Tuesday in Cologne...

Not much to tell today, work all day. The conference started at 8am and went until 3:30. There was a tour of a factory this afternoon but I decided to stay at the hotel and meet up with them for dinner. Had myself a great hot bath instead. Rested in my room then meet up with all of them at 7pm. We went to a great venue for dinner. Very Europeon. Dinner took about 4 hours but was great. We had Duck Confee, (i know thats not how you spell it, but I just dont know) linguine and Deer meat for dinner. Yummy. Plus they kept my glass full of local Reisling. Oh so good.

We all got suits for the week, check it out! I am looking good!

Catching up with us.

A little history of the last few months.......

In May Marshall took a job working at the state police academy as a defensive tactics instructor. He left his job as a detective for this new adventure! He now gets to train, teach, and fight new police officers. This is his dream job. He is so happy.

The Academy is in Salem, that is about 50 min drive from our house in McMinnville. So we decided to put our house on the market just to see what might happen. Well after 3 weeks and not a single looker, we got a call that someone wanted to see the house. Great. An hour after I got back home from the showing, my realitor called and said she had an offer! Long story short, the buyers wanted to move in in 4 weeks!!! So I got right on to packing.....not fun I might add. Its true that if you stay in one place for a while you really accumulate a lot of stuff! Well we had not moved in 5 years and had another baby sence then. So we really have a lot of stuff.

We moved in to a rental in Salem in mid June. Then started looking for land. We were close to making an offer on some, when Marshall picked up a free flyer at the Post Office with homes for sale by owner. We flipped through it and landed on the "one"! 2.5 acres, fully landscaped, close to town (South East Salem, almost in Aumsville), 3 out buildings, and a one level house!! Thats what we wanted! Exactally. We went out to look at it and discovered that it also had christmas trees on over half of it. We could not let that one get away.....so again long story short. We now are the owners of 2.5 acres and a christmas tree farm!

We have been super busy painting the entire house, re did the Family room, kitchen and dining room flooring. Changed out some light fixtures, bathroom fixtures and some other odds and ends. Also built an office in the garage for us to work out of. We are almost done and are working on moving in. I am hoping to be moved soon after I return from Germany this weekend.

While I have been gone, Marshall and my brother Reid have been moving furniture and boxes. So we should be close.

This has been a very busy and crazy summer. But has also been wonderful for our family. We have jobs we love, our dream home, a great marrage and 2 awsome kids! Its a good life, we really are feeling overwhelmed with blessings these days.

So to excite you even more......here are a few pictures of our work in progress on the house.

The kids helping rip out the old flooring. This is why you have kids!!! Free labor!

My hard working family enjoying some pizza in the future dining room.

Marshall right after he fininished laying the last floor board! Nice work baby! You Rock!




This the view looking into the kitchen from the Family room and on into the dining room. Nice table! No its not staying......

Monday in Cologne

My mom and me!
Jane, Myself and Barb
Here is our entire team! Nancy, Rob, Gary, Me, Barb, Jane, Paul and Even in the back! At dinner last night! In the wine celler!


I was up at 5:30 am, ready to go! We had our registration today and Coker process training all day. All the exhbiits set up and we then had our Welcome reception. We had a great turn out. Increadible food, lots to drink. So great.
This was then followd by 2 hospitality suites, one in the bar the other in the restaruant. So we had more to drink and more to eat. Wow, the best part is I am getting paid for all this!?!?! Some times I have to pinch myself just to make sure I am not dreaming. What a great job.

First Blog!

Well here I am. Joining the blogging community. I just could not help myself.
I am starting this while I sit in my hotel room in Cologne Germany. I am here hosting a conference for Coking.com. We are in our 3rd conference of the year. It is beautiful here. The weather is great and the hotel is very nice. So far so good. I got in yesterday after 15 hours of travel. Met the rest of my group and hopped on a bus to tour the city. They say the best way to beat jet lag is to jump right in to the time zone your in. So I just lost 9 hours, but who cares right? We spent the day touring around, then had dinner at a street side restaurant. People watched for a few hours then headed back to the Hilton. I set up my computer at 8pm (30 hours awake) but my eyes and body had a different plan. I made it to my bed just in time to fall sound asleep. Until 2am that is! I did manage to fall back to sleep at 5.
We spent most of Sunday setting up for the conference and then had some early registration time. Then off to dinner at this very cool, very old wine celler. Had a great German dinner and a few bottles of wine. So good.
I am now sitting up wide a wake at 11:30 at night. I do have to get up at 5:30 so I think I should hit the sack sooner than later.

So far I think I am off to a good start on this blogging thing! Yay me!