Life Transplanet

On Saturday my friend Kelly had another White Elephant/Re-wrap your crap party. We don’t have too much crap left after our multiple clean outs and garage sales, but we managed to put together a pretty good gift of random never-opened bathroom essentials inside a fish bowl. It was also the day of the Broncos big loss, so it was nice to have the White Elephant game instead of just football.

The first present we chose was a powdered coffee gift with two fairly decent glasses with it. I thought we had lucked out. Then, of course, as the game is played…our gift was “stolen” by someone else and we had to choose again. This time, we got what had to be the worst present: pigs feet and Spam! Yuck! But it was a pretty funny present.

Kelly LOVES the pigs feet haha :-p

We had a fun night out and then Sunday we prepared for Puerto Rico. We are leaving this week!! Lots to do still, but we are looking forward to going back to the property and getting some work done.

The other day we took a long walk down the Poudre Trail from 71st Ave past 83rd Ave. It was cold, but sunny, and in our black hoodies and pants and at a brisk pace we stayed fairly ok. When we got to 83rd by the old Hazelton School House which is now being used as the Poudre Learning Center, we went off trail a bit by the pond and happened upon an empty old teepee (or tipi depending on your preference for spelling).

Teepee on the trail- they don’t usually lilt so much though!!

Teepees were the main form of lodging for the nomadic Native Americans/Indians who lived in this area. They mainly hunted the wild buffalo that roamed these areas and moved according to the weather and the food sources in the region. People still find old arrow heads around here in fields from time to time. A reminder of the wilder times only a few hundred years ago.

This teepee is not an authenic tipi, but a reproduction, similar to the teepee displayed at Centennial Village. There was some information inside of it about teepees and the Cottonwood trees of the area. We did notice how much warmer it was inside sheltered from the cold slight wind that day. With a fire in the middle it would have been pretty toasty!

We thought it would be pretty cool to have a teepee for our property in Puerto Rico, or maybe we could go with the thatch huts that the native Tainos used! Could be fun.

Huts that the Tainos used in Puerto Rico (pic taken on our honeymoon)

On the sidebar of this site, you may have noticed a little green vine crawling up the side. Well, we have added a new feature: the Moving to Rincon Progress Meter. It is a scale from one to 100 that will track our progress to our goal of living in Rincon, Puerto Rico. Mostly it measures the amount we estimated that we need to save in order to move there and be able to do some major upgrades to the property, but it also covers some things like ongoing income sources as well.

At this point in time you will notice we are at approximately a 35 on the scale or 35% of the way there. We estimate an increase of more or less about 5% per month on this meter. We thought this might be a fun way for those of you out in Internet-land to watch the progress we are making as we close the gap to moving and living in Rincon. We will be down visiting Rincon in just a few short weeks, so watch the blog soon for updates straight from there.

After the crazy wind died down on New Year’s Eve, we went out to eat at the Texas Roadhouse, a Texas-themed steakhouse where they play country music and you can throw peanut shells on the ground. The perfect type of place for Greeley. And it was full of people. Thankfully, Britton had called ahead and we walked right in with no wait. We felt like VIPs!

At Texas Roadhouse in Greeley

Then we went over to our friends Matt and Jamie’s house to play some Texas Hold-Em poker (a very Texas night for some reason) and ring in the new year. We played tournament style which takes way too long for my patience, but is fun for a night counting down the hours, minutes and seconds to the new year.

After about three hours of playing everyone starts getting restless and not paying much attention to the game and instead starts telling jokes and messing around.

Me and Hailee playing around

To add a little spice to the night, Britton and I had  decided beforehand to play a practical joke. We found some “untearable toilet paper” at the dollar store the other day. Britton inconspicuously traded out the regular paper in the bathroom for the un-tearable kind. We thought about removing all the regular toilet paper under the bathroom sink, but thought that might be too mean, so he just removed and replaced the roll on the spring.

After about 2 hours of playing poker, finally someone went to the bathroom. Britton and I waited to see what would happen. Finally, our friend Erin came out and said “Matt and Jamie, what IS this stuff? It’s just about impossible to tear. Are you trying to re-use your toilet paper?” They were mortified and said, “We just bought it at Wal-Mart the other day.” Britton and I just laughed along with everyone else, and no one knew it was us for the longest time until we came clean. We were just shocked that Erin was actually able to pry it apart and even used it!! That takes some doing. It was pretty hilarious.

Erin with the TP around her neck

Finally as we were nearing midnight only Britton, Erin and I remained as the last three in the poker tournament. We decided to call it and Britton and I took first, and she took second. So we walked away with $60! Not too shabby!

This was the final table. I had the most chips (on the right)! Yay

Erin, Jamie and Me- Making the Money-haha

It was a fun night out with friends and a great start to the new year. We hope everyone has a wonderful and prosperous 2012!

Britton and I both had a four day weekend for the Christmas holiday but most of it was filled with activities.

Friday we baked cookies all day long. Then Saturday we spent the evening with Britton’s family. On Sunday we went over to my grandma’s for Christmas dinner. And on Monday we took Britton’s niece and nephew out to lunch and to pick out a present of their choice. So while it was nice to sleep in, we didn’t really get much of a break otherwise. The time went by rather quickly and 2012 is rapidly approaching as well. We hope you all had a nice holiday with friends and family.  Britton and I are looking forward to 2012 and our next trip to Puerto Rico which will be at the mid to end of January.