Life In the Burg!: Birthday Week

Get out the cake, the streamers, the nachos & beer...it's time to celebrate!!! Today marks the beginning of BIRTHDAY WEEK in the Andreen household, a much reveled and important occasion (if you're not familiar with birthday week, you're definitely missing out...who could pass up the opportunity to celebrate for an entire week, rather than just a day)! A big shout-out to my mom, Deb, who celebrates a very special birthday today...I'll let her fill you in on the details!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!!

My grandma's birthday was earlier in the week and my sister, Kelsey, turns the big 24 tomorrow :) Mike and I had homemade chocolate chip waffles to celebrate the occasion from afar, then a nice skype session with the fam, complete with a video tour of the pad in Harrisburg (I'm sure a bit jumpy as I was carrying the computer around the house with me).

Friday was a rainy day in Harrisburg; luckily, I used the time to do a little cleaning. Those of you who know me know that I love to clean. No joke, it's definitely something that I've grown into, but I love, love, love to have a spotlessly clean house...it's my way to organize and de-stress, I'm much more relaxed when I can sit down in a clean home! Anyhow, this space is proving quite the challenge...our entire main floor is hardwood and seems to collect all sorts of dirt and chihuahua hair. Needless to say, I spent a great deal of time wiping the floor :) Soon enough the house will be pulled together and decorated enough to post some photos on the blog. Slowly but surely it's starting to feel like a home, not just a shell of a house!

Let it rain, let it rain, let it rain...

The Prius misses it's garage...oh well, impromptu car wash!

Thursday night, Mike and I finally made the trek across the river to Al Retherford...basically a local greenhouse/flower-mart of Market Street in Camp Hill, PA. Market Street is the route I use to get to TARGET (no longer 2 blocks away, but something like 6 miles, eeeekkk!) so I drive by quite often. The entire front lawn is covered in the most gorgeous hanging baskets and potted plants I've seen--Lynde's has nothing on these baskets! After 20 minutes of browsing and talking to the proud "flower parents", we finally decided on two baskets to bring home and hang from our front porch. I've never heard someone talk so much about the love and care and babying that goes into growing flowers! The love definitely shows...these two beauties now have a new home, viola! Now...let's just hope I can keep them alive!!

Friday evening cleared up and after a run to the grocery store, we made some deliciously spicy sweet and sour shrimp with basil, cracked a few beers, took the chi's on a walk, and watched the Twins bounce back against the Chi-sox. All in all, a nice relaxing Friday night! Not that you all want to see last night's dinner, but I'm trying