Kitchen refinish

After five years of high traffic, the kitchen floors needed to be refinished.  Judi left town with the girls and left Nick in charge of getting it done (and cleaning up all the dust for days afterwards)

With the second coat still wet

New couch and chairs

 

 

 

Yipppeeeeee

To me from Nick. Merry Christmas. I love my new hooks!

Fountain

This is our new fountain! I need to get pictures of the whole backyard! It's 95-97% done.

More backyard

almost done….. it just needs its shingles.

The Bars

Cool weather gardening

In the new backyard, we have 2 big planter beds (raised and gopher proof); the two are about 150 square feet total. We're filling them with greens (see the picture above for what we're planting) and other cool weather plants.  I am so excited! This will be cross-posted to http://veryveryverygreen.blogspot.com.

Backyard fun

 

They are still working hard on our backyard. More pictures soon!

Expanding our network

Nick installs another wi-fi in the house for better coverage.

Office

Here you can see some of our office. I have a super cool picture over my treadmill desk now, too. I love my treadmill desk. I have walked 7-8 miles a day on it during crazy work times. So much better than sitting! (I'll get another picture when I remember.)

Wires and things

We had some internet difficulties when we moved in the new house--that's putting it mildy. Nick spent lots of time figuring out how to make it better. Here you can see some of the new networking he put in. Ask him more to find out more! He got us a super new cable under the house to make things better, too. (I did not document that process.)

Buddy's stairs

He can't jump all the way up to Nat's bed so Nick and Nat made him his own staircase. He is one lucky kitty. He also loves to lounge in the sun by the window.

Kitty corner

In the new house. (I think this is Coale.)

Coale

 

Coale tries to climb up the attic stairs. Nick takes the photo from above.

new paint job!

 

Yay!

 

A little over exposed, but you can see more of the house.  It's hard to get a good picture of the house with the way the flag lot is laid out. 

New spot on the couch

One of the fun things about moving is seeing where kitties decide they should sit/sleep. All these new spots in the new house. Buddy never did this at the old house. I think the kitties are sitting on the couch more because it's closer to the kitchen so they can be near and in comfort.  Kitties are fun!

Butterflies and bees

Grapes

This was about 1/4th to 1/5th of our harvest this year. I hope we get even more next year! They are concord grapes and super sweet. They have seeds, but the seeds are really good for you!  Nat and I like to freeze them and then eat them. We call them grapesicles!

cleaning...

Solar panel cleaning...

Who knew?

Moths!

At the new house, we've seen some crazy moths!

First, Mothra... about 4 inches long.  We never saw the wing span.  It's a type of sphinx moth; probably a waved sphinx moth, but they are generally not west of the Rockies, so I may need to do a little more digging. Maybe it's a http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/species/Manduca-sexta.

Then this cute little leaf-like moth.

I love the antennae. A friend in facebook said it looked like a "gunslinger" in the photo with the stance. 

After many web searches, I have determined that it's a Dichorda illustraria http://mothphotographersgroup.msstate.edu/species.php?hodges=7055 ... more web searching will be necessary to determine what it eats (or ate as a larva). Being a moth scientist is hard work.