It's all new to me!

Hope you all like my new look. Cheri & I worked on this for a while. You know, I still need a lot of help with this computer stuff. Thanks Cheri!!

Conversation with Shaelyn this morning went something like this:
Shaelyn: Mom, I have itchy bumps on my arms this morning.
Me: Oh dear....
Shaelyn: No, oh dear to me. I'm the one with the bumps...





70%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

I guess I am more addicted than I thought, especially after the time spent on this today. Oh well, it's still fun.

Fun at the fair

Sorry this video is sideways. I don't know how or if it's even possible to switch it over so this is how it is. They sure had fun on this slide last week.

Allllll Aboard!!

I was cleaning my floor this morning and had to move the table and chairs. Shaelyn saw me doing this and instructed me to put them in line. She was going to make a train. This seems to be a popular thing to do when Mom's clean floors. I remember making trains when my mom would clean the floor. Bonnie talks about childhood fun today and this is one that goes from generation to generation. You can see that at one time, I was driving this train. The ball was my steering wheel. Shaelyn did a pretty good job taking that picture. If any of you want to ride this train, come on over. We'll give you a great deal!

Last weeks storm

Last week Wednesday and Thursday, we had some big storms come through. There was a lot of wind. We lost power Wednesday night and were prepared for problems Thursday. Well nothing really happened until we woke up Friday morning and this is what we found. This tree fell over during the night. It probably got weakened from the storm. We had taken our pool down and laid it over the trampoline to dry out. Now the tree fell on it. Our insurance guy came over Saturday to take pictures. We'll have to try to put some more water in the pool to see if it leaks. We didn't see any outright holes but there might be leaks. We also have to see if our tramp got bent, but I think it looks okay for now.

School days, school days

Chelsea started school today, much to her dismay. Most of the schools around here start after Labor Day, to help with tourism. Unfortunately, hers does not. She is beginning her sophomore year, so that's not as nerve racking as the freshman year. It seems that she likes most of her teachers. They had a shortened day today, getting done at 12:20. Tuesday and Wednesday are full days. Thursday is a full day for the freshman as they are having a mixer, so she will get out early again. Friday will be off for the holiday weekend. I had to bring her and pick her up today, as there is not bussing because the public schools are off. What a pain! I have to do this for the whole week.
After picking her up, we headed to the fair to pick up all the things she entered. She did fairly well, coming home with a check for $22. Tomorrow I have to start my daycare again. Am I ready? Not so sure but we'll gradually ease into all this schedulized stuff again.

Katelyn's all moved in

We got Katelyn all moved in! I thought Dave should come along to help because she had so much packed. I was wrong. We drove in and there were all kinds of upper classmen there to carry all her stuff. Dave carried in her printer and I carried in my camera and her water. They plan this for the freshmen. It was great. Her roommate wasn't there yet so she unpacked. When Liz arrived they decided to bunk their beds, so in come about 3 other students to take care of that for us. They ended up not having any suite mates so to their "horrible disappointment" they have the bathroom all to themselves. Around 11:30, we all (liz & her parents) headed for lunch - chicken parmesan, mashed potatoes, lasagna, carrots, rice, rolls and cheesecake. (No wonder kids gain weight their first year in college!) Then we went to a dedication ceremony at the chapel. Later on there was an orientation type of meeting. Katelyn had to go to a technology meeting at 3:00 where they get all information for their computers. They're pretty much set up in their room except for some final adjustments. Last night, everyone was going to a baseball game. Today she has to take some freshman tests and then they will be having a campus "Meijer" run for anything that has been forgotten. Sunday, they will be having campus worship
Monday is a fun fest for all and Tuesday, classes start. She will be coming home next Friday. Here's some pictures of the day. I've got some of all her stuff packed, students helping, her dorm and room, their community kitchen, Liz & her, and me with her. I think she's off to a great start!

Katelyn is moving to college

Katelyn is packed and mostly ready for moving tomorrow. I heard this song on Michael W. Smith's last album, Stand. He wrote it when his daughter was leaving for college. I thought it was fitting for Katelyn. Take a listen and see if it brings any tears to your eyes.

Michael W. Smith-How To Say Goodbye

The fair

Cheri & I went to the fair today. The kids had earned 5 free rides through summer reading club. Here's some of the fun they had. Tonight we're heading back for the grandstand event - the off road derby. That's where they take old cars and drive around the mud jumps on the track. It's so much fun to watch. We love the fair. It's the ending to our summer fun before school starts next week.

The next room redo

Mari was working so fast the picture was blurry












The pink room before it's "remake"



Mari and I headed over to Dad's to do some more painting. We started in the living room. It went really quick and we had a gallon of paint leftover so.... we started looking around for what else we could do. We wandered into my old pink bedroom. We thought about trying to remove the wallpaper but saw that it was really stuck on. We did a test spot and decided to paint it the same cream color as the living room. Any of you who know this house, know that this was in desperate need for a change. Dad never was big on remodeling and this room was never changed since we built it in 1974. We finished the 1st coat of paint and noticed that some of the flowers had a texture to them and were starting to show through. So we added another coat. They still show a bit but it's sooo much better. What do you think? Carpet might be coming for both bedrooms tomorrow.They also took out the flourescent lights in the kitchen. The drywall guy came today to replaster the ceiling and that's now ready to be painted. We've got a little more to do but we're getting there.


Shaelyn helping Ann remove tacks from the floor












This would be where Cheri drew on the walls right after we moved into our new house. Mom made her try to scrub the marker off but as you can see, the wallpaper went with it. We were not very happy!












The finished paint job

Shaelyn's tying her shoes!

Well, I finally figured out a bit how to get this configured onto Blogger. This is a video I took of Shaelyn about 3 weeks ago, learning to tie her shoes. She had this figured out in about 15 minutes. We told her it was one of the requirements of going to Kindergarten. Pretty good for a 4 1/2 year old, huh?

Son Exposure Fun Night

Last night was Son Exposure at church again. It was fun night. They had carnival games and big blow ups to play on. Dave & Chelsea were in charge of the "knock down the cats" game. You would always win a prize no matter how you did. There was also toss the rings, knock down the milk cans, throw balls into containers and throw balls into open holes. She came home with quite a few toys as you can see. She got rings, balls, kites and candy. On the side were the humvee - which was like the moonwalk that you jump in. She loved the big dinosaur. There were 2 entrances, so the kids would race through the whole thing. It was kind of like an obstacle course with ropes and steps. You would end by coming down a slide.There was also a big rock climbing wall. She was in line to do it and when she had about 4 people in front of her, decided that she would rather do the dinosaur again. I couldn't talk her into waiting 5 more minutes so off to the dinosaur we went again. After 2 sno-cones and 2 bags of popcorn, we decided to call it a night. We would like to do more but it will have to wait until next August.

Painting job

Mari & I went to Dad's today to paint his and Ann's bedroom. We have been wanting to do this room over for many years. Now the time has finally come. It had been somewhat of a yellow color and Ann wanted it blue to match a quilt her granddaughter is making for the bed. It only took 1 coat to cover it. Hopefully, you can see the difference in the before and after pictures. There is one of Ann taking off the light switch covers. I was so busy painting that I forgot to get one of Mari working. We both worked extremely hard!! Then they told us to paint the closets too. So after a lunch of pizza, we finished the closets. It went really good. Next, they would like the living room painted so when we have a free day, we'll be heading over there to work on that room. This is really fun to do when you have somebody to do it with. I'm ready to go on to that living room.

How blonde is Katelyn?

Our family all knows how much fun it is to pick on Katelyn because she has blonde hair. I guess they know that about her at her work too. Yesterday, she was answering phones. Someone called and asked to speak to Mark. She thought his voice sounded familiar. She asked who was calling and he told her,"Bill Bennett" She had no clue that there actually was a real Bill Bennett. So she put him on hold and asked the other lady there if she knew a Bill Bennett. She told Katelyn to double check and make sure she had the name correct and then transfer him. Katelyn went back to the phone and asked again what his name was. He replied, Bill Bennett and Mark knows who I am. So she transferred the call to Mark and told him "Bill Bennett is on the line" He didn't recall who that was but took the call. A little later on Mark came to Katelyn's section of the office and told her that it was Jim who works in the office and was on the road who had called. Later on Jim got back to the office and came through smiling and introduced himself to her as Bill B. She seems to have a lot of these problems at work. Good thing she's got a sense of humor. It's good to know that they're keeping her in line at work while we do it at home.

Camping in Montague

We had a great time camping this weekend aside from some problems. We went with Chuck and Sue, a couple we went to China with. We wanted to leave on time to avoid congestion. We left on time but ran into construction. And then we went into Burger King for supper and they were slow. After we merged onto the highway there was a traffic jam because of an accident. So it took us about 2 hours to get there. There was a pool for swimming which was 10 feet deep so I tried teaching Shaelyn how to dive. She was willing to give it a try. I kind of helped her and she did it - right into the 10 ft. section. She was pretty proud of herself for that. Granted, some of them were sort of belly flops, but pretty good for a 4 year old. Chuck always cooks up a big breakfast for us. It was great except he grabbed the wrong meat from his refrigerator and cooked up hotdogs instead of sausage for his family. (you can see the big "sausages" on the grill) We laughed because Dave had brought our meat out and when I questioned what he took, he had taken our brats instead of our sausage too. At least I caught this before they were cooked. We went canoeing and kayaking on Saturday. I wasn't sure if I would be able to do this but it went great. Katelyn and I took a 2 person kayak and Dave, Chelsea and Shaelyn went in the canoe. I was going to take my camera but since we were there in the afternoon and it was hot, I thought we might be splashing a little too much to risk taking my camera. Now I wish I would have taken it, because I could have gotten some great pictures. We did a 1 hour trip. Shaelyn did great. She did ride in the kayak with us for a while too, as well as with Chuck and Sue. For never having done this before, Katelyn and I did great. We got beached on a few trees in the river but it was fun. Next time, we want to take a longer trip. I would highly recommend this for great fun.
Because we were camping in the middle of a state forest, there weren't many lights and the stars were very bright. It was beautiful to look at. We had a thunderstorm Saturday night, but we really needed the rain. At least we weren't packing up in the rain. We got home Sunday afternoon, tired, but having had fun. Now I'm not camping until mid-October. We've got to get used to school schedule again.

oh, the news!

For those of you who aren't family, I will let you know that something exciting happened last night. My dad got married. My mom died 4 years ago and dad was very self sufficient but we knew he was lonely. Dad met Ann because they both bowled on the same days. They have been "friends" for about 2 years but didn't tell us the truth (although we guessed it). Finally, in June, he proposed but they both have been very secretive and would not tell anyone when this would happen. I had a really good idea that it would be happening this weekend, due to a variety of questions that I had asked. They didn't want a big wedding so they went to dads church last night and had his minister marry them. My aunt and uncle were there as witnesses. Then they proceeded to call us all. We are very happy for them both, although we would really have loved to have been there to see it too. We are working on fixing up dads house. Meanwhile, they'll be living at Ann's house. We'll be going to dads on Wednesday to paint the bedroom. I'm sure we'll have pictures of the progress.
Today, my family is leaving for a weekend camping trip. We're going to try some canoeing on the river by the campground. It sounds like warm weather. I'll try to get some good pictures - hopefully not of being being flipped over in the canoe!!

Son Exposure

Our church has something called "Son Exposure" the first three Wednesday nights in August. It's our form of Bible school and outreach for the community. Last week, they had sports night. Dave helped out then with the moonwalk. Last night, we had arts and crafts night. We start with a supper of hotdogs and salads. Then we went to our craft table. The girls and Katelyn's friend, Erin helped me too. You can see how beautiful our table looked before all the kids came. We had to make a pinball machine craft. They had to color the background picture and we would help glue the rest of the parts together. We had 50 of these to make and they, apparently were popular because we ran out. There was also face painting, tattoos, sno-cones and popcorn. All the girls decided that they wanted tattoos too. Shaelyn also make a frog toy, bracelet, scratch art cross and a painted leaf. It was a beautiful night for it. I thought it was going to be hot but it went behind the clouds and we got a little breeze. Next week, we will be having carnival night. Lots of carnival games and big blow up slides. Anyone is welcome. Free supper and fun - Who could ask for more?

Tie-dye

Here's Shaelyn's new tie-dye shirt. She made this when we were camping. Every Friday at the campground, they have tie-dye Friday. All the staff wears tie-dye shirts and if you signed up earlier in the week, you go to the craft barn to make your own. Last time we were there, one of Shaelyn's friends was making one and she wanted to also. But since I didn't have a slot, we were out of luck. So I promised her that this time, we would plan on making one. We had a lot of fun. They showed us different ways of folding them to get the design you liked. She chose to do the bulls-eye design. You never know how they will turn out, but I think hers is pretty stinkin' cute!

terri-and-her-talk

Myspace Countdown Clocks at WishAFriend.com

It's baking day

As you can see, Shaelyn is feeling much better today. I think she had some sort of 24 hour bug. Last night she was already perking up and helping Dave outside. So today, we decided to do some baking. We made a chocolate cake with white frosting and Danish apple bars. These bars were one of my Mom's favorites when I was growing up. Mom made them a lot. I don't make them very often because you have to roll the dough and it takes forever. But because I had apples that needed to be used, I thought it would be a good choice for today with Shaelyn.