Weekend Plans

Looking forward to starting my long weekend. Anyone else adding a day to their weekend? I have lots of projects going and hope to get a few of them finished this weekend. The New Year has me starting a lot of new things :) Also plan on fitting in a lot of WII Fit. We got it for Christmas and are having a ball with it.

Check back next week and see what I've been up to.

Weekend Update

You know how I've had a quest lately to get a cute photo of the two girls together. Well, I got a few this weekend. This first one looks like they're both looking for direction. "Where do you want us to look?"

I thought this was really sweet with Peanut kissing lil Muffin. She was kissing her a lot, but it's just really hard to capture it on film.

Muffin is changing so much. Just in the one week between visits I was amazed at how much more animated she's gotten. Adorable.

Peanut was running around giving everyone kisses and hugs. This is her with her Mom.

Then we had the girls gang up on Papa. He was entertaining Muffin for quite a while. Peanut was off in a minute to explore more new toys.

So that's it for pictures. Saturday I spent the morning with my Mom and took her out to lunch after a test she had to have. Then in the afternoon went to my Son and DIL's for my birthday celebration. Sunday we did a lot of running then took a nice bike ride on one of those rails to trails. It was the perfect day. Did a little yard work when we got home and laundry. Weekends don't get much better than that. Hope you have a great week.

Weekend With My Girls!

I had another great weekend with my girls. They are growing up so much!! On Friday night we went to my son and dil to watch little Muffin while they went out. She is such a good baby. At 3 1/2 months old she's very focused on objects around her and loves when you hold her standing. Can you say "Big Blue Eyes?" lol



She liked sitting in her little play chair too.



I'm not sure what they're going to do when Muffin needs her highchair lol. Actually, this is Oliver and he pretty much goes with the flow and I'm sure he'll just move over lol.


When the kids got home we stayed and visited for a while then had a nice drive home on a beautiful summer night. We laugh because now that we're older we don't usually get to enjoy late nights lol If you're over 40 you understand what I'm saying... Wow, 11:00 and we're still up!

Saturday we drove around so MM could drool over Corvettes. Found a couple of interesting ones, but not the one he's looking for whew!! Another bullet dodged. In the evening my daughter and sil came over for a bbq and campfire. Little Peanut loves running around the backyard. She's always in motion lol



She didn't have much of an appetite, but when it came to the s'more she had no problem. She sat and ate that thing til it was gone! Little marshmallow in her hair and lots of goo on her face. She enjoyed that baby!


Sunday we rested up and watered the gardens. Started reading another book too. It was a great weekend all in all. You just can't beat spending time with the grandbabies.

25th Annual Howell Michigan Challenge Balloonfest!

The Balloonfest had a GREAT year this year with over 100,000 attendees. We went on Friday night and had a terrific display. In addition to the balloon launches they had a medivial festival, a car show, lots of crafts (wish I'd have bought that birdhouse), a carnival and lots of people watching. Saturday was another perfect day with lots of fun. The wind brought in Sunday so there was no launch, but everything else was very exciting.

I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves. There were lots of colorful balloons and lots of different distinct motifs. This first one had a definite Halloween theme.


This one had a beautiful American Flag on one side and the other side said USA.


This carousel balloon has been here in years past. Love it.


Here's the local radio station in all it's glory.


This one has lots of fishies and scuba divers... cute.


The Boynton Character one is quite comical.


The Cherry Bomb needs no explanation.


There were literally balloons popping up everywhere!


Doesn't the Phoenix look majestic?


Had to get this one with a penguin for my daughter.


Saturday we stayed home and had a bbq with the family. Peanut came over early so I had lots of one on one time with her before Muffin arrived. Got a great shot of Muffin with Auntie. Is that not adorable?


Later in the evening my daughter was trying out these portable chairs she was going to borrow. Doesn't Peanut look like this chair was made just for her? She loved it!


Sunday arrived and MM put up some hammock chairs on the front porch and we spent the rest of the weekend chillin. It doesn't get much better than that. Gotta love the weekends.

Relaxing Weekend

We had a great 'quiet' weekend camping at the Rifle River campground. Usually we have to take the one and only site left if we want to camp on the river, but this weekend we had our pick. I think it was because school is still in session and everyone is waiting for school to let out and go for longer than a weekend. Whatever the reason, we loved it. This campground has two levels the upper is much larger and had only 8 campers - the lower we like better because you can get right on the river(if you're lucky) and there were only 4 campers there (including us).


Is this not the most peaceful setting?

There were a few canoers on the river Saturday, but it was a little cool. There was also a storm later in the afternoon. Sunday there were a few too, but really quiet still.

There were 3 other campers on this level, but none were beyond us. Can you say quiet? You can see how crowded it usually is if you look at all the picnic tables. They really pack them in on a hot summer day.

Weekend With My Girls!

We had a real fun weekend with our granddaughters. Peanut was dropped off on Friday and she was the joy that she always is. We made stepping stones using her feet impressions and wooden letters to spell out her name. She wasn't real fond of this, but we did it and got it over with. She really liked putting in the colorful jewels after her feet were cleaned up. We now have a stepping stone of each of the girls because we did Muffins on Mother's Day. Note to self... get a picture of stepping stones.

Saturday we played around the house in the morning (I did go out and spread some mulch) til it was time to go to Muffin's house. I was really on a mission to get pictures of the girls together, but two little ones.... need I say more.







I still need to do some cropping and stuff, but I think I got lots of good material. They are just so precious. Muffin continues to grow and smile and coo. I love to just hold a sleeping baby. Peanut is proving to be a beautiful well adjusted little girl. She didn't misbehave all weekend. I can definitely say though that God gives little children to young parents for a reason. When they start running around it can really wear you out. No worries though, a little rest and I'll be ready for more.

I Get Both Girls for the Weekend!

Can't wait for the weekend to start. Lil Peanut is already at the house with MM and she's staying with us til Sunday. Saturday we're going to Muffin's house to watch her too and then take Peanut home on Sunday. I love these girls!! I know my daughter is a little anxious to leave Peanut for the first time for a weekend, but I'm confident that she'll be fine. If all else fails and we can't get her to sleep I'll do what they do - take her for a car ride lol. But really, I've gotten her to sleep at her house and I'm sure this will be no different. I have to get all the girl time in that I can because I know MM is chomping at the bit to go camping and I won't be able to see them as much as I want. Hopefully I'll have some cute pictures after the weekend. Check back next week. Oh yeah, wish me luck lol. No I don't need it, but it never hurt.

Weekend Plans?

Have any weekend plans? I've got a Clairol party at my daughters tomorrow. Not sure what we do, but I always have fun with her and her friends. On Sunday we've planned our first cookout. All the family is coming out and it looks like the weather just might cooperate. NOT like last weekend. Hopefully I'll be able to get a little yard work in too. MM has been doing sooooo much and I feel bad because he doesn't like to do it and I do. Why? He's retired and I work full time. I'll let you know next week what actually gets done. Have a great one!

Weekend update

We wanted to get our last camping weekend in in order to winterize our camper. The weatherman was predicting rain all weekend - Not Again!! Leaving work on Friday - you guessed it - already drizzling. We were only going to a local park about an hours away so at least the travel time wasn't extensive. There was one backup of a spun out car that lasted about 20 minutes and then we were on our way again. Once there things were pretty quick since we didn't tow the car. MM comes in and starts to take off his jacket and I start to fix dinner - what no electricity? Back out he goes. He was ready to throw in the towel and head home because this power surger box that we have had a short in it and we couldn't keep the power on. Just one more try and 'yes' it's on - don't anybody breathe. Oh yeah, the park had already turned off the water - good thing we had a full tank.

It was nice sleeping Friday night because it kept sprinkling on and off and I love to hear it on the roof. Saturday morning things were sunny and bright. Okay, it was still a bit on the cool side. We built a fire and kept it going all day. There was a kid across the road from us that was in shorts and shortsleeve shirt wearing flip flops and I kept thinking 'is it just me?'. Checking the thermometer it was around 47 -48 all day. Not shorts weather, but boy was it beautiful. Seeing and listening to the leaves blowing around and watching the trees try to hang onto their remaining leaves. A perfect fall day.

Sunday we woke to - you guessed it - rain again. We kind of took our time getting going and it paid off. MM was able to rinse out and empty all of our holding tanks and the winterizing had begun. We were able to get home before the strong winds started (thank God, cause that is not fun). Anyway, what started out as a weekend that I was not looking forward to turned out quite nicely.

Do you plan your weekends exclusively around what the weatherman predicts?

Cropping Weekend

I joined my daughter in a Scrapbooking Retreat this weekend and we had a ball. We made a lot of new friends, had some fun and even managed to get a few pages finished. It was funny that we both got about 3 months cropped. Mine was, of course, the Alaskan vacation this summer; hers was the first three months of Maggie. I had such big plans and took all the pictures that I have to crop – yeah, that didn’t happen, but I’m thrilled to have gotten at least one whole event done.

The days were filled with cropping, classes, happy hour, contests, manicures, pedicures, massages and of course lots of eating and snacking. Don’t know about the other ladies, but I didn’t participate in the manicures, pedicures or massages, just didn’t want to take the time. On Friday night we were given a pack of seasonal papers to crop and submit the next day for a contest. Being ‘Fall’ I had the perfect pictures of Peanut the previous year that I hadn’t cropped yet. On Saturday they were judged by judges and then by our peers. The judges had a lot of categories and my page won “Proudest Moment”. Before that was announced we judged each other’s pages for the “Peoples Choice Award”. There was a tie and we had to vote a second time on the two that tied. Yeah me!! My page won the “Peoples Choice Award”!! Personally I don’t think it was even a contest lol. Peanut is just so precious.

I never thought it would be so exhausting. We stayed up late each night (til about 1:30ish) and got up early (didn’t want to waste any time) so we only got about 5 hours of sleep each night. After checking out we went back to see Peanut and play for a while. Driving home I had a hard time staying awake. Today it’s back to work and all I can think about is going home and sleeping, like that’s going to happen. When I left the Embassy Suites I was all hyped up to go home and keep working, but we all know about the best plans. Life is just so busy and I enjoy every minute of it, but I have a lot of interests and it’s hard to fit everything in. Hopefully over the next few days I’ll be able to put some order to all my scrapbooking supplies (that I just quickly packed up) and maybe continue on a regular basis.

Does anybody have any solutions on how to stay up to date on scrapbooking? I could use all the suggestions I can get.

Weekend

What a great weekend. Got a lot done and had lots of time for fun too. Went to a Chocolate Party on Saturday morning at my sisters. Can't go wrong there, lots of relaxing and 'chocolate'. Nice meeting my sisters neighbors too.

My daughter came back to the house with me and we set up the sewing machine. She's making a bag for one of her blog friends. Her hubby came around with Peanut and we had a great time playing. Sis came over for dinner later and we all shared a big pot of chili then went out back for a campfire. Beautiful night.

Sunday was another beautiful day. Got up early for church and then dove right in on the housework I wanted to get done. It took all day, but the whole upper level is now out of chaos. You know I feel good! Got the laundry done simultaneously, and even took a few breaks to sit outside. Kind of like scoring a home run.

The bonus part of the weekend was having Monday off too, and all three days were beautiful. Monday was filled with trying to organize my photos for a three day crop this coming weekend. I made such a big mess and it's gonna take a lot of organizing. Good thing I can leave it out and keep working on it (it's not really in our 'living' space). Sometimes I wonder why I started scrapbooking. It puts so much pressure on me. Now that I've had a blog for the Alaskan vacation I think that is definitely the way to go. You blog whenever you get time and add pictures as often as you want and when you get home the vacation is all blogged. What can be better than that?! Anyway, it'll be a great weekend away and we'll have a blast. Hope I get some cropping done. Wish all my weekends could be as productive and fun.

Who Said The Economy Was Bad?

You’d never believe it if you were traveling in the state of Michigan this weekend. The roads were thick with traffic. Between the hunting traffic (it’s small game and bow season) and people looking for some Michigan ‘color’ there were lots of cars.

We went to Mackinaw Island this weekend with our daughter, sil and peanut. It is so much more fun with a little one around. We got an early start on Friday and it took us about 5 hours of driving to get to a campground. We pulled into Mill Creek Campground around 10:00 p.m. and the kids got there around 12:30. Exhausting! Saturday we got a slow start since we were up late (at least late for us) the night before.

SIL is used to taking the Shepler Ferry across so that’s what we did. I always end up taking a photo on the boat when everyone is still fresh.


Once on the island we rented bikes and a ‘burley carrier’ for peanut. The rental place said she didn’t need a helmet, but the kids had already bought one for her so we thought we’d give it a try.

She kept it on for about 2 seconds. She was ready for a nap anyway and that’s how she spent most of our trip around the island. Personally, I love the bike ride around the island. It is an easy ride and this late in the season it wasn’t too crowded. We were just getting back into town when it started sprinkling. We almost made it, but we didn’t get too wet. The kids were behind us and they had a little bike mishap with the chain coming off so they got a little wetter fixing that.

Once we returned in the bikes we went to the old time photo place and the kids got a family photo. Peanut looked so cute, but they wouldn’t let me take any pictures since it is a studio. After that we had lunch and did the usual touristy stuff including buying lots of their famous fudge. At the Lilac Tree store they had this little cutout for a photo op.

On the boat ride back we were all a little tired. The rest of the evening was filled with dinner and a campfire. Nice evening.

Peanut was happy and playing outside the next day. Don’t you love her ‘surprised’ face? She gives you that look often. I just love it!

Thought I’d add a picture of the Fall Color. I don’t think it’s peaked yet, maybe next weekend. It was beautiful, and we just wanted to keep traveling, but home again it was for us. Color should be even better for our trip next weekend. I’ll let you know.

Moving Day for Sister-In-Law

Sunday we had to say goodbye to my sister-in-law who is moving back to Nevada. She’s been here in Michigan for the last 3 or 4 years, but she misses her kids. They came back to help her pack up and move her back across country. Because her things are going into storage for a while she had to part with a lot of her personal things. It was very sad and I hope I never have to do it. I know the stuff is just material, but to have to make a choice about each thing and decide if it really has a space…that’s hard. And when you think that you paid good money for something adds more pressure to just getting rid of it. Very emotional day and very emotional weekend for my MM, he picked up her kids from the airport on Friday and had been busy with them all weekend. I’m sure we’ll still see her since she will be living in a destination location, but it was very sad to see her go.

Have you ever had to downsize everything and move? I hope I never have to do it since I’ve lived in one place for almost 30 years. It has kind of opened my eyes to what I need to do on a regular basis so I never have to do it all at once. I do go through and clean out closets every few years, but I still have a lot of ‘stuff’.

Renaissance Festival

Over the weekend I joined my daughter, son-in-law and Peanut at the Renaissance Festival on Saturday. I’ve been a few times before, but it was more fun with them when they were all costumed up. I loved the photo of them with the ‘Living Statue’.



We only sat through one show – The Zucchini Brothers and just walked around and watched all the other people. Very interesting. As with any festival the food was limitless. Watching Peanut dancing to the music was the highlight of my day. I remembered too late that my camera has a video feature. Anyway, I did get cute pictures of her smelling the flowers and just being cute.

That era is still not my favorite, but I’m glad I joined them.

More Peanut pictures

Had to take lots of pictures this weekend to last me the summer. Is she cute or what?


Or do you like this face better? Her teeth even show up in this one lol



I'm going to miss her so much. Of course I'll miss my Mom and kids too, but Peanut will have the most changes in the time we're gone. They promised to send lots of pics and videos so I'll be content with that and never go away again lol. Good thing my Maintenance Man doesn't read this - that last statement would not make him happy.

Weekend

We had another great weekend. Saturday I spent the day with my Mom for Mothers Day. I had talked with my sister earlier and heard that there were a few people going to my Mom's on Sunday so I chose to have her to myself on Saturday. We went to Michael's and she picked out a couple of paint by number which she likes to do, then we went to the battery store to get a new battery for her watch, next was Bordines for a new plant for her deck, swung by the house so she could see the new porch then out to lunch. We rounded out the afternoon by playing a game of Scrabble - which she won. MM was home working on stuff for the RV. He's basically making a skirt that will protect our tow car. He's just about done with it. Then we went to Lowes and got some mulch. We went to Applebee's Saturday night too. I love their nachos.

Sunday I got up early to beat the rain and get the mulch down. I got the six bags that we bought spread and was just grabbing the bags for the trash when I felt the first sprinkle. God is good! We relaxed (or should I say I relaxed he was out in the barn). MM went back to Lowes with our Son to get more mulch and some other stuff that he needed. Our Son and Daughter-In-Law treated us to dinner for Mother's Day at Bravos. That was so good! And of course we stopped for dessert on the way home. It was a great weekend.

Before work on Monday I got up and spread the final six bags of mulch around the yard. I think I'll miss that this summer. I love working in the yard in the early morning hours. Hope they don't get mad at me at the campgrounds for weeding the flowerbeds around camp. I know other summers I've found myself doing that lol. Guess I just find it relaxing.

This is our final full week at work and we're counting down now. So many little details to take care of but I'm really not stressing. Guess if we forget something we'll just deal with it. Just one more week before we leave!!

WHAT A WEEKEND!!

Don't know how I am still standing, much less walking, but God is good. The rain held off all weekend. I got home from work on Friday and joined the Maintenance Man on the rooftop. He'd already been up there for an hour. We wanted to get a head start and make it look a little less daunting for our crew that was coming Saturday. I'm not a height kind of person so I pretty much crawled around loosening shingles and stacking them to be hauled. The jeans I had on that night were in the garbage as soon as I came down because the seat was gone. So much for crawling around on a gravel like roof. We worked til we couldn't see any more - him 4 1/2 hours and me 3 1/2 hours and we got about a third of the back roof off. Saturday MM was back up there by 7:30 as I ran off to the store to get food and water for the troops. Everyone got there early as planned and got working. There was another crew there working on tying in the new porch roof with the existing house roof. And then they were following our crew in reroofing what we had torn off. The tearoff was done by about 2 and the guys were whipped. When it is not your everyday job it does take it's toll. My daughter and peanut were here for the day too so that made it more special. She (my daughter not peanut)helped a lot putting shingles into the dumpster, baking cookies and keeping the guys supplied with water and food.

Sunday morning the roofing crew came back out to finish roofing the back of the house. MM and I continued working on the ground hauling shingles that had been tossed off the roof at the opposite end of the house from the dumpster. After that had been all cleaned up we were walking around searching for nails. What a task. Fortunately, a neighbor spotted us and brought over a powerful magnet for picking up nails. What a great tool. I went around the house once so far and I think it'll be a good thing to go around again just to make sure. We do not want any flat tires on the lawn mower.

So, all in all we had the perfect weekend. lol Perfect weather, no injuries (a few sore muscles) and a new roof on the house. It looks great! We're already enjoying the new porch even though it is not finished. The porch makes a hugh difference in the appearance of the house, all the neighbors are stopping by to say how great it looks. I just know we will have year of enjoyment and relaxation sitting out there.

Weekend Plans

The weekend plans are up in the air. We've been planning on this being the weekend to get the porch on, the old roof off and new roof on. Everything is in place. The landscape has been removed for the porch to be added, the post holes for the footings are dug, the lumber has been delivered, the new shingles are sitting on the roof ridge and the dumpster should be delivered today. It took the building department a full 9 days to approve the plans - that was not part of our plans. Our plan was to have the plans approved the first week we dropped them off, then have the postholes inspected and start rolling on the rest of the project. The deck would have been in and the roof addition would be connected to the footing posts. The best laid plans as they say. And, of course, the last two weekends were gorgeous and they are calling for severe weather this weekend. The weathermen are often incorrect, but how do you ask all your workers to just hang loose and see how things go. These people have lives too. Oh well, guess if we aren't able to do it this weekend then we'll shoot for next weekend. I'm just so frustrated that the planner at the county took his old sweet time. There is like no building going on right now so in my opinion this should have taken no more than 2 days not 9! Are these people put in our paths to help us build character, improve our patience? Whatever. We'll do what we can and hope for the best. The porch will be done before we leave for Alaska.

Babysitting and House Hunting

We had a another great weekend. Saturday was an early start with more yardwork preparing for a new front porch (it will happen, waiting for the building permit). The ground was thawed enough to get the rest of the shrubs out and there were still some bricks to be picked up that were frozen in the previous week. And you wouldn't believe the amount of twigs that we picked up from the front yard. Anyway, that done I worked on the quilt I'm working on a little more before it was time to go babysit for the little peanut. She was adorable as usual. It was so funny, you never know what response you're going to get from an eight month old, she saw me, smiled and started crawling pell mell right over to me lol. Maintenance Man and I took her for a long walk to get a little nap in (she napped for about 35 minutes - not long enough). Then there was lots of play time and fun. Not a lick of trouble.

Sunday was househunting day. Our second child is looking for a new home now that his has sold (YES, a house in Michigan has SOLD!!). We had 4 on the schedule to look at. The first one we walked in and immediately turned around and walked out. Very depressing, the people are loosing the house and have all but given up, dents in the walls, dirty, the whole nine yards. The next one was okay, but I think they already had their hearts set on the final one. The third one was interesting and the buyers didn't even care about the offer - the relocation company was going to give them the appraised value no matter what it sold for. Nice house, but again the 4th and final one was the one we were waiting for. If the forth one doesn't work out they might take another look at house #3.

The forth one we were told was on the market for two years, but the sellers aren't in any hurry. Yea, right. The kids had been through this one before and said that the sellers had removed a lot of furniture and you could tell they were all but moving out. It is definitely the best of the four. The neighborhood is very nice, the landscaping is done, the school district is desirable and the house is move in ready. So back to the office to write up an offer. That was interesting since we haven't done this in over 25 years. Now we just wait for the counter offer by Wednesday night. Motivated seller? We'll see.

Hoping to get a little more quilting done this week. Want to get it finished before we start travelling for the summer.