Family Fun

Our weekend in Canada was pretty much a non-stop family reunion. We arrived Friday evening just in time for dinner. After eating, we had our Jack-and-Jill shower (see previous post). By time everyone left, it was bed time!

Saturday morning, I got up early to make breakfast...cinnamon rolls! After eating we had a little bit of time to get ready before the whole family came over for morning coffee and cake. We were celebrating my Grandparent's 55th Anniversary. They like to celebrate all day long! Around 11 everyone was there and we started serving cake. We visited again until about 1:30 and then we headed to Aunt Anita's house to relax by the pool.

It was an absolutely perfect day to spend in the sun and in the pool. It was so much fun to have everyone together!

After spending the afternoon at the pool, we headed back to Grandma's house for a family picture and dinner. Grandpa was feeling well enough to join us for the picture and dinner, so that was a huge blessing! I don't have a picture of the whole family on my camera, but when I get it, I'll be sure to share! We had Chinese food catered from a popular local restaurant, and we enjoyed dining outside.

I hadn't seen my cousin Jason in nearly 5 years (since my Grandparent's 50th), and he was able to make it with his family. It was so good to see him and meet his two beautiful children! Above is his 2-1/2 year old, Chase. He is such a sweet boy. I just can't get over how much he looks like his daddy did when he was younger! And below is his gorgeous baby girl, Alaura. She turned 1 on Sunday so we had a birthday cake for her Saturday afternoon. Alaura took to Mike and I very well and she was so fun to play with and cuddle.

She was absolutely enamored with Mike. Every time she would look at him, her eyes would light up and she would get an enormous smile. We just had to get a picture of her looking at him.

Mike couldn't help but fall in love with her as well...who wouldn't love such a sweet baby?

We had a wonderful weekend with everyone, it went by way too quickly, but a lot of fun was had and lots of memories were made!

For Love...or Money?

In the past 2 days, this topic has come up twice and I just couldn't believe it.

I was watching a tv show yesterday in which the a woman found out that her dad had paid her ex-boyfriend $10,000 to dump her and never see her again. He did it and she never knew why he had dumped her.

Then today, I was driving home and on the radio the DJ was talking about a letter he received from a woman stating that her future mother-in-law offered her $25,000 to leave her fiance and never contact him again.

Now, as someone who is literally counting down the days to her wedding (85 days to go!), I just can't imagine those situations. For someone to even consider taking money and leaving someone they love just blows my mind! I asked Mike yesterday (jokingly because I knew the answer) what he would do if someone offered him $10,000 to leave me. His words were, "I wouldn't take it. I wouldn't do it for all the money in the world." (Yep, that's my man!) And I feel the exact way about him.

I guess the way I see it is that if you would even consider taking money in exchange for someone you love, then you must not really love them in the first place. And if you don't love them, you certainly should not be preparing to marry them.

I'm in love with my future-husband, and I wouldn't trade him for anything in the whole world!

(Thanks for bearing with me on my media-driven tirade!)

Wedding Shower

Mike and I had our very first wedding shower this weekend. We drove up to Canada for the weekend for a huge family get-together. Friday night we were all together so my Aunt Anita threw us a shower. She did a wonderful job and we had a blast!
We all gathered in the living room for the festivities. Aunt Anita had a game for us, men versus women. The women had to answer questions that men would typically know and vice versa. There were questions about what tool you would use for a product, what spice was in a bag, what ingredient would not be used in a recipe, or what car emblem the picture was of. The men won!!!

There was a whole table full of munchies that we snacked on while we played games. But then, it was time for gifts! We recieved this beautiful frame from my mom.

My Aung got us a bunch of huge towels.

Aunt Anita brought us a beautiful cake...it was absoultely delicious! We had enough that we were able to bring some home and share it with Mike's family as well.

We got a lot of items from our registry. The evening was a great time with our family, and it was especially special because Mike and I were both able to be there!

For Katie

Hi Katie (and the rest of the tribe),

Melissa went to Canada for the weekend, so she took me to Grandma and Grandpa Y's house. I really liked riding in the car. She put the window down a little bit for me and I tried to stick my head out but it was too big! The breeze sure felt good, it was so hot in the car, and I loved having my tongue out!

Grandma and Grandpa said I was a very good girl and they loved me so much. I got to play inside with them. I also got to play outside with the cats. One of them swatted me across the face, I thought she wanted to play so I chased her a bit, but it turns out she was just mean so I stayed away from her then. There were lots of neat things to explore at their house. Melissa finally came back for me today, and I was very excited to go back home. We played outside for a bit and I got to run. I worried Melissa a bit though because I went to explore at our neighbor's house. I was a good girl though and I came back when she called me. I ran and ran and ran. We finally got inside and I crashed on the floor while Melissa worked out.

Melissa turned on the TV and I curled up on my chair. After a busy weekend, I was sure ready for a nap! Well, I'm going to go back to sleep now. I miss you tons!

Love and slobbery kisses,

Ella

Painting

One done and seven to go!!! Rooms, that is...I finished painting the master bedroom on Saturday afternoon. I am thrilled with how it turned out! (The pictures make the blue a bit brighter than it is in person.) I was able to finish this room and begin priming the living room. My goal for Saturday is to finish priming the living room and the guest bedroom. My dad and Mike's mom have offered to help, so we should be able to get a lot accomplished!

It's been so fun to see our house take shape and really become ours!!!

"And where is Mike when you're doing all this painting?" you might wonder. Well my friends, he is just goofing off a bit and having fun while I'm slaving away!

JUST KIDDING!!!! He is working incredibly hard as well. He worked on ripping up the flooring in the half-bath. The chunk he got out the other day is where the toilet was sitting, since he has his head in the hole, you might be able to call him a poop-head! (Haha...I love you Mike!)

Fun With Ella

Ella has been fun to have around the house! She doesn't like to help with the housework though!!!



I think Mike likes to play with her too!

Getting rid of the stink

We have been spending much of our spare time working on our house. It is coming along quite well. The biggest project we have tackled so far was ripping out all the flooring. Mike and his dad got the carpet out in one night. The dining room and kitchen were another story. There were 2 layers of laminate on those floors and they were glued and stapled down very well!

If you look in the corner behind my dad, you can see the white laminate that was in the dining room and kitchen. After that was pulled up, we had the not-so-pleasant surprise of all the thin brown laminate under it. The brown stuff was so hard to get off, as you can see; it took shovels, crowbars, and lots of muscle to get up!

This was about the halfway point for the dining room. I think right now it is about 95% up and the sub-floor is visible. There were a few places that we were unable to get the white gunk up from, so we have to see if we can leave it or if we need to sand it down or something before having the new wood floors installed.

Here is the living room after the carpet was torn out. Our house still kind of stunk after the carpet was all removed so we figured better safe than sorry, and decided to cover the floors with BIN. It's a neat product that you just paint onto the floor and it will get rid of/cover up/kill the stinky pet smell. We put it into the rooms that smelled the worst and had the least amount of floor covering (the office, bathrooms, kitchen, and dining room all had at least 2 layers of flooring so we don't think urine got into the sub-floor).

It was pretty simple to do, just roll the paint onto the floor. I felt kind of silly painting floors instead of walls! Thanks to some help from Mike's mom, it only took a couple hours to do the 3 rooms and hallway.

This is the living room after the floors were painted. We are glad that we took the time to do this step because we can already tell that our house no longer smells like animal urine!

I spent some time yesterday patching a few missed holes in the master bedroom and sanding down the ones I did last week. Today and tomorrow I hope to get in there and put the tape where it needs to be because Saturday I start painting!!!

Ella

I am housesitting for some friends this summer while they are doing mission work in Haiti. They have a puppy named Ella who I get to play with all summer too. I told the kids that I would occasionally post pictures on my blog of Ella and the different things we do and places I take her. Kind of like a Flat Stanley, except Ella is real. Here she is, making her debut on my blog...
I just love her crooked smile...isn't she cute? :)

Best Candle Ever!

This was one of the presents in my enormous stocking Mike gave me this past Christmas. I haven't used it yet, but decided to use it today. It's really unique, it's like a gel candle. When you touch it, it is like touching gelly, my finger actually was kind of sticky/wet. It smells so good, just like a Watermelon Jolly Rancher. This is probably one of the best smelling candles I've ever had, and I've had a lot!!!

On a more interesting and exciting note, Mike and I are getting married in exactly 4 months!!!
I'll post an update on our wedding plans soon!

Finally!

For probably 2 years now I have been looking for a sugar cookie recipe that tastes like some cookies I made for some friends. The only problem was, the ones I made were really those break and bake cookies, and I wanted something I could make from scratch. I thought I had found the perfect recipe when I had some cookies from the nursing home, but when I made them, the texture just wasn't right. I have tried recipe upon recipe and I just haven't found one that is what I am looking for. Today I was reading blogs and I came across a recipe that looked like it was "the recipe". I couldn't wait, so I made the cookies this afternoon...and, the verdict is in...these are he closest I have come to "the recipe"!!!! I am so happy! Here is the recipe.