Our Soon-to-Be New House

While my family was visiting for Thanksgiving, our wonderful Realtor, Susan, allowed us to take them on a tour of our soon-to-be new house. Mom and Dad were impressed and offered lots of advice on projects we should and should not undertake.

We are keeping our fingers crossed that the VA appraisal is done soon and we are able to close on December 11th. That gives us just enough time to get moved in prior to leaving for our long trip north to Washington for Christmas.

I took a few pictures while were on the tour, but the photos really don't do the place justice. It's a 2100+ sqft house, with 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths in a military-populated neighborhood. We can't wait to move in and make new friends!

Front of the house

Back the house

Kitchen & Dining Area

Family room off the kitchen

Master Bath

Thankful for Thanksgiving!

We are so thankful for Thanksgiving this year. Not only were we able to spend it together in our new hometown, but we were able to share our blessings with family and friends!

I was so grateful to have most of my immediate family join us for the big day. My parents drove down from Washington on Wednesday and my youngest brother, Erik, flew in on Thursday morning. Unfortunately, my other brother, Tim, was unable to leave NY and we all missed him terribly.

While the family was in town, we took them sight-seeing around El Paso and Ft. Bliss and even showed them the "mighty" Rio Grande. Despite my father's best efforts, we did NOT tour Juarez, Mexico ... even if we had the ability to be armed to the teeth! We were also able (thanks to our wonderful Realtor) to take them on a tour of our soon-to-be new house!

For the big day, Cam invited a few of the single 2nd Lt in his class for dinner. They, in turn, invited a few more friends, so we had a packed house for dinner. It ended up that we had PLENTY of food and no one went hungry! We even sent leftovers home with the visiting 2nd Lts.

We had a marvelous, if uber-casual and slightly cramped, Thanksgiving! Hope all of you were as lucky as us and able to enjoy the holiday with those you love! Happy Belated Turkey Day!

Cam and his beautiful (and TASTY!) bird

3/4 of our guests

Food-induced coma (Or maybe it was all the football?)

Please forgive us ...

Well, we finally BOTH made it.  We are now officially grown-ups (i.e. in our 30s!) and no longer carefree 20-somethings.  As such, we're finding it harder and harder to remember to post things to our blog.  So, to make up for the month-long absence, please find THREE (3) posts below detailing our "wild" and "crazy" adventures of the past four weeks.

However, one benefit to old age (besides yelling at random whipper-snappers), we're finally taking the plunge and buying a house!  After several rounds of offers and counter-offers on two separate houses, we finally have a Seller-accepted offer!!!  We are hoping to close the first week of December and be all moved in before we trek north to Washington for Christmas.  As soon as the t's are dotted and i's are crossed, we'll post some pictures!

Now, without further ado, please see our newest three posts below...

Welcome to the Dirty Thirties!

We decided to really celebrate our entrance into a new decade by taking a weekend trip to San Antonio, TX. (See post below for details and photos.)

However, an occasion such as this also requires a party in town with friends. Therefore, eleven of our friends (and two adorable kids) joined us for a dinner out in El Paso.

The Birthday Kids

Our very good friends, the Welches
(He is in BOLC III with Cam; She is my crafty buddy!)

Leslie is another classmate

The Radcliffes came too!

Miclos is yet another classmate

The cute camera-hog daughter of our friends, the Dubys

The beautiful freeway and power lines

Racing Fools

Cam has discovered a new "hobby".  About once a month, he competes in races in and around El Paso.  The latest race on Nov. 7th  was the 5th Annual 2009 Grape Race!  It was sponsored by and took place at Zin Valley Vineyards in Anthony, TX (about 10 miles northwest of El Paso).

Cam ran the 8K race and improved his time by over 3 minutes.  This may be attributed to his participation in the daily Running PT at Ft. Bliss for the last 3 weeks.  He even completed 30 miles total (including this race) during that week! 

For my first race EVER, I decided to take it easy and did the 1 mile "fun walk".  While I walked faster than I thought I might, I am now more motivated to start training for the 5K run/walk coming up in December.

Following the race, the Vineyard supplied wine for tasting and PK Chang's provided a catered dinner.  If only all the races had such incentives to finish!

Pre-race Photo

 

Kristy crossing the finish line!

 

Cam crossing the finish line!

Cam had been participating in the Running PT for the last three weeks in order to train for the 10K Run Post Championship on Nov. 14th.  The training proved to be beneficial again as he was able to maintain a less-than-9-minute mile pace during this race!  Keep up the good work, Cam!

 

The BOLC III 2nd LTs that ran the 10K