Do You Want to Build a Snowman?

All of the hard work and late nights cleaning in the old apartment paid off!  When they walked through for the inspection, they thought that we had the oven professionally cleaned.  Nope!  Twas I!  I am very proud of myself. The oven is the kind with coils, and apparently most people don't realize you're supposed to take out the coils and the drip pans, clean the crap out of those, then lift up the top part of the oven and clean all that out as well.

Ok, honestly, our apartment in Midvale had coils as well and I didn't even know the top lifted up... So, lesson was learned there and applied at Caribbean Isle.  I'm really happy to hear it's common for people to not know that.




I've been working in my office for almost a week, and it's nice.  Lily comes in and tells me things or steals my stuff, but I like it.  It is quieter, and the dogs can just lay on the futon and stare at me until they fall asleep and start snoring.

Dogs have such a hard life.

I've got my kitchen mostly organized.  The pantry is very large, so I am loving it for those extra appliances that I hardly ever use but really would rather not get rid of...  For example, a toaster, sandwich griller thingy, hot chocolate maker, ice cream attachment, cup cake party thing...  Random stuff.

As of Sunday I've started cooking again. Actually cooking!  Not just grabbing a frozen dinner out of the freezer and popping it in the oven, but real cooking!  So far the experience has been pleasant as far as space is concerned, but, I did not miss grocery shopping or washing dishes.

The house is still a giant mess.  I have no motivation to do anything about that.


In other news, Hollywood Studios had a "Frozen" summer party over the past couple of months. We hadn't gone to that park in a while, so on a whim on a Saturday I declared we were going.  When we got to the park we found out it was the very last day for the party!  Lucky!

The line to get in Oaken's Trading Post wasn't that bad.  But as soon as we got in there, we got in another line to play in the "snow."  Lily wasn't happy about waiting in line for that.  So Lance went over to a little treat stand they had and bought a cupcake and a frozen blue drink in a souvenir cup that has Olaf on it.  Lance loves souvenir cups.  The treats kept Lily occupied for the line.  Then we were able to play in the snow.  She loved it!  But apparently we are lame parents, because she kept trying to run to the people next to us who had made an actual snow man, and put a carrot in its nose.  So then we made a snow man, without a carrot nose, and she was happier.

When our time was up (they give each group 10 minutes) she wasn't very happy about leaving.  It kind of makes me wish Lily could experience real snow, and we can build a real snowman and make snow angels.  Maybe one day we'll travel to Utah in the winter and go sledding.

Her face! It makes me giggle.

Lance has more pictures - these are just the ones he has shared with me.  Gosh, how dare he hoard his photos! :)

Other than the snow and the treat stand, they also had an ice skating rink in there. It was $10 to skate, but we skipped that.



So the cycle starts in a month.  Well, four weeks from yesterday.  So... I'm really desperate to get out of town and take a day off ONE MORE TIME before I'm not allowed to for 10 weeks. Miami?  The Keys?  Tampa?  Atlanta again?  Maybe my parents can meet us in Atlanta...  We didn't get to go to the Coke thingy when we went to Atlanta.

(Did I write about when we went to Atlanta for the fourth of July?  I don't remember.  Well, if not, we went to Atlanta to watch a Braves game.  I loved the weather. It's really hot like here, except we were there while it was dry so there was no humidity. Perfect!)

Ok, bye.