Friday night fun

I am not sure what normal people do on Friday nights, but it can't be more fun than what we do. Our evening began with John blowing up our last pumpkin. See video in previous post. Once he was done playing with explosives we made dinner. We had left over mashed potatoes, so we decided to make them into patties and fry them. Sounds easy enough. When I was growing up, or as they say in Mississippi, when I was coming up, my grandpa used to make potato pancakes with leftovers. I think he (or more likely my grandma) cooked them like pancakes, without oil. John said his mom used to fry potato patties in oil. We tried it with oil, but I think it was too much oil. It sort of turned into a skillet full of mush. John drained most of the oil off and let is cook some without the oil. In the end they were edible, but definitely not a culinary masterpiece.

Once dinner was over, John began sanding the dining room floor. It didn't take long for him to determine we needed a more aggressive sand paper. Off to Home Depot we went. Now that we are home again, John is sanding the floor. I just took some triple strength Sudafed and once I get some coffee in me I should be up for the long haul. The current plan is to get the floors stained tonight. The stain has to set for at least 8 hours before you seal it, so we want to knock that out tonight. We would like to seal it pretty early in the day tomorrow.

The floor is one of many projects we want to complete this weekend. We still need to paint the trim and walls in the kitchen/dining area and the front living room. Completing the fence around the pool is also on the schedule. No rest for the weary. I am going to need a nap come Monday.

The Pumpkin Is No More

Everyone needs deadlines

So we were sitting around and said to ourselves, "hey, we haven't done any projects in a while." We have been wanting to remove the last of the paneling (dining room) from the house and refinish those walls, prime and paint all of the wood trim and built in cabinets in the dining room, living room, and entry way, paint the kitchen, and paint the exterior doors from the dining room and living room. So then we said, "you know, we have 30+ people that will be here in two weeks for a shower we are hosting, what better time than now to start all of these at once? Oh, and while we're at it why don't we completely refinish the hardwood parquet floors in the dining room? How hard can it be?" And then, "and we still have about 200 feet of fence to do in the back yard, that sure would look nice if it was done before everyone is here."

So this is our life. We have less than 1 1/2 weeks to finish. We have barely gotten started. No guarantees this time. Pictures will be added as time allows.

The pumpkin that won't die

You can't leave him alone

What happens when my dear husband has a night at home without me? Apparently, panelling is removed from walls. This is a momentous day. Our house is now panelling free. Obviously, it isn't free of ugly wall paper, but we will get there. We need to get busy if we are going to have the dining area back together in the next two weeks. Sounds easy enough. All we have to do is get the walls textured and painted and paint all the trim. In addition, we plan to sand and refinish the floors. Wish us luck. We were starting to miss the excitement of having our house in chaos.

The party never ends

John and I were sitting in the front room checking out the facebook. He looks up and says "Are those wet spots?" What? Apparently our roof has a leak. It is supposed to rain until Thursday, so who knows what we will find once it dries out enough to get up there and check it out. I would be fine with just ripping out the tray ceiling. Yes I realize that won't fix the roof leak, but I wanted to make sure I got that idea out there. At one time it had a vaulted ceiling. According to the man we bought the house from the tray ceiling was put in because he was losing too much heat and air with the vaulted ceiling. According to one of the neighbors they had problems with moisture (condensation) on the vaulted ceiling and just covered it up. Who knows what we will discover. It should be fun, or maybe the opposite of fun. An adventure to say the least. To make this more interesting, we are hosting a baby shower/bar-b-que (remember where we live) in a couple of weeks. I need the house to be somewhat in order since the guest list includes about 30 adults, plus the children that come along with 15 couples. Nothing like a little pressure. This weekend is already pretty full with the Akela Campout. Hopefully everyone stays well and we get to enjoy the fun. Joshua is running a fever today, but the doctor diagnosed it as a viral infection that needs to run its course. Hopefully, he doesn't share the bug.

Sunday Night

Here is is, another weekend over. It has been over a week since our last post. We have been caught up in the weekly activities that we haven't had a chance to blog, and nothing particularly picture worthy to post and as I've said before, not everyone reads it for the articles. I am referring to this blog of course.

Here we are dressed and ready for the annual sales banquet for my work that we went to last night. My thanks to Joshua for his photography skills. It isn't often that we get to go out without the kids, and we very rarely get to go out dressed up so it was a treat. Thanks again to Thomas and Sharon for watching the boys last night. We are ready to repay the favor at any time.

After church we went out to lunch with our friends and upon leaving Jacob informed me that his friend Kameron wanted to come over for the afternoon (I think it was mutual). Kameron came over and the three of them played the Rock Band and jacob and Kameron played outside doing very well to avoid the mud. Jacob got to push her as you see, but then had to come get me to push him high. He likes to show off his dare devil skills to impress the ladies (or anyone that will slow down to watch).

While they were playing I started raking out our flowerbeds. Kameron asked if she could do it so I didn't deny her. You see Jacob was too busy playing with his light saber to help. Tu and Brooke, you are doing a wonderful job, she is very polite and a joy to be around.

We all went to get ice cream cones on the way to church tonight, but Joshua was not feeling well and he and Kristina came home while Jacob and I stayed at church. it looks like Joshua will be missing school tomorrow. Hopefully it is just a little bug that will pass quickly.

Time to get ready for bed. I hope that everyone has a great week.

It's Friday, wanna climb a tree?

This has been a busy week, so I am ready to slow down for a day or two. I'm starting my slow down by catching up on laundry. Tomorrow I will continue relaxing while enjoying Toy Story in 3D. Sunday after church the air show is where you'll find us. Sometime during the weekend, I need to work in some rest and grocery shopping. The kids are working in some play time right now. They have not gotten much home time this week. I have worked later than usual, so we haven't been getting home until close to six. By the time homework and dinner are over, it is time to get showers and go to bed. I don't like it when things are so rushed. I'm ready for a break. On the way home Jacob asked if he could climb a tree when we got home. Joshua asked if I wanted to climb too, but I refrained. I am not sure this poor little tree will survive my boys.