Mitch W. Griswold

When I left the gym last night, I checked my phone to see if anyone had called while I was inside. I was surprised to see 13 missed calls from Mitch.

I called him and he immediately told me, "I fell through the ceiling at the house."

Turns out Mitch was in the attic putting some boxes away when he stepped on an area that had wood laid over the beams. Only they didn't use sturdy wood...so Mitch pulled a Christmas Vacation and crashed through the drywall in our garage ceiling. He caught himself with his arms about halfway down and managed to crawl back up.

Once I established that he was okay, I couldn't help but laugh for about 20 minutes. Tonight, we're definitely going to watch Christmas Vacation. I'm sure I'll laugh especially hard at one certain part.

As for now, I just wonder if Mitch will staple himself to the house later...

Extra, Extra!

Time for Valerie's life update, which one could technically argue is really the only point of having a blog....hmm.

We've been through some major changes in the Naked Wifedom lately.
1. We got another dog.
Her name is Scooter, she's a very cuddly and soft black lab. That's a labrador retriever for those of you who, well....I hope no one needed to be told that. If you did, here's a picture of what black labs look like. Also, here's your sign.
Scooter looks a lot like this dog in the picture, except way more cool. This coolness is mostly due to her orange collar and OSU dog bone shaped tag with her name on it. I would have included a picture, but I somehow lost my camera battery charger in the move. Just think of this as me contributing to the development of your imagination...or something like that.

2. Speaking of animals, our neighbor finally moved in. We were a little worried it might be a couple frat guys who would be throwing up in our nearly communal backyard all the time, but really it was Kathy, the veterinarian. Kathy is 25 like me, but unlike me, she's a graduate of Texas A&M vet school, making her a doctor.

Unfortunately for us, Kathy is a large-animal vet who will be working on the "Food Animal and Fiber" rotation as an intern at OSU's vet school. If you're as confused as I was, you're really confused right now. Food and Fiber means all those animals who are raised for food (cows, sheep, pigs, cats [I kid!]) as well as llamas and alpacas (fiber animals, hey it all makes sense!). I guess vets in Texas won't touch llamas, so there's a lucrative market for a Texas vet who works with fiber animals.

Learn something new every day.

3. Ikea exploded on my bedroom. Mitch and I bought a bed and 2 nightstands from Ikea when we were in Dallas for the George Strait concert. Unfortunately, we had to grab the last headboard from the store that day, and when we arrived home 5 hours later and I was about to pee myself out of excitement, it was broken. I cried. Honestly. 4 months of anticipation down the toilet!

So the next weekend, while Mitch was at a bachelor party watching strippers fishing, Mom and I ventured down to Dallas again to return it....and buy a million other things. That store is addictive, I swear.

But, as a reward for making it a year (almost) with Mitch, Mom bought me a dresser and two lamps. And a microplane grater. And an ambiance light. Our bedroom officially looks like the bedroom of a married couple and not a skeezy college couple. It's divine. The nice result is that I make the bed every morning now because I actually care about how it looks.

Oh look! Another great opportunity to use your imagination to picture our bedroom!

Sigh, ok I'll find the battery replacement soon.

Open House

I'm exhausted. Mitch and I have been packing and moving for a few days now, and I'm constantly amazed by how much stuff we have. Today I found a set of Western-themed ice cream sandwich molds. I packed it right next to the molds for the ice shot glasses.

This is the house we brought home our wedding loot to. So we have a tremendous amount of stuff. We started the packing process days ago, but we've gotten to the "just throw crap in a box" stage. We got there quickly.

The good news of the move is our new duplex. Our new place has a much bigger living space, a dining area, a fireplace, a fenced back yard and closets. Oh glorious closets! (Our current place has only 2 small closets in the entire place. We have loads of storage racks. It looks like a grocery store in here, everything exposed on a shelf.)

Here's the photo tour of the new place, in all it's empty glory.

This is the view when you first walk in. Well, really you'd see a faux wall made of bannister rails. Confused? So are we. The fireplace is nice, but the angle it's set on really makes living room layout complicated. I expect to make Mitch move the couch about 6 times tomorrow. (And it's a sleeper, hehe!) Hi Einstein! That door goes into the backyard. You'll have to use your imagination there, my camera was nearly dead.
Fireplace close-up. I'm actually digging this 70s rock look. You can't see it in the picture, but the gas pipe under the rack is broken off and all jagged looking. Umm, not so safe. I don't see any smores in our near future. Well, plus it is May...so we'll be okay for a while.

This is the brand spanking new linoleum in the entry way. It's crooked and makes me want to punch someone. I tried to add a rug, to camoflauge the crookedness but it just emphasized it. But then I was too lazy to move the rug, so looks like it's living there forever.Kitchen, or what you can see from the dining area. It's a tiny, galley-style kitchen with horribly outdated appliances, but it will do. The space between the open doorway and the door to the garage is where our fancy new washer and dryer will go. (As I write this, Mitch is reading the owner's manual IN GREAT DETAIL. We're both pretty pumped.) And you can't see this in this picture, but the cabinet handles are in the very center of each door, rather than on the bottom edge. And the handles are nearly 5 inches tall. Awesome.
Best bathroom fixture EVER. And an elaborate gold framed mirror? AMAZING.
By the way, in the 10 seconds I was in the bathroom taking the last picture, Einstein was sitting outside the closed door crying. Don't his eyes just look sad? The packing has made him really nervous so he's been pretty clingy.
The exterior. That shrubbery is trying to eat the sidewalk, but Mitch is going to trim it soon. Also note the small Boston Terrier who has a very low window that he can look out. It's like dog TV!
Stay tuned for furnished pictures.

Packing

I finally got the call today that our new duplex is ready for us to move. While it is exciting to move into a place that has more room and better features (closets? Amazing!), moving requires packing. Packing might be my least favorite activity on the planet. Seriously. I would rather buy new stuff than move my existing stuff. If I had the money, I probably would just take a match to our old place.

But since I can't do that, does anyone want to come over and help pack? I'll give you guacamole and beer, promise!

(Photo tour of the new place soon!)

Dream Come True...

I discovered lately that home decorating and furnishings are my new addiction. I just have this overwhelming desire to make our home the most attractive and best functioning it can be.

So when Mitch and I went to Sears today to look for appliances, I was in heaven. And the best part is, we found a washer that is absolutely amazing.

Yeah, I know, it's just a little sad that I'm this excited about a washing machine, but whatever...I do a lot of laundry.

The Kenmore Elite Oasis dryer...machine of my dreams. It's a top loader with no agitator, so it saves 70% on water and 65% on power. And it will wash 20 full-size bath towels. Y'all, I don't even own that many bath towels. I'm in love.

Maybe Sears will give this to me for free because of all my free publicity.

(We won't tell them I have 3 readers, k?)