All we are is dust in the wind....



One week to go until the wedding!  And we've been quite busy.  And I've been neglecting posting...  woe is me... or woe is you?  hehe.  Anyway.

 

We've been to potluck- Cecily got to go to the farm and play.  Little miss and I picked beans at Di's and Lori's.  Well, I picked, she played with the boys and Grandpa and Cliff's bike.  She about threw a fit when we made her leave the trike... 

 

Michelle and Nathan's singing shower was last Friday.  It was fun, I guess.  I spent most of it upstairs keeping a little girl from destroying Paul and Jean's house. 

 

One day Cecily refused to fall asleep until she crashed about 5pm... sitting up on the couch with her sun glasses and tutu on.  Yeah.  Strange child.  

 Carol's church shower was Tuesday.  Fred was sick so she asked me to help her open gifts.  It was kind of awkward to be opening somebody else's presents, but it was better than writing them down...  plus I love opening presents. 

So I've been waiting and waiting for carpet to go on sale at Menards and this week it hit 49 cents. Sooooo.....  I had to hurry up and get the walls painted because painting with new carpet is no fun.  And painting with a toddler is no fun.  I got the upper part done with her awake, but I waited to paint the bottom while she was sleeping.  Two nights of painting after 10pm- one night until 1am- and I finished just in time for the carpet installer on Thursday. I was a little tired and sore.

I like it.  Bob say it feels like being on an ocean liner.  I'm not sure what to think of that. The top is called Sidewalk gray, and the bottom is called Smokestack gray although it's way more blue than gray.  And the carpet is gray.  I'm a little worried it will be harder to see spiders on dark carpet... Still a few more things to finish up- hide the pipe, the ceiling, the list is never ending.

Anyway, after the carpet guy came I had to hurry up and get ready for company Thursday night.  We had Grandpa and Grandma Beutel, Grandpa and Grandma Wyss, and Pearl and Andy for supper.  I made pork loin and forgot to check it until it was dry and needed lots of BBQ sauce.  *sigh*  O well, I think they still love me.  It was a good night and little miss had a great time being the center of attention.  She even tried to leave with them...

Friday morning I picked up my bridesmaid dress and Shelly's dress and then we went to the farm to do sweet corn.  We had to try on our dresses again and Cecily wanted a pretty dress too, so Mom got some down from the attic that were hers when she was little.  She refused to take it off so she wore it home.  Silly girl. 

 We made her put her shorts on to play outside in it.  The ribbon was for "Gussy."



 

Today was the Threshing Day at Uncle Vernon's.  Bob helped direct traffic and he wanted Cecily and I to come along.  We spent most of our time petting the animals.

 She wore her John Deere shirt.

 She also climbed on lots of tractors. 

We spent a lot of time outside today even though it's almost cold!  Hopefully it's this nice next weekend! 

Blessings.

Tradition, Tradition!

... please tell me that I'm not the only one who wants to dance around like Tevya when I hear that song, or even just that word repeated....   or am I just weird?

I finished up the week with two showers and testimonies.  Yeah.  Fun times.

Thursday night was the Wyss family shower at Jean's.  Little miss got to come with me and she was pretty good.  The most amusing part of the evening was when I was telling Nathan and Shelly about how when Bob brings change home he gives Cecily a "cut" to put in her piggy bank.  And now sometimes she demands her cut when he walks in the door.  "Want cut?"  So Shelly got out her change and Little miss dove right in for her cut.  *sigh*

On Friday Bob was home sick and I had Sarah's shower in Champaign to go to so Cecily got dropped off at Rustin and Sharon's.  They took her out to Bob's parent's for the evening and she had lots of fun without us.  I had fun too.  We were all supposed to dress up... I was very unoriginal and went for the lab coat and goggles.  Amber had lots of good food and fun games and it was really good to see those girls again.  I got home kind of late, of course. 

So when I was growing up we'd sometimes go to Glen Oak Park on Sunday evenings and listen to the free band concerts at the amphitheater.  I think G and G used to take their kids too, so taking Cecily makes it a four generation tradition.  Bob was still sick (he's finally on an antibiotic- thanks Uncle Randy!) so I  got my parents to come with me.  We had a picnic and then we let little miss play.  She was not in a super great mood.  Warm Sunday evenings are just not her thing, apparently, probably because they come after long days in church.  I think she spent more time whining about and trying to get other people's shoes than playing. 

 
I remember this playground as being the coolest thing ever.  I think she liked it, even though she couldn't wear the silver sandals...

Then we headed down to listen to the band.  She did pretty good overall.  Minus trying to steal toys from the baby in front of us.  And putting the bug spray in her mouth.  And tripping in the grass. And trying to go dance with the Civil War dance society.  And drinking so much water to get the bug spray out of her mouth that her diaper leaked.  *sigh*  It's a good thing it's a very informal event.    

Grandpa even bought her ice cream.   I did end up taking her home  half an hour before the concert was over because I wasn't sure how much longer she would last without a complete meltdown.  She fell asleep in the car... poor hot, tired, girly.

In spite of all that, I really, really enjoyed myself.  They played some fun music (that I recognized!), the period style dancing was cool, and it was just a lovely night to be at the park. 

Oh, and randomly, I have decided that I like the red cellar doors.  Anybody who can guess what the name of the color is gets... I dunno... 5 points?  They're so pretty and shiny though that it's making it obvious that our other doors need a fresh coat of paint.  *sigh*  I'm not fond of painting outside- everything ends up with bugs in the paint and other things stuck in it.

Blessings.

Red, White, and Blue

So this is carbon fiber reinforcing.  Lovely, isn't it.  *grin*  Actually, knowing that there's a 75 year warranty on this stuff and if the wall moves they have to come fix it for free is rather lovely.  And it's paintable and doesn't take up near the space as I beams.  

And this is my red cellar door.  I think it's growing on me, it doesn't seem quite as red when we're outside now.  However, that may be me just getting used to it.  What do all my wonderful readers think?  Too red?  Paint it back to a grayish?

 

You can see part of the door as it was last fall in the far right corner of this picture.... and wow, the grass and flower beds look much better this year!  Hooray for rain!!

 

There's this rock that we inherited with the house.  It used to sit in the grass right at the end of our driveway.  It was a pain to mow around.  It looked really odd just sitting there by itself by the electric pole.  So it's been on the to-do list to move it up to the landscaping for, oh, about a year now.  It got bumped to the top of the list when a certain sister of mine who will remain nameless brought her bumper down on it on a dark and stormy night.

 

It's a very heavy rock.  I missed the process of getting it into the wheel barrow.  I'm told it took three shovels, a piece of old counter top (also inherited), and lots of levering to get it in there.  I'm kind of glad I wasn't watching- I would have been very nervous. 

 

I think being married to an engineer is fantastic.  I mean, is this not an ingenious way to move a rock that is too heavy for one person to push up a slope or what?  A little redneck, but hey, it worked like a charm.  Bob lifted the wheel barrow and I very slowly pulled it forward with the mower.      

 

The peanut gallery wasn't all that impressed.

 Here it is about to be unceremoniously dumped into it's new home... so much nicer.

 Smartest thing I've done all summer:  planted a packet of wildflower seeds for Little Miss to pick.  She wants to pick every.single.flower.that.she.sees.  This is her flower patch and she can "I pickit" to her hearts content.  She filled that watering can the other day with buds.



 We didn't do much on the Fourth except go to Ron and Kary's to watch fireworks.  Somebody loved the schwide.

And the little car.

Too bad we don't like Fords.  hehe.

She didn't mind the fireworks, but she was more interested in going down the slide so she didn't really watch them much.  Bob kept an eye on her so I got to watch all the 'Purdy flowees.'

Shelly's personal shower was the next evening at Wendi-with-an-i's house.  I slaved away all day on food...  haha.  Or something, hooray for Kroger wraps and Jimmy John's!  Ellie made green tea ice cream which was different, not sure if I liked it or not. 

 So yeah, it was a good night.  Personal showers are just kind of weird by their very nature but it was good to see Shelly's friends again.  And Kacie.  Oh, Kacie. 

Otherwise, we've been laying low around here.  Cecily's been coughing and has a runny nose and Bob's got what she has plus a large dose of allergies.  I could go to five different showers this week (for four different people) but I'm only going to two.  I have my limits.  hehe. 

Blessings.

Summer time, and the Living is Easy...



Randomly, my two favorite houses in town are for sale, here and here. *sigh*  Oooo, and you could be my neighbor! 

I think I might become a kitchen aid attachment junkie.  We just got the ice cream maker attachment and it. is. awesome.  No ice, no salt, no mess, no randomly engineered contraptions to make it run and it makes the best homemade ice cream I've ever tasted.  So smooth and creamy!

I just finally got the turtle pool out for Cecily...  yes, I know these are for sandboxes, but really, they make much better pools. (Built in cover!) It's not nearly deep enough for decent digging, but it is just deep enough for splashing.  In her clothes.  In freezing water.  On a cool evening.  Crazy girl.

 

 

Yeah.  She was not happy when I made her get out, but she was shivering so much! 

 

 

Tuesday evening it was our turn to host date night/babysitting for potluck.  It was quite the night.  Bob and Rustin worked late so Sharon and I watched seven girls by ourselves for a while...  two who missed their mommy very much.  We probably had at least three girls crying at any given point for the first hour. 

 

Thankfully (fortuitously?), their grandma thought she was supposed to be babysitting them that night so they were very happy to leave the craziness.  hehe.  Sharon and I breathed a sigh of relief.

 

I sent them all outside.  They played in the sandbox, did a nature scavenger hunt,   

played in the clothesline tent, ran around and acted silly, and were actually pretty good with minimal fighting.

 I'd call it a success. 

 

This morning we had to get up early (for us-haha) because the guy came and fixed the basement wall.  I need to remember to take some pictures to document the process... for posterity. Poor Cecily was rudely awakened by a very loud grinder right under her room...  but, then she took a super long nap so I painted the cellar door.  Definitely need pictures of that.  It's red.  Very red.  Not sure how I feel about it yet. 

 

Blessings.