Good morning everyonbe. Still no package, and no mail today as we all know it's a holiday. We have been sleeping in so much later these last few days, that not sure we'll hear the alarm tomorrow when it's time to get up for school! My granddaughter had off as of Friday. I better get in the habit since I may be going back to work real soon...sooner rather than never! LOL Mary Ellen, I don't blame you for being partial to the photos. I would be proud as well. Dianne, I can't tell you the number of times I would "remmeber" something, anything...especially that stuff I package up and put in containers in the freezer! LMAO....sometimes it's a defrost everything to determoine what it is. Or defrost what you think were mashed p potatoes and find out it was buttercream icing! My promise to myself this year was to label everything, but I don't always. oh well. One time I had a box take the longest time. When it came down to it, it was never mailed as a priority box, so it took a longer time to get here, perhaps Vina that is what is happeneing? I'm still experiencing great problems with GW. I type to a blank page and then minutes later, the words appear. As of now, I see the paragraph where I mention MaryEllen. It will be minutes before anything else appears and then I have to go back and fix typos. So strange, not sure why this is happening. Spring, plesae come soon, I can no longer take this cold. Have a great Monday! Maryanne

Good luck with the HOSP's. I have taken 15 so far this year. I was using an elevator trap past years, works great but catches everything from chipmunks to native birds. It is invaluable to catch juvenile HOSP's however. I've now switched to a Crosman .177 pellet gun. It works and surprisingly, the HOSP's must know they are the target. I hardly get them anymore. I get every other native bird at my feeders, but HOSP's which pollute our neighborhood rarely land in our yard. They fly in and around, but I haven't taken a bird since February this year.

Originally, I was told I'd be moving in for the holidays, and I don't mean the upcoming St. Patrick's day -- I knew this wouldn't happen, and there's been a lot of Waiting for Permits / Waiting for Inspections -- which in a small town with a population less than 600 means the town offices have severely limited hours. My broken ankle didn't help matters much either -- during the 3.5 - 4 months of severe down time at my end, I got up there a total of once. However, I've now been there twice in two weeks, yay team. I'd picked out a lot of stuff for the kitchen last summer. Had to jump through hoops to get the kitchen wood-look tile I really really wanted... after ordering about 15 samples of other stuff that when you see it in person, just didn't work out. When I ordered it last December it seemed to have been discontinued, but a call placed to South Cypress found that it had simply been moved to a different "line". I have it, now. I also picked out two quartz countertops from Consentino last summer. They still have the Eco Luna, which I love. However, the Silestone Olive Green is no longer in production. I'm ordering a sample of Silestone Tea Leaf, to see if this works for me. This is it: https://shop.cosentino.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/slide_16.jpg The other counter top: http://www.silestoneusa.com/colors/color/luna/ You fine folks here convinced me to go with silgranit sinks. I'm ordering the main sink and the prep sink both in biscotti -- here's the main one: http://www.efaucets.com/detail.asp?product_id=441595 and the prep one: http://www.efaucets.com/detail.asp?Product_Id=441219. (AND you guys convinced me to put in a prep sink....) I do believe my GC is going for the best quality possible. It's just taking forever. This is quality pine backing for my lower kitchen cabinet/drawers, being custom built by GC. GC doesn't understand the whole "drawer" ambiance, but thanks to you folks, I'm pushing for them. Fridge will go to the opening in the left. Counters will be 38" tall, because I'm 6'1". Ceiling vents, not required by code, but helpfully useful none the less.

I just returned from a weekend in Philly. We drove to Gladwyne and saw that house #1 (aka "money pit") is under contract. From the outside, it looks dated and neglected, but I expected that. Than we drove around and also looked at Limberlost lane where Ded mentioned a house might come on the market in Feb. Very nice homes there. We than drove to Wayne to the second house I linked, on Thomas Jefferson Rd. (the one with the stream in the back.) Well, it isn't a stream, more like a not so small pond with outlets on both sides. and the back yard dropped off precipitously. But the biggest problem is that there is the white noise of highways in the background there. I cant do that. That was in the Glen Hardie section. We drove around to see a bunch of other homes (drive by). What I know now is that I don't mind being further from downtown as the roads further out are beautiful and many more trees. Lots of cul-du-sacs, (a plus) but lots of houses either perched on high driveways or at the bottom of a steep hill. I don't want either of those. I found myself drawn more and more to the stuccoed center hall colonials, followed by stone and brick. We grabbed a quick bite in Wayne and walked around the downtown for a little bit. I think we are ruling out Ardmore and Gladwyne. Both are beautiful towns, but my dh works in KOP and has been doing giant commutes forever. I think it would be nice for him to be able to cut his commute in half or more. It also makes it easier to concentrate on one general area. (Wayne is huge, encompassing 5 zip codes!) I'm haunting realtor.com these days but I also know we're still on the early side of the search. Thanks for all your help. Jo