Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Memorial weekend in Colorado

Doug went on his annual guys kayaking trip this weekend, and so I took advantage of the 5 day weekend and went to CO with my parents to visit my brother, his wife, and little girl Molina.
commence endless cute photos
This little girl is saying words and recognizing people and making animal noises. So cute
We took a trip to the petting zoo
While we were in town Joel and Michelle had their gender reveal party for baby #2
Here's where I need to figure out how to embed a video, they shake the boxes and PINK streamers fall out! Another girl! I was right in my guessing.
I also wish I could embed videos cause I have such cute ones of Molina. I was showing her pictures of September on my phone and then every time she'd see my phone she'd point to it "meow! meow!". And her room is decorated in a Paris theme with pictures of the Eiffel Tower and she points at it and says "Eif-fa To-wa", so cute.
I missed Doug, and wished Elizabeth and Johnny were there too, but it was a nice relaxing and fun time together.

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Celebrate Your Marriage

This last weekend Doug and I went to the Celebrate Your Marriage conference on Mackinac Island. This was my graduation gift from my parents (you're welcome for sharing Doug!) The conference was actually Sunday/Monday, and even though I put in for the day off when I got hired, they scheduled me. Rrrr! I finally found someone to switch with me, she will be richly rewarded in fudge, but it was irritating.
We drove up Saturday and spent the evening in Mackinaw City. We walked around, got pizza, tried to eat by the lake (but were swarmed away by May flies). Our pizza was just as tasty on our hotel bed with HGTV in the background. I can't get enough of those shows! Then we ventured out again to see the sunset.
We had a jacuzzi tub in our hotel room and a radio in the wall, it was really nice! The next morning we got up and caught the ferry to Mackinac Island. We went on the Mighty Mac ferry which takes a brief detour under the Mackinac bridge, that was cool, I've been to Mackinac several times, but have never done that ferry trip.
Doug was excited to see this Delorean
I was excited for this Eskimo Kisses icecream
oh my gosh, brrrr, was it cold!
Once we got to the island we window shopped, and then got bikes to see the island. Doug hadn't been since he was a kid so it was fun to do that with him.
biking by the East bluff
Arch Rock
Pretty soon it was time to head up to the hotel for the conference. It was hosted by a couple, married for 30 years, and they shared stories, and talked about marriage using funny clips of songs in a he said/she said type feel. And another speaker, a pastor, who also talked about marriage topics such as sex, intimacy, honoring and enjoying marriage, prioritizing marriage, what to do when your marriage is stuck in the grind, and about a covenant marriage. It was really a good weekend. There were 3 main sessions and then a little free time, a 'date night'
(dressed up!)
where they had dancing, and in between were these fabulous Grand Hotel meals.
The first night was a 5 course meal. I usually don't like all that fanciness, but the staff was super accommodating and I was able to order my goat cheese crepe duck-less, and get the bacon sauce off my beef bourguignon. Breakfast and lunch were these amazing buffets, I think the only bad thing I had was some kind of rum ball, everything else was delicious.
I had never stayed overnight on the island before, and never been up to the Grand Hotel. The staff was amazing, but the decor was very 70s/80s. Ugly cheap checked tile floor, patterned plastic couch cushions, entire floors with walls painted kelly green or bright pink. Our room was very grandma-like, but also very cozy.
the ceiling wallpaper matched the inside of the duvet!
the view from our window
But it was a sunny, if a little nippy, weekend and we enjoyed sitting out on the porch
After lunch on Monday, we headed back on the ferry and drove back.
It was a great weekend and time to connect. The conference sparked many good conversations, and hopefully more to come, and they even challenged the couples to do child sponsorship with Compassion. Doug already was doing a little boy from Africa, and now we are so happy that a little Indian girl will be able to go to school and be free from prostitution and child labor, and have a chance to learn about Jesus.

Thursday, May 14, 2015

week in review

Last weekend Doug and I went up to my parent's for their spring choir concert. Afterwards they had friends over so we went for visiting and yummy snacks. While we were there we got 9-10 tubs out of my parent's attic that I have been storing there for 10 odd years.
Thanks to my hoarding tendencies and the generosity of the families I used to babysit for (they gave me their kids grown-out-of clothes for my 'future baby').... which obviously does not yet exist. So anyway, it was time to give mom and dad their attic back. On my day off I organized all the tubs to boys and girl's stuff and by ages. I pretty much have stuff until a girl is 7 years old, and a boy is 9. Geez!
Somehow a couple other things got into my bins. One was my old lovey. As soon as I pulled it out my dad goes "oh, it's Bun-Bun". Good memory dad!
And this baby book that I made for my dolls
What do I do with this stuff?!? It seems sad to throw it away, but also possibly explains the hoarding...
I also made a delicious rhubarb compote from rhubarb from mom's garden (Doug didn't like)
Quite delicious on vanilla icecream
This adventure cat has taken to hanging out on our neighbor's roof, I hope he's cool with that
I worked in the yard a little while today. Planted my new lilac bush and getting the blocks ready for sunflowers and snap peas. It is a beautiful day out but I just feel so overwhelmed looking at all the work.
Our grass is about a foot high and such a weed fest. 3 parts weeds to 1 part grass practically. The deck looks super white trash with that awful plastic furniture. Although Doug's mom picked up a patio table for us and we used the last of our Bed, Bath and Beyond wedding gift cards for some nice new chairs. We have to wait for a few days in a row of dry weather (and days off work for me) but we plan to paint the deck. It seems really involved with power washing, sanding, and then finally painting. After all that is done hopefully things will start looking a little better. I actually wish we had a little more sun on our deck and in the yard, but the trade off is we have a couple nice big mature trees. Win some, lose some I guess!