Homeowners

We bought a house!  We started looking in February or so and found a place we liked far more quickly and easily than we imagined.  It's not *everything* we wanted (we already miss being within walking distance of the downtown square and all of the restaurants on Dickson street) but it's a lot of space that we'll be able to grow into.  It's a long but manageable walk from my office (a little over 2 miles), but right on the campus bus route.  We've also realized we're pretty close to the fairgrounds and a few other places worth walking to, and a short drive to all the old standbys.  So far we are pretty happy and settling in slowly, with more wall decoration and furniture to come in the future.

As people have asked for pictures, I figured here might be the easiest place to put them.  Let me take you on a little tour.

Here is the front door and the weird little open room space near the door where we have stashed a couch.  Perhaps later there will be toy bins here, but for now this is what we've done:

To the left of this is the living area (complete with a cat).

Behind the living area is an archway to the dining room.

From the dining room, you can look over into the kitchen.  This is another weird "room" with open space, but there is also a back screened in porch accessible from this area.

Another view of the kitchen.

Off the kitchen there is a room we call the "orange room" (for obvious reasons) which we are using as an office.

We made our books into a sort of "art" piece by arranging them by color...we love how it turned out!

Down the hallway we have the bedrooms.  A guest room (dubbed "the Brown Room" because we had one of those at our old place and it seemed to still fit):

A guest bathroom, which was the only room in the whole place we painted ourselves.  And by "ourselves" I actually mean my husband and our friend painted it when I was out of town.  It used to be a hideous neon orange color the paint can called "Passion Fruit."  We like it much better in bright yellow:

And last, the master bedroom, in a delicious shade of plum.

If you look closely you can see the grey and white paws of the other cat in the hallway outside the room!

There's also a master bath, and a currently empty room that will become the baby's room, but as those rooms are currently not interesting, I won't include them in the "tour."

Nor will I include the incredibly large garage and workshop space or the basement my friends have dubbed the "murder basement" because part of it looks like a place Dexter might want to set up camp.  There is a TON of storage available to us, and at least one room that we can finish to make into a game room or something.

It's our first home and so far we are loving it!

Big news!

Although most of the (very few!) people who read this blog already know this information, it is worth announcing that Doug and I are having a baby!  Here is what we posted on Facebook, based on the trivia cards we had on the tables at our wedding reception:

Now that the obvious is out of the way, it may be worth telling more of the story.  We have been trying to conceive since shortly after our wedding (for those counting, that's a year and a half), with no success.  We did the cheapy tests and found nothing wrong, but I wasn't willing to commit to the expensive tests that insurance wouldn't pay for without trying other things.  So last summer we basically quit drinking alcohol, started eating healthier and I started acupuncture.  Acupuncture was an interesting experience, to say the least, but nothing changed in the getting-preggo department.

So, in the fall, I finally succumbed to having the expensive tests.  The ultrasound (which is done to check for fibroids, I think) found nothing wrong, but the other test, which was so painful that I've managed to block out the name of it (but essentially shows if the fallopian tubes are open) found "something" wrong.  My doctor told me it was "the weirdest" one of these test results she's ever seen...which honestly was a little flattering, but also confusing.  One of my fallopian tubes was open and the other one didn't seem to be blocked, exactly, but something was getting in the way.  So, I had outpatient surgery in November and they ended up removing a polyp in my uterus.  The surgery was an event in and of itself, as I've never had "real" surgery before (only oral surgery, after which I made my mom sing me Christmas songs in the recovery room, despite the fact that it was July).  Needless to say, I made it through that just fine and apparently the surgery "worked" because.....one month later, we found out that we're expecting.

In case anyone is wondering, all is well so far!  We heard the heartbeat at our 10-week appointment in January and everything seems to be progressing well.  I also seem to be in the lucky quadrant of the 25% of women who do NOT experience "morning sickness" (which doesn't always occur in the morning, but is either nausea or vomiting or both)....I've barely felt sick at all, only a little more tired than usual. No cravings, no wild mood swings, just continuing on with life sans lunch meat, sushi, alcohol, and soft cheeses.  Plus I was convinced to get a flu shot for the first time in my life, which it turns out was probably a good idea as the flu has been pretty bad this year, and particularly bad here in Walmart Country.

We are excited about the next year and all the changes it will bring!

Oh, and in case anyone is wondering, because I've already got the "what are you having?" question repeatedly, to which my answer is "a baby?," we probably WILL find out the sex of the baby but we likely will NOT be telling people. Why? Because gender is a social construction and I don't like the genderizing of infants and I refuse to participant in it.

Just call me smug, I kind of agree:

A respite from the yo-yo weather

Compared to the rest of the country, we really don't have too much to complain about in terms of the weather...not that we don't still try.  It has been bitterly cold here (yes yes, nothing like you've experienced, Minnesota-Wisconsin-Chicago, got it) at times, but mostly the weather has just been a tease.  Take the last week, for example.  It was 55 on Saturday, 65 and sunny on Sunday, and then 25 on Monday with an overnight low of 0 degrees Fahrenheit.  We're teased with lovely Southern weather, the promise of spring, only to be spanked back into the cold.  It was actually colder here than in Madison, Wisconsin for a few hours this week!

We took advantage of the absolutely beautiful weather to take a walk at Lake Wedington on Sunday afternoon, a new walking/hiking spot for us.  We got kind of a late start, and had limited time because I had to be back to go to a prospective graduate student dinner, so our walk wasn't as long and luxurious as I'd have liked.  Also, Lake Wedington was further away than I thought it was, which also cut into our time.  I keep telling people that everything in Fayetteville is a 15 minute drive, which is pretty much true....but I forgot that Lake Wedington is not really in Fayetteville.  Still in the county, but not in the town (at all). 

We got out to the lake in the warm afternoon with the sun sparkling on the water, and it was quite pretty:

We then walked about a mile, passing a cute little waterfall:

Our favorite part of the walk, though, was being right up next to the lake, which tinkled like chimes because the top layer of the lake was still icy, but the ice was breaking up and knocking into nearby pieces.  It was neat to look at

and was neat to listen to.

We made it back to town in enough time for me to get ready for my dinner, with a shorter walk than originally intended, but "better than nothing!' as my dear husband pointed out.  Hopefully we can make it out to Lake Wedington again when we have more time to linger and explore. 

Well, that and when the weather decides to yo-yo back again from the frigid to the moderate, as we've become spoiled to expect of Arkansas winters.

A quiet Hawaiian food return

I have no excuse for not writing for the last nine months, and no real reason to start up again except that I want to.  Because rehashing everything we've been doing for the last nine months is daunting and part of the reason I haven't written a word since April, we'll just skip over that.

We discovered a new tasty place to eat this week.  Or, to be clear, we finally tried a place that's been around for awhile now, called Hawaiin Brians.  It has what might be the worst website of all time, but the food was so good that the web travesty is forgiven.

The restaurant itself is the first success story for the Fayetteville "Yacht Club" which is basically a parking lot with a bunch of airstream trailers.   Pretty sure I posted about it a ways back, when we had some homemade pie from one of the trailers (that place, sadly, is long gone....though an internet search tells me there is a NEW dessert place there now!  Hopefully a forthcoming post will review that one!).  It's a nice way for new businesses to try things out without having to rent a whole building or store.  Some of the trailers serve food, some have clothing, and unless you visit regularly, there's often something new.

Hawaiian Brians was a trailer there for awhile, developed a following, and then rented out a brick-and-mortar store over a year ago, where it appears they have been successful.  It's in a strip mall near the awesome vintage Arcadia Retrocade (a vintage arcade), and when you walk in, the dulcet tones of Hawaiian music are playing, with tropical decorations, and a projector of waves on one wall.  It's a great environment, and different than any other place in town we've been.

I tried the Hawaiian Shoyu Chicken, which was absolutely delish.  Tender meat, soaked in some kind of soy-sauce-plus-other-stuff sauce, it had a familiar taste that I couldn't quite place...and I loved every bite.  Served with white rice and a big spoonful of cold macaroni salad, I devoured every morsel.   My husband ordered the Kalua Pig, also tender shredded pork in some sauce (I think it might have been the same sauce, but it didn't taste the same).  I think he might have licked his plate when I wasn't looking.

Then for dessert we had the Kings Gelato, which was a dessert-y french toast topped with salted carmel gelato.  Yes, it's absolutely as good as it sounds.

Only downside about this place is that it's so meat-based it ain't great for the vegetarians...but as we're not vegetarians that isn't a big downside.  Now we have to go back for breakfast and try the Portuguese sausage!