Ubuntu

Christmas is gone. We had a good one. Amber and I had a lot of fun and were able to see the family. We got a lot of stuff that we asked for. One of those things we didn't ask for was a new PC. My brother Ben gave it to me. It was completely and utterly unexpected. But one of the best gifts of the year. So, I took the chance of going Linux. I haven't really played with Linux since the days of Redhat (and even then I didn't get into it much.) To make it a little more user friendly for Amber, I went the route of Ubuntu. I'm pretty happy with it so far. So from now on, expect to have a lil' bit of Linux infused with our posts. Happy Holidays.

Crazy for Crayons

At the beginning of November, while tweeting for work @M2Results, I came across a contest that called to my love of hands-on art projects. Veer, a stock photography company, asked any and all creatives to find a unique way to recreate the company logo by hand. (no computers allowed) I loved all my tedious art classes in college and I frequently spend hours making hand cut cards so this request was right up my alley.

With a little inspiration from a picture on my iPhone I decided my medium ... crayons. Something about the vibrant colors and glossy sheen said "Amber, we aren't just for elementary school projects." I purchased 4 boxes of 64 crayons and only had about 10 left. Overall it took about 2 1/2 hours to create, not including the extra Wal-mart run at 11:30 for the fourth box of crayons.

Alas I didn't win, but I had a great time! Did I mention there was a Macbook Pro, CS 4, & plenty of other sweet prizes on the line. Yep $8000 grand prize, but no dice, mine just wasn't creative enough. Veer recently put up a gallery of all the entries and the quantity of amazing logos is astounding. Make sure to check it out!

Where's Waldo?

For all of those who are wondering, yes the Where's Waldo app is here. And yes, I did already get it. And it's pretty good. It is exactly like the book, except that some of the characters in the pages move ... oh yeah, and there is music.

Let's update.

Since our last post we've :
1.) Bought a new car
2.) Re-arranged the furniture for the Christmas tree
3.) Got in the Christmas Spirit
4.) Added subtle changes to the blog, including Google Voice.


Unfortunately the Saab had some problems this last week. It only has 74k miles on it and the transmission had some problems on my way (Sam) to work. Instead of hassling with it, we bought a new car. We'll get the Saab fixed in a bit and decide who will drive what car. Amber will probably take the Saab for the automatic, heated seats, and LCD screen.
Our house is cozy, but fits us well. Everything has been redone to the structure: new electrical, plumbing, roof, floors, paint. The problem is the layout. Our 1600 square feet is spread between our ground floor and the basement. The basement has a large room that is bigger than our front room and kitchen combined, one unfinished bedroom/storage room, and a laundry room (that also contains our furnace, water heater, and water softener.). This means we have limited options in our furniture. Like so:

The tree

Here are some other miscellaneous items around the house.

It's that time of the year again....

When we have all the sweet holidays. I'm not saying that St. Patrick's day isn't sweet. But, do you get a pillow sack full of candies or pumpkin pie? What about a white Christmas? I think not. It's also the time for insurance premium renewals, car registration, and birthday season. Fun and not so fun. We also get the puppies groomed right before the holidays. Here are some before and after pictures. Some from the iPhone, some from the camera. They're fast, so it's hard to get a good picture with them without a camera with amazing shutter/aperture speed.

Before

After

Horse Chestnuts.

For those of you who have not made it to our little home in Riverton, you're missing out on the chance to see one of the most beautiful Horse Chestnut trees ever. Our tree is over 30 feet high, who knows how old it is. Unfortunately - the chestnuts are not edible. Their color on the other hand is as Dick Van Dyke would say, "Truly scrumptious." Here are some pictures. And a picture of the dogs as well.

The leaves

I wish I had taken more pictures in the summer, these are usually bright green and very sharp. Emphasis on the very.

The backyard grass is starting to come in, as you can see. Where this pictures was taken, we find the most sparse grass in the yard.

An Endorsement!

Kanye has decided to endorse our site. He's not the best sponsor, at least he is a celebrity.

Check out our new link.

http://kanyelicio.us/http://aowah.blogspot.com/