
bimboy girls = skimpy anything, angle, devil, eighties valley girl equipped with neon necklace
nerd men = some costume with deep meaning. "i am John J. Armstrong, now assistant director
of American prison operations in Iraq." sweet
and here's all of us

nils trying to make his way to hell faster


sam, he looks beautiful everyday of the year. babayaga


salior/frank sinatra gio and charlie chaplin nick. damn gio looks hot!!!


nils trying harder


mikey flander as once again panty hose ballon boy


gio's distrubed by my costum - ballerina clown


after this photo the camera went boom on the ground!!! hummmmmmmm?


and fun was had by all.......

halloween 2004

well we didn't start off with quite the bang we're used to.
but we having been doing a few things....

before vacation sam hosted a clay party. the theme of the party was to make scary skulls and other goolish objects that could be useful or not.

i made an ash tray for gio


last sunday we had some more people over to carve pumpkins. lots o'fun.
done by girl sam

this is mine

i'm not sure


last night sam, hazel and i went to the scream park in brighton. good fun. pretty scary.



it was the high tech scary that you'll find at primitive fear or over at elitches haunted houses.
it was the good ol' dangerous fun we all used to have during halloween - the halloween when mom and dad didn't check your candy!


there were two haunted houses, a fun house, a kiddy haunted train ride and another kiddy haunted house.

well if any one knows hazel you'll know that her biggest fear is clowns.
end count of evening = fifteen clowns ( some children size in groups),
two pint size scream masks,
several gools with blood,
several odds and ends people in the dark
one chainsaw guy,
one red neck boy on top of his trailer who would leep on to trampoline
and bounce onto another trailer!!!!! super cool

moving on

the rest of the trip?

i have waited too long and now san fran seems like a foggy memory.... pun not intended

napa......
at the last wine tasting were other older couples seemed amused to find out that we were biking around to the tastings. crazy kids!




the drive back was short and we stopped off at the golden gate.....



after we got back from napa there was only three days left before the drive home to denver.
we had not been over to the mission. we went in search of the brazilian market that we had heard of....we found a cute little italien market as well....



gio and i spent a beautiful late afternoon at baker beach.
this is the beach that cathy and darren used to live by when they lived in the presidio








over all the vacation was brilliant but to short.
the time i spent in the car driving was almost equal to the time in sf. but there were parts of nevada and utah that were breath taking: canyons, mountains, big sky.
it really should have been a two week vacation....
hard to pull off with the both of us at st.marks.

thanks again to my two wonderful sisters and super great brother in law using his powers for good!!! thank you for helping us see you all and have a great vacation!!!!

maybe soon we will all be able to go away to gether some where warm!!!!
not that i don't like the cold..... ocean city any time soon?