Bugs Palace!

Lots of beetle updates. Not sure where to begin.  I won’t get into the dirty details, but long story short, until this week, I didn’t technically own the bug. A mixup with paper work 5 years ago left the previous owner as the current owner. It has been all sorted out now, and I officially own the car.

Bryan stopped by this week with my new brake line. Hopefully throw that in tomorrow night. (Thanks Bry!) Picked up the new interior early this week. Seats are all recovered with a sexy coating of white goodness.  Today, the car came home from the shop with the headliner and windows freshly installed. Looks really good. I’m very impressed overall. It’s not perfect, but I am still very happy. Thanks for all towing me all over the place Paul! Pictures of the seats and install can be found HERE. Also, last week, my new header/exhaust showed up the for bug.  Pretty good shape for a used piece. Hopefully it is as loud and menacing as I am hoping it will be 🙂 Worst case scenerio, I’ll just remove the muffler from the header, and throw on baffle free stinger.

Going to be a busy week. Hopefully I can get a lot done in a short period of time, as the car is supposed to go back to Paul next weekend for a 1-2 week stay to get the paint work finished off, and the headlights/running boards mounted. Last stop after that is Dions house to finish the suspension.

And for the none beetle updates 🙂

Momma and Baby are doing well. Getting bigger by the day. We went in for a second, more in depth ultra sound yesturday. After a nerve racking hour waiting for results, everything checked out, and looks ‘perfect’ as the doctor put it. 3 more months or so to go. I’m starting to get impatient. I kept myself busy tonight, painting the babies room 🙂 On the upside, I finally felt the baby kicking !

 Only other update is I spoiled myself, and picked up a new Yamaha acoustic guitar. An FG700MS I believe the model is for anyone who may care 🙂 Love the sound of it. My mad skillz are slowly coming back. I can actually ‘play’ and Shannon is able to identify the songs 🙂 It isn’t much, but it IS progress.

Shannon and I are now past the half way mark with the baby. If I am not mistaken, we are now in the 22nd week. Things seem to be going well. A little discomfort here and there, but at this point nothing unbearable. (touch wood!).  We now have the babies room nearly cleaned out. Still need to remove a couple things, but we are nearly ready to paint and fill the room with baby stuff. And man, is there ever a lot of baby stuff.  Shannon and I went to ‘Babies R’ Us’ to register for baby items. Partially for any baby showers, and partially just to get an idea of what we need to buy. A bit overwhelming when you see just how many things you could get.

Well, at long last (after a 10 year hiatus), I am finally getting back to a hobby I once loved. Playing guitar. As those who knew me in highschool, I spent a great deal of time trying to tame the six stringed beast. I wasn’t very good, but I really enjoyed playing. So after years of me saying ‘I have to start playing again’, I took the plunge, took my old electric guitar in to be ‘set up’ and bought a small practice amp. Only other thing I really want is a good acoustic guitar. It would be nice not to have to plug in all the time, and also, its nice to have both types, so I can play any type of song I want. I will keep you informed on my progress 🙂

And lastly, could the beetle actually be on the road this year? Yes, it’s almost looking that way. It is going into the headliner shop tomorrow to have the headliner, seats and windows installed. Once that is done, with any luck, it will only be a few more weeks until it is road worthy. I imagine the car will be there for no more then a week, so hopefully next week at this time, I will have some more updated pictures.

 Here are some updated galleries that I had put off uploading until the server was behaving again. Looks like its finally good to go.

• Florida pics
• Old Towne Car Show Pics
• Final Day with the Mini CooperS
• Pics of the beetle before it goes in for the headliner

Well, its been a while since my last update. Wow, so much has happened. First, and most importantly, Shannon and I finally seen our baby face to face in an ultrasound. Before anyone asks, no, we didn’t learn the gender. Nor do we want to.  I have never seen anything more incredible in my entire life. To see the baby wiggling around inside of Shannon’s belly, moving its hands around was simply amazing. I am now impatiently looking very forward to the next ultrasound.

Other major update is a vehicle update. Sadly, my MINI Cooper S is GONE! Thats right, I met with the future buyer a week ago Sunday. After some short negotitation, we decided on a price, and it was sold. Then, I spent the next week waiting for a safety to be completed. It cost a lot more then I had expected, but in the end, the monthly savings will be worth it. 

With the sale of my MINI costing me a lot more then we had anticipated, finding spare cash to pick up an inexpensive ‘beater’ was proving to be difficult. Luckilly, my Dad and I struck up a deal that worked well for both of us.  We purchased a 1991 VW Golf turbo diesel. Its in decent shape, has about 367,000kms on it, and the price was right. So now, I have a decent car to get me by until Shannon goes off work, and Dad will have something to replace his van with when its e-test is due at the beginning of September.  Thanks again Mom and Dad. Shannon and I would be sunk without this help.

Lastly, my webserver is working, for the most part. Only one small issue left to resolve. Hopefully in the next few days I will figure it out.