Pre Owned Glory

We kind of glazed over the whole we bought a house thing with all the excitement of the past months.

Well here it is in all its pre owned glory!

3 Bed 1 bath 1187 Sq Ft. on .36 of an Acre (if your hyperventilating about the amount of yard work to come, I'm right there with you) Built in 1956 and yes that drive way is in fact 8,000 feet long and currently ice packed.
Living room with gleaming hardwood floors

Dine in Kitchen

The Christmas Kitchen! The counter tops are Green fake marble 1950's formica! and the cabinets are original and painted brick red!

the one and only bath

one of the three very small bedrooms

One of four closets with out doors

Master Bedroom? well the largest room with two closets NO Doors, yet again.

Swing set not included

a view from the back patio to a group of pines

Yes the back yard is really that big and the house is that small. objects in photo may appear smaller in person (the house that is)

Oddly placed gardens in the middle of our very own grassy park

We have ripped out all the carpet to find beautiful hard wood floors we plan to refinish. Painting the Christmas Kitchen and replace the bedroom windows are on the list of to do's before we move in.

Ready

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIo-zH5mOw8

I finally made youtube with my clothes on.

more luck

Justin at the Albert Einstein Monument. We stumbled across this and we're happy to have done so.

The Lincoln Monument is quite a site

Gorgeous View of the Washington monument

Yes it was that Cold. We were huddling together for heat & love at the FDR monument

Jefferson Monument

Lovers cuddling again
How did we site see in DC when their are 2 million visitors in this town. Again we have nothing but luck on this trip. We bought lottery tickets hoping the luck carries through

Iowa Dodd reunion at the glorious Capital Lounge

But Wait is that my 19yr old Brother in a Bar? With a beer?

Blue Ball

The Youth Ball once again an event with Luck for the Daniels'. TJ tired of hanging with his sister ditched us right after we walked in the door to pick up on Chicks! Justin, Alisha & Steve wondered around and tried to get into the main ballroom but it was full to capacity and no one was coming out! We found and unused lounge that must have been some kind of Press Lounge that we walked right into to find an empty room except for Kid Rock (every where we turned Kid Rock was there, it's kind of scary) there was a guard watching the stairs that went to the main ballroom and we asked if we could go down them and he said sure so we just waltzed right into the ballroom. Just in time to see Kanye West perform.

To star see and get a photo with Eric Benet. Ashton Kutcher, Demi Moore, Geraldo Rivera, Will I am, more Kid rock (seriously he was every where) Wyatt Cenac part of the best damn news team on the Daily show. along with fall out boy on stage and of course the Obamas!

everyone has a camera and yes they can take a picture

Official Dance of the cooolest president ever!

Alisha, Justin, Bianca & Matt
Yes He Did! Portta Potties in the lobby of the Hilton... How Formal!

Yes We Did!

Justin, Alisha & TJ head to DC for the Historical Inauguration of Brack Obama the 44th President. We stayed with Justin's Friend Steve in Friendship Heights and gave him a ticket to Inaugurating & the Youth Ball for housing us. We had a wonderful time and thanks to Steve for making it happen for us.
The We are One Concert was amazing to see in person and it was so nice of U2 to play for such and small intimate crowed. Justin was so amazed and Happy to see not only the Boss but the Boss of Bosses Pete Seager.
Our day of Inauguration was really full of luck. We underestimated our travel time and didn't leave until 7am. On a normal day it would take us 30 min or so to get to the capital. Not today it took 1 & 1/2 hrs just in the Metro. We did have to take different Metro trains due to large crowds and were separated for about an hour with out cell service (a t&t sucks in DC) But some how we all found each other and strolled right in to our ticketed Silver area, just behind the fountain.
It was cold, very cold, their were millions of people and yet we are all excited and Happy!
Waiting patiently for the inauguration of the dare I say the best president in my life time.

TJ with his inauguration beard so common among young democrats theses days.

Obama takes the stage and pledges to do his best (I think that is what is going on, I can't quite hear with the echos of the all the speakers)

Bush is out and Justin is HAPPY! Change and Hope to Come! Change and Hope is here! Change and Hope to Drink!

After hours of moving with the heard of Millions of people we finally made our way to the other side of the Capital. We broke down fences with sharp shooters watching and just shaking their heads at us. We trampled through gardens just to get out of the their. And Yes we Did make it out!

Home Sweet Home

We closed on our home loan yesterday. We are now Home Owners.
Let the aggravation begin!

Competition

One of the cutest babies I have ever seen. Justin Cousins Baby Finn.



Baby Finn you have competition! This is my Cousins Baby Chase he is soooo cute.

No offense to all the Babies in my life you are all special and adorable.

ahh the holidays... extended version with directors commentary

With much encouragement form my devoted fan, here is the unedited version of the The Holiday season according to Alisha
Dec. 13 start the much anticipated NOTYONEWS the letter.
Dec. 14 think really hard about news for the letter for about 11 minutes, take a nap due to brain strain.
Dec. 16 panic about the newsletter.
Dec. 17 give up and mail what we have.
Dec. 21 Jack Daniels Christmas. I know what you're thinking, but there was no alcohol involved! Jack is Justin's Grandfather. Jack Daniels Christmas is always a good time. We head to Provo to meet with all the aunts, uncles and cousins. We dine, we play games, we story tell, we white elephant and best of all. We keep in Daniels tradition and make it as quick as possible. We hightail it out of there as fast as can be. This always amazes me, at my family gatherings we linger for an excruciating amount of time. But not the Daniels Family. They get in and get out, very efficient.
Dec. 24 The day with Mike for a grueling game of "X96 Radio from Hell home edition the game." For those of you not from Utah I highly recommend you give the radio from hell a listen. With out online streaming in Iowa, I never would have made it.
http://www.x96.com/
Dec. 24 Eve Grandparents house. We did cookie decorating this year instead of the usually game of Take my Junk. Me and my mother went to my Grandmothers house the week before to bake the cookies. Then on Christmas Eve we get invited over to decorate the cookies and then plate them, all so my Grandmother could give me the gift of Cookies. Now I'm not one to complain (well yeah I am but...) I want to point this out for comedic purposes that I baked, decorated, plated and cleaned up all the mess so my Grandmother could give me a plate of homemade cookies for Christmas. When I pointed this out to my Grandma she reminded me its the thought that counts...
Dec. 25th AM my usually Teenage Lazy Brothers were out of bed by 9AM this year, which leads me to believe they never went to bed the night before.
Dec. 25 Afternoon Present frenzy at Becks. Children screaming, Wrapping Paper flying, Maggie fearing for her life as gifts fly through the air and noisy toys scream the anthem of Christmas! Of course the traditional Christmas Ham. (by News Years Justin has eaten so much Ham he glistens in the dark)
Dec. 25 Christmas Dinner! More Ham. and Vegan fair for the rest!
Dec. 26 Bossmass. The usual Breakfast Feast for Dinner (if your not aware of the Picky Daniels Family eating habits, it makes it nearly impossible to feed them all) Breakfast is the meal we all agree on.
Dec. 28 Our 6th Wedding anniversary. Because of a couple of reasons this may be our last anniversary. One reason is California's Prop. 8, the other is that I made Justin see a movie he was not emotionally prepared for.
Dec. 31 NEW YEARS EVE! what party animals we are... We went to the Fritz's for an appetizer extravaganza! We were home by 10PM to watch the sad Dick Clark Rockin' New Years Eve Show. I have to say we were in Time Square for 2003 New Years Eve and watching it on TV is much more exciting.
As a new years resolution Justin & myself vow this

a) buy a house

b) fix said house

c) complain about being home owners

d) Justin of course would like to take a picture of himself every day again and count how many times he pees in year. This is something Justin has done every year since I started dating him and yet I still married him. What does that say about me???
I think c) is the only one we can keep up all year!
This New Years was the 15th anniversary of our first date. and they said it wouldn't last.
The end of the Holiday season ends with my Birthday Jan.9 I have a unique gift for making my Birthday last for weeks. I have to say thank you to Divorcees, for making such dreams come true!

ahh the holidays...

Christmas came and went with all the regular festivities.
This year my family choose to exchange the gift of food. We collected 642 lbs of food that we took to the Utah food bank.. I believe that's quite amazing, if I do say so myself.

Justin and I are under contract on a house. What kind of morons buy a house during the holidays? Oh yeah us. We're the kind of idiots that plan a huge wedding 3 days after Christmas. Whats next's? Triplets on new years? (OK people that was a joke I AM NOT PREGNANT!!!)

As tradition for our wedding anniversary we intended to go to the moves all day, but I choose to start the mega movieplex experience with "Marley and Me". This movie is not what you think it is. The dog dies! My dear Husband, the sensitive fella he is was very upset I did not let him in on the ending of this movie before we saw it. We immediately had to leave the theater and rush to visit with Maggie and then directly to the Blockbuster to rent an arm full of comedy's