little woman

Tonight we celebrate 3 years together, 1 year in the house… we haven’t done anything too out of the ordinary. We made salsa for our twice baked Mexican potatoes. In between episodes of Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman we sipped wine outside in hopes of seeing Mars, Venus and Spica. And we had some dark chocolate hatch chili gelato as is tradition. Oh and Paul gave me a copy of Leaves of Grass.

Allons! the road is before us!
It is safe–I have tried it–my own feet have tried it well–be not detain’d!
Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten,and the book on the shelf unopen’d!
Let the tools remain in the workshop! let the money remain unearn’d!
Let the school stand! mind not the cry of the teacher!
Let the preacher preach in his pulpit! let the lawyer plead in the
court, and the judge expound the law.

Camerado, I give you my hand!
I give you my love more precious than money,
I give you myself before preaching or law;
Will you give me yourselp. will you come travel with me?
Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?

<3

Paul installed a new microwave above the oven today!

And I made him a Jayne hat.

It was a productive weekend.

Our love for him now
Ain’t hard to explain
The hero of Canton
The man they call Jayne.

Man walks down the street in a hat like that, you know he’s not afraid of anything.

I had a very interesting variety of events this weekend! It was the first in a series of busy, holiday weekends!

Friday I went to see Dionysus in 69 at the Off Center… that was quite an experience. It is a very interactive show based on Euripides’ The Bacchae. It was first performed in 1968 and directed by Richard Schechner. Schechner also directed this production, was there and gave a talk.

There is a portion of the show in which the actors play instruments, dance around and encourage audience members to get up and dance about all crazy. It was interesting to watch people slowly feel comfortable enough to do it. It was fascinating how the actors’ freedom carried over to the audience so easily! I wanted to get up and dance, but I purposefully did not get involved in the action so I could watch the audience react. There was one corner of the audience that started laying on one another and massaging each other by the end of the show. There is such a thin line between “decorum” and acting like the animals that we are…

This, of course, was the whole point! In The Bacchae, a woman is so aroused in a frenzy by Dionysus that she actually helps dismember her son’s body and carries his head home to show everyone because she thinks it is the head of a lion.  When she gets home, she realizes what she has done and tragedy ensues.

On Saturday we drove out to Elgin and cut down our Christmas tree!

We came home and decorated the house and the tree before heading downtown for the Capitol tree lighting, caroling and the annual Slackers show.

On Sunday we went to the Blanton to see a Baroque concert and check out the art.

We grabbed some Tom’s Tabooley, got the weekly groceries and got home just in time for Sunday movie! We watched Mr. Leonard’s pick of The Thin Man, ate dinner and I busted out the guitar to practice some Christmas carols. Great weekend!

Monday after a holiday is nooooooo fun!

Had a pretty decent Thanksgiving all in all. We drove up Wednesday night. Got on the road about 5:30 and didn’t get there until 11:30. One 40-mile stretch took us an hour and a half! But no one was taking the secret road in Hillsboro so that helped speed things along.

Thursday we went to Gram’s and had a Thanksgiving lunch that couldn’t be beat. Then we went over to my mother’s and had a Thanksgiving dinner that couldn’t be beat. That night we watched Love Actually.

Friday, Mom and I watched Harvey Girls then Mary, Paul and I went over to my Aunt Vickie’s house for a Thanksgiving lunch that couldn’t be beat. Then Mom, Mary and I went to visit my grandmother. That night we watched Bedknobs & Broomsticks and Sleepless in Seattle.

Mom had to work on Saturday so Mary and I watched Annie Hall, had lunch with my dad at the Jazz Cafe on Montgomery (omg so good) and then met up with Paul, Jim & Anne at the new and improved Fort Worth Museum of Science and History. These are some of the only pictures I took all weekend!

We drove back to Austin that night, Paul went to the Data Pop show, and I stayed home and watched Wicker Man.

It was nice to be home Sunday and have some time to get stuff done. We got groceries, beer making stuffs and xmas lights! Paul got up on the roof and put a strand around the house. Another house in the cul-de-sac was also putting up lights… They wrapped their tree and also changed all the outdoor lights to either red or green bulbs! We might need to step it up a notch! And I actually made Chestnut and Apple Dressing last night! It was ok, but with a few tweaks should be good for next year. Thanksgiving, I wish I could quit you!

I have always wanted a real wreath!

Soooo that was an incredibly boring recap of a fun Thanksgiving holiday! I watched some great movies and ate too much!

THE END

We ran across a baby rattlesnake while working in the front yard today. I pulled a shrub up by the roots and there he was… I can’t believe I didn’t get a bite! The little girls from next door were playing outside so we showed them and told them to be careful if they saw any more. We took him and let him go by a creek in our neighborhood.

You can tell how young it is because the rattle didn’t work yet.
They are more dangerous the younger they are… we got lucky!

On Saturday we did our first installation of sod. They quoted us 5 palettes but we only wanted to buy 3. It almost covered everything! I think half a palette would finish it. The backyard looks much better! Thanks to Abbie for coming over and helping

I also got soil for the soon-to-be flower bed and vegetable garden. Now to plant!!

We have been hard at work putting our house together. We had a Labor Day party to break it in that was lots of fun! We rushed to make it presentable for that. Now we are starting to get stuff organized and really put away. Here are some pictures (scroll to the right).

I hung these after dinner post Sunday movie

PS: Happy Roald Dahl Day!

After we signed the paperwork on Wednesday, I had to go back to work and Paul went right to the house to get started! Soon Mom and Mary arrived to help us paint and get the curtains up. They left on Thursday. Dad arrived on Friday with the truck with some furniture donated to the cause by Mom. We went and got a load of stuff from the apartment with Paul Leonard’s help but didnt break our backs because of the huge effort planned on Saturday.

On Saturday, some amazing people arrived at the PLV to help us move. We had a great crew! We got out of there in no time. We went back to the house to unload and have some pizza before heading over to the storage unit. Next we went to Castle Greybeard to get the washer and dryer. Everyone came back and unloaded one last time and relaxed a bit. I took a bath in our new amazing bathtub…

Seriously, we would not have been able to do that without all that help! Thanks to EVERYONE that came out. I can’t wait to have you all over for dinner… just as soon as I can get the kitchen out of boxes…

Sunday was spent emptying and cleaning the PLV one last time. We (ok I) got a little teary as we were walking out the door because I know Petra would have had SO much fun exploring the new house…

After we spent some time putting things away at the house, we went to Central Market to get supplies for our two year anniversary dinner.

We watched Contact (one of our favorite movies) and had a very tasty, very spicy dinner

Hatch chile chicken sausage with onions and gnocchi in a hatch chile poblano pesto. For not making meat on a regular basis, I was quite pleased with my sausage cooking skills… But it really isn’t that hard. I just seared them in a pan and then cooked them in some home brew with the onions.

For dessert…

… a hatch chile apple pie with Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla. With a glass or two of carmenere, it was the perfect way to end a hectic, but very satisfying, weekend. Now… back to it…

Yes! It has finally be confirmed that we are able to close on the house tomorrow! If there are any able-bodied friends reading this that would be so kind as to assist us in our moving endeavors…

~

You are cordially invited to join

Katelyn Patterson & Paul Swan

at

Park Lane Villas, Apartment #221

Saturday, August 29th at 10am

to help them move all of their belongings

~

PS: Bring a swimsuit (and a towel) so you can jump in the pool to cool off! The community pool is right behind our house! Also, we will have a Penske truck (not pink… Penske. Think Uhaul.)  to help cut down on trips! You will be well rewarded with copious victuals. If you can’t make it at 10am but are still willing to help, just let us know when you prefer. We can be reached at Katelyn 817-291-2318 or Paul 512-507-5403. We just thought the earlier the better…

Thanks to all for putting up with my relentless documentation of all that has gone on in the house-buying process. It has been a lot of fun!

Everyone said if Paul and I could survive building a home together, we must have something special. I think it is kinda neat that we are celebrating two years together on Sunday of the weekend we are moving into our house!

Well we had a minor scare yesterday that the closing date was going to have to be moved. It has always been on Wednesday, August 26. But during our final walk through with the builder, we noticed a scratch on the island counter top. They would have had to special order another one, it wouldn’t have gotten here by that closing date and they can’t close on a house that has any outstanding issues.

They were going to move it to Friday… which wouldn’t have been the end of the world REALLY. But we have been ready to move in for the last month. We decided to ignore the tiny scratch to avoid moving the date. Mom and Mary are coming on Wednesday and we have things scheduled for Thursday… It was just better that way. YAY!

This week we moved large sums of money around in preparation of closing. And after two Saturdays of Abbie coming over to help us pack (THANK YOU, ABBIE!), one musical and Star Wars IV, V, and VI [and I ! -paul] later, the books and the kitchen are packed up! We need to get busy to have it all done!

Mainly books…

SOOOOO if anyone knows that you don’t already have awesome plans on Saturday, August 29, would you maybe want to help us move?? We are going to have a Penske van to move things and plan to have it all boxed up and ready to go… we want to make this as easy as possible!! You will be rewarded with beer and pizza at the very least