getting ready for another move.

As I posted previously, my firm is moving into a new office. We now have the schedule and move-date finalized. Today I wore jeans because I thought my boss and I were going to be doing measurements of the new office, but that got pushed to tomorrow. Jeans two days in a row? I think I'm okay with that one. So tomorrow I'll be taking measurements of the new space and putting a plan of it into CAD. I'll be in charge of "design development" of the new office, a.k.a. placing furnishing and plotters, etc. And thanks to my experience with InDesign I'll be helping Brian with postcards to notify clients and contacts of the new location. He'll draw out what he wants, and I'll simply drop it into InDesign. If anyone else in this office dealt with the InDesign portion of it they'd probably be reading a manual as they went along and it would take much longer than necessary. I'm kind of excited for that part -- I'm starting to miss InDesign and Illustrator. Our overall goal is to have everything ready to move on June 30, then the following week while my boss is on vacation we can get everything organized and settled for when she comes back.

This past weekend my mom and grandparents were in town for the 4th, and I think the five days they were here was good. If they had been here any longer my mom might have killed my grandmother (although she still had another couple days to spend with her in Lubbock) or my grandmother may have even killed my mom. Let's just say I'm really glad I'm not in Lubbock with them right now.

They got here on Thursday afternoon and as soon as I got off work I met them for dinner then we caught a movie. My grandparents went to see The Karate Kid and my mom and I went to see Eclipse. They enjoyed their movie, and we enjoyed our movie. I was surprised that my mom liked it as much as she did. She seemed fairly bored with the first two movies, but with this one she didn't even want to get up to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to see it again, probably this weekend, so I can really just enjoy it. I think the first time around I'm so concentrated on comparing it with the book that I didn't get to just sit back and enjoy it as much. Don't get me wrong, I really liked it and think it was the best of the three so far, but I still need a second viewing.

On Friday they met me for lunch -- we went to The Shed at The Plaza -- and it was very good. Very busy (we had a 40 minute wait at lunch time) but very good. I wouldn't mind going back there again. My boss had left for Colorado that morning and said I could leave early so I could spend more time with my mom, so I took her up on that offer, left early, and the fam and I went to Buffalo Thunder Resort & Casino. When you sign up for the Player's Club you get $25 in free money to play the slots, which I lost all of, plus $20 of my own money. On the first $5 or $10 of my mom's free money she won $90, and left the casino up $180. Not fair at all.

Saturday and Sunday were pretty typical days for my mom and Bon Bon -- shopping and wine. I took them to Jackalope when we got up and around on Saturday (and we saw Ali MacGraw there, the girl from Love Story) then headed to the Plaza. We shopped for a little while then went to Maria's for dinner and margaritas. The food there was also very good, but both my mom and I agree that Habanero's margaritas are still better. Sunday we went to the wine festival, which was a pretty good deal in my opinion. It was $13 to get in and you got a glass with your admission and all the tastings you wanted. I ended up buying some cactus & pineapple jam and a bottle of wine called 'Girls Are Meaner'.  Then Monday was the hurry up and go day. Bon Bon kept pushing up the time she thought they needed to leave, so the "let's buy Ashley groceries before we leave" was very rushed and stressful. That's when heads really might have gone flying. We finished that an hour before they really needed to leave, and mind you the only reason they really needed to leave early was so Bon Bon didn't miss 'The Bachelorette'. They need to get a DVR, or some blank tapes and do it the old-fashioned way. So they were off in a hurry, and after they left I was exhausted and spent the rest of the day catching up on shows and watching a movie.

And now I'm trying to figure out a weekend to go down to Muleshoe soon, scheduling it around Bon Bon's work and the markets that will be going on in Santa Fe. This weekend is the International Folk Art Market, two weeks after that is the Spanish Market, and four weeks after that is the Indian Market. I definitely want to get down there sooner so it's not too close to Labor Day when I'll already be going down there, so I'm thinking the weekend in-between the International Folk Art Market and the Spanish Market. I'm definitely excited about all the markets. It's too bad that my mom and my grandparents just missed them.

I decided a while ago that I didn't want to fly anywhere for Thanksgiving. I'm tired of airplanes and really won't have much time since I'll be working. With that said, my mom had the idea of going to Ruidoso for Thanksgiving -- kind of convenient this year since she'd only have to pay for one plane ticket. We booked a unit at Crown Point but I'm not sure if she's looked at airfare yet. It's pretty up there. So we'll see if that's actually going to work out or not.

Finally, Martha has decided to go to school in Texas (a decision that I never had much question about), at Midwestern State University to be exact. It's so far north in Texas that she'll basically be in Oklahoma, and also 500 miles from Santa Fe. About the same distance as a trip from Orlando to Atlanta. We're hoping to go skiing in the winter, probably right after she's done with finals and before I leave Santa Fe. Should be exciting considering neither of us have ever skiied before. Looking forward to the next 6 months.