May Adventures

Ah what a month- busy but fun! My parents are still with us, holding strong, despite being roped into helping me plant trees, vacuuming, making dinner cleaning floors and dishes. My dad has made shelves for nearly all our closets too.

In the midst of this, Heather came out for a surprise visit and I had no idea she was coming. She called mom's cell phone to chat supposedly and asked if she could speak to me. As we were talking I could hear her echoing from the front of the house and couldn't figure out why. Then as I turned around there she was in the kitchen!! We had a marvelous visit, scrapbooking of course, going for a walk, out to BBQ for lunch and more scrapbooking. She was with us from a Friday to a Monday the weekend before Mother's Day.

Craft day at the Teague's: Dad is fly tying, Mom, Heather and I are scrapbooking, and Paul in the background is modifying a Darth Vader helmet.

Sadly, Heather had to get back to work for a busy Mother's Day at the restaurant and that little thing called school. But we marched forth with our fun-having, and for Mother's Day we went to a house in Bishopville, SC where we had heard that the guy that lives there has a massive topiary garden in his 3 acres. He allows anyone to stop buy and visit and you can donate money in his mail box to the cause. Mom had heard our neighbors talking about it so we hunted it down and went. It was very cool indeed!

Pearl Fryer has been an inspiration to the neighborhood so that the adjoining neighbors on the street have taken up the craft as well.

Mixed into the month of activities, I had a few work projects, one being inundated with mosquitos that loved to hitch a ride on the ceiling of our car. Every time we opened the back door to load equipment in and out, a few hundred would fly in. We ended up spraying the inside of the car with OFF and running the A/C full blast because they really don't like that.

I also started painting a landscaping sign for a friend at work who is helping her husband get his business to take flight. I volunteered to paint the sign that will go on the back of their equipment trailer in exchange for me putting my website address on it. I am still determined to get my embroidery and painting business up and running.

Getting started in the photo above, and half way through in the photo below..

Plus, I found out I passed the PG exam so I am an official Professional Geologist for the state of North Carolina, and a week later found out we all got laid off (starting in another few weeks to a month). But, my whole office has gone for interviews with the new contracting company and I have another interview scheduled with a different company in a few weeks. So I am hopeful. It was a real blessing that I found out about my test results just in time to put it on my resume, and it was a miracle that I passed in the first place!! I have so much to give thanks for. The results came out about a month earlier than expected so the whole event feels like my own little miracle.

We have so many more pictures but most of them are on my mom's camera as she is the real photo documentarialist in the family (is that a word?). I will try and post more at a later date... I must get to bed for I have a 5:30am appointment with my colleagues and "the river" to collect surface water samples (in Virginia for the week). Good night to yall!

Visiting with Mom and Dad

Wow it has been nearly a month since I had any news to post. Well, not really, it's just been one of those crazy months with so much to say that it's easier to avoid saying anything! In synopsis, I was in the field for 3 of the weeks, during which I found out I am on the brink of losing my job along with everyone else in my office, as our new contract will maintain 50% of the work we had for the previous 5 years. Our office got the bad end of the stick and most likely will be eliminated. We are all hoping that the new contracting company that gets the other 50% of the work comes in and hires us all. We are all waiting to hear what happens on the magical day of April 24th when the new contract gets signed.

Meanwhile, I've had a birthday and my parents have come out for a 5-6 week visit during which we celebrated my birthday and her 60th! Needless to say there has been lots of distraction and plenty of cheer in our house despite the looming liklihood of unemployment. My parents have a way of making any time a good time, and so it has been so good for the soul to have such comfort around.

We've spent much time in the yard (here they are supervising me turning the compost pile)

I took a day off of work on my mom's birthday and we did some countryside sightseeing and went out to lunch...

... and scrapbooked of course. My Dad is tying flies for fishing.

Plus, a real bonus is that my mom has made dinner for us everynight when we get home from work and my dad has been busy doing projects around the house such as building shelves in the closet (happy thought indeed!) hanging pictures, and supervising contractors that are still doing warranty repair work on the house. We really needed the help and it has been enjoyable and a big relief to get some of these things done.

This week I'm back in the field, and my parents and friends Liz and Ed, who came down from Vermont on Friday, are heading out to Charleston for the week together.

Scrapbooking All Night Long!

Since finishing my test, I've been busy making sure to have lots of fun and enjoy my weekends more to eliminate some stress and get rid of my heart palpitations that my dr. says is stress-related. The cure: exercise, exercise, excersize, have some fun and get away from the news.

So, as part of my medicine, I invited two girls from work to come over on Friday to scrapbook and have a barbeque-- Paul was included in the barbeque but opted to watch movies while we worked on our albums.

Now, I'm not known for my late hours, but if I am busy working on a fun project, I can do ok.

But even I was surprised that we made it all the way to 4:00 am! Everyone crashed out for a few hours' nap and headed out by 8:00 to their various activities.

I had a dry stone walling class at 8:30 at a local Presbyterian church cemetery. This was really fun and I found out about it when I met the Stone Man at the garden show I went to a few weeks ago. He said to come on by to help out on this volunteer project of restoring the 300 year old church wall that borders the back property line behind the cemetery. It was a really really fun event and we ended up building a section of the wall that was about 30 feet by 4 feet high! All without mortar-- looked straight out of Scotland.

After the wall experience finished at 2:30, I went back home and Paul and I went for a walk, to Starbucks for a hot chocolate and then we had barbecued hamburgers and watched movies until 10:30. I did all this without a nap and I impressed myself immensely!

This week I'm dragging a bit at work, but since I'm just monitoring the safety of several workers on a site, it's not terribly taxing.

Have a good week!

The Garden Show experience

What a show this was! The Southern Spring Home and Garden Show in Charlotte was fantastic! This was the 49th annual event and I thought every bit worth the time to go. I sat in on a talk about organic gardening, and was impressed by the amount of booths set up that were focused on environmental decorating or water conservation tools and green architects... it was really neat to see environmental consciousness a bigger presence in the market.

The show was completely indoors, which was a surprise, but the landscaping competitors did a phenomenal job of making the surroundings look real. Of coarse each landscaper was there to pass out business cards -- it was really clever how it all worked.

In the landscaping area shown in the pictures above, there were intermingled home settings where interior designers showed off their skills in home decor. This room was designed out of environmentally friendly materials -- non VOC paint and fabrics, etc. I loved this room for its cozy feel.

Then in another part of the center, there were booths for folks to sell their wares. What is a garden show without the Gourd Lady? She made hand painted gourd decor and with enthusiasm! She was a real crowd pleaser.

I ended up coming home with some plants for the garden and then Darth Orchi II pictured here in his ominous glory amongst the tulips. I had bought Darth Orchi I when we were still living in California. He was a beautiful orchid, I thought, because of his originality. Paul thought he looked downright scary sitting on a shelf in the bedroom and thought he resembled Darth Vader. Of coarse Paul would think that since he is on a one-track mindset of Star Wars. But anyway, Darth Orchi caught some mysterious orchid disease after a year or so and I found out his roots were shot. So I did a emergency surgery, cut off the dead roots, dipped the base in rooting hormone, placed him in moist soil with an upside-down vase over the top of him to keep in the humidity. Paul immediately drew the similarities between the real Darth with his supplied air in the dome-like helmet to Darth Orchi and his dome-like oxygen chamber. So the name was truly a good fit. Sadly, Darth Orchi didn't make it and we missed him bad. I never saw another one like him until this show and so I couldn't pass up Darth Orchi II when I saw him sitting amongst the orchids at the orchid booth. Paul was thrilled and gave him a special place on his bathroom counter.

Geology Test Done

It is done at last! That's the good news. After weeks of studying (which should have been months) I can have my life back and hopefully start having some fun again. The bad news is that the test was way harder than I had anticipated, which is hard to believe! It was a gruelling 8 hours of 230 questions/problems to solve. I knew about 1 out of 10 questions, narrowed it down to two of 4 choices in about 5 out of 10 questions and the other 4 out of 10 questions I didn't even know what they were talking about! It's kinda funny really, to come to the realization of how little of geology, and the practice of it in the workplace, that I actually know. Even though I read the study manual from front to back, memorized terms, and practiced the word problems, I couldn't have studied that material for another 3 months and feel like I would have done much better because there was so much on the test that I don't think I've ever learned or even know where to look to find the subject matter. So bizarre considering I did well in school.

But it's not the end of the world and there's definitely more important things in life than my career (and this isn't a career-buster anyway). I couldn't sleep last night except for 3-4 hours because I was wide awake thinking of what I could have done better, will I attempt this again in 6 months and fork out the money or should I just go on and say this is one of those things to lay at rest and close the chapter. After all, I do want to continue working on getting my side embroidery business up and running and hopefully have children at some point before I'm too old!

I'm heading out soon to go to the Southern Spring Home and Garden Show with some friends. Have a good weekend!

Potato Leek Soup

Ah I fell in love with this soup all over again this weekend. It's been awhile since I made it and now that I found a new sausage that makes everything taste good, this is a winter day recipe that's hard to beat.

1 package of Gautney 40% lower fat sausage meat without the casings
3-4 leeks sliced without the green tops (first time I made this I didn't know you weren't supposed to use the dark green tops of leeks)
4 potatoes, thickly chopped
1 onion chopped
1/2 tsp. rubbed sage
1/4 tsp. ground thyme
salt and pepper to taste
1 quart of chicken stock
a few cups of milk to make the soup creamy
2-3 Tbs. flour

Brown the sausage in a frying pan and drain the fat. Add to the ol' Crock-pot with all the rest of the ingredients except the milk and flour. Cook for abut5-6 hours on low or until the potatoes are tender. Turn the Crock Pot to high. In a small bowl combine the flour with a few Tbs. of the soup liquid, adding a Tbs. at a time until the mixture forms a paste. Then add to the rest of the soup, blending until smooth. Add the milk and heat until ready to serve.

I used this recipe, the promise of some bread and butter pudding and a hot bath with story time to lure Paul to go on a run with me on Sunday afternoon. It worked, and he was amazing- completing a half hour of running with me with hardly a complaint once I got him out the door. And it was freezing outside. I carried out my promises too, but forgot to make the bread and butter pudding as we got saddled into helping a neighbor bring her treadmill in from the garage.

Sunday was a perfect day as I took the day off after church from studying (back to getting ready for the Professional Geologist exam on March 6th), had some good quality time with Paul and it was really relaxing. Today I'm back into Hendersonville for some groundwater sampling and although the work is tough, it's good to see the familiar faces.

Paul's Birthday Weekend (and Valentines)

What a fun weekend we had! I decided to surprise Paul and plan something for him that didn't involve getting up early, doing a long drive or staying out all day. He likes to chill out on weekends since the workdays are so long, and so I thought the best thing to do is head into Charlotte, the city we are so close to but have hardly ever been to (downtown that is). Actually, Charlotte calls their downtown "Uptown." We left at the leisurely hour of 1:00 when we started to get hungry enough for lunch. To add to the adventure, I drove us to the train station to ride the Lynx to the city center. It was a lot of fun, relaxing, no traffic involved and no parking meters to worry about.

We walked around on the main center of town and then went to Ri-Ra's for lunch, a great little Irish Pub that has the traditional British cuisine and decor. We then headed to the Levine Museum where they had the opening day of an exhibit about how the south has changed over the years, with a focus on Charlotte. This was very cool!

On the way back to the train station on 7th st, we found a grocery store that had a coffee bar and we each got a hot chocolate.

That was it for us on Saturday. We got back and Paul put in "The Incredible Hulk" and I promptly fell asleep on the couch while he watched the movie. I've had a cold this week so I keep falling asleep!

Today we slept in (ahhhh) and then had a full bacon and egg breakfast. I made some chicken salad and a fruit salsa with cinnamon tortilla chips and brought an assortment of cheeses and bread and drinks and we headed down to the Andrew Jackson State Park in SC around 2:30. We were there on Memorial weekend too, and hardly anyone there both times.

Paul loved his surprise picnic and when we were done, he shared a few pieces of bread with the locals.
Some were waiting very stoically, and proud and didn't seem to want to ask for handouts.

And others were a little more impatient, coming right up on the blanket behind us.

This little guy was not shy at all and wasn't afraid to ask for food! I thought he was going to bite, but he just kept putting his bill near our shoulders - couldn't get any closer - until we gave him a piece. When he was done he kept making chewing sounds as if to say, "come on, where's my next slice? I'm tired of eating grass!"