Aaron/Amy/Leo/Ruby and Leroy

Here are some pictures from our short trip to Madison last week.  Leo is picking Mulberries from their back yard tree as is Leroy (big black dog!) and then Leo is all smiles before he ate his frog cookie.
Summer is here and also brother Dave is 67 young today--happy birthday and I will give you a call sometime today.
We have now had two meals of lettuce from our garden as well as a small zucchini that was very good.  We have lost half of our tomato plants but still have 6 so later we should be able to enjoy them.  The flowers that Cynthia planted for me are really beautiful in front as they weathered the winter very well.
Joe H got 2 windows in yesterday and is here today working on the west and maybe the north bedroom ones.  They really really look nice.  Pictures will come and you can see if you can tell the old and the new!
Men's group will be here tonight so Terry is making brownies and will put a dab of ice cream on top but not sure the men will like that............  Got a note from John L and they will arrive in time for lunch Saturday so that should be fun. 
I am not sure what I should do but for everything I get done there is 2 things added to the list.  The last I saw the list was on the fridge and the end of it was out the back door-yikes
It looks like a wonderful weather day again.  I have been to Seven Corners Hardware at 7 this morning to get some things and now it is a bit to eat and then out on the garage roof to get some more of that trim finished.  Would be nice to get the gutters back up in case we get rain later this week.  We have been so busy I have decided to postpone our Lee reunion until next year-----wait I had better run that past Joan, Helen and Dave and John and Glorine. :)
Got to go as I have things to do and work is waiting

A new week

This past week of course flew by.  We were gone 2 days but still managed to get some things done.  We now have only about 2 hours left and ALL of the painting will be finished.  I still have some trim to replace but some of that has been done.  I want to do some work with the door as when it comes down it is not straight where the top of the door meets the door frame and I want to do some chalking but the majority is finished.  We also got a some work done in the house and the lawn was mowed twice this week.  Also got weed and feed on the lawn before the rains came. 
We traveled to Madison Friday morning and had lunch with Aaron at his work.  He took us on a tour of his bike place which was very interesting. We then got to take care of Leo and Ruby while Aaron went back to work for a short time and A/A went out on a short date and we again had the kids.  Our plan was to get up, go on a bike ride and head home but------  I had a shingles shot on Thursday and a reaction started in Friday afternoon.  By the time 9 PM came I was out and ready for bed.  As Terry tried to look at her e-mail on the computer in the room next to where we slept she could hear my teeth chattering so she piled on several blankets and finally I was able to go to sleep.  In the morning I knew I would be no good on a bike ride so we went out for breakfast, put the bikes on the car and headed home.  Aaron did major things to the other red bike and it looks great.  Will it help Terry with her neck problem we do not know but we will give it a try.  (As I write this I am sipping a homemade brew from Aaron and it is very good.  Any way it is good to get the bike changed like Aaron did the other one over a year ago.
John/Mary and kids will stop for a short time this Saturday.  They will be on their way to the west coast and then the Black Hills for the reunion after that.
The Lee family reunion is less than 4 weeks away.  In fact in 4 weeks it will be history.  It will be so fun to see people, spend time with them and I am sure remember past family events.  I think I am correct when I say that yesterday would have been mother and dad's 76 anniversary.  Each of them would have turned 100 this year in October.
Terry and I have several things we would like to complete this week so will see what gets done.  It actually is lining up as fairly busy with meetings, dinner with John K on Wednesday and company on Saturday but we all like to be kept busy so life is good.
Brother Dave turns 67 this Wednesday.  An early happy birthday Dave. 
I think it is going to be an early bed tonight but need to ice that darn shot place on my arm as that helps a bit.  I could complain about the effect of the shot but if it prevents shingles these little side things now are nothing.

Rain Rain Rain

Oh my the rain comes and comes and comes.  In the last few days we have gotten 3-4 inches, mostly a half inch or more at a time.  The forecast is for dry weather starting tomorrow and then sunny and warm next week.  Bring it on!!
I can not believe that it has been a week since I wrote.
 Progress??-- I think so.  I finished one more corner of the garage where the boards have many sides and many angles.  Terry has done more deep cleaning in the house, a contractor put two new windows in the west basement wall and the last of the scrapping and washing down of the garage is finished.  With the warm dry weather coming the last of the priming and painting of the garage should happen Monday and Tuesday.  I then have some trim to replace.  Some of it is behind the gutters and am not sure what I will do.  I really do not want to take the gutters down but will see.  Also need to do something with the large garage door as when it shuts it is not straight on the top.  All in due time I guess.
We will be on the road kind of early tomorrow as we are traveling to Madison for an over night.  We will have lunch with Aaron at noon, have Leo and Ruby to ourselves as they will get them from day care early and then A/A will have a date night and agaiin we will have the kids to ourselves.  Will have to see if little Ruby still has that frown that I have never seen in a little girl.  It is so so cute as she has this look and then a smile and who knows what is going through her mind. 
When the rain stops I will have to try and get the lawn mowed before we go but not sure that will happen.  I have managed to keep it cut and now have most of the weeds out of it so it looks kind of nice.  This fall we will need to reseed some of it as the front is thin.  I really like to work on the lawn and it would be fun to some time in the near future have a lawn weedfree and looking really nice.  There is something about a nice green lawn, a weedfree garden that is fun.
No, I may actually go back to bed to see if I can get some more shuteye.

Before and after

Can you guess which is before the painting and which one is after??  The east side of the garage is completely finished.  That means one side down and 9 to go!!!  Who has a garage with 10 sides besides us?  It was so nice today to finally finish one side and say amen, it is finished.  It seems there are so many steps to getting it done that each step seems to be followed by another one.  Again God blessed us with a perfect painting day so it was good.  I think I have all the material we need and the cost has come to $302.  I was complaining about that to myself and then I figured what would it have cost us to hire it done and I think if I would have bid the garage it would have been in the range of $4000-$5000 so I will not complain about the $300+.
Most of what has been happening around here is work work work.  Yesterday we spent about 8-10 person hours sorting papers, labeling files, filing things and getting some sort of paper order.  I had piles and piles of papers that needed to be gone through so it was nice to get it done.  Our goal is now to get the mail, sort, recycle, file and deal with things that need to be dealt with.  Can we do it??--time will tell but I say yes. 
It looks like at least one more good day of painting before some rain so will see how much more we can get finished tomorrow.

A day of rest??

As I sit blogging this morning I am thinking it may be a day to shuffle papers, get more prayer time in, drink that extra cup of french press coffee or maybe even read a book with the idea one may doze off.  With hat on and PJ's still in tack I made the short trip to the fancy rain gauge and saw that over night 1+ inches of rain fell.  The lawns were dry and the veggies and flowers were screaming for real water so it is good.  For our garage project of course it is not good but another day delay is not the end of the world.  All the garage is now washed with bleach and TSP, most of it is scrapped/sanded and washed down and about 60 % is primed.  So we have made great progress.  I am thinking that it may take another 40 hours to complete the work.  When that gets done there will be maybe 10-15 hours on my part alone to do the rest of the fixing of some trim.  After that is finished it will be onto the storms and screens to get them painted and maybe some fixed too.  When the new inserts upstairs are completed that will mean 6 large screens and 6 large storms will no longer be needed.  That is good.  On another note I was priming the windows yesterday as Terry was priming the siding and I thought God was creating more windows as I went.  Finally I stopped and counted the garage windows and there are 14.  Who in their right mind has a garage with 14 windows???  AND these are not tiny windows but are ones about 40" X 35" with tiny grilles so that each window has either 6 or 9 pains, I mean panes!  Terry came up with the idea to put screens on the garage windows (even if they do not open) and then paint the screens green so the garage would then fit in with the house.  We will see if that gets done this summer
We took in a limited number of graduation parties last weekend and have one coming up this Saturday and that will conclude graduation 2011.  There were several we could not get to but that is always the case. 
The 3 month calendar for People of Praise Servant Branch came yesterday and as I looked it over I noticed the Servant Camp meetings on it.  Wow--had not thought much about that aspect of camp all summer.  I am missing (to some degree) camp activities this summer but it is so right and so good to have stepped away to allow others to plan, make decisions, make changes and move ahead with God's work.  To have been involved like I was for 30+ years was so good, so fun and so rich but to have stepped aside is so right and so RELAXING.
Our Lee Family Reunion is coming up fast.  Not much more than a month away now.  It will be fun to spend a couple of days catching up on family and enjoying family stories of the past.  There will be some there I have never seen and that will be fun.
No, the rain has stopped for the time, the shades are now up on the house and it is time for Wallace's breakfast, time for a snack and maybe a book or paper filing for a while.  That nap may come later this afternoon.
By the way the picture is of Faustina and Aunt Kim at Faustina's birthday party last month.  Faustina seems to really enjoy her Auntie.

It's a BIG deal

When it happened yesterday it was a BIG deal for me.  As I sat and thought about why it was so important I decided that it is good for a person to have plans, have dreams, maybe even have them waylaided for some time because when they do come true it is so much fun and so exciting.  Well to most people it may seem like a little thing but to me it was big.  Several years ago when I brought 200 amp service into the garage.  I decided to put it underground and then run 100 amp service from there into the house so I could eliminate the overhead line into the house.  Well the garage service has been in for some time now but the house service just got in about a month ago.  Then it took a phone call to Xcel energy to come drop the line.  I called yesterday morning and about 6:00 PM a truck pulled up and the line was gone in about 25 minutes.  It is now so nice with no line hanging over head when one is on the deck.  BIG DAY!!!!
Yesterday was also a big day for our friend Jerry W.  Susan called about 11:15 and said they would be home in about 15 minutes as she had asked if Terry and I could be there when Jerry arrived home after spending the last 7+ weeks in the hospital/rehab.  His 9 broken bones are healing but he will have to be on pain meds for some time yet but it was a wonderful thing to see him home.  We helped Susan and David get Jerry into the house, toasted God's goodness with a small glass of wine and then headed home.  Thank you Lord for your love and protection.
Yesterday we finished scrubbing the garage and I was able to get 2 front small corners off that need to be replaced.  Now it is sanding, making some new trim boards and then on to priming and painting.  The corners that I took off are just amazing.  One board with 5 sides to it has 5 different angles on the edges and to top it off the 2X4 it is attached to is angled as well.  I need to take some pictures as you do not see that kind of construction today.  It will be a challenge and fun to make new boards.  With patience and elbow work I was able to get the 4 different boards off in one piece so I can use them as a template for the new ones.   Without that I may have wasted many boards and with them I still may waste some!!
On Monday the official temp was 103 and today, three days later, it is supposed to be a high of 59.  Only in the Midwest can one experience that.
I think it is time for some work.

A Green Day

Just a quick one.  A green day today.  Yesterday Terry and I went to Saturday church so today we could take in the Grand Old days parade.  We biked to the parade and back again after spending $10 on very good food.  Of course we caught some candy during the parade.  Then this afternoon we biked to a grad party so the cars sat in the driveway all day and did not even complain.  So it was in deed a green day for fuel!!
Time to close the day out after watching house hunting on TV and a Rieu concert on public TV.  On to another week of hopefully getting more things done.

Missing

I am missing seeing the sun set since we arrived in St. Paul 6 weeks ago.  It just is not easy to get some place to see it.
A little more work done on the garage today.  There is much mildue on it so a very good washing with TSP and bleach is in the process now.  More than half is washed.  It will then be to scrape, wash down, prime and paint and I must not forget there is at least 2+ days of repairing wood etc.
I have had John Krause on my mind a lot today.  Having said final good-byes to Jeanette yesterday I know that there is much company, family and friends still around but will call him early next week as I know that after people get back to their normal lives reality sets in.
Our friend Jerry Wind is scheduled to go home next Wednesday.  I think it will be 7 and 1/2 weeks in the hospital and rehab--wow.  We pray daily that those 9 broken bones will heal in a good way.  They are in the process of making some changes in their house as it will be difficult at home for a while.
Our little garden certainly came up quickly so we will see how it grows now.  We made labels out of old wood and then put the laminated package fronts on the stakes---looks cute.
Terry and I will take in some of "Grand Old Days" on Grand Ave tomorrow.  She loves parades so will get there in time for that.  Should be fun.
I think it is time to call it a night.

What is it???

For Joan, Dave and anyone else what is this?  The answer at the end of my note today.
The week flew past in a blur.  No rain, not much heat, a lot of wind, much work done and then the sad part- we said good-bye to the dad of one of Travis' good friends (he was 71) and today we will say good-bye to a very good friend Jeanette Krause(she was 64).  A year ago today John and Jeanette stopped by to talk to me and let me know that her cancer had indeed returned and it looked like a tough road ahead.  It was their 43rd anniversary that day and now one year later on what would have been their 44th anniversary we will say one final thanks and good-bye.  As I have said so many many times life never remains the same and it always moves on in spite of births, deaths and anything else that may happen.  John Krause has devoted so much time, love and energy to serving and loving his Jeanette and now he too will move on to who knows what.  I know that he loves our God so much and in that will be some comfort and peace but the walk that he embarks on today will have many times of loneliness, saddness and "what if" times.  John is just a gem of a guy and he will do OK but prayers for him will greatly help him cope and live on with a new focus and purpose.
Terry and I did get a lot done this week.  We can now see several little veggies up in the garden, some of the garage got washed and is ready for priming, the window wells in the deck got covered with custom cedar grates and the on going order and cleaning continued.  We ordered a portable air conditioner that should arrive today and that will go in the sun room and hopefully help in the putting air c in and out of windows.   We are also in the process of getting a bid for some window work and that may happen soon.  I am at a place where I do not enjoy climbing up and down the ladder with storm windows in hand.  It would be great to replace the sash in 6 windows on the second floor so no storms are needed and washing can take place from inside the house. 
Lastly the answer to the picture.  It is the small room at WoodLake school that we would serve lunch out of when we went to country school.  I think the last lunch was served in 1956!!  I still remember the government canned peachs and cheese :(
Enough as I need to shave and get ready to say good-bye to Jeanette and honor her life by sharing with her family and friends how special and loving she was to me and 100's of people.