1200 Miles West

For those of you who don’t know our schedule yet, we’re flying in on the 16th arriving back in Michigan just after midnight. Thankfully Michael has agreed to pick us up from the airport.

We’ve only scheduled a few things thus far, so if you’re interested in seeing us we’ll be in Michigan through the following Saturday when we pack up my Jeep and drive 18 hours back to CO with two cats!

Yes, that’s right. Kali and Karmel have been living the Kitty Hotel (better known as Mom and Dad’s house) for the last 4+ months and it’s now time for them to make the trek to their new home in CO.

While we’ll be primarily be staying at my parents house in Livonia, we’re also planning to make stops in Grand Rapids and Mike will be heading to Alpena to hunt (aka drink beer and play video games with Scott) out at the hunting camp.

In addition, I’m looking forward to meeting baby Addison for the first time. She’s the beautiful bundle of joy that arrived shortly after I left for CO back in early Aug courtesy of Todd and Monica. Way to go you two!

And in case you were wondering (I know many of you do…) one of my priorities while I’m at home is to visit Salon XL to have Angel dye my hair. I have yet to find a hairdresser here in CO, although I’m not sure that I’ll ever find a replacement for her! If you’re in the AA area and you’re looking for someone new to do your hair, Angel comes HIGHLY recommended and not just by me!

I know everyone will be busy with family stuff during the week, but we probably won’t be back in Michigan again until the Summer of 2008, so if you have the time…we’d love to see you.

Hugs and Kisses!

Unfortunately outside of Michigan this game gets very little attention. Erin and I will miss all the pomp and circumstance of the BIG game in Michigan. No matter the rankings this game is always exciting.

State has won a few times - most notably when they cheat.

Just a few facts though to put it in perspective:

-UM has won the last FIVE in a row.
-99 game record of UM versus MSU: 66-28–5
-Heisman Trophy Winners: UM - 3, MSU - 0
-National Championships: UM - 7, MSU - 6
-Rose Bowl Wins: UM - 8 , MSU - 3

Michigan Football Facts:

• Most wins (867) and highest winning percentage (.746) in NCAA Division I-A football history
• The most conference championships of any college football program in any conference (42)
• The most winning seasons (109)
• The most undefeated seasons in Division 1-A football (25)
• One of only two schools with a winning record against every Division 1-A conference, including independent schools such as Notre Dame.

Mike and I eat a small breakfast every morning before we head off to work. Sometimes it’s a bowl of cereal, while other days it’s a granola bar and a piece of fruit. Okay…so Mike doesn’t normally eat fruit, but that’s not the point of this blog entry. That’s a whole other discussion in itself.

On the weekends we like to go out to breakfast and instead of eating a full lunch, we typically get a breakfast that consists of eggs, bacon and toast. The problem is that at home in Michigan we had the option to choose between Bob Evan’s (Mike’s favorite) or IHOP. Each had options that we enjoyed at a reasonable price.

Since we’ve been in the house we’ve gone out for breakfast twice and for whatever reason we dined at The Village Inn, which if you haven’t been there before it’s basically a step down from Denny’s. So, we decided today that we’re not going back. We’re going to try to break out of our 2 mile radius and find something that we enjoy. Hopefully we’ll find it before my parents arrive on the 10th as I know they are always up for a good breakfast…although maybe we can just convince my Dad to cook, which would be even better!

I know our passionate and devoted followers haven’t received an update in quite some time so I figured I better throw something up. It will be minus Erin’s normal pictorial bonanza as the camera is buried somewhere and hasn’t been found yet. I would expect to see some new pictures in the next couple of days.

At about 0945 on Friday morning we completed the final signatures and took possession of our new home. It has been a whirlwind since then to say the least…

On Friday we took care of sealing all the grout. No idea why they consider that home owner maintenance as opposed to what you normally do when you install tile but Erin and I completed that task to ensure our grout would stay new looking. The first two POD containers had arrived by dinner time. One of our windows was fixed and the phone installation had been finished before we headed back to downtown for the last night in our apartment.

On Saturday we packed up the majority of our belongings in the apartment and headed back to the house to meet the movers for 0830. They arrived and with the cooperation of PODS, all three of our pods had been emptied and moved into the appropriate part of the house by 1130. For some reason though the entire 2.5 car garage was full even though we came from a 2 car garage - maybe my tools multiplied on the way here? We spent the majority of the day focused on the upstairs and by 1800, Madden was running on the big screen… Oh and we set up the master bedroom and the two other bedrooms.

Sunday was Kitchen day and underneath 32,000 pounds of wrapping paper we found most of our Kitchen. It is amazing how dirty stuff your old stuff looks when you move it into a new house. The house is pretty livable and mostly unpacked with the exception of the garage and a complete sparseness of furnishings.

More soon…

We signed the final paper work and sent it back to Michigan via FedEx for our closing tomorrow, so as far as we’re concerned the house is SOLD! A special thank you goes out to DeShaun at the Blake St and 15th Street Kinko’s as we were in desperate need of a notary and typically he only works until 5pm…lucky for us he picked up a few extra hours and was there to notarize the necessary documents.

Also another special thank you goes out to my Dad for picking up our mail and cutting our grass while we’ve been in Denver. We couldn’t have made the move without his help…THANKS DAD!

Now it’s time to prepare to move into our new house. We hope to see the house this weekend as the carpets have been installed and the hardwood floors should now be stained and varnished. Our target move in date September 12th, so watch for more updates…

Last but not least did you hear that we’re going to Vegas this weekend? We couldn’t pass up the $39 one-way tickets. If by chance we hit it big I can’t promise that I’ll be able to keep the blog up-to-date, but what’s the chance that would happen???

We currently reside at 1600 Glenarm Place in apartment #808. It’s in the heart of downtown Denver and located withing the same city block as our new office. It’s only 681 sq/ft, but it provides us with more than enough room.