Bon voyage!

So they're off... again. How fair is this?

Shawn and Arianna are off to see his family for our annual 'Thanksgiving week in Kentucky' tonight. They'll drive 16 hours while I stay home... again. There is a discrepency in my vacation time at work and I don't have enough time for this trip, I guess. I wouldn't have enough time accrued by the time our cruise comes around if I took this week anyway...

I'm disappointed. I really enjoy staying with his family (the food, outstanding!) and especially seeing his mother, whom I adore. It would normally be the week of Thanksgiving but his mothers new job couldn't grant her that week, so she took the week before instead.

Shawn is surprising her - she still thinks he'll arrive the day she leaves to go back to CA. She'll be so thrilled to see Ari again and I know everyone will have a great time. Shawn's cousin David's wife Sheila just had a little girl this week (gosh, we better call and find out how she's doing!) and I've already packed the camera (no, not my new one! I'll be buried with it!) for him to take lots of pictures. Arianna will get to play with her cousins Abby(2), Brenden(3) and Alyssa(4.5) - which I'm sure she'll love. But most of all she'll be spoiled rotten by her grandma. I wish I could be there to see the expression on my mother in laws face when she sees Arianna :(.

So what will I be doing while they're gone this time? Not a scrapbooking marathon! I have a crop to go to tomorrow night but I have everything all set for that - an album on my great aunt and uncles 50th wedding anniversary.

I'm going to be tearing apart my bedroom and kitchen!

My father and brother arrive early tomorrow morning so we can tear down a wall in my kitchen to put in a pantry - we have NO space at all to store food, I've been hiding it in cabinets with the dishes and storing it in the extra bedroom we have. They anticipate it taking most of the day on Saturday (hopefully before my crop starts!) and I'll spend all day Sunday spackling to cover joists and screw holes... then the rest of the week will be spent painting. Our bedroom is purple... dark purple sponge paint and we didn't paint it that way. It's nasty. I'm going to paint it a sort of tropical yellow/orange to make it more inviting and brighter. The kitchen is going to be painted a muted yellow and I'm going to take down the hideous ivy wall paper running on one wall.

I'm ambitious - hope I can finish it before they get home next Sunday!